Fairs end. School starts. Games/competitions–football, soccer, volleyball., golf, cross-country–are on ( Just got an invitation to a Quiz Bowl event too). It’s crazy out there. Hang onto your hats…or any other item of apparel which you might find inhibiting…it’s all happening Now!
I finished the summer with a Grand Tour de Force, hitting three fairs–Lorain County Wellington Fair, Portage County Randolph Fair and the Great Geauga County Fair in Burton. The comestibles were on the tasty side, although I really did not see (or taste) anything really new and/or exciting. I searched in vain for the Tornado Potato to start off with but had to settle for Cheezies, made from brick cheese & monterey jack dipped & deep-fried by some estimable ladies’ group from Wellington. Then some excellent egg rolls–which could be ordered containing Hmong sausage (who knows what that might contain)–went down the gullet; my enjoyment of these was tempered by my not-real-wise selection of dining area, right underneath the bee exit from the demo hive in the Bee Barn. Had to be a little careful about opening my mouth to take a bite of anything, since the little buzzers were as interested in the “hot & delicious” as I was. Finished up there with a dozen doughnuts/donuts produced by the Wellington Dukes Band Boosters; it is their biggest fund-raiser, and pretty tasty too.
I had not been to the Portage County Randolph Fair in quite some time, so I was amazed at how much the operation had grown–buildings, parking lots, displays, the whole shebang. Hitched a ride on the tractor-wagon bus service to get to the main activity centers. Browsed through displays, exhibits, ponies, draft horses, commercial booths, farm implements, picking up freebies all along the way. I always do that–interesting stuff–used to keep it to use in my classroom; now I give it away to anyone who might use it…or not. Food here was confined to deep-fried cheese curds and I confess that on the way home, I went through the drive-thru at Arby’s in Rootstown to top things off.
The Great Geauga County Fair in Burton has a really cool fishing pond in the back where the Geauga County Park District can show off all of the outdoor attractions of the Raccoon County. My favorite dining feature there was the Sherbet Shakes–in case you ever run across them somewhere else. See, they have a selection of sherbet flavors, then a variety of punch flavors used to make the shakes, mix ‘n’ match–no milk involved–which are done like any other cold drinks of this sort in big blenders. Then they get served in cups with a plastic domed lid with a hole in it, a big, fat straw and an optional dollop of whipped cream. Talk about refreshing on a hot summer day at the fair! You bet.
There was one interesting display there, alerting us all to the total eclipse of the sun, which will be coming up next year–April 8. The path of the umbra (shadow) will pass right over us here in Northeast Ohio. People are already making hotel/motel reservations, signing up for campsites, calling local relatives to plan family reunions of a sort just to get to see the event. Get your eclipse glasses ready–don’t look at the sun ! Get ready for the crowds. All of this for a totality of approximately 4 minutes and 28.1 seconds. We will be right in the thick of the whole thing for plenty of time before and after. Rent out your back yard for viewing, why don’t you? And, actually, I was amazed to see how well all of these classic country events had recovered from the storms/tornadoes/rain/ wind which came through each of these quintessentially rural settings. Sure, there were muddy places & poodles, er, puddles, indications of power outages, a few missing features (possibly blown away), but everybody was “up and running”…and having a fine time.
The Old Farmer’s Almanac, 2023 edition (no. 231) is pretty quiet through September, and we did not get a real good look at the Super Blue Moon in August, due to the overcast skies that night. The next one of those will not appear until 2026, or something like that. I did get to see a little of the display in the morning and it was still pretty spectacular. Hummingbirds have already started south. Woodchucks start to hibernate. Guess which season is next.
