I always thought the band thing was a little hokey. Everyone was bused in from Epworth. We gathered back by the beer tent, got all situated in our perfect lines and then marched up the main street er... walkway to the grandstand. Once we were at the grandstand, we had to play a couple of songs -- maybe the national anthem -- then we marched back to the busses. Then we could wander around for a couple of hours before we were all bused back to Epworth again.
The memory was never a good one for me because it meant:
- Getting up at the crack of dawn in the middle of the hottest week of the summer.
- Putting on our HOT polyester uniforms -- because God Forbid that we wear just a white T-shirt or something that wasn't going to smother us.
- Marching up a dusty street and playing whatever music in front of barely no crowd.
- Being trapped at the fair for a couple of hours with nothing to do because we were there before any of the food stands were open or the rides were running.
Here's the breakdown of the night:
First of all, it was blazing hot all week. Like temperatures in the high 90's and heat index over 100. Then Thursday morning, it rained for like 5 minutes, so the temperature went down, but the humidity went up. Great. Thanks Mother Nature, lets make it a little more miserable.
Cathy and I got down to Monticello at 5:30. The concert started at 8, so I thought we'd have time to walk around, get something to eat etc. After driving aimless around Monticello and the blocks by the fairgrounds, I decided to pay $5 to park in someone's front yard -- close to the front gate, as opposed to the free lot, 2 miles down the road. I thought this was a good deal -- and later it proved to be a wise investment.
Admission to the fair cost me $10. The concert tickets were $40 each, so before the show even started I had invested $55. Yikes.
Since it was hot all day, I drank a lot of water and ice tea -- trying to stay hydrated you know. Well, staying hydrated has a negative effect on the body -- i.e. the need for multiple bathroom breaks. We weren't on the fair grounds 10 minutes and I already had to go. So we found a free standing restroom building to use. I wish I would have taken a picture of the place, but I was sweating hot and sticky. First off, the toilets were up on this cement ledge, so you had to step up into the stall. The stall itself barely fit around the toilet, so once you were in the stall, there was no movement and there was no way to latch the door. So in the space of a sardine can, you had to get your pants down, hoover over the toilet, hold the door shut and not pee on yourself -- all while still sweating and balancing yourself and your purse. Ugh, I failed miserably at that task. The only nice thing about that bathroom was the sink and the ice cold water coming out of the faucet.
After the bathroom break, Cathy and I walked around looking for something to eat. One thing we noticed right away: Fair food is expensive. Everything cost $5. Whether it was chicken on a stick, corn dogs, fried mushrooms, hot dogs, hamburgers, nachos, funnel cakes or even homemade lemonade... it was all $5. A piece. McDonalds would have been a better deal. Three beer tickets were $10. And other than Mike's Hard Lemonade, that was the only adult beverage available. I told Cathy that we should have brought in a bottle of vodka and just bought a lot of lemonade. It would have saved us some money in the long run.
Cathy finallly settled on a Gyro that actually cost a little more than $5. There was one stand selling fish tacos and I tried to order some -- but despite that Fish Taco's was painted on all four sides of their stand -- they didn't have fish available. In fact the girl told me they never have fish and tried to sell me a cheese something instead. I thought that was false advertising and walked away. WTH? Instead I ordered a corn dog -- yes! I actually ate a meat like product. I ate half of it and it tasted okay. I was more into the breading than the actual hot dog. It didn't sit too well in my stomach, though.
Attire: I was wearing white shorts, tennis shoes and my favorite Roling Rock t-shirt. Cathy was wearing some really cute jeans, flip flops and a cute tank top. But based on the little people watching we were doing, we weren't dressed correctly. Here was the female uniform of the night: We saw all different combinations of this. Some tasteful like these ladies, some not so much. (oh, and take note of the dirt track -- because that'll be important later)
There were a lot of real cowboys and guys pretending to be real cowboys. You know what I mean when I say "real" .. like George Strait real. The kind of guy that knows how to wear a pair of wrangler jeans, plaid snap button shirt, big belt buckle and real cowboy boots? (or a Justin baseball cap). Not a faker that wears any kind of jean with gym shoes and a body armour t-shirt. There were a lot of people there dressed like Cathy and I too.
Some random crowd shots.
In the background of this picture you can see a couple of cowboy wanna bees ... oh and Rod Kramer too. (He tried to act like he didn't know me, but funny how your wife said hi to me and knew who I was and that Neyen guy that you were with -- he said I looked like Carol)
Anyway, Thompson Square played first and they were good, but only sang about 5 songs. It's a husband/wife duo. Their #1 song is "You going to Kiss me or Not?" The female part of the duo was dressed like a goth -- so i don't know what that's about. You can't really see it in this picture, but her hair is jet black on the side and bleach blonde in the middle.
So that took up about 25 minutes. I took my second potty break when they were done and watched the Monticello PD arrest this drunk guy down by the porta potties. He looked to be all of about 15 and clearly was hammered. He appeared to be sleeping on his feet. Then he just fell out. Then the cops showed up and I guess he thought that was a good time to wrestle. Very entertaining for those of us in the potty line.
Chris Young was the second act and he was great. I had to take my 3rd potty break while he was singing and I didn't miss anything -- despite being in line for the john and the beer stand for nearly 20 minutes. The cool thing abou the Jones County Fair is they have these huge screens on the side of the stage, so you can see all the action up close and personal. Makes for good viewing when you aren't by the stage--or if you're sitting over in the free section.
When I got back from my potty break, Cathy and the people we were standing around were all in an uproar because some chick behind them squated on the ground and peed -- instead of going to the john. I guess it splashed on eveyone's legs and people were pissed. So that was talk of our "neighbors" for a while. We all decided that it was a straight trailer park trash move, because a true redneck woman would go behind a tree.
Then Jason started playing and oh ... he was fabulous.
So about 15 minutes into Jason's show, things started to get interesting in our neighborhood. First there was a fight between one of the guys standing by us and some kid -- who felt neighbor guys wife up. Another female behind us got sick, barfed and then about 3 minutes later took a header into it. YUCK! Then there was some more posturing for another fight -- but then it started to rain.... HARD... so that pretty much took care of that.
Remember that dirt track from the other pictures? Here's where wearing cowboy boots would have it's advantages. Our "seats" were for standing room only on the track. So as it started raining, the dirt slowly turned to mud. Mud was every where, all over my gym shoes, splashed on my legs, smeared on my clothes. There were some funny moments with the ladies in the neighborhood slipping out their shoes and nearly falling down. Cathy and I stayed for 15 minutes or so in the rain, until we were good and soaked and then headed for the gate. This is where our prime parking spot paid off. We were out of the concert area and in the car in less than five minutes. Soaked and muddy. Then, we drove right out of Monticello -- no traffic. Took us all of 25 minutes to get back to Farley.
I contemplated going to the Lady Antebellum concert on Friday night -- but as it was, the weather wasn't as nice as Thursday night and it was cancelled long before any of their road tour took the stage. Bummer.
So next week, I'm working at the Dubuque County Fair. Selling tickets or something -- which I hope is by the beer tent, because that would be fun. I'm not sure if I'm going to eat another corn dog again -- but I might have to indulge in some other fair type food and I told my friend that I would go on the rides with her son. Maybe relive the those high school memories that I never had.
When I saw the "roommate" on Friday, of course he had his usual questions for me about the goings-on. Then he told me that when he was a kid, his dad used to take them to the Jones County Fair when they were spending their summers at the cabin in Delhi. He said they would go visit the IH dealer in Monticello (ah, ha! A clue as to why all of our summer vacations included a trip through a tractor dealer lot) and then spend a whole afternoon at the fair. I bet he didn't have to pay to park the Buick, or an entrance fee and the food was probably a lot cheaper back in the day.
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