A fair way to spend a day

The Minnesota State Fair is one of the most unique events in the entire country. Just about every state has a fair of some way, shape or form. But people come from all over to this extravaganza. What makes this fun is not just the carnies ... who are basically no different than anywhere else in the country.

It's the odd combo of foods (even beer on a stick) and people-watching, a sport that is still very strong in our little part of the world.

Yesterday, I did an eight-hour shift in a small tent selling beer, pop, burgers, etc. It was for a group that uses the proceeds to benefit playgrounds in St. Paul. And, like a lot of volunteer experiences, I got more out of it than the people I served.

When you stand on the same corner for nearly eight hours and watch the world go by, you tend to see things in a different light. You see the same people pass by two or three times with their kids. When they go by the first time, the adults seem full of energy. By the third pass, most of them are dragging a bit while the kids continue to skip at a merry pace.

Business was steady at our little tent. We had folks who said they had been coming to this spot for 30 years, young couples on first or second dates and people who were just hungry and knew a good deal when they saw one (2 bucks a hamburger, a quarter more for cheese.)

One of my favorites was a big guy who wanted a Triple Hamburger. "A triple?", I asked. (We had Doubles on the boatrd but no Triples listed.)

"They did it for me here yesterday," he said by way of explanation. "They just charged me 50 more cents."

"Who am I to argue with history?", I replied. "A triple it is."

The woman cooking gave me a funny look as I wrote this order down but merely smiled.
So did the gentleman as he ate it deliberately with great enjoyment.

There were a surprising amount of moms who stopped for ... er ... refreshment while pushing baby carts. My favorite was a young woman about age 30 who had a baby in a stroller and another young 'un clinging to her leg.

"What's your largest size beer?" she asked. When informed it was 20 ounces, she asked "Is that it?" But she gladly bought two of them and said she would be back later when she found "him."

Apparently, she did find "him" because she returned alone an hour later for a refill. This beer was drank slowly and seem to be cherished with the fervor of a jeweler looking at the Hope Diamond. "Is it okay if I just sit here for a while?" she asked. "Take all the time you need," I responded. I think she was stationary for 15 minutes.

There was another couple who looked to be in their early 60s who wandered by.

"What can I do for you?", I asked.

Before the male half of this happy pair could utter a sound, the female half jumped in. "We'll have a large Pepsi," she said. This option seemed to disappoint the male half of the party considerably. But he merely sighed and, upon a non-verbal command, handed over the dollar and a half as they went on their merry way.

And so it went nearly all day. Only one person got upset at how a beer was poured and insisted on a do-over. Women who were 30 years old and were asked for their ID anyway did so with a grateful smile. Young guys who recently entered the legal age (one of them was only a month past his 21st birthday) didn't object to being carded. A couple of folks had Passports instead of Driver Licenses for ID. I was a bit quizzical the first time I saw this. "I left it at his house," the young woman said, nodding to her escort. He grinned knowingly.

After watching weeks of allegedly angry people on TV yelling about health care, the damn Democrats, the damn Republicans, the damn Yankees, etc., it was refreshing to see happy (or at least not unhappy) faces again.

I love going to the fair, strolling the Midway, seeing some new exhibits and eating anything from Tom Thumb Donuts to Sweet Martha's Cookies along the way. After spending a day somewhat on the inside, I have a new and healthy respect for the folks who work it for 10 days. I am not sure I am made of strong enough stuff to do that. But an eight-hour shift there does wonders for the soul. It was nice to see people smiling again.

Nirvana is a wonderful place

It was a weekend to get away from the rat race. And what better place to do so than in one of Minnesota's little havens of heaven? My brother Frank and his wife Peggy live in Lanesboro, a tiny town of 800 people a couple hours south of the Twin Cities. My brother Paul and his wife Pam happened to be at a seminar of sorts in nearby Rochester so it was the perfect time for a mini-family reunion.

But Lanesboro is more than that. Whether it is hanging out at the market in town, going to yard sales (where I bought a book on hunting and the outdoors authored by former president Grover Cleveland, attending a terrific play at the Commonweal Theater or just sitting on the porch, there is a serenity here that is much needed.

I am not sure I could live in a town like Lanesboro full time. But I know my soul feels better every time I visit and I am always reluctant to leave.

I understand a bit better what Kevin Costner talked about in "Fields of Dreams" about heaven in Iowa. We all need this every now and then.

One for the ages

As I write this, Tom Watson, at age 59, is leading the British Open Golf tournament. Tiger Woods, a mere 26 years younger, didn't make the cut.

I heard some ESPN guys yesterday bemoaning this fact because it didn't fit the pattern most people thought would happen.

One of the biggest problems we have in athletics today is many people go into events with a pre-set idea of what will happen. When the predicted result goes askew, they are aghast and ask why. In some ways, ESPN has been the worst thing to ever happen to athletics because it does a lot of predicting and not nearly as much anticipating.

The idea of playing a game (or a sport) is everybody starts at zero and then you see what happens. My mother-in-law, at age 80, was still a very formidable Scrabble player. That may not be the same thing as golf but it is the same concept.

The sooner we go back to simply showing up and playing or watching to see what happens, the better off we will be.

In the meantime, go Tom Watson. Good golf, whether it is played by a talented 33-year old or a crafty 59-year old, is still fun to watch.

Where did we get so much stuff?

There is a young woman down the street who is going on a trip to Tanzania with her church in a month. She put out a flyer saying she was looking to make some money doing whatever tasks somebody needed done. We put her to work today with a massive job - cleaning out the garage.

We don't quite know how this happened but our garage is not a haven for cars. It is a haven for everything else from old records to birdseed to actual tools to empty boxes. There are war zones that are less cluttered.

We are deeply grateful to her for tacking this job. We do this every year -- clean and sweep the garage out and then placing things back nice and neatly. In about two weeks, it returns to looking like a war zone.

My question today is simple: how in the world did we get so much stuff? And are we the only people who go through this routine every year?

Bewitched, bothered, bewildered and befuddled about Bejeweled

There is a game on Facebook called Bejeweled Blitz. In a nutshell, it involves moving characters around so you can get at least three running consecutively in any direction. When you do that, they dissolved and a new list of items go onto the screen.

It is a frustrating and ... very addictive game. I had seen this evil invention on the internet before but had forgotten about it until it was called to my attention recently.

I became a quick convert. The Facebook game is a timed one - you have a minute to get these things in line. If you can morph four or five in line, you get more points. After several tries, I have managed to get up to 65,000 points. This sounds good but two friends of mine are well over 100,000. Either they have smaller, more nimble fingers are simply a helluva smarter than I am. (I choose to believe the first idea.)

What is really maddening about this game is I tend to see combos a second too late. I move a green gob into position for a three spot and then notice that if I had moved it the other way, I would have gotten a four or five spotter. Arrggh.

These games are supposed to bring you relaxation. In a way, I suppose they do. But what happens is you find yourself suddenly being very competitive because a young friend of yours has 116,000 points and you "only" have 65,000. I don't like playing golf for a buck a round and I find myself playing this game by the hour just to improve my score to get ahead of somebody ... for no money. That says something about me. The problem is I don't exactly know if it is a good something.

Happy Birthday, Happy Dog!

This may seem weird to some people. But we celebrated the Happy Dog's seventh birthday this week. He got an ice cream treat @ the greatest ice cream place in town, Conny's and also got a bath and a haircut.

I think he apprciated it ... even if he didn't exactly know the reason why.

Dogs are often our friends. They cheer us up when we are down and they support us almost all the time. So why not celebrate their big day?

All hail the surgeon ... I mean the repairman

Granted, it was not hot by the standards of, say, Las Vegas, where it is over 100 degrees on a daily basis this time of year.

But it was damned muggy the other night here. My wife and I spent a restless night with the windows open hoping to get any kind of breeze going. Eventually, morning came and I was on the phone as soon as possible asking the company that put in our air conditioner last year to get the hell over here and fix it. It had gone out the night before and we couldn't possibly be expected to live in two nights of 70 degree agony.

I was told a guy would come between 1 and 5 p.m. Usually that means they arrive at 4:59 but this time, Jerry showed up at 1:30. He was a big fellow and Pete, the Happy Dog who had turned sour because of no air conditioning, was suspicious of him for a long time. But Jerry won him over and was soon allowed to proceed to cooling down everybody.

It turned out now to be as easy as it sounded. We bought the air conditioning unit a year ago and had hardly used it. I figured it was a freon problem or some such thing. The guy would fill up what was needed and be gone in 20 minutes.

Didn't happen that way. Instead, I could hear him doing a lot of sighing and puzzled grunts as he worked downstairs. In time, he came up to report that a motor of some sort was no longer working in the furnace area. Naturally, this was an item that was probably not covered under warranty. But he would call and check and give me a price. Jerry spent some time in the truck, came back with a small box and headed back downstairs.

More sighs and puzzled grunts were heard. 20 minutes later, he came upstairs again.

"I have good news and bad news for you," he said. "The good news is the motor I told you about is covered under warranty so you won't have to pay $410 for it. The bad news is the end motor also isn't working and that is not covered under warranty. That will cost $465 and I am not sure I even have one in my truck. I haven't replaced one of those in a few months."

Back to the truck he went. 15 minutes later, he emerged with another box. By now, he had entered and left the house so many times that Pete didn't even get up to check him out. The thermostat in the dining room read 80 degrees and the dog wasn't going anywhere any more. It was too damn hot outside and it was too damn hot inside.

Jerry returned to the basement. 10 minutes later, I heard the most wondrous noise - a purring sound that resembled a large cat that had drank a bowl of milk. Pete's ears perked up. The noise went off for a few minutes and then returned.

Fairly soon, Jerry came upstairs to report the happy news the end motor was working just fine. The operation was a success and the doctor seems pleased with the result. I looked at the thermostat. It was down to 79 degrees already. Cooler heads were about to prevail again.

This whole performance only took about two hours overall. But it seemed like an eternity.

We are a country that likes our comfort. I am not a big air conditioner guy when you are a little hot, your spouse is hot and your dog is hot, not having the machine available for your use when needed is damn near an emergency.

Jerry didn't look like the kind of doctor you see on TV. But he performed a surgery that, in its own way, had as much value as many operations you hear about. The results are really noticeable today. It is 90 degrees outside and a nice 73 inside. And I hope Jerry makes somebody else (and their dog) equally happy today.