New discovery in Fair Food!

I'm not sure how this picture was missed in the initial post, but here was the best food find of the fair.

Matt loves mangos. It is hard to get across in print how much Matt loves mangos. I've seen him so excited to eat a mango that he has consumed not only the flesh, but also the skin. He just bites right in. Me? I'll eat mangos when they are served to me--and they are peeled--but can do without them.

So Matt managed to find the perfect fair food for him. I was impressed with the presentation. Introducing: Mango on a Stick.
"Do they deep fry it?" was my first question. My attempts at humor notwithstanding, they do not. A mango is peeled, shoved on a stick and then sliced to make a flower shape. Matt enjoyed it very much. If all fair food was this healthy, the United States would be a different country.

Posts you may have missed....

...because they are published long, long after their date and out of order.

04/19/08 One less blind.
04/19/08 Jocelyn and Marla's wedding.
05/03/08 It's easy to get rid of ants.
05/10/08 Garden update--a cold May.
05/15/08. First Harvest.
05/25/08 Atlas. A very large dog.
06/07/08 More graduation things.
06/08/08 Even more lettuce!
06/14/08 Bat box ascendant.
06/14/08 Electrical Box Begone!
06/15/08 The clothesline is up! The clothesline is up!

What we've been loving.

The Office, Season II. Cracking us up.

But really, I'm writing to tell you about Pandora Radio. Our friend Amanda told Matt about it and really, if you like music--any kind of music--you must check it out.

First, create a user name and sign in. Then, start by entering the name of an artist or song that you like. I started with Bruce Springsteen. Pandora will create a radio station that plays songs by Bruce Springsteen and songs that are like Bruce Springsteen's songs. You can create many, many separate stations.

As you listen to the stations you can say if you like or don't like each song. You can also click on "Guide Us" and say that you really love songs, or really hate songs. You can bookmark songs or artists that you like and you can find out why they are playing the song they are playing.

But the QuickMix is the genius part of Pandora. You can set your QuickMix to play all, or some combination, of your stations. When you do this, the QuickMix rotates through your stations, playing a little something inspired by Bruce Springsteen, then a little something inspired by Ella Fitzgerald, then a little something inspired by Cake. It pretty much rocks.

I'm a big supporter of local radio. If you have a good local station, by all means, keep listening to it. But for times that station isn't playing anything good, or you wouldn't have been listening anyway? Pandora is the coolest thing I've seen this year.

Laundry on the Line

It occurred to me that I never took a picture of my laundry successfully hanging on the clothesline. Here, our pillowcases blow in the wind. Line dried bedding is one of the best smells in the world. I also love that I can wash an entire week of laundry on Sunday morning, put it all on the clothes line (our clothesline holds tons) and by Sunday afternoon it is dry. This will all change in the fall when, 1) church activities retake my Sundays and 2) It starts to rain. But don't worry, I have a plan.

Washington County Fair

Matt and I attended the Washington County Fair for a fun, car-free date. That's right. You can take public transportation to the Fair. We started on the Yellow Line, switched to the Blue line and got off at the Fair Complex/Hillsboro Airport stop. Sadly, it was one of those missed connection days and it took us nearly two hours to get there. Still, we could take public transportation to county fair. That's pretty cool.
After riding on the train, we got on the shuttle to the fair. It turned out to not be very far and we totally could have walked, but we got to ride on a school bus. The aisles seem narrower at age 33 then they did at age 14. I wonder why that is?
We first looks at the exhibitions. There were many lovely handmade goods. Matt poses next to a Hogwarts art tote and a very large cross stitch portrait.
All sorts of vegetables. I liked the display at this fair. They were set out in those great dirt boxes which could be wet down, so the vegetables weren't all shriveled like they usually are.
The livestock auction was going on. I am familiar with this from working at the Washington County Extension Office, but I had never seen it before. Youth raise various kinds of animals and they are auctioned off at the fair. The goal is to make a profit, but also so the youth can learn about raising livestock. These cows are waiting to be auctioned off. In the background you can see the crowd around the actual auction. There wasn't a seat to be had. We stood at the edge of the crowd and watched the action for a bit. It was pretty exciting with the fast-talking auctioneer and the spotters and the animals and their young handlers.
Then we took a gander at the animals. Here's a fluffy chicken.
This sheep had an interesting horn. It was a double horn, with one sticking straight back and one curling forward like normal.
Fair food! I had to stand in line to get my chocolate shake from the Dairy Women, but it was worth it.
We watched a family magic show for awhile. The dad came out first, and then brought out his son. I'm not sure how old he was, but he may have still been in braces. His sister came out too, and they did a clever 3-card Monte trick.
More fair food. While waiting for our curly fries I became entranced watching this woman make corn dogs. Two observations: Corn dog hot dogs straight out of the box do not look very appetizing, and they fry for much, much longer than I would have thought.
Our curly fries. There were a lot of different curly fries to choose from. I'm glad we got this kind as they were not very mushy, which I find to be a drawback in a curly fry. Or any fry, for that matter.
There was free miniature golf! While we were waiting to begin, I chatted with the attendant and found out that the course was built by our friends at Glowing Greens, who we visited last July. Here, Matt prepares his first shot.
I prepare to give Matt a run for his money. I had a few good holes where I only needed 2 shots. As usual, consistency was a problem and there were also a few bad holes where I was more than 3 over par. Matt wins again.
What would the fair be if it didn't have the fast-talking salesmen ready to sell you something to make your life a bit better. Usually, the salesmen are middle-aged or older, but this man was quite young. He may have been wearing braces. Or I may be making that up. We could have bought for only $20.00 four super shammies (made in Germany) and gotten four more smaller super shammies. We did not buy, but I got a wink from the salesman.
We looked over the rides and decided to over look them, so we headed back to the Max and back to our home. Thankfully the public transportation gods were with us on the way back and it didn't take us as long as it did to get there. A good time was had by us.

Celebration part II

The funniest thing about Matt's celebration was the couple sitting next to us. They were mid-forties, looked pretty upper middle class and they were sitting at their table each reading their own book. They read until their food came, put down their books, ate--though didn't really talk--then picked the books back up when they were waiting for their check. I really wanted to sneak a picture of them, but couldn't figure out a way to do so. We were sitting very close to them.

I finally got a look at what they were reading. She: The Coming Economic Collapse. He: A Walk in the Woods, Bill Bryson's hilarious trek on the Appalachian trail.

Celebration

Hey, I got a job! (The schedule's a little weird, but it's cool). So, we went out to celebrate.
Mm-mm. Patricia's food looks good.
Mm-mm! So does mine!