Wednesday GUEST blog

8-31-11 celebrating brain
Happy Birthday Molly! More from Ann today ~judy

Love Me Some Iowa State Fair – Part Two

So what’s the draw to the fair? Food, livestock, competitions, vendors, talent show, gadgets and drum roll please ….. entertainment!

The highlight for me, Maroon 5 with frontman Adam Levine and Train with frontman Pat Monahan. Yes, I’m a bit obsessed with Adam, but dang, he had me with “Moves Like Jagger”. He’s a bit quirky but a fantastic singer and dancer. He termed his Friday night shows as “Friday Night Whitey’s”, the band dressed in white. As a groupie, I got decked in white with purple lashes, sportin’ black and white western boots. (I got the boots from Larry the shoe guy that I wrote about in April). Extra special for the evening, I’ve been Tweeting to Maroon 5 daily to win VIP tickets and wow, won tickets the day of the show. I passed them on to Paige, daughter of my concert buddy Sue. Did I say great show, best ever!

          

Train was equally as good and I became a Train “angel” overnight. Their current song “Marry Me” is fantastic with a pre-arranged live proposal, which was awesome! Their tour is insane, and he was under the weather last week. Here’s a shout out to Train and hope Pat is feeling better.

           

Then there’s Ms. Jackson. What a great show and awesome seats. Judy can attest that I was on my feet the whole show. She was fantastic!

           

Done gushing, the free shows were dyno-mite as well. With three stages, I was able to see Tonic Sol Fa (acappella group), Hairball (hair band), The Oak Ridge Boys (Opry inductees), The Band Perry (excellent), Ying Yang Twins (rap) and to close out the fair, Paul Revere and the Raiders. And one can’t leave the fair without see the one-man band Bandaloni . He’s awesome, sings and plays at least 5 instruments at the same time.

           

For some, the fair means beer beer beer. I just don’t understand how one can drink so much beer just to be drinking. Well, I’d rather waste my calories on something sweet, peppermint ice cream and pineapple whip. I did have 2 corndogs, 1 gyro and with the ice cream, my belly was full. Wow, I do have some control.

Lastly, I enjoy going to the fair with my friends. Sue and Judy went with me to the concerts. Thanks for going with me guys!

          

Then there’s Nat and Lexi, Drake travel buddies, from Kansas City. We have a tradition of a full day at the fair, and that we did. We go out for breakfast, then to the Market, then quick shopping (this time at the spice store) and got to the Fair at noon. Yep, we got our list done by 7 pm, rode around in the tram then sat outside the grandstand to hear a little Reba and people watch outside the Depot, staying until midnight. Yep, 12 hours at the fair and reloaded for 3 hours on Sunday. I love these girls to pieces.

           

I report, you decide if “you love me some fair too”.
           
Chat Later

That Girl, Ann Marie

August is here and almost gone: part 1

8-24-09 waning summer brain

I still have more to write about on July topics; especially the Beachy Family Reunion, which we attended during our two week driving trip, but August is slipping away, so I’ll need to move on for a few days.

You know its August when...... the Iowa State Fair time arrives. Friday, Greg and I took off work to attend on a beautiful cool August day. We needed jackets! I don’t remember attending the State Fair before wearing a jacket.

We spent about 5 hours seeing some of our favorite sites.

We started out in the Cultural Center to view the photos and art work. Peace-Sister Carolyn had entered a few of her china painting pieces, so we also looked for those.

The Cultural Center is a good place to start since they have my new favorite fair food: an apple stick pastry. So I went off to get one and then starting looking at the photography section.



Then also in the Cultural Center, special this year, they had the “Freedom Rock” guy. The Freedom Rock is a big rock in rural Iowa near Greenfield.

This guy, Ray Sorensen II, started painting it every year with a new veteran’s theme, back around 1999. This year they invited him to create something special on a big rock they placed in the middle of the Cultural Center.




A few other favorite sights this year were there Largest Pumpkin Contest and the Ugliest Cake Contest.



To be continued…..