Deep. Fried. Oreos.

(This actually took place last weekend, but I managed to avoid blogging about it until now.)

The end of August always heralds the annual county fair and this year was no different. What was different was that I had someone who actually wanted to go (not DH, who has more of a "meh" attitude about small country fairs). My friend Sally (whose husband has a similar attitude to DH) and I resolved to go and revel in the small country fairishness. And revel we did...

We had a map of the fairgrounds and all the exhibits/attractions and dutifully went down the list to make sure we saw everything. Not much exciting in the commercial vendors area...though we had fun talking with the Roller Derby girls. Also picked up some free gardening gloves and some maps of local parks and hiking areas where we can take River.

Next up, the hobby/crafts exhibits. On display were baked goods, sewing projects, quilts, artwork, photography, quilts, vegetables, collections and "uniques". An impressive and sometimes puzzling display of items. Not all of the baked goods and vegetables looked worthy of the ribbons they had won, but it was on the last day of the event and I don't know anything about the judging criteria, so what do I know? Though the 10 pound cabbage and the 2 foot rhubarb leaf were neat.

Lots of cool paintings/drawings/photography on display. Sally and I spent quite a while looking at all those exhibits. Really impressive what some people can do. Cool collections of rocks/minerals/other geological wonders. Lots of Legos exhibits from the younger exhibitors as well as some very impressive crafts from the senior members of the community. I especially liked the portrait of Abraham Lincoln composed of pennies...shinny copper to dulled red to a greenish patina.

We then took a break to have our "morning meal," meaning we split an elephant ear and some curly fries. On to the animals! No fair experience is truly complete without seeing the animals. But first...

That's right...it's human hamster balls on water. I wish I'd taken a video, those kids were hilarious. No adult version of this attraction...bummer.

Now on to the animal barns...Rabbits, horses, pigs, cows, llamas, chickens, ducks, geese, goats, sheep, birds, cats and dogs. A couple things...

1) Sally and I had a ridiculously good time looking at the animals.
2) The llamas were awesome.
3) Putting one's house cat on display at the county fair is simply a bad idea. Half the cats were curled up in their litter boxes. One cat had even managed to crawl under the carpet in its display so you couldn't really see the cat just this big lump. Universally the cats looked miserable or pissed. You just know they were plotting their revenge.

We pretty much ignored the rides and the carnival games. Instead we headed back to the food area for more fair food. For the record neither of us was interested in trying the Krispy Kreme burger, but I can now say that I've tried deep fried Oreos. I've seen them before, but I've always been with someone who looked at them in horror and said something like "you're not going to try that, are you?" This time though I was there with Sally who said something like "Do it!" So, I did. Sally tried the deep fried Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.

It wasn't just deep fried Oreos either. It was served topped off with whipped cream and chocolate sauce. Pretty rich. It wasn't bad. That being said, I think I'd rather have had plain Oreos and a glass of milk. And having said that, I'm still planning on having a deep fried Hostess Cupcake next year!

And that was the fair...

(More photos found HERE.)