Ok, I warned you that I had one more Illiois State Fair post to go along with my State Fair recap post, and now here it is.

When I was a lad growing up in Springfield, my family would go to the Illinois State Fair every year. My dad would usually drag us to a particular building that displayed lots of different foods that had been submitted for judging. Farmers would submit fruits and vegetables, people would bake pies and cakes, breads, etc. You would submit your food, it would be judged, and if you won your category I’m guessing you would get some sort of monetary prize.

Now, the fair runs 8 or 9 days. The food goes up for display in a building at the start of the fair, and stays there until the fair is over. My dad would prefer going the second weekend of the fair, when all the cakes, vegetables, etc., were in less than stellar condition. To put it bluntly, the food was rotting. This is just his sense of humor, which for the most part was passed down to me intact.

Now, in my childhood this building was not air-conditioned. If it was 90 degrees outside, it was pretty much the same temperature in the building. These days the building is air-conditioned, but still the ravages of time work their magic over the week that the food sits out.

I took pictures the first weekend of the fair, and asked my brother (who is down there this weekend) to take some pictures the second weekend.

Here are the results. Enjoy!

Carrots and Lettuce, before:

And after. Note the carrots are somewhat dessicated, the lettuce mottled.

Peppers before

Peppers after

Eggplants before

Eggplants after

Barbecue Bites before

And after

Pies before

After

Alien cake before

And after (no change)

Apparently after I left the fair, they had some sort of Spam cooking contest. Here are some of the entries. I’m assuming that they looked more appetizing when first displayed, though I can’t verify this.

Spam Something

More Spam

One last picture of a delectable Illinois State Fair entry. Who wants dip?

Thanks again to my brother for braving the putrid stench of rotten food to get these lovely pictures.

First of all, welcome. Abe Lincoln welcomes you to the 2007 Illinois State Fair.

What you might not be able to tell from this picture (and the rest of the pictures here) is that it was hot. It was 99 degrees Fahrenheit, with a heat index of “OH MY GOD IT’S HOTTER THAN SATAN’S ARMPIT”.

It was Sunday morning. I picked up Tim at around 9:30 am and we headed to the fairgrounds. It was too damned hot to take my family, so I just went there with Tim while my wife and my mom did some shoe shopping with the kids.

One important aspect to the Illinois State Fair is eating. Their motto should be, give us a foodstuff and we’ll put a stick in it and fry it. One of the food booths actually has a name I admire, “Fried What?”.

But for me, the food I have to eat every time I visit the fair is Tom Thumb donuts.

That’s what I call them, at least. They haven’t actually been called that in years, though. Now they have the extremely boring name, Donut Family.

Still, they taste the same as the hot, sugary donuts I fondly remember.

Tim opted for the healthy choice of the Bob Vose corndog. It was so nice, in fact, he had it twice.

Most booths at the Illinois State Fair are just brought in trailers, but Bob Vose apparently has enough clout that he has a permanent structure on the grounds where he sells his food. Note that some disturbing behind-the-scenes business has taken place. As you can see by the sign, Pepsi is no longer served by Bob Vose!

Between Tim’s 1st and 2nd corn dogs, I ambled over to the Pork Patio for a pork chop sandwich.

Okay, enough eating! Let’s get out of this godforsaken heat!

So, one thing I had to do was go see the butter cow. It’s actually the law in Springfield that you must see the butter cow if you visit the fair.

Usually the butter cow is a life-sized cow that stands in a refrigerated glass cabinet reminiscent of a high school’s trophy case. This year, they shook things up a bit. The case this year is round, and rotates. The rotation is not what I would call smooth — it seems to catch every few inches with a minor jolt. In addition to the butter cow, there is a butter calf, a butter tree, a butter cat, a butter… well, I’ll just show you:

One way of rating the butter cow sculptor’s craft is how well the veins on the cow’s teats are portrayed. Sadly, this year the veins are a little unrealistic:

There was actually a little controversy over the butter cow this year. In a recent column in the local paper, a food critic recommended that the butter cow tradition be discontinued, which prompted backlash from the community.

I can understand both points of view. One is sick of having a butter cow around every year, a tradition since 1922. The other wants to see a life-sized sculpture made of butter.

Could we compromise? Perhaps next year we can have a butter Henry Rollins? He’s got plenty of veins that could be lovingly rendered.

Okay, we ate, we saw the butter cow. Now, I just wanted to do one more thing before the sun caused me to spontaneously combust. We had to go on the Sky Ride.

Carnival rides from the Sky Ride

Hi-Dive in front of the Exposition Building

Near the end of the Sky Ride, ridin’ over the “God Mobile”

Just a couple more pictures. Have you ever watched an infomercial? If you have, chances are they are selling its product in the Exposition building. It’s basically that, crappy leather belts, and evangelical Christian booths.

Here’s a quiz for you!

Please be warned that if you try to answer the questions, I cannot tell you if you are right or wrong, as I didn’t uncover #2 or #3.

One more pic from the Exposition building. This is the superpowered Televac handwriting analysis computer, which has been using the same blinking light technology it did back when I was a kid. I guess if it ain’t broke, don’t upgrade it.

And finally, a couple fun ride pics.

The Yo-Yo

The Giant Slide

Well, that’s it. Of course I didn’t cover everything. There’s craploads of livestock, mediocre bands at the Grandstand and beer tents, etc., but I’ve told you what *I* was there for.

I might have one more 2007 Illinois State Fair post in me, but it won’t be published here until next week. If you can stick around for that long, you might find yourself amused, shocked and frightened.

Love and Kisses From The State Capitol,

Splotchy

Snotty? Check.
Does it rock? Check.
Is it about fairs? Check.

The Breeders – Saints

Being originally from the esteemed capital of Illinois, Springfield, and with familial ties still there, I have a tradition of going down for a weekend visit in August.

I usually go there during one of the weekends of the Illinois State Fair (it runs for 9-10 days).

Often times I won’t actually go to the fair during my visit, as at this time of year in Springfield it’s usually hot enough to liquefy metal.

But, I think I might go this year. I have a neat idea of a little photography series. Plus, they have these hot bags of sugary donuts that I thoroughly enjoy.

My wife and kids are actually driving down to Springfield on Friday morning. I am going to take an Amtrak train out of Union Station after work, which I am actually excited about.

The train goes through some really beautiful industrial landscapes as it makes its way out of Chicago.

If you want more information regarding all the glory that is the Illinois State Fair (tractor pulls and all), click here.

FOR THOSE OF YOU WITH BALLS:
The Illinois State Fair actually has an intro page which eventually routes you to the above link. The intro page is actually what comes up as the first result when you search for “Illinois State Fair” on Google. If you visit the intro page, I salute your ballsiness. You’ll understand what I mean after you visit (hint: you might want to plug in your headphones).