County Fairs & Demo Derbys

Ok...it's late and I really should be going to bed (when don't I type when it's late though?). L, M and K left this morning - we went out to breakfast first then they got on the road and I ended up doing two runs. They chose to stay over so they could go to the county fair with us to see the bus demolition derby that was on last night. It took absolutely forever to start...first they had dancing lawnmowers - that was the most boring thing I've ever tried to watch. Next was the first two elimination heats for the demo car derby - that was alot of fun. Noisy, muddy but fun. We had an intermission followed by an egg toss followed by the "feature" - consisting of all the cars that could still run from the first two heats. I think there were 21 cars that could still run...it was amazing to watch them. Probably what amazed me most was seeing cars with steam, smoke and sometimes fire shooting out of them still able to reverse, run and crash into others. When flames got too major things were stopped so they could allow the drivers to get out and off the track. The very last event was the bus derby. There were only 3 school buses (painted blue, black and red) with windows removed, doors and half the seats removed. The buses tried to make sure they only hit in the back so they would get some distance then reverse at speed. The blue bus was hit severely enough multiple times that its frame shifted forward and eventually collapsed in the middle. The red bus lost its ability to reverse and I'm not sure what happened to the black one. It was actually rather encouraging to me as a bus driver to see just how sturdy our school buses are. Sure they dented easily enough but it took alot to actually stop them. Of course the only person in them was the driver - no one else to get injured or anything like that.

One really funny thing about the fair is the question that M (11) asked as we were walking between the animal barns to get our tickets to the derby. We passed a brown "pile" on the ground...M says "eew what's that?" My response was to lean down and whisper near his ear "that's cow poo*" at which point he said "eeewww that's gross!" Both L and I laughed so hard we wiped tears from our eyes. They are openly admitted "city slickers" - they enjoy visits to the country but can't imagine actually living out here.

I have poison ivy rash again. This time it's on my face - much worse than last time. I'm probably going to have to break down and figure out how to get to the dr. tomorrow.