Fair As Folk

Wow! It was Labor Day Weekend just last week and the last few days have just flown by.  Where do they all go?  I had a 4 day weekend, actually, so it was packed with all kinds of great fun.

On Saturday morning I drove down to the Kenai Peninsula with VeggieMama to run some errands and visit other family.  The trip down was . . . interesting would be a good way to put it.  VeggieMama's car has no CD player, so I was happily humming to myself for the hour and a half that I had no cell phone reception.  It was a nice reprieve from the local Ke$ha drowned radio stations, though. Ugh that girl makes my blood curdle.  But the Seward Highway is a beautiful drive, regardless of the weather and season, and certainly took much of my attention off of the silent drive down.

Do note the credit is not to me, but to a gallery!

While we were down there, we picked around in my aunt's vegetable garden and got some of these goodies:

Lettuce, turnip, cucumbers, and sugar snap peas!

That was a serious killing and those snap peas are delish! 

The drive home wasn't too bad either.  It's always nice having 2-3 uninterrupted hours of VeggieMama talk.  I do love my VeggieMama!

Later that night I joined some friends downtown at The Woodshed for some seriously bad  karaoke. Few things are better than spending an evening with good friends who you haven't seen in a long time with a couple of drinks and embarrassing the crap out of yourselves. 

Above, two brothers singing Under Pressure and below, one of us rocking out to Gangsta's Paradise

I did a fabulous rendition of Poker Face with a guy friend and butchered Geek in the Pink before leaving for the evening. 

Are you a karaoke fan?  Any classics?

Sunday was a nice lazy day with MEH before we joined up with friend Allison and her hubby for some end of summer BBQing and laughs.  Check out her rendition of Morgan's Veggie Patties for an awesome vegan alternative to burgers! You can actually eat these buddies raw and they are still delicious!

Do you have any vegan creations for a grilling alternative? 

And then Monday, Blessed Monday came around.  This was a big day because not only was it Labor Day, but it was also the last day of the Alaska State Fair, which is where BOYZ II MEN WERE PERFORMING.  These men have been on my radar since age 8.  I adore them.  They probably could do no wrong, but I won't test that.  Monday was full of time with my dearest friend SweetCaroline, fair food, farm animals gigantic produce, and music.  Ahhh the stuff life is made of.

Gobbly Gobble Gobble! TURRRKEEEYYY!

Perhaps it should be assumed that in being vegan I have a natural love for animals, but I really had not expected to love seeing the farm animals as much as I did.  Ask SC.  I was hopping and skipping and more happy than most of the 5 year olds.  I mean, look at that turkey! 

But before we got to the rest of the farm animals was my other favorite part of the fair:  The Giant Produce.  This year's pumpkin almost broke the world record.  It truly is The Great Pumpkin!

Over 1,000 pounds of pumpkin!  That's a lot of pie, folks!

The cabbage weight in at 97 pounds! Hellooooooo cole slaw!

Aaaand then we moved on to more farm animals.  I actively ran over to this guy: 

ALPACA!!!!!

And he ran right over to me, too!!!  He was so soft! And so cute! I mean, how can you not love this face?

Excuse the crappy photo quality, friends, but I had to use my phone . . .

And then there were pigs! And piglets! And COWS! Oh my!

This ol' girl named Bennita weight 850 pounds.  Almost as much as that pumpkin!

BABY PIGSSSSS!

And after all of the sweet adorable petting of farm animals, we went on to the real business of the fair:  Food Hunting.  I came with camera phone in tow to catch photos of the weirdest food I found, as well as what I partook in, and here is what we have:

First stop: Doughnut Rolls!  13 little guys for 5 bucks.  I didn't have too many, but man, they were totally delicious.  I hadn't had doughnuts in at least a year before these guys!

And here's where I found my first stop for lunch:  Tres Amigos for their Black Beans & Rice!

There's me, looking quite blurry, with my food! Mmmm! 

And of course, there is the weird crap you find wandering around.  Like these Doughnut Burgers:

The sign said that it was a jelly doughnut cut in half with a burger patty in between.  I didn't wait to take a picture, but wow.  Talk about weird.

And the Fry Bread stands.  Man, I love this stuff.  But one go at the fair will have my fried goods quota for a goooood long while.

This was my favorite sign.  It was inside of a wine art bar.  Who doesn't love Mona and her smile?  And wine? and Get Happy? Come on!

My first venture to the Sluicebox

After some serious munching on food, we went to the Sluicebox for the Alaska State Fair Beer ala Kassik's Brewery in Kenai!  The Sluicebox is the stuff of Fair legend with beer, food, and music all day long.  When I was younger my parents would go and while my brother and I went on rides and I was always a little jealous since I couldn't go in (of course, I didn't know it was for the beer and had never had beer to begin with). 

And then we found more fresh produce, but this stuff was for purchase.  Holy Cabbage!

And here was my moment of Blogger Nerdiness.  We walked by a place that had Pork Chops on a Stick.  Now, clearly, I don't want one, but I certainly wanted a picture.  SC didn't want one, I wasn't going to buy one, so I waited until an unsuspecting victim customer purchased one.  This kind lady allowed me to take a picture of her bounty:

Can't say I'm a convert, but whatever works for you, right?

And finally finally what we went for:  BOYZ II MEN.  In all their glory they came onto stage just a short 14 rows ahead of us.  They. Were. Amazing.  Better than I remembered the last time around.  And so gracious.  I figure you can tell when someone's genuinely happy that you paid your money to listen to them, and these guys were far more gracious than I've seen most artists.  After 20 years, you could tell they'd seen their fair share of ups and downs.  We laughed, we danced, and literally, we cried.  I know, right?  At least I'm not the only wear my heart on my sleeve pansy of the group! :)

So we had an amazing weekend!  My Tuesday was another lazy day, followed by Bad Ass Girls Book Club at Michelle's house.  She's back from her honeymoon! Wooo!  I can't tell you enough how much fun this is.  I'd say our Book Talk to Girl Talk ratio is something like 1:5, but that's no worry.  We love the company and time, we really do read the books and talk about them a bit, and it's already gotten most of us to read books we wouldn't have otherwise picked up.  So far we've read:
Bonk:  The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex  by Mary Roach
A History of Love by Nicole Krauss
The Swan Thieves by Elizabeth Kostova (currently reading)
And coming up:
Even Cowgirls Get the Blues  by Tom Robbins
Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
Memoirs of a Geisha  by Arthur Golden

Mantra of the Day:  Yogas chitta vritti nirodaha.  Translated:  Yoga is the restriction of the fluctuation of consciousness.  The title alone had me laughing today.  So let's break it down if you don't feel like reading that short article:  Yogas:  Union.  Chitta:  Super simplified?  Consciousness/awareness/observance of self and consciousness.  Vritti:  Things that piss you off.  Want to be a yogi nerd?  Say you had a vritti about something to day.  Like traffic.  But it's actually much more than that.  Vritti is when something fluctuates in your awareness, when something is raking you, when raking occurs.  Nirodaha: meditations/restriction of the senses.  So. There you go.  Yoga is not just that physical practice of upward and downward dog and sun salutations.  It's much more an attitude, a way of being.  It is literally Union.  So, to achieve union, one must restrict the fluctuations of consciousness.  Work to maintaining a calm mind.  That doesn't mean always being happy or not being anything at all.  It doesn't have to be that.  It's to come to terms with who you are and accept feelings as them come and let them go as they may.  So.  Grab ahold of those vrittis!

Question of Gratitude, Who, or what, are you thankful for today?:  I am thankful for the girls of the Badass Book Club.  You ladies nurse my sanity.  Your love, support, arguments, stories, wine, and simple presence is healing in every way.  And I adore you all.  I couldn't ask for, nor ever dream to hope of being surrounded by better friends.  You guys are the best.  Thank you!