malkav11

It's that time again. Yes, time for that plague upon the Twin Cities, the Minnesota State Fair. I really cannot think of an event on the local social calendar that I hate more. Part of it is that it's so completely uninteresting to me. You have basically three main sorts of things going on: incredibly dull exhibits, mostly to do with farming and animal husbandry, incredibly overpriced food stands purveying food that you actually can get pretty much anytime you want, if you shop at the right store, that's also incredibly bad for you, and lame games and events. Every now and then they have a decent band do a concert, and I will admit that some of the food tastes pretty good, but neither, in my opinion, justify wading through the crushing masses of humanity. (I hate crowds.)

So if that were all, I simply wouldn't go, and no skin off my nose. I'm sure there are plenty of people who don't enjoy the Renaissance Festival and the kitschy costumes and mud and such, after all. The difference, though, is that (unlike the other State Fairs I've been to, and unlike the RenFest), the Minnesota State Fair is smack dab in the fucking middle of the metropolitan area so that the crushing masses of humanity disrupt the hell out of normal commerce and movement for miles around. If I drove I could just avoid that particular region without too much trouble, as I don't have any need to go to the few establishments in the immediate area, at least not during the 10 days or so of the Fair.

Ah, but I don't drive. I ride the city bus. And the route I have to take between my house and work (well, one of the two to three it takes to get me there and back) passes right by the fairgrounds. Which means, even though they run the bus extra often on those routes during the fair season, that the bus fills to the point of oxygen deprivation and takes an extra 5, 10, 15, even 20 minutes to get where I'm going. It wasn't *too* bad today, probably because it was raining and the first day of the Fair, but I still missed my connecting bus, which does *not* run extra often during Fair season.

Grr.

In other news, watching Deadwood season 2. I have to wonder what magic HBO possesses that practically every one of their original series, especially the dramas, is so phenomenally good. (The only HBO original series that I dislike is Curb Your Enthusiasm, which I am assured by people who liked Seinfeld is hilarious. I did not like Seinfeld. I do not like Curb Your Enthusiasm for similar reasons, only more so.) I'd never before had the urge to watch a Western, but Deadwood I had to see 'cause it was HBO. And it did not disappoint. True, it's not strictly speaking a Western in the classic sense, but it's definitely in that vein and yet I am loving it. Al Swearengen is definitely going up there as one of the great screen villains.