Heartland Hokum

Well in Iowa, or as the locals call it, Iowa, it is State Fair Time. This is known to me as the time when the normal surburbia restaurants normally busy on Friday and Saturday are abandoned in favor of funnel cakes, breaded hotdogs, pork chop on a stick and batter fried snickers.

State Fairs in the Midwest are the kitsch capital of the heartland.

We are now three years from the height of the Presidential Campaign which means that in addition to four-footed livestock, we will have two-footed oinkers like Newt Gingrich and sundry others walking around the fair and being happy people will attribute the aroma to cow and horseshit.

Get the feeling I could take or leave the Fair?

The central recurring focus of the State Fair, other than sugar coma (or for me, where is the damn Beer tent?) is Butter Sculpture. Year after year, we have the Cow sculpted of butter. A few years ago, one of the last I was shanghaied (sp?) to attend the Fair, the highlight was -- I kid you not -- the "Butter Last Supper" and the Dairy Industry Barn was never busier. The sculpture was in a refrigerated enclosure but I saw people take communion and I wonder how many people thought Jesus would taste better with a little spread over the top with his likeness? If I recall correctly, Judas was made out of margarine.

Blessed are the Lobsters, for they will taste...delicious with this!