Fair season complete, lessons and acquaintances acquired in rookie year
Delano Junker is a storyteller, a charismatic old timer from Sioux Falls, S.D. We met June 15 at the Ringgold County Fair.
The 75-year old sat behind a standard white card table, donning a blue-floret Hawaiian shirt with the top two buttons unfastened.
The card tables occupied antique wooden cases with glass fronts. The cases held antique fishing lures and paraphernalia. We spoke for about 90 minutes, or so. I had time to kill; the horse show wasn’t to commence until 3 p.m.
We talked about lures, at the beginning.
We talked about family, especially his wife — now in a nursing home. He missed his wife, Muriel, dearly. She was an antique collector. Muriel was the reason he began collecting lures.
He told stories about friends he met while collecting. The conversation never ceased. The conversation never became mundane.
Flash
On July 26 at the Union County Fair, I met Flash — a 1,240-pound heifer.
I guided his Angus around the celebrity beef show, twice. His owner, Tyson Tucker, was patient, realizing I was no beef-show veteran. He supplied several helpful pointers.
The main pointer being, scratch his stomach with the cattle tool, a tool looking awfully similar to a household fireplace poker.
Turkey leg
Another first at a fair came Thursday at the Iowa State Fair.
I consumed a turkey leg.
OK, half a turkey leg.
Other than seeing country-rock band Love and Theft, consuming a turkey leg was the only item on my itinerary. Stormy Lee and I took a break from “non-stop fun,” finding a two-seater across from the turkey leg vendor.
The turkey skin was slimy, basically adhesive saturated fat. Three bites and Stormy Lee was done with the leg. I went caveman, like I’d seen others do in the past, aggressively gripping the leg and ripping the meat from the bone. Bad idea. Eight dollar turkey leg ... not worth the money.
I tossed the turkey leg away and grabbed a six-pack of napkins from the closest vendor.
I wiped and the slimy blubber on my fingers adhered to the first napkin. Using a glove-removal motion, I curled the other five napkins, shucking off the first.
Never again.
The turkey leg followed by Love and Theft on the Anderson Erickson stage, concluded my fair season.
In past years, I’ve been involved with fair events — demolition derbies and rodeos. I attended my first rodeo and received my first concussion, trying to skip bleachers, at 5 years old. Uncle Gary Hayes, in the 007 car, derbied and figure 8 raced until I was a middle schooler.
This year, as a reporter for the CNA, I witnessed daily fair schedules. Horse, beef, sheep, goats, swine shows. And from those, I gleaned three how to’s”
How to make a pig switch directions — use a hybrid switch, swat him below the eye.
How to win senior showmanship — eye contact.
How to dodge a cow manure land mine — wear boots.
Because I failed to witness one boot-wearing person step in manure but witnessed plenty of sneakers locate the fertilizer and step right in. Surely, the boot wearers chuckle at the sneaker wearers. They have to think — rookies.
I wore sneakers.
