Great Minnesota Get-Together
noun: grayt min-nuh-soh-tah git too-geth-er
The State Fair is a quintessential Minnesota experience yet decidedly un-Minnesotan. Loud, excessive, immodest. As close as Lutherans get to bacchanal. You’ll leave 10 pounds heavier, because the deep-fried cuisine is heart-attack-on-a-stick delicious. Corn dogs. Cheese curds. A bucket of Sweet Martha’s cookies washed down with milk. Grain Belt in one hand, chocolate-covered bacon in the other, two fried pickles in your pocket, and dried mustard on your chin. Within the first five minutes, you’ll spot an American flag tattoo, a Looney Tunes tank top, four fanny packs, and a bald guy with a hairy back cultivating a terrible sunburn. Zoom down the big green-and-yellow slide, relive 4-H days in the pig barn, watch your kids nearly fall out of the Skyride, and enjoy the overheated, sickening bliss of it all.