I skipped the front-page article ("County Boomers Stay Put -- And Active: Not Your Grandmother's Senior Center"), as tempting as it seemed. Since I'm not on Facebook, I also skipped the big article on the newly-started "You Knew You Grew Up in Columbia When ..." Facebook group. And, yes, I also skipped the third feature ("Ulman Offers Rent-Free Land to Revive Post Office"). Why should the Post Office get rent-free land?
I was just about to completely give up and toss the paper in the trash when I came to page 49. It was a re-cap of the recently concluded Howard County Fair. I'd hit paydirt. You see, the next 39 pages contained a complete listing of all the winners of every competitive category that had been judged at the Fair. Each page had nearly 50 categories listed. That's almost 2,000 different categories! I knew they had champion steer and prize pig, but 2,000 categories?
In case you didn't have a chance to review this comprehensive listing of winners, let me bring you up to speed on just a few of the things you missed:
- The major categories are 4-H Home Arts, Open Home Arts, Arts, 4-H Livestock, Open Livestock, and Open Farm. OK -- that's six categories. That doesn't seem too unreasonable, right? Until you realize that ...
- Each category has dozens of different sub-categories. For example, in the Open Home Arts category, the first sub-category is "Food Preservation - Canned Fruit and Vegetables." There are 84 different contests in that single sub-category. Trust me. I counted them. My favorites are "Other Butter," "Sweet Pickle Peaches," and "Meat - Jerky." Who knew that Meat - Jerky is a canned fruit or vegetable?
- I definitely want to be a judge next year in the Baked Goods sub-category. Would you believe there are three different contests just for brownies with no icing? There's "Brownies," "Brownies - Chewy," and "Brownies - Cake Like." I'm a little confused by the just "Brownies" category. If they're not chewy or cake like, what are they?
- Kim must not be the only one who has a million different types of vinegars in the pantry. Vinegar contests at the Fair included Tarragon, Rosemary, Dill, Basil, and Mint. I'm wondering why no contest for Red Wine or White Wine.
- Finally, if you're wondering, here's the complete listing of categories for Children's Art Work - Ages 5 to 7:
- Pencil
- Colored Pencil
- Crayon
- Colored Markers (what other kind of marker is there?)
- Watercolor & Tempra
- Pastel
- Mixed Media
- Building Theme
- Charcoal
- Miscellaneous Forms (OK, would that be scribbling?) .
