Texas State Fair- 10/12

FLASHBACK: Two Years Ago (October 2000)

My last visit to the State Fair kind of happened on a whim- my family and I decided to head to the Dallas Summer Musicals to see The Phantom of the Opera, but we had an extra hour so we went and did a couple of rides and looked at some exhibits. Following that, we went and saw the show; it was great; everything was good.

Oh, did I forget to mention what day we went? Well, it just happened to be the day of the Oklahoma-Texas "Red River Shootout" football game. Might I mention that Texas got smothered, 63-14? However, though we passed several casual/mean-spirited verbal tantrums, crowds were light and we had a great time.

FAST FORWARD- October 12, 2002

My younger brother just happened to have a soccer game in Plano (next to Dallas, for the not-so-local folks), so he, my dad, and I decided to hit the State Fair while we were at it. Since we weren't going to see a musical this time (The Lion King- sold out around May), we'd have a lot more time to hit everything we wanted.

Oh yeah, some college game was going on at the same time (I wonder who?) and a certain college team won (we noticed a sea of orange exiling the gates as we entered... wonder who won?), so we paid our $24 to get in, and we noticed crowds would be quite a bit larger than our last visit. Maybe more folks showed up to see Bevo get beat for the third year in a row...

So we bought 100 tickets, and set off to the midway.I'm getting kind of tired of all the wordiness, so I'll just quickly review all the rides we rode over the course of the evening:

CRAZY MOUSE- Reverchon Spinning Mouse-

I'll admit, I had high expectations for this ride, as it would be my first spinning mouse. It looked great from the midway, and so I paid my 10 tickets and got ready to roll. We do a tiny drop and maneuver through some exciting sharp turns before we begin to drop, turn, and spin. However, the ride was a kind of letdown to me, but it still beats a regular mouse.

ZILLERATOR- A Zyklon clone... Pinfari? Not sure...

This zippy little ride was fun, but its only redeeming qualities we the gigantic floodlights sitting next to the ride, and occasionally passengers were bathed in white light.

We also rode MOBY DICK, a flying carpet ride, SPACE ROLLER, a Mondial Top Scan, ILLUSIONS, a dark ride, and a Zierer Wave Swinger. We ate through tickets faster than a rat on a Cheetoh....

The winners were the Top Scan, now my all-time favorite flat ride, and the Zierer Wave Swinger- some really fun swings that should fit right in at HW.

So, as our time expired, and I sat down eating a rather tasty quesadilla and watching Hank Williams Jr. in concert, I realized the fair was just what I needed- a nice evening away from the amusement park experience, but gaining some new rides which I enjoyed very much.

My last impression of the fair, however, was as the Texas football team left Fair Park, and recieved some pleasant hand gestures from victorious OU fans.

What a night.....