State fair - part II

More awesomeness from the old State Fair of Texas(SFoT)...

Unofficial SFoT Fair King & Fair Queen - as voted by the loyal fairgoers (me).

So congrats to Paul and Lesley...what a cute couple. Sweet jersey, Paul. They came for the fried guacamole and went home as royalty.

College GameDay set. Which prompted Ash and I to walk around aimlessly yelling..."Where's Kirk?!?!" "WHERE'S KIRK?" Needless to say, the other fairgoers were less than impressed. And we never did find Kirk Herbstreit. He must have been continuously riding the ferris wheel while downing fried twinkies and bud heavies.

Chicken hats. Not sure where they got them or why they were wearing them, but jealousy set in initially, followed by regret, followed by gratitude that I never had to put one of those ridiculous things on my head.

A grown man on the little kids rollercoaster. He looked totally ridiculous. I also took a picture (for proof) of the little kids on the rollercoaster, to show that it was truly only for little kids. After snapping the shot, I realized that I was the creepy guy at the fair, taking pictures of little kids while their parents watched. Pretty standard, really.

Now it's time to hand out some SFoT awards:

Most redneck looking man with his family in tow:

Best cowboy hat that is two sizes too small for your head (He also won the award for best use of cowboy hat with otherwise non-Southern clothing - new balance sneakers and a standard buttondown shirt):

Best coordination of leopard print outfits by a couple over 50, with one member of the duo in a wheelchair goes to...

These two. Priceless.

And finally, best use of cinematography in taking a picture of four horseback police officers in front of a fountain, while being lit by fireworks, goes to....me.

After the fair, we went and met up with Ash and Laura's friends, Chris and Kelsey (soon to be newlyweds). As usual, Chris called me Doug, Kelsey looked scared by my antics, and Ash and I acted like bumbling idiots. We played quarters, unsuccessfully, on a table where the coins wouldn't bounce. I asked Chris and Kelsey to pose for me. This is what I got...

If this isn't true love, then what is??

Also, when our cute waitress, Sarah, came over to ask for drink orders, Ash passionately ordered for me - 2 irish car bombs. Why not? Chris, a real doctor who had to practice real medicine today, joined us in the debauchery. Here a few action shots...

After this bar, we went home, played a game of "Dave and Ash drink beers, while Laura labors through picking an outfit for the rest of the night." It went well. I drank two beers. Ash drank zero. And Laura looked great. Success.

A disastrous attempt at taking a photo of us in the mirrored doors of the elevator.

After this, we went out to a piano bar - where they combine drinking with dudes playing songs on the piano. Pretty self-explanatory, really. Naturally, Ash and I (read me) chose to take a shot out of a test tube. Mostly, because the waitress serving them was cute and this was an easier option than trying to actually seduce her. It didn't work...weird.

Good news, however. Carrie Underwood was in attendance. Which was nice.

State fair - part I

State Fair of Texas - everything I possibly could have wished for in a state fair in the Lonestar State. And more.

Here are the First Round of Highlights (like the NFL draft - it is quite possible that there will be more rounds than you wanted to take part in). But just remember - Tom Brady was drafted in the 6th round, so don't give up on anything to come.

So, going into the fair, we had a few goals:

- Look for everything redneck

- Do a lot of people watching, and make fun of everyone that you can

- Document as much as possible via photograph

- Eat 10 different fried foods (which is harder than it sounds, despite there being an abundance of fried delicacies/disasters)

This was in the line to buy "coupons" which are like wampum at the fair. You take real money and trade it in for coupons, which then serve as currency in the fair. Everything costs coupons, which are each worth 50 cents. All of this doesn't matter in any way, except that beers cost 10. Coupons, not dollars. Which was the teller told the man in front of Laura, they cost. And $10 per beer seems excessive. $5 a beer seems perfect. So perfection it was.

The worst part about this photo was that, right before it was taken, she was faking grabbing his butt. Which was much funnier. But Laura's face of disgust/sheer glory in this pic is worth at least one thousand words. Which is roughly 2 thousand coupons.

Enjoying a corn dog in front of "Big Tex" - the unofficial mascot of the Texas State Fair. This is the most southern I felt in a long time. Or ever. This was a grand kickoff to fried foods. #1 out of quest of 10. Although there was some argument if this counts, because everything else we were going to eat is normally eaten sans fryolator. However, corn dogs are always fried. Debate ensued. By the end of the evening, we counted it towards 10 (mostly because 10 was a lofty goal for us to attain).

The Cotton Bowl - in the middle of the state fairgrounds. It's also where they play OU-UT. Whatever, moving on.

This woman was in front of us during our first trip to the "We will fry literally anything, because we know you are crazy/dumb/fat enough to buy it" tent.

At this tent, we bought fried coke (which tastes, in Laura's words, "like coke flavored donuts"). She urged us not to get them. Ash and I got them anyways. We should have listened to Laura (which seems to be a theme of the weekend). We also had fried butter (hence, the name of this tent) covered in garlic - which ended up tasting like garlic bread. The butter melts and it's just fried batter covered in butter. Still fatty and artery clogging. I'm guessing this woman was not in line for a water and corn on the cob. She also might be going hunting post-fair and is wearing her finest hunting gear (another theme of the fair - weird - could have guessed that one).

Here's the menu... Hmm...a nice fried pizza washed down with an energy drink. Hearts all over Dallas are exploding everywhere tonight.

So after this little stop, we were 4 out of 10 on our fried food list - corn dogs, fried coke, fried texas cookie dough, fried butter. We all felt terrible, but knew that we had trudge on with our cause.

More to come later. But right now, I am too busy downing Bud Lights to keep blogging...

Frustration with the DART

Not that frustrated. At all. Maybe even satisfied with the experience...




Frustrated, I guess?




EXTREME frustration!

grassy knoll, boomer sooner cops, and more...

Ash and I just took a trip to the Grassy Knoll/JFK got killed here Museum. Here are all things that we decided we had to blog about:

- We had BBQ for lunch. It was awesome. Clearly.

While at lunch, we saw a girl/woman wearing tights and leg warmers. We then had an argument over the relative-attractiveness of tights on girls. I argued that they are usually attractive and make good legs look great. I advocated for their selective use by all girls, as long as they had decently attractive legs. You know if you should not be wearing a skin tight leg garment, so don't. Otherwise...go for it. Ashley, however, staunchly disagreed and filibustered about how no girl should wear them and that he HATES tights. I've determined that either he is batshit crazy, swayed by marriage, or hates nice legs. Whatever. We welcome your opinions; Ash and I are quite drastically split on this topic.

- While on our way to the grassy knoll, we were walking one the side of the road and a Dallas cop yelled at us - "BOOOMER SOONER." Ash gave him the requisite fist shake of excitement and sincerity, and we went on our way. On at least three separate occasions, Ash referred to this interaction with the cop as having "made my day". Everyday living in Dallas has its excitement too, folks!!!

- We saw where JFK was shot. This is the view from where Lee Harvey Oswald supposedly shot. I took it illegally....shhhhh. There is an "X" in the middle of the street, where JFK was fatally shot. It's in the same place where the idiot in the middle of the photo is standing in the middle of the street as traffic quickly approaches. Obviously, I had Ash take a similar picture of me, but I checked for cars first...idiot.

- We sang along with my iphone to Eric Church's "I Love Your Love The Most" while walking through downtown Dallas. It was awesome, and just as gay as it sounds.

- We took a trolley ride on the world's oldest, continually running trolley. (100% of this statement is 50% true.) And the trolley care we were on is definitely an original, I was nervous about its safety for 100% of the trip. We made a "friend" on the trolley. He was a 30-something year old. When I commented on his friendliness, Ash called him "a good ole boy". When I asked what that mean, he said "you know, he's the kind of guy who goes out on weekends in cowboy boots and is very country. I should mention, he was dressed in a collared shirt, designer jeans, expensive shoes, had a standard, southern frat boy haircut, talked about getting hammered with his bro and tickling a 6'6" 300lb OU fan at last year's OU-UT game, and he works for a financial consulting firm in Dallas, but used to NYC and Chicago. It my opinion, this is roughly the opposite of what I would describe as a "good ole boy." But that's just one New Englander's opinion...

- Here's a pic of my two favorite OU newlyweds in their matching jerseys. Sadly, it looks like Ash just drugged this poor girl and is creepily watching over her body. Which is exactly correct. I would know, I took the photo.

- Me hard at work on the blog...

And, oddly enough, there was another Carrie Underwood sighting. Weird...

Addendum 2: photo addendum

Cheerwine. Whatever that is.







A picture's worth a thousand words, says Ash. You can choose whatever thousand you want for this one...

Addendum...

A few things I forgot to add in my earlier post:

- At the concert last night, needtobreathe was playing one song and Ash commented on "You know what this song needs?? A VIOLIN." So naturally, he broke down and started playing the air violin. Yes...AIR VIOLINING. The best part, however, is that while fake playing a non-existent violin, he made sound effects. And they sounded exactly like this..."Wakka, wakka, wakka, wok." Which is exactly the opposite of how I envision the violin sounding. Great work, Ash. Stick to your day job of...whatever it is, you do. Map-making?

- Laura told us stories of her kindergarten classroom. All I took away from it:

- She uses the bathroom in her classroom for the first few weeks of school and then no longer does, because the kids have peed and pooped all over it
- She routinely lies to her children and tells them that a stuffed owl, named Ethel, watches over them and reports back to her. And they are so brainwashed that when someone calls over the intercom, they think it's actually Ethel speaking to them

- A youngster, named Sammie, in her class lost a tooth last year and asked "Why is is that when you lose a tooth, you just don't feel like the same guy anymore?" Philosophical, Sammie. Poor fella - good luck with your first crush in middle school...

Another Carrie Underwood sighting on CMT.

BBQ time. And I'm still wearing my wristband from the House of Blues. Dave 1. Ash 0.

concert

HOTLY ANTICIPATED UPDATE!!!!!

Ash, Laura, and I attended a concert last night - Selena Ryder and Needtobreathe. At the House of Blues in Dallas. blah blah blah.

Highlights/Lowlights:

- 24 oz Bud Lights (so big that Laura had to use two hands to take a sip)

- Ash and I started a clap-a-long - which sounds much lamer than it was (or exactly as lame as it was)

- When I asked Ash what his highlights were from last night, he said "the opener getting off the stage" (so we liked needtobreathe better, i'd say)

- He said another highlight was "the cattle scattered around the city". He thinks this was a highlight. I do not agree, I'd classify this under "whatever/lowlight" (they would have been a highlight, if they were REAL cattle, not sculptures. Then, every stereotype I had of Texas would come true - they DO have random farm animals roaming the street!)

Another true Texas classic - George Bush Turnpike, which Ash had to point out, was named while he was still in office. And he said I would probably not find an Obama highway anywhere. Good thing.

- Postgame TARTS and Cheerwine (which is essentially Carolina's cherry coke/dr. pepper hybrid - but highly touted by the Ellison family)

- A dogfight involving two former Mike Vick refugees in a parking lot on the walk back

- Our next concert...WOLFMOTHER.

- Lamest joke ever: What are the two dirtiest animals on the farm? Brown chicken, brown cow. Which apparently is supposed to sound like "bown-chicka. bow-wow." Welcome to Lameville, USA.

- Ash and I decided (ok, I decided) that we were going to have a contest to see who could wear their wristband from the concert longer. I'm winning (duh.)

- We played a post-concert round of Wii frisbee golf. Ash squeaked out a win over myself +3 to +12. Much like Phil Mickelson, I blew up on a few holes and it came back to haunt me. Unlike Ash's style of play, which I would comfortable refer to as "playing from the ladies' tees and laying up on every shot." I am more of "grip it and rip it" style of Wii frolf. Similar to both my real golf and campus golf philosophies. Also, in true dave style, fell asleep on the couch, mid-shot on the 8th hole. Again, Ash and I differ in our classifications on this one - I'd say it was on the lowlight end of the spectrum, Ash put this as one of his favorite moments of the trip so far. He also said that he could not wait to stack some bud light cans on my face tomorrow night "for old time's sake". Yeah, me too...

- Last night pre-concert, Laura proposed our first red light challenge during an episode of jeopardy. The Jeopardy question was something about a female celebrity being overweight. Without really thinking about an answer - I yelled "Kirstie Alley" "Britney Spears". Whilst Laura yelled "Tyra Banks." And Ash yelled...nothing, Ash hates celebrities. Either way, TODAY'S FIRST RED LIGHT CHALLENGE (answers left in the comments), name as many celebrities as possible who have been featured in the likes of People Magazine, US Weekly, etc. who were featured solely due to their sudden weight loss/gain and the resulting surprise/disgust/horror than ensued by the American public.

Here's a picture of Laura - just so y'all know that she is indeed part of these ridiculous adventures.

I am now sitting on the couch at Ash's place. Which also serves as my bed. Which is in the living room. Which also serves as the guest bedroom/study/balcony/dining room/movie theater/Wii frolf course. Needless to say, this apartment is spacious. From where I am sitting I can see every single place in the apartment, except for the bathroom (which oddly enough is just smaller than the bedroom).

Just ate some Count Chocula. And a chocolate chip cookie sandwich that Laura made (which is called a "sammie" because not only is it a cookie sammie/sandwich. It is also named, by Laura, affectionately after Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford. Yes, they love Oklahoma football so much that they name baked good products after him.)

I also drank some coffee this morning. And edited my fantasy team. Off to a big start for the weekend. Right now, Ash and I are watching CMT video countdown - Taylor Swift's singing in the rain about being 15. Whatever, Taylor. Seriously, let's just get back to more Carrie Underwood...

And today's SECOND CHALLENGE to my loyal readers - we are going to the Texas State Fair tonight. I am taking requests for photo ops of ridiculous/redneck/awesome things tonight. So if you have any ideas or physical challenges that you would like to see Ash, Laura, or I undertake, send them our way.

****THIS JUST IN - Ashley Blake informs me that in roughly an hour, we will be going to get BBQ for lunch. I am now giddy...****