Summer festivals up and running

I began my tour of many summer fairs and festivals with Bullhead Days in Waterville. This time, I enjoyed the decadence of freshly deep fried bullheads, the usual buttered bread, and fries. I do regret using the salt shaker for my fish, though. Not only did it pour salt, but it turned out whatever seasonings they used on the fish were salty enough. But boy, was it good. I haven’t had bullhead in years.

The specialty dining experience reminded me of being at my step-grandparents’ place. They lived out in Wilton Township. If you all know the Eustice family that lives southeast of Janesville, my step-grandparents were neighbors. I remembered one of my first times meeting them involved them frying a bunch of bullheads for supper. I must have eaten a dozen of them (I was definitely not older than twelve at the time), while my stepdad likely ate half of what there was.

Bullhead Days means the start of a busy summer for us. It was nice having a bit of a break between graduation and the sudden onslaught of fairs. Now comes the “summer season,” as I like to call it. Instead of covering a bunch of sports, we cover baseball and the festivals. And almost every festivity that I cover involves some kind of pageant (Miss Waterville for Bullhead Days, for example), a bunch of food trucks, something unique to the celebration (free French fries for Eagle Lake’s Tator Days comes to mind for me), some form of live entertainment (usually either IV Play or Power House), and a parade.

Most–if not all–of my summer weekends, are committed to covering these things. So much so that I’ve come to recognize a pattern. Pageants usually take place on Thursday or Friday, while the parades take place either Saturday or Sunday. The live music happens on any given evening during the event. Along with all that are carnival games and rides, tractor pulls, and some kind of fun run.

I do love summer, but one thing I hate about it is the amount I sweat. Even if the temperature is in the mid 70s, the air is dry, and there is a breeze, I feel conspicuous. I just hate the feeling of it. I think part of it is that I’m self-conscious that I’m going to start smelling like the human equivalent of a wet gym sock. I dislike everything about it.

The feeling of sweat is gross, too. Imagine just sitting around and starting to sweat because the temperature is flirting with 90, it’s humid, the sun is out, and you exist. That was me during the Waseca County Fair last summer when we had our stand in one of the buildings. After running around for hours and feeling like a roasted chicken, I find it euphoric to finally get into a house with A/C and jump into a lukewarm shower.

In my personal life, I’ve been learning that there are just situations where I need to not only be more confident, but act on that confidence. See, a vast majority of my life has been filled with regret and playing it safe. But sometimes, when you take a risk, it doesn’t work out. And in those times, you realize that your intuition was telling you that it wasn’t going to work out for a good reason.

On some occasions there are red flags flying in your face, but you don’t care because you want things to work out, and you convince yourself that because of that, all the trouble will be worth it in the end. It’s the textbook relationship issue. One person stays in love despite the obvious warning signs that the other person is toxic or that the relationship isn’t meant to last.

The lesson? Listen to your intuition. Be more confident. Oh, and eat more bullheads.