Each Sunday in Church for the past several weeks the person conducting has been pleading for two people to volunteer to work at the Boy Scout’s Tiger Ear Booth at the Eastern Idaho State Fair on Monday, September 1st (aka Labor Day). As we sat in Sacrament Meeting on Sunday, August 23rd, Nina leaned over to me and said she wanted to volunteer and would I go with her?
I knew she was going to volunteer. They had made the announcement too many times with no one stepping forward and that’s a vacuum that Nina abhors. So, I’d already decided that if she wanted to volunteer, I would go with her. She did, and I did.
We got to the fair around noon as we wanted to check out some of the fine arts, handicraft, paintings, and photographic exhibits. One of the inmates had done a lovely cross-stitch that a friend framed and entered into the fair (which won a blue ribbon); there are some very talented artists; the fair wouldn’t be so crowded at that time. The exhibits were indeed very interesting and a couple of paintings definitely suited me. Good thing there’s no place to hang them in our motor home!
The Tiger Ear Booth was definitely a once-in-a-lifetime event (that is, you only want to do it once). Both Nina and I spent the four hours shaking cinnamon-sugar on the Tiger Ears. About a half-hour before we were finished, I finally found a stool to sit on … but by then my feet were definitely done for the day.
Tiger Ears are some kind of a scone with the dough squashed flat then fried in a deep-fat fryer, sprinkled liberally with cinnamon-sugar, and sold for $3.00 (extra honey-butter 50¢). The squishing process takes place in a hydraulic press with blobs of dough soaked in oil, then fried in oil. It is an oily, greasy process. By the time we were finished, I was in no mood to eat one! They’re anywhere from 8″ to a foot across…. heart attack heaven.
The booth requires about 30 people to be fully staffed. It was crowded and hot and by the time we were finished, we were coated with grease and cinnamon-sugar! I think we smelled ok, but felt rather gritty!
We finished up right a 7 pm and made our way (slowly and a bit painfully) to the car, followed by a stop a Ridley’s to pick up a quart of milk and some Kellog’s Corn Flakes for my dinner. No cooking happening at the motor home!
Shortly after we got there, some good Church friends stopped by bringing a tray of home-made enchiladas! Tuesday night’s dinner was already prepared. Life was good!
