Stream of Unconsciousness

Some weeks, my ex- perience doesn't lend itself well to a nicely organized, cohesive piece. On those occasions, I string my thoughts together in the order they enter my brain. This style of organization is known as 'stream of con- sciousness'. It's sort of the 'fruitcake' of writing styles - some people can't stand it, while others think it does the single truest job of capturing the human experience in all its raw, gritty glory.

If you fall into the latter category, prepare for dis- sappointment. This is not a 'stream of conscionsness' week. Rather, due to the fact that I've been sleep-chal- lenged as of late, these past few days have been a stream of UNconscionsness.

It all started on Friday night, when the Columbia County Fair Court appeared at the Benton-Franklin Fair and Rodeo. It has to be one of my favorite events of the year: the fairgrounds are beautiful and easy to navi- gate, the rodeo arena offers a lovely view of rolling hills, the announcer is wonderful, the rodeo clown (J.J Harri- son!) was hilarious, and the evening offered entertain- ment besides bucking and roping. A lasso artist from Mexico enthralled the crowd with his mastery of the lariat and a fireworks show set the August sky ablaze with color. If you ever get the chance to go, go.

After the rodeo, all the fair royalty in attendance (along with other rodeo personalities) sit down at a line of tables and sign autographs. That's a ton of fun for every- one involved. And after that, we sleepily trooped back to the parking lot.

Once we were all loaded into the car and pulling out, I telephoned my grandparents to let them know what time we'd be home. It was ten- thirty, so I was already pretty sure that I wouldn't be in bed before midnight.

But because all the rodeogoers were leaving at ap- proximately the same time and there was only one way out of the parking lot, it took us nearly an hour to move the hundred yards to the highway.

To pass the time, we danced (well, rhythmically thrashed our arms around, because we were all wearing seatbelts) to music on Heidi's phone. We made a failed attempt to sing operatic karaoke to the song "Fields of Athenry" and we read all the advertising circulars we had been loaded down with at the fairgrounds. It was about two in the morning when I finally hit the hay. I had lost my court earrings, but I figured I would track them down later because I had to get up the next morning to go shopping in town. I spent an hour at Macy's (and another thirty minutes at Hidden Treasures) without finding a thing, and I forced Mom to detour to Three Divas Beads so I could get supplies for a bracelet. I took quite a while there, too, because it's hard to coordinate colors when your brain is still snoozing.

After the shopping, we attended the annual TVAC cast picnic. I will be playing the ostrich in this fall's produc- tion of Peter Pan, and I am double-cast as one of the Indians. (For clarity purposes, I call myself a 'squawstrich'.) We ended up staying and chatting with the hosts until about nine at night, at which point I went home, ate dinner, worked on my bracelet, and finally - finally - hit the sack at about midnight.

In the morning, my mom found my fair court earrings in the trash can, where I had accidentally thrown them away (along with a used piece of gum) after coming home from the rodeo. My brain had beat my body into bed - and it still hasn't wo- ken up.