Washington, MO Fall Festival of the Arts and Crafts

Every time my wife and I try to plan some fun event we get defeated by the weather. No matter what the occasion is or whom we are with it never fails, the weather is wrong.

A while back we tried to set up a nice evening of burning some wood and roasting some Smores. The entire week was cool and in the evenings it was borderline cold. But the evening of the Smores it was a cool 95 degrees after sunset. And let me tell you, there is nothing better than sweating next to a roaring fire in 95-degree shade. The evening went off without a single complaint, but I’m sure our guests would have rather had been back home in their nice cool air-conditioning. And I’ll be surprised if they ever come over for another fun evening by the fire.

A more recent example is for months we have been planning a trip to the Washington, MO Fall Festival of the Arts and Crafts. We invited the same couple that came to our 95 degree marshmallow roasting.

The week prior to the art event we started talking it up to everyone and inviting anyone that showed any interest. We talked about all the great booths and wonderful weather from previous years. I told everyone that would listen about the beer tent that gave out a complementary collectors edition glass that you could drink out of and bring home! I still use the glass to this day. I bragged about the great food samples you can get at each booth, and all the different salsa’s, hot sauces, and jalapeno jellies you could handle.

When the day finally arrived we had a small group of people prepared to go, but half of them looked out their window that morning and decided not to go. Off to the west was a horrible looking storm cloud just waiting for us to leave the house.

We decided to wait a few hours to see if the storm would finally come and pass, but by noon there was still no rain and we decided to brave it and go to the festival. As soon as we walked out the door to head out the first drops of rain started falling.

Stubborn and determined to go we decided to go anyway. We packed up the car and headed out and drove the 45 minutes to Washington, MO. By the time we got there, with only the Smores couple, the weather had cleared and it looked to be an enjoyable day.

We walked around and saw the sights. A few new ones like the Jasbo’s Salsa stand and the 1920s style women’s hats. And a few old ones like Cowboy Chris’ Buffalo Wing Sauce stand and The Gorde Guy, a guy that makes art out of gordes. To my disappointment there were no complementary collectors glasses at the beer stand, so I settled for the plastic Bud Light cup.

When we had seen a good amount of kitschy arts and crafts we decided to go get some pie at Cowan’s Cafe. In my opinion, it’s some of the best pie I’ve ever had. I’m normally not a big pie fan but this pie is great. They also sell food there, but again in my opinion, it’s nothing to write home to mom about.

After our pie we decided to wander a bit longer but by the time we reached the end of the street we saw another huge storm cloud on its way in. The lady at the beer tent said they were closing up shop because of the sever weather, that was my tip to pack up my family and go home. We said goodbye to our friends, packed up our stuff and raced to the car to try and beat the rain.

As soon as we got in the car the sky’s opened up and it started too poor. I had a few too many beers to drive so my wife took the wheel. We made it home safely, but it made me think. Either I have the worst timing when it comes to planning things or someone doesn’t want me to have a good time. The weather is always the opposite of what it should be. Murphy’s Law, Karma, or some Supreme Being; whatever it is, I wish it would leave me alone, I do just fine at screwing up my own plans, I don’t need any help.

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