Why not come dancing

One very busy Sunday in June 2018 we tried to go to the BalloonFest in Howell, Michigan, and then to the Livonia Spree, in Livonia. Both are local fairs carrying roller coasters and other attractions like that. We were successful at BalloonFest, but Livonia Spree disappointed us, as the roller coaster we wanted to ride was closed. It made up some, with a great cookie sundae and an amazing half-hour-long fireworks show. But we had that unfinished business. (We missed it in 2019 --- we were in upstate New York --- and 2020 and 2021 were 2020 and 2021, respectively.) But this year? ... BalloonFest would not have any roller coasters adults could ride. Livonia Spree, though? They would have that roller coaster we missed, and we even saw on-ride video taken from it this year.

My reservation, of course, was how packed it would be. Outdoors is strikingly safer than indoors but enough of a crowd and I get nervous again. I brought one of the basic Rite-Aid surgical masks that we keep in the pinball box, as something I could put on as need demanded and that could still fit in my pockets. (The N95's from the hardware store hold their shape too much.) This would prove adequate. The place was busy, but not packed, and there was enough space and enough breeze to feel reasonable. And compared to the long series of traffic jams and closed roads getting to the Spree, its last hours, in 2018? Going on the next-to-the-last-day, in the late afternoon was a breeze.

When we got there it was hot, a bit below 90 degrees, and sunny, and we thought this was not going to be much fun. Light clouds overtook the sun soon enough, though, and a couple degrees' drop in temperature made the environment great. Still, we did get a lot of lemonade --- the large plastic cups with half-price refills --- as that seemed like the best defense against the heat. It probably was but after drinking that and a refill we got to feeling bloated. Maybe we should've taken longer between refills.

The goal of going to Spree was the Super Cyclone, a portable steel coaster that's of a size and experience like that of the Serpent at Kokomo's. It had a pretty substantial line for a carnival ride, spilling out a little onto the midway. Later in the evening the line would grow even longer yet, wending a confusing trail over to the Balloon-A-Rama carnival game and not quite knowing what to do from there. Not sure if that's because the carnival was better-attended than they expected or because the rides were just that popular, just then. Still the wait was not much, about 20 minutes for the longer ride. Even with what seems like an excessive restraint system --- a bar, with seat belt attached, that hooks to a post that goes between the rider's legs --- they were moving, putting on and dispatching a load of passengers in a few seconds.

It's a fun ride (do I ever say anything else about a roller coaster?), and we got great views of the fairgrounds while riding. (Also of a mongoose bike left in the center of the turnaround spiral.) It had a nice gentle rattle, too, reminding me of the Serpent and its cozy rumbling.

The other roller coaster they had, and that we didn't know would be there, was a Wacky worm. That's one like we'd ridden at Delgrosso's years ago, and at Fantasy Island in Buffalo back in our 2019 visit, before that park's troubles. That's much more a kiddie coaster, like you'd think from the name and from the car having a figure of a large bug head on its front car. Nice ride, though, and you get two cycles on it. When we were waiting in line for it, a couple kids asked if we were waiting in line. We weren't sure whether this was because of the ambiguity of the line --- the rides did not have much queue capacity --- or their disbelief that adults would be waiting for a Wacky Worm when they didn't even have kids along.

We also took rides on their Himalaya, here named the Typhoon and featuring an art package I hope you understand if I describe as ``Women Doing Pirates Of The Caribbean Movie Cosplay''. And on their carousel, a tiny kiddie model that we technically were over the posted weight limit for and they weren't concerned about. We could not figure out who the manufacturer of the carousel was, and didn't see anything suggesting anything. The horse figures were too generic to suggest anything particular. The ride was fine, if a bit clunky.

They had a craft fair, with a bunch of slightly tempting things (we also got a free sample of homemade soap fragments). But our attention was drawn away from that and to pig races. One of the exhibitions was racing piglets in a series of circuits around a small track. The guy running the races was funny and pleasant, and talked up the intelligence of pigs using a dubious list that claimed the 'smartest' animals after humans were dolphins and (something) and pigs and so on, with dogs being pretty far down the list. Any cross-species intelligence comparison is flaky anyway but if we suppose humans are at the top, there's a lot of primates that have to be pretty close. The guy also warned that pigs are adorable at this age, but grow up fast, so if you're thinking of getting one as a pet, ``think twice, think again, and then don't get one'', a message repeated for Vietnamese potbellied pigs.

Anyway the races were quite, and cute, and funny, not least because the pigs kept falling out of their costumes. And the races were interrupted midway through with a separate race, one of wiener dogs in costumes. Was all quite silly and pleasant fun.

We ended up staying longer than we planned on, as we kind of knew we would. We'd wanted a last ride on the Super Cyclone, and this had the much longer queue this time even if it was only maybe a 20-minute wait. We would get home somewhere around 11 pm, and need to try to hurry to bed, because we had plans for Sunday. Maybe not big plans, but plans that required we get up at 7 am. In the morning.

More pictures from the Rodents SIG, taken over by the woodchuck at this point. You have no regrets for that, I'm sure.

Hi! Woodchuck is excited to meet you!

Hey, look at those feet!

Woodchuck exploring her environment and considering what the edge of the table might mean. I was terrified she might fall off, but that never threatened to happen. Note bunny_hugger getting ready to pet her.

Trivia: Thomas Edison picked John Kruesi to build the first cylinder-foil photograph from Edison's sketch. The budget for the construction was US$18. Source: Edison: A Biography, Matthew Josephson. (Edison paid his mechanics by a minimum-wage/piece-work system; if the project came in under cost, the worker got his base wage plus the difference between estimate and actual cost. Josephson does not write whether Kruesi finished under budget.)

Currently Reading: Moon Launch! A History of the Saturn-Apollo Launch Operations, Charles D Benson, William B Faherty.