The TX State Fair....a once in a lifetime opportunity

Kyle & I finally went along with all of the hype & excitement of the TX State Fair this year. We went for our "fair experience" this past Friday night. Here is a quick re-cap:

1.) We went on Friday night because we could get in for FREE. Yes, the star telegram press pass has its perks! Being the tight wads that we are on our budget, we didn't want our experience to break the bank too much. If you pay for admission at the gate to the state fair, you pay $14 per adult...yikes! I can think of many other things I'd rather spent my money on.
2.) We first had to figure out where to park. I printed off a map from the fair website (http://www.bigtex.com/) & tried my best to navigate Kyle to a parking place. Unfortunately, the press pass does not cover the $10 to park your car. But we did luck out & get a parking spot close to one of the many entrance gates (I think there are like 16 or something).
3.) After being wanded down at security to get in (I never had to go through security at the Miami county fair in Troy, OH), we were ready for the fair experience.
4.) Our first stop was at the "Dancing with the Dogs" show in one of the arenas. It was basically a show where dog trainers have trained dogs to do various tricks to music. Some of the acts were kind of cute, others were, as you can imagine, kind of dumb. Kyle & I both decided that our yorkie Pepper would fit into the dumb category.
5.) Our next stop was at the car show. This was pretty cool, as we got to see all of the 2009 models of various cars that were coming out without any pushing salespeople. We figured that by the time we are ready to buy a new car, it will be in a few years, so one of these car models is probably the kind we will end up with.
6.) Then it was time to start the eating process. I was starving & ready to try all of this good food I had heard my friends tell me about. If you have never been to the TX state fair, you can't just buy food with cash/credit cards. You have to first go to a booth & pay for meal coupons. One coupon equals $0.50. Kyle bought $20 worth of coupons, thinking this would be enough. (I mean, come on, we can eat at Chili's or a nice sit down restaurant for $20).
7.) The first thing I had to eat was a corny dog (for 8 tickets, or $4). Kyle didn't want to buy his own in case he didn't like it, so we split the corny dog. It was hand breaded & fried fresh on the spot, but was not any bigger than a corn dog you would purchase at Sonic or at the store.
8.) Then we were thirsty. I managed to find a vendor who had FREE tap water, which was awesome to us. (even though mine had a bug in it that I had to dig out before gulping it down). The bottles of water were 6 tickets (or $3), but we resisted buying one.
9.) We were also still hungry since we just split a corny dog, so Kyle decided he wanted some chili cheese nachos. He paid like 12 tickets or something for the tiniest thing of nachos I've ever seen. We were going to split it, but I only had a few chips cuz they didn't taste that great at all. Kyle only ate it because he paid for it. The stinky part is that right after he finished eating his tiny awful nachos, we walked by another booth that had really awsome looking nachos! Go figure!
10.) Then I was still hungry. So we finally found a booth that sold fried corn on the cob for 12 tickets ($6, I know, ridiculous!). It tasted ok, but was hard to split with the still hungry Kyle.
11.) After the corn, we decided to not spend any more money on food & went on a ride (for 12 tickets each) on the giant ferris wheel. This was a lot of fun! Scary that high up, but we enjoyed it. A good way to see a lot of Dallas! We could even see Baylor Dallas from the ferris wheel.
12.) After that, we looked at the schedule of events & noticed that there was a Las Vegas inspired light show about to start in 20 minutes. So we booked it over to the part of the fairgrounds where the show was to take place. Let's just say....we have both seen much neater things! There were like a few little fireworks and then this screen that was showing strange music videos and then a random fire fountain thing. Maybe we just aren't the "artsy type" but the light show wasn't that great. But I did enjoy spending time with the love of my life, Kyle.
13.) After the light show, we decided that we had had enough of the fair experience & were still hungry. We purchased some cotton candy (10 tickets) on the way out the door.
14.) Since we were still hungry, on the way home we stopped at Jack & the Box for dinner. We both got filled up on the dollar menu for less than $5!

So overall, I had a fun time with Kyle. I also know what the State Fair is like. So, if a friend asks me in the future if I would like to go, I will politely tell them "no thank you, let's just go eat junk at Jack & the Box instead!" Better yet, let's go to Chili's!