My First New York Street Fair

Today at work we had a booth set up at a street fair on Broadway. Mattie, my coworker, was born and raised in Manhattan and took me for a little walk on a quick break and gave me some NYC Street Fair pointers. Basically its like a midway, but there aren't rides, just vendors. They sell a variety of things; some on the hand-crafted side, others tacky. Mattie says all street fairs are exactly the same but that doesn't take away from how great they are. Street fairs also have fair food. New Yorkers love different fair food than I love. For one thing they all eat grilled corn on the cob. I'm not saying I don't love corn on the cob! Who doesn't!? But for every vendor of any kind in that fair, there was a second booth selling ears of grilled corn. Most of the people walking by were eating grilled corn. Mattie was very effusive about how great corn on the cob is and how exciting it is to have at street fairs and then bought an ear. I guess us southerners are just used to having corn on the cob all summer. It was kind of weird to me for sure. Mattie also got something from a pickle stand that was, allegedly, a 'New Pickle', but was in fact a cucumber with vinegar on it. Mattie said 'new pickles' are her favorite kind of pickle. Also New Yorkers are very excited about Zeppole, which is another kind of fried dough, but, as Mattie put it, so much more than fried dough. They have funnel cake and crepes too, but nobody was nearly as excited about that as zeppole. I heard about them all day. I had a corn dog. I wasn't feeling very adventurous. My mistake, as it wasn't nearly as good as Nathan's and I felt kinda gross after. The sun was very hot and the fair was crowded. I spent the rest of the day teaching little kids that wandered by the booth how to make a tissue paper flower.

Also today I noticed that New Yorkers all call those inflatable jumping structures 'Bouncy Houses' while I grew up calling them 'Moon Bounce'. I thought this was a regionalism but I'm not sure now. What do you call them?

One thing they didn't have at the street fair were fly swatters. I sure could use one! Its hot tonight and I have my windows open. There's a fly buzzing around my room. Earlier tonight I had my fire escape window open, with the curtain closed and someone went up the fire escape! That's not really allowed and I'm very curious as to what that person was up to. Shortly after I closed and locked the window whoever it was came back down. Weird! I have my hammer though.