The Fair is Fiscal Dry Rape

Ahh, the fair.  Bright lights, exciting rides, games of chance and games of you-have-no-chance.  Breathe deep, and notice the smells.  Corn dogs, sawdust, vomit, cotton candy, and… what’s that?  That underlying smell…  It smells almost like the concession stand at the movie theatre.  It isn’t the smell of popcorn; it’s the smell of greed.

The fair is a god-awful place, designed to do one thing: suck the money right out of your wallet.  From the cost of admission, to the ride tickets, to the food you throw up while on the rides, everything is overpriced.  Paying to get into the fair is like paying to get into a time-share sales pitch: you’re paying to be fiscally dry raped.

Paying for the rides is the only part of the experience that comes close to not being a hugely irresponsible use of your hard earned money.  Rides suck up a lot of power, and they’ve gotta pay the asshole pushing the button to make it go.  Besides, rides are fun… if you’re a mentally deficient three year old.  Who actually enjoys paying to be spun around in a circle at high speed for five minutes?  That sounds more like something I’d pay to avoid.   Don’t even get me started on the Ferris wheel: it’s like every other ride, minus the mindless excitement of the other rides.  It’s a thrill ride for old people and people who are afraid of heights: everyone else is in for a miserable time.

Eating at the fair is akin to volunteering for gastrointestinal distress, at a price that none of us can really afford.  Paying $5 for a corndog that’s going to give me the runs is pretty much the cherry on the sundae of disappointment that is every experience I’ve had at the fair.

The carnie as we once knew him is no more.  Instead, the rides are being run by some asshole with a liberal arts degree who’s got no shot at finding a better job. He spent four years of his life and $40,000 so he could land a job pulling levers on a carnival ride like a FUCKING MONKEY!

So you’ve gone on the Zapper, controlled by a man with a master’s degree in philosophy.  You’ve paid $10 for a burger and fries from the hairy lady at the concession stand, and now you’re ready to play some games, because you’re an idiot.

Before stepping up to any of the games, take a good look at each one of them.  What’s similar about them?  No, it’s not the English major running them.  Nor is it the shitty prizes hanging from the ceiling.  What’s universal to all carnival games, is that they’re rigged.  100%, totally and completely rigged by design. 

None of the “good” prizes hanging from the ceiling can be won with one round at any of these games, no matter how good you are.  Even if you knock down all the bottles, or pop all the balloons, or win at that super creepy game where you shoot water in a clown’s mouth, you won’t get anything good. You have to win several shitty prizes, to trade them in for one mediocre prize.  You have to trade in many mediocre prizes for one crappy prize, and a few of those for the large stuffed animal your dog is going to latch on to.   You have to pay for many, many rounds of play before you even have a chance to win the stuffed dog you could have bought for $5 instead of the $60 it cost you to win it.  Only masochists and overcompensating A-type personalities are guilty of this; the rest of us are too cheap to waste all our money on it, and don’t have the 3 hours required to do it.

Even if you do have the time and money to waste, so what?  They’ve made a huge profit off of you, and you have nothing to show for it but a canine sex toy.  Oooh, you won that asbestos-stuffed octopus for your girl, did you? Well, she can warm up to it at night while you’re working the graveyard shift at McDonald’s because you blow the money from your day job on stupid games and hollow acts of chivalry. 

Do us all a favor; if you get excited when you drive past the fair, jump out of your vehicle and into traffic. The rest of us have better things to do, like posting rude things on the internet.