This weekend was made interesting by a trip to the Oregon State Fair. I usually go every year with my friend Torin, but we didn’t make it last year because it was raining. Luckily, the rain didn’t show up this year and the fair was attended.

Lots of cool things at the fair, and a lot of stuff I really wanted but didn’t buy for lack of funding and/or space. For example, I really wanted a Shopsmith Mark V 5-in-1 woodworking tool. It was so cool. In one machine, it’s a lathe, a table saw, a sander, a drill press, and a horizontal boring machine. It took the guy demonstrating the machine about six seconds to make this really cool table leg that had a sort of ring “trapped” around a section of it and then bore out a hole for a dowel to join it to a table. It was so amazing. If I had the money and the room for it, I’d have bought it. I’ve always been interested in building stuff, and they’ll even train you on how to use it and give you all sorts of self-study material to take home. Not bad, eh?

I also saw the Bernina Artista 180E, and wanted it really bad. Actually, looking at the Artista 200E, I want that one even more. These are sewing machines where you can scan in a picture and it’ll automatically figure out how to cross-stitch or embroider that picture (any size!) on whatever fabric you give it. Want a button hole? Stick the button up to the touch screen and the machine measures the button and makes the hole the right size. It threads the needle for you. Lots of cool stuff like that. Anyway, the 200E, which I’m looking at right now on the web site, actually has more stuff than the 180E, and it’s even got a color screen and runs Windows, right on the machine. How messed up is that? Not that I’m a huge tailor or anything, but I could get into the whole “sewing thing” if I had a machine running like that. A little on the expensive side, though, at nearly $4000 for the 180E. I can only imagine how much the 200E costs.

We also saw a pretty cool cheese grating gizmo that will grate both soft and hard cheeses for you. It’ll also shred unpeeled garlic and separate the peels from the garlic. I actually nearly bought one of those, but I didn’t because it would have taken away from my food money. They apparently carry these at Lechters Housewares, so I’ll have to go there and find one. I haven’t found it online yet, but I haven’t looked very hard, either.

So the fair was cool. I had my funnel cake, I had my BBQ beef sandwich… I’m a happy camper. That’s the fair.

On a whole separate note, I found out that Kristy Swanson is going to be in Playboy next month. Hell, yeah! I’ve had her on my top 10 list since the original Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie. Woohoo!

Speaking of Buffy, I have the second season DVD set and the second disc is bad. So I’ve been trying to find a Fred Meyer locally to exchange it, but no Freddy’s in the Portland metro area has it. Unbelievable. So I’m still looking. Guess I’ll have to try again this weekend.