If you hate the term "throw up," you may want to not read this.

It doesn't matter where you live. There's a Sawdust Days festival everywhere. Sure, it may be called "Kalida Pioneer Days" or something like that, but it's all the same.

It's all AWESOME. Kind of.

See, the awesomeness (it's a word, I added it to my dictionary today) comes from going, eating greasy food and not feeling guilty about it until the next day, seeing friends, listening to crappy karaoke and watching people throw up on rides. It's seeing friends from high school, it's eating food on a stick -- any food, dessert, pizza, cheese, whatever. If it's on a stick, it must be festival time. It's the lights, the sounds, the booth-keepers yelling about guessing your weight or your birthday.

It's Americana. It's summer. It's small-town, even in a medium-sized city.

The kind of? It made me so homesick I could hardly finish my funnel cake the first time I went. Hardly finish, I said. I managed, don't you worry. But even as I walked around Sawdust Days with my friends here, I kept wishing I were at the Putnam County Fair, or the Pioneer. It's funnier watching someone throw up on the Zipper if you know that person, after all.

I went back after work tonight to walk around, and watch people scream on the rides; I was reminded of being 5, stuck up on the top of the Ferris wheel when the power went out at the fair. Then of the time I spent all my ride money trying to get a fish, only to come up empty-handed, while my cousin got the largest goldfish I'd ever seen. And it lived like, five years. I'm not even kidding. I got cheated. That fish could've been mine ...

But, dangit, I'm going back. And the fireworks are tomorrow, and I'm not going to miss that. Heck no.