I love biggest vegetable contests, but most gardeners would like to know in the spring, so they can throw ridiculous amounts of care at one vegetable.

Things like baking and canning competitions (best pie, best chow chow, etc.) are good if you want community participation, and you can make some money from entry fees. It helps if you can corral a local celebrity food person. It would be historically accurate.

Cake and pie sales at county fairs are often done by church groups or PTAs here, so you could invite such groups so that they could raise funds and it would be an inexpensive draw.

Anything in which someone is making something an old fashioned way is interesting, and maybe you have a business in the area that makes cider or syrup or something else that they'd like to promote. (In the South, fall fairs used to have a cane mill with a mule walking around and round and someone boiling down the cane syrup.)

Another possibility is a children's art competition with a fall theme.

I personally like mule pullings, but I think that's mostly just me.

juliebird, you might also want to check out Stone Barns Agricultural Center. I know the executive director if you want someone to call.

Wow. In completely inappropriate coverage of Chelsea Clinton's wedding, from the New York Times: [link]

Arguably the most important question is who will officiate. The groom is Jewish, the bride Methodist. Will there be both a rabbi and a minister? Will vows be exchanged only after the Jewish Sabbath ends Saturday night? Will Mr. Mezvinsky seal the deal with the traditional smashing of a glass? Will Hiram Monserrate be at home taking notes on the proper way to break one?

so many great ideas! Thanks, Cash (hey, it's only a state away!).

What about live music? When I think fall and music, I go to a banjo and fiddle/bluegrass place.

I think about any acoustic music is fine. If you want to push the historical route, go with someone who performs old American folksongs (or sea shanties if you're close to the sea). Contra dancing is also an old form of dancing that was popular in the US in the 18th and early 19th centuries (it's still danced today, though). A lot of the moves are the same as square dancing but it's even more of a mixer dance. The couple will interact with almost every other couple on the floor. If you get a caller who can stick to simple contras, it's a good way to get people moving and involved.

Oh god, went to take a sip of my iced tea and felt something against my lips. It looks vaguely like a spider .

I just took a Zipcar to bring a bunch of stuff to electronics recycling.

that place is in a black hole. I always get lost going there.

I'm watching Coyote Ugly on TV. I thought it was ridiculous the first time I saw it, and it's still ridiculous, but it's got decent music, and I need something in the background. I think my eyerolling started when the girl from NJ got a job at a bar in NYC, and her being from NJ was so unusual and exotic that the other people who work there start calling her Jersey.

I was disappointed in that movie. I thought it had potential, and they marketed it badly. It seemed like a movie about some kickass women running a bar, but it turned out to be a sappy rom com abot a struggling songwriter. The movie would have been a lot more interesting if they'd explored the background/lives of the other girls. Like Tyra in law school or the girl with anger management issues.

::cries::

I tried not to look as I rinsed the cup out, but I saw it when I opened my eyes to shut the faucet off. All eight legs of it.

I'm clutching my mouth and shuddering.

At least all the legs were still there, Juliebird. I had a bug in my coffee one morning. I'm pretty sure I cried.

I'm so glad I don't sleep with my mouth open. The stories I've heard about the amount of bugs people ingest at night makes me quiver.

But, spiders... if it was a fly, I'd be all "Gross!", but a spider I'm all about insane body shivers and clenches and panic, even at the memory of it.