Quick Job Update

Long story short, not a lot of places within the distance I was willing to travel are hiring music therapists.

So I'm doing the crazy thing and opening up a private practice.

I'll possibly talk about it in more detail later; I'm still getting everything set up. I'm also working part time to make enough money to afford to open up my own business. Graveyard shifts at a residence for adults with developmental disabilities-- not a bad gig, but the hours are killing me. Oh well, it's just until I can make enough money with my business that I don't need another job OR until this plan crashes and burns and I find a job somewhere else after all.

Adulting Status: I need external help to keep track of what day it is and whether or not it's been a week since I last slept. Also, still living in my parents basement. And I'm a business owner with no actual clients. But I'm freaking paying for my own health insurance, so, that's something right?

The Western Idaho State Fair

So this summer my roommates and I decided to take a jaunt through the Western Idaho State Fair when it came through Boise. My roommates were particularly excited to see a concert by some singer I heard a staff member describe to a visitor as "that young lady that couldn't make it last year", aka Cyndi Lauper. 

The first gauntlet was just getting parked; traffic was backed up approximately as far as Oregon and most of the parking lots were charging $10 or more. Juliet and I managed to find an open spot just a twenty minute walk from the fairgrounds along a sketchy dirt road without having to pay, but Wendi shelled out for a closer space for her car. Which necessitated some phone tag and Marco Polo to find each other in the parking lot, but eventually we found each other and were able to buy tickets and get in.

My roommates went to see Cyndi Lauper first, but I wasn't in the mood for crowds, loud music, or 80s music, so instead I took off to the first free attraction I could find-- the butterfly tent.

It was a special tent containing several dozen butterflies, monarchs and painted ladies.

The Monarchs were more social than the Painted Ladies, but eventually I was able to coax one of them down for some photos.

You'll of course notice the expensive and high tech butterfly feeding wand each visitor was issued--i.e. A Q-tip dipped in nectar. There was also a box of chrysalises, but they had all hatched already so I didn't get any photos. 

We also had to be checked for stowaways before we left the tent.

My next adventure-- a motorcycle show. My roommates found me there and expressed confusion that I found Cyndi Lauper too loud and crowded but stayed for this whole thing. Um... Yeah, I've got no explanation. But, hey, look, motorcycle stunts!

After this I met up with my roommates again and we went window shopping around some of the outdoor vendors. Boise has a lot more diversity in food options than I would have guessed before living in Idaho-- there were tons of vendors selling food from a variety of nationalities and styles-- but I quickly realized that on my carefully budgeted spending money for the night ($2), the only thing I could afford to buy myself was a bottle of water. Sigh. But my roommates were nice and shared some of the frybread they bought.

As it grew darker, we walked through the carnival rides. My roommates had brought enough money to go on one ride, but wanted to see them all before they decided where they would spend their tickets. While I was too poor to ride anything myself, I enjoyed trying to photograph the brightly lit rides and games. Some of the photos actually turned out pretty well, considering that I was in a dimly lit field using a cellphone camera.

In the end, I watched my roommates' purses and took photos while they took their ride, though it was next to impossible to get clear photos on this one:

Last we went to the indoor displays (which felt backwards for me; when I was a kid going to the fair with my parents, I always remember seeing the livestock and the art and plants first), but a lot of things had already been put away because it was already quite late on the second to last day of the fair. Still, there was some nice artwork and photographs, and the biggest sunflower I've seen in my life:

You could sit on that thing!

Afterward we had to walk a ways in the dark to find that elusive free parking spot, but we made it back to our vehicles without further incident. All in all, I had a great time. But you can decide what it says about me that the highlight of an event with roller coasters, motorcycles, and Cyndi Lauper, my highlight was playing with the butterflies.