Country Music at the County Fair

Note: Mary is on temporary hiatus during September. This post was originally written on August 30, 2006.

A couple of weeks ago, I spent a Saturday wandering around the Dakota County fairgrounds, on the beautiful south side of Farmington. The county fair is an event akin to Christmas for me. I usually go two or three times. This Saturday was my first round of animal barns and mini-doughnuts.
I was munching a giant pickle on a stick when I spotted the Power 96 van parked in front of the John Deere display. Power 96 is the best radio station serving the Farmington, Northfield, and Faribault area. You know why I love this station so much? They never play ads for jewelry stores. After a couple hours of listening to 93X, I’ve heard endless reminders of where to shop for that special gift. There’s Arthur’s Jewelers, where you never ever pay mall prices, and Tom Shane, my friend in the diamond business on Radio Drive. Then there’s Dean and Yumi at Wedding Day, and Goodman’s, where you can buy a gift that goes straight through the heart. After hearing all of these ads several times a day for the past ten years, I never want to buy a special gift for anyone ever again. If you get a pair of earrings from me, I’m sorry. They are Cubic Zirconia, straight from the Dollar Store, where you never ever pay mall prices. If you really want a special gift, I hope it’s power tools.
Anyway, I was standing by the Power 96 van, wondering why they weren’t broadcasting live from the fair. They broadcast live from the Steele County fair in Owatonna. The Dakota County Fair is bigger, and it has more 4-H exhibits. As I stood there, I heard the strains of a country music song from the beer garden. The lyrics were faint. “I wear this crown of . . . a most peculiar thing . . . the needle tears a hole, that old familiar sting.” The lyrics were from the Nine Inch Nails song “Hurt”. The experience was so surreal, I thought I was having an auditory hallucination. Like maybe my desire to hear Nine Inch Nails instead of country music, and the lack of Power 96 rock, was combining to make me hallucinate.
So this week I was relieved to discover that there really is a country-music version of the song “Hurt” on one of Johnny Cash’s recent albums. I did not know Johnny Cash was a Nine Inch Nails fan, but it’s not all that strange, considering Pat Boone is buddies with Alice Cooper. I proudly own a copy of “No More Mister Nice Guy”, Pat’s heavy metal cover album. His version of Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” is swinging.