Steel wading pool exhibition match. Two vertebrates enter; two vertebrates leave.

It’s that time again! The Indiana State Fair is an annual celebration of Hoosier pride, farming, food, and 4-H, with amusement park rides and big-ticket concerts by musicians that other people love. My wife and I attend each year as a date-day to seek new forms of creativity and imagination within a local context.

The State Fair also brings in entertainers from around the globe at various levels. Top-40 musicians play at the Coliseum; former Top-40 musicians play the large, free main stage; local acts play an even smaller stage; and a few touring entertainers perform in the farm-equipment areas, around the animal-education section, or near the 4-H Building. The latter charge no admission, earning only the intake from whatever merchandise they sell after their performance.

One of this year’s freebies was a traveling roadshow called “Kachunga and the Alligator”. The basic premise was several minutes of stage patter about swampland conservation and animal rights, followed by a few minutes of a man tussling with a modest alligator.

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