16th Most Favorite Thing About the State Fair of Texas: Coupons
Currency. Its stable circulation is the building block upon which most major world economies have been built since ancient times. Indeed, the successful trade of a unique legal tender for goods and services is one of the defining characteristics of a mature nation state — India has the rupee, Mexico has the peso, Japan has the yen, and the United States has the dollar.
I assume the ascension to nation-hood was a primary consideration in determining that the State Fair of Texas ALSO needed to have its very own currency. (I can personally think of nothing better than exiling myself to a nation built on principles including peace, love, fun for kids, even more fun for adults, binge eating, animal entertainment, and a general disregard for anything the rest of the world would classify as “serious.”) Yes, folks, once you enter the gleaming gates of the State Fair, your US dollars will no longer buy you anything of importance (except your Handwriting Analysis). In order to purchase food or Thrillway fun, you must exchange your dollars for official State Fair coupons.
It is a testament to the stability of the State Fair economy to note that the exchange rate inside Fair Park NEVER fluctuates (2 coupons = 1 dollar), no matter what sort of volatility we may experience in world currency markets. And even though coupons may look different each year, old coupons are always accepted by State Fair vendors. Again, who wouldn’t want to be a citizen of such a great nation?
Aside from these positives, the State Fair coupon possesses a few other characteristics that make it perhaps the most clever legal tender ever created. First of all, buying coupons seems to immediately drain (from the mind of the fairgoer, at least) all memory of how those coupons actually compare to dollars. Sure, right now, sitting calmly at a computer far away from the Fair, it is easy for me to remember that two coupons equal a dollar. But put most people (myself included) inside those gates, stuff a couple of sheets of coupons in their pockets, and they lose every ounce of mathematical and analytical sense:
A fried cookie is 10 coupons? Sure, sounds about right. I have absolutely no idea what that means, but mmmm…dee-licious!
For only 50 coupons, I can be strapped onto a contraption that launches me 50 feet in the air and then swings me around a few times on a giant elastic cord, and the whole thing lasts TWO WHOLE MINUTES?!? Where do I sign up?!
Obviously, the entire system was engineered after some close observation of the human condition.
Second, NOT having to mess around with cash and coins and small change and receipts and the like simply speeds up the efficiency of the entire food retrieval process, which, in turn, makes people like me VERY happy. When you’re on a mission — when you absolutely MUST get a Tornado Tater and begin to shovel it into your stomach within the next three minutes because you’ve been waiting an ENTIRE YEAR to have one, and even the tiniest nanosecond longer than three minutes will be one nanosecond too long — you really can’t be waiting around for someone to fish correct change in pennies out of a recalcitrant cash drawer. I am serious when I say that coupons very likely allay freak incidents of hunger-induced violence at the Fair.
If an item costs four coupons, you hand over four coupons. The vendor hands over the item. Exchange complete. A genius system.
So if anyone ever asks you which nation (or loose affiliation of countries) in the world has the most stable (and least annoying) currency, you now know the answer: The State Fair of Texas, of course.
