Old Home Days in Warren

Team Grigsby's visit to Warren, New Hampshire, coincided with Warren's Old Home Days.  For those of you unfamiliar with the idea of Old Home Days, it's sort of like a really really REALLY small county fair, but with none of the judginess (of animals, pies, beauty queen contestants, etc.) that usually accompanies such fairs.  OHD is pretty is pretty much just an excuse to eat fried dough on the town common, play some games of chance, shoot off some fireworks, and throw a parade.

My friends Joe and Wendy live right in the center of Warren in a very cool, 19th-century barn that has been converted into a living space.   

"The Barn"

"The Barn," as it is called, is wonderfully convenient for all things Old Home Days.  It's a stone's throw to the town common, the fireworks are launched from its back yard, and it is right on the parade route.

First, the town common: 

Joe and Jenny on the Common.  Note the missile.

Warren's town common is like many other New England town commons (i.e., a patch of green grass surrounded by white clapboard buildings, a church a two, maybe a school, etc.) with one significant exception.  It has a missile. 

I borrowed this photo from Wikipedia because the photo I took didn't turn out.

There are conflicting stories as to how the missle came to reside in Warren.  The most popular account is that it was donated by some town muckamuck, who bought it in the early 70s, transported it from Alabama, and placed it in Warren in honor of long-time U.S. Senator Norris Cotton, a Warren native.

Anyway.  For OHD, the town common is awash in fried food vendors, games of chance, and people selling things made in China.  We of course availed ourselves of all three categories.  First, we ate buckets of french fries, pulled pork, and hamburgers (the latter two are not technically "fried," but they're pretty close).

We also played some games of chance:  the Chuck-a-Luck (sp?) and the Chicken Drop.  The Chuck-a-Luck consists of a booth with a long wooden rail that has the numbers one through six painted on it.  A caller has a little cage with three dice in it.  The patron places her bet(s) on whatever number(s) seem lucky.  The caller then rolls the dice in the cage.  If your number comes up, you win double your money.  Pretty basic stuff.

Wendy and Jenny at the Chuck-a-Luck

Another game of chance, the Chicken Drop, consists of a 6' x 6' pen with the numbers 1 through 50 painted on the plywood floor.  The patron pays $2 for a number.  Once all the numbers are sold, a chicken (one that has, presumably, eaten a lot recently) is literally "dropped" into the pen.  The first number that the chicken shits on wins $50.

And then there is the crap from China for sale.  I did not win the Chicken Drop, but I did make some money at the Chuck-a-Luck.  So I took my winnings and bought a totally pimping purple hat:

Yes, I know it's a crappy photo.  Shut up.

Next up, fireworks.  The fireworks were shot off from the trail behind Joe and Wendy's backyard.  So we all sat down in the grass with the alcoholic beverage of our choice, got consumed by voraciously insatiable mosquitos and other blood-sucking invertebrates, and enjoyed a fireworks display that was really quite impressive given the relatively small scale of OHD.

Oooh!  Aaaaah!

Finally, the next morning, we were treated to the OHD Parade (while we scratched the open wounds caused by the mosquitos and other invertebrates the night before).  The parade was a blast, if very short, lasting all of twenty minutes or so.  The first ten minutes were some floats, firetrucks, a couple of town bands (who, instead of marching, opted to sit in the back of flatbed trucks), and some classic cars.

Wild AND Awesome.

After the classic cars went by, the remaining half of the parade was taken up by Warren's ATV club:

Warren:  Human Population 1,000; ATV Population 1,500. 



And as the last ATV lurched by and the parade came to an end, we sadly had to say goodbye to Warren and hit the road.  Canada beckoned.  So we said our reluctant goodbyes to our gracious and most supremely awesome hosts, Joe and Wendy.  And just as we exited this New England gem of a town, Grigsby hit a milestone:



No, I wasn't driving when I took this photo.

 Next stop, the border!