Part of being the Special Projects Supervisor for Special Events is being challenged to not only make established events like San Diego’s Best Dance Crew bigger and better each year, but to come up with new contests that will attract the crowds and entertain.  I’ve had my failures, but I think with the DJ Mix-Off we really pulled it off.  It was a great event from start to finish with DJ Wonderbread, Qoolee Kid, DJ Snipez, and DJ Bandoma competing for $1,000 and many of the great DJ’s from Z90 like Kid Viscious, DJ Rich E Rich, DJ Mission, Majestik, and Al Squared judging the contest.

DJ Bandoma

Really glad we pulled it off, because I think this could be a returning contest next year.  And our Marketing department really pulled through for us in helping promote this new contest, and getting us a great partner in Z90.  Last but not least special thanks to Blaine, the afternoon jock at Z90 who was there to attend the event, and was able to step up and host when Tati from Z90 had a family emergency.  It was all around a team effort and a great event.  Congratulations to DJ Bandoma on winning!

Frog Legs, Chocolate Dipped Pickles, Deep Fried Butter, Chocolate Covered Bacon, Deep Fried Klondike Bar … you name it and the San Diego County Fair most likely has it! But the last thing I thought I would ever try here at the Fair, or in my life, was Camel’s Milk.  To my surprise, I was asked to accompany Nancy & Gil Riegler from the Oasis Camel Dairy last week as they headed off to the Vita-Mix booth to have their staff whip them up a Camel’s milk and dates milkshake! As you probably have heard, Nancy and Gil have tackled the challenge of going on a 14 day diet of solely camel’s milk and dates! Pretty crazy stuff if you ask me…especially with all of the delicious food and smells here at the fair tempting them everyday.

As we wandered over to Bing Crosby Hall where the handy dandy Vita-Mix Booth is located (go check them out, that blender is pretty intense and can whip up just about anything including homemade soup, go figure) I did not know what to expect. I figured I would just stand by and watch and shoot some video footage with my tiny little flip camera and then be on my merry little way, but ohhh no I was wrong… I was chosen to be a taste tester alongside Nancy and Gil! After watching the Vita-Mix pro whip up our shakes I was pretty apprehensive about the whole thing. Camel’s milk? Dates? Together in a shake? What did I get myself into…but oh what the heck I figured, one little sip wouldn’t kill me. As I waited for my shake, a crowd of fairgoers had gathered to see what the heck was going on. When we told them what we were doing, they all thought we were crazy! So they stayed to watch and see our reaction. Now the moment of truth had arrived and it was my turn to try this new twist on a milkshake. This concoction was not what I expected at all (in a good way)! To my surprise it was actually super tasty and healthy too! If I had not known any better, I would have guessed it to be a regular old fashioned chocholate milkshake (yummy yummy in my tummy:).

So, long story short, and as my Dad always say…”Don’t knock something ’til you try it!” And I have to agree with my Dad on this one.  One of the best parts about coming to the Fair is getting to try and experience new things every year, cause you never know what kind of funs things might pop up here. So head on out to the fair and try something new, whatever it may be!

Artwork by E-man, The Dope Show

The Dope Show is a collection of artists working together to make art and share their love of the Hip Hop culture.  At the San Diego’s Best Dance Crew event on June 24, The Dope Show performed a “Live Art” demonstration combining graffiti and brush techniques to create unique pieces of art.  These artists donated their time and art to a great cause in The Don Diego Scholarship Fund.  The artists that took part were E-Man, Monique, SPIC, Gumaro, Crevice Creeps, Kristine De Dios and Amon.

They each individually created a piece and then with friends worked on the collaboration.  Check out these art pieces online and bid on them for a great cause at:

http://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/item/Browse.action?auctionId=114691386.

150 head of cattle make their way through the Fairgrounds

Don’t know how many of you city slickers knew this, but we had a Cattle Drive.  No, really we did.

There were a hundred or so cows, some horses and real live cowpokes.  They walked them all around the Fairgrounds.  From the Del Mar Arena to the east parking lot, around the race track and in front of the Heineken Grandstand Stage.

Now you are wondering “How did I miss that?”  Well Buckaroos, I’m here to tell ya.   We did it this morning, Monday, June 28.  Yup, that’s why you missed it.  We were closed.  Side note: We will be open next Monday July 5.

Is this a great place to work or what?  Now work with me here.  How many people get paid to go to work and put on “out of the corral” stuff like cattle drives?  Not to mention doing them on days we are closed?  Side note#2: We will be open next Monday, July 5.

Sometimes I think management should charge us admission to work here.  I hear it was a good time had by all.  It was a little too early for this “sidewinder.”  However, you may want to consider this.   There is a non-confirmed rumor that the “king of anything and everything  deep fried,” was spotted following this bovine parade with wheel barrow and shovel.  So, keeping that in mind, when you come to the fair this week – Side note #3: we will be open next Monday, July 5 - and you notice “new item” hastily scribbled on a menu board, go ahead and “Taste the Fun!”…I dare you.

Bet you didn’t know we have a worm bin her at the Del Mar Fairgrounds! Well, technically we call it the Vermi-Composting Bin and this thing is crawling with thousands of worms for a good cause! It’s a win-win situation that keeps the cycle of life going as our worms feed on old fruit and veggie scraps in return for castings we use to fertilize the Fairground gardens. We are taking old food that would normally be disposed of and turning it into rich fertilizer (with the help of our worm friends of course) used to help our plants and gardens grow!

So you might be wondering just how effective these worms really are? Well, believe it or not, they handle 250 lbs of scraps per week during the racing season alone! That’s about the same weight of 2,600 Kit Kat bars!! As long as our worms stay “happy” they are able to reproduce and re-compost. Our friends at the Solana Center actually come over and help take care of our worms since we constantly need to make sure they get plenty of darkness and food that is not too acidic.

With all this love and care our worms are able to make the best fertilizer that we collect all throughout the year! So this year, be sure to stop by our Vermi-Composting bin out in The Farm, located in the Sparkletts Water Infield, because you won’t want to miss out on what our worms have been up to!!

Many people deem Tuesday as the worst day of the week…and understandably so. The fun you had over the weekend has started to fade into a distant memory and the week is still soooo far from being over. But for me, Tuesdays are definitely my favorite day of the week here at the San Diego County Fair. Why, you may ask? Because every Tuesday is Taste of the Fair day – you can peruse the Fair’s plethora of food booths and indulge upon sample size portions of your favorite and crazy fair food for only $2 each. I mean if this isn’t a fairgoer’s paradise, I don’t know what is!

Over the course of the last two weeks, myself and the four other equally hungry marketing interns have succeeded in eating our way through the Fair’s Avenue, Concourse, Infield and Plaza de Mexico. We may be skinny, but man can we eat (and for this we thank our young and rampant metabolisms…heaven forbid if they ever slow down!) At any moment of any day you can find one of us coaxing the others to head out into the chaos to “taste-test” a new fair delicacy. At this point our eating has gone way beyond tasting; we have almost eaten the whole dang Fairgrounds.

Some of the delectable sample sized food portions include half of a giant pretzel, a mini meatball sub, half a mile-long hot dog, and mini churros, just to name a few. There are over 50 different food booths that offer this deal to fairgoers, so for all the people who visit the Fair for its food, this is the perfect way to try everything you may be craving without breaking the bank. My personal $2 favorites have been the half a cinnamon roll covered in cream cheese frosting and walnuts (seriously delicious) and the taste of cheesecake rolled in Oreo cookie crumbles. The portions are good sized and I always leave feeling fully satisfied.  So if you are like me and love to eat, you have just found a new reason to start loving Tuesdays.

Help shake off the post-weekend blues and come on out and sample all the tasty treats here at the Fair, every Tuesday for only $2!

Anthony teaches Fair employees Thriller moves

If you opened the Union Tribune this morning you will have seen on the front page just one of the MANY tributes the Fair had to Michael Jackson yesterday on the one year anniversary of his death.  In the morning we checked in over 150 dancers from C Star Productions for a Michael Jackson Thriller dance on the avenue.  And in the evening another 250+!  I heard it was pretty cool to see, and the picture in the UT is impressive.  While I was one of the many people helping pull this stunt together from day one, I actually missed both performances because I was busy elsewhere on the Fairgrounds.  More on that in moment, but I really wanted to bring to attention one of our Special Events staff who did not get all the press and accolades but did make a lot of people very happy.  One of our staff, Anthony, is like the biggest Michael Jackson fan ever.  Last year during the Hip Hop Dance Competition when word started spreading through Blackberries and iPhones, Anthony was almost in tears at the news that one of his favorite entertainers had died.

One year later, with this big zombie stunt planned and announced many of the Fair employees wanted to take part as well.  Knowing Anthony’s love for Michael Jackson, I challenged him to teach as many of the Fair employees the Thriller dance as were willing to learn.  Check out the picture of Anthony teaching some of the ladies from HR, Marketing, and Admin.  Now this was just the start.  I hear that at the morning performance of Thriller even the GM was out there shaking his Zombie groove thing.  So hats off to Anthony for staying up late the night before and practicing his dance moves.  He made some Fair employees very happy.

Now the reason that I could not witness both performances is because I had the Semi-Finals for the Musicpalooza contest AND my night I booked for Comedy Nights @ The SD Fair.  Yesterday the zombies descended on the Fair and today, I FEEL like a zombie.  Braaaaaaiiiiiiinnnnnnsssss…..

Marketing Intern, Kelly, on the Heineken Grandstand Stage

Every night of the Toyota Summer Concert Series on the Heineken Grandstand Stage, a very famous artist or band puts on an amazing show.  But, before the show even begins, a chosen intern (that’s where I come in) has to go on stage in front of the entire crowd (who is honestly sometimes getting very anxious and rambunctious waiting) and announce upcoming events of the San Diego County Fair.  Almost every night, we are greeted with cheers and whistles, I think because the crowd is just happy to see ANYONE come on stage!  It’s a pretty sweet rush and I now can somewhat relate to how big musicians must feel rockin’ out for their fans.  Granted, these people are not members of the “Marketing Intern Fan Club,” but it’s still pretty cool to get cheered on by a large crowd just for walking ten steps to a microphone!

It’s only about 45 seconds of actual stage time but it is definitely on the ‘perks’ of working at the Fairgrounds.  We only have about seven days left, but I am really excited to announce for Uncle Kracker, Lifehouse, OneRepublic, and Jeff Dunham next week! You can be the judge, but I think we are ready for our own World Tour!

Prepping the Arena for the Big Day!

Oh man today is huge!  San Diego’s Best Dance Crew is taking over the Chevrolet Del Mar Arena and I am so excited for this event.  The details of the event are literally smothering me and I cannot wait for 11am when the Youth Division kicks off and I can finally breathe a sigh of relief and just enjoy this amazing event.  I wanted to mention some folks that really make EVERYTHING here at the Fairgrounds run smoothly.  That is our Production and Operations departments.  I was here late last night making sure that my dance floor was put in the right place, booths were setup correctly and other last minute details.  But late for me is early for them.  Throughout the night, EVERY night, these people work tirelessly breaking down stages and events and setting up the next event for the next day.  They literally announced the winners for the horse show at 7:30pm Wednesday night and by 10pm everything was out, the dirt floor was packed like concrete, and Raphael’s Party Rentals was laying the dancefloor.  And after SDBDC ends?  They do it all again for another event on Friday.  These people are AMAZING.

Dentist-to-be Omar

23 year old Omar is no stranger to the San Diego County Fair, and with one year to go in his dentistry studies, this future DDS – who is used to working summers here at the Fair – says it’s ok to enjoy your deep fried goodies, IF you take good care of yourself.

“It’s ok to eat deep fried foods, if you don’t forget to wash and take good care of your teeth. The problem with fair food, specially with little kids, is over indulging with the sweets and forgetting to clean up your smile”, says our future DDS.

According to Omar, who works at the Australian Battered Potatoes stand on the Avenue of the Palms, the best way to help your smile and enjoy the yummy Fair food, especially if you suffer from acid reflux, is to “not forget to take your medications before you eat deep fried food to avoid the acid from damaging your teeth, not to mention it feels better after you eat it and totally avoid the heartburn and indigestion.”

So don’t forget to take your Prisolec early in the morning before you head over here, and throw a roll of Tums or Pepto tablets and a toothbrush in your pocket.  You want to enjoy your Fair Food Favorites and want to keep that awesome smile cavity free!