I'm A Tattletale!

And darn proud of it!

But first, a let's back up a little.

I've posted before that every year we like to go to the St. Elias Festival in Brooklyn Ohio.  The food is fabulous, the dice-on-the-wheel game is exciting, and the time spent with friends is priceless.

My friend Edna came home from San Diego for the festival and for her Mom's birthday.  Since her Mom and Dad (Sally and Nick) had adopted me, I was all about celebrating her Mom's birthday too!  We get together with Nick and Sally every year for this festival.  It was an added bonus that Edna made it in this year to play our reindeer games.

We usually hit the festival on Friday night for dinner and then the music.  The temps were in the 90s Friday night with the humidity not far behind.  I could not deal with that.  We all decided that it was just too hot to go to the festival, so we instead chose plan "B" which was dinner at Nick and Sally's house.  That is always a great plan "B"!  We got to eat, joke, talk and just catch up.  We still planned on festival fun, but we were playing it day by day to see if the weather broke.

Sunday was our day.  The temps fell but the threat of rain was there.  We decided to chance it anyway!  I am so glad we did!

We all met up at the festival in the tent with the food and the dice-on-the-wheel game.  It's a big wheel that every space has three dice faces on it.  It could be a 1 - 2 - 6 or a 3 - 4 - 5 or a 2 - 6 - 6 or any and every combination.  On the tables around this wheel are corresponding dice faces numbered 1 through 6.  You put a dollar on the number you want to come up on the wheel, the wheel is spun and if the wheel stops on your number, you're a winner!  It's a one to one ratio, so if I bet 6 (which was my number!) and three 6s came up, I'd win three dollars.  One 6 comes up, I win one dollar.  No 6s, I lose!

I'm really not a big gambler, but I'm telling you, we have so much fun at this game!  Part of it is I love to yell out SIX SIX SIX SIX while the wheel is spinning.  Most of the time, I can get the crowd to join me in the reindeer games until everyone around the wheel is yelling out their favorite number!  Our first time at the wheel that night, the woman calling the game was a hoot.  She'd have these funny diddies that she'd say as the wheel was spinning that would just crack me up!  My favorite one was "I spin, you win"!  Ok, I had to run with that one!  "C'mon!  Spin it so I could win it!!!"  We were having so much fun!

You have to understand that this is a fund raiser for a Church.  That's almost always a good cause.  So, I take my money there and plan on leaving it there for the Church.  My hope is that I have a lot of fun losing my money.  If I have fun, I'm jiggy with the donation!

Between screaming "SIX" and "you spin it so I can win it!" I had a whoop load of fun!  Until some kids came up next to me.

I'm old, and the older I get, the younger everyone else looks.  I'm guessing these kids were in high school or about there.  By now there are a lot of people around the table, so the people working the table have their hands full trying to watch everyone and be fair.  I'm laying my money on the six of course, and these kids have $2 on 2 and $2 on 3.  Two 2s came up on the wheel.  While the workers were going around the table trying to pay out or collect the money, these kids reached out and moved their $2 bet on #3 to the #2 spot.  C'mon, really?

I thought the guy working the table saw that, but he must have missed it as he was paying the kid out $8 on what he thought was a $4 bet.  So me and my big mouth entered the fun.

I chastised the kid right there.  I said something to the effect of "really?  You're going to cheat the CHURCH?  You know all of this money goes to the CHURCH and you're cheating?  You know that's just wrong, don't you?"  The kid and I did a little back and forth where he tried to talk his way out of it and I wouldn't let him. So he stayed and bet until the money was gone, with me and the worker watching him like a hawk.

I believe there is a special kind of hell for people that rip off the Church and this kid was just way too young to be going down that path.  I did tattle on him and hopefully he felt bad enough to turn his little ass around.

Other than this little hiccup, the festival was awesome.  After playing the wheel for awhile, we all put the feed bag on.  I really don't know the name of much of this stuff. All I can tell you is that we had some of the regular food, like the stuffed grape leaves and the kibbie and the little pie filled with spinach (I can't remember the name of this one right now) and Ron and I tried a couple of new sandwiches.  I got a chicken shawarma and Ron got the kafka which was made with beef.  Both very good sandwiches, hard to tell which was better.  Like I said, great food at this festival!  All that with no pictures!  Ugh!  I am such a slacker!

After dinner, we went back to the wheel for a little more gambling, then over to the music tent.  I'm not sure if it was the same band from last year, but again, a three piece band playing the Middle Eastern music.  You know, I don't have a clue what they're saying, but I LOVE this music!  My feet were tapping, I was clapping along and cheering when everyone else did.  Once again, I chickened out of getting up to dance, but maybe next year.  The music is addictive, I didn't want it to stop!

Unfortunately, when we were on our second turn at the wheel, it started to pour.  And I mean pour.  It was one of those rains that you'd swear if you'd just wait a minute, it would HAVE to slow down!  It never did!  O M G!  We were soaked by the end of the night as there was no other alternative in getting to the music tent than walking out in the rain.  Then, we parked a whoop away from the festivities so Ron and I were drenched by the time we got to the car afterwards.

I was cold, tired, but fed well, my ears still full of good music, and happy.  It's always great to spend time with friends.

I had no voice today, and answering the phone at work was a challenge!  Most everyone was compassionate about my lost voice and were patient with me while I tried to get what I was saying across.  I think some tea with honey is on my schedule for tonight!

I really don't feel too badly, I just don't have a voice.  Hmm, maybe that was what I got for tattling on the cheating kid!  Well, if so, it was worth it.