According to television, the center of the universe this week has been the Iowa State Fair. It is an 11-day event and attracts upwards of 100,000 people a day.

My favorite part of any fair, be it the Decatur County Fair, the Georgia State Fair, or the Iowa State Fair would not be the midway or the rides. I really like the agricultural exhibits, but I’m sort of partial to the foods that one can get at fairs.

Health experts have their moments to let us know how important it is to eat foods that are low in calories and high in nutritional value, but they hold no sway over the people who go to various sized fairs and walk along the obliterated grass or sawdust and are magnetized unto those hawkers selling “whatever”-on-a-stick!

The first food I remember being on a stick was a Dixie Doodle. It was a glob of vanilla ice cream dipped in chocolate with a slender tongue depressor sticking in it so it could be held and eaten in convenience. Don’t look for anything Dixie anymore.

Of course most of us remember corn dogs. Corn dogs can still be found at fairs and who can resist a “weeny” dipped in a cornbread sort of batter and deep fried.

Add a little mustard and ketchup and it’s the kind of food that, as I say often, warms the cockles and clogs the arteries of any heart.

The interesting thing about the Iowa State Fair culinary offerings was that they offered 70, count them 70 items that one could buy on-a-stick!

Among those was a corn dog, but it was “gluten-free” whatever that may mean. I think it means a healthier corn dog, but who goes to a State Fair and peruses the food section looking for a healthy “weeny”?

The most popular item on-a-stick seemed to be the pork chop. I saw Hilary holding one of those. It looked like she was enjoying herself and good for her. She was probably glad that no one was offering an “email-on-a-stick!”

The Donald flew into Des Moines in his Trump-o-copter and landed at the fairgrounds. Magnanimously (and self-servingly as always) he offered helicopter rides to children. He was also seen walking the grounds with “hot baloney”-on-a-stick. Most say that was natural and he did not need it because he was already full of baloney.

The main reason that vendors put food on a stick is so that they might dip it into some hot grease and deep fry it. You might be surprised…not really…at some of the foods put on a stick and fried.

For instance there were peanut-butter and jelly sandwiches on-a-stick fried. There were monkey tails. I know you’re wondering what monkey tails are. Don’t worry, they’re not real monkey tails, but you knew that.

Monkey tails are bananas dipped in chocolate. Sounds pretty good to me, but fried?

All sorts of sweet “thangs” were on-a-stick and deep fried. Milky Ways, Snickers, Oreos, Twinkies, Key Lime Pie, Apple Pie; all on-a-stick and fried.

It really is amazing what we will eat when we are at a State Fair and under no compunction or sense of guilt.

It was also the perfect chance for presidential contender Dr. Ben Carson, the famous neurosurgeon, to examine the brains of the people he wants to govern. All while holding a double-bacon-chocolate-covered corndog in his hand. He just might reconsider this race!