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What happens when you’re standing on the corner, 70 of you, but not watching all the girls go by …

It wasn’t fair summer weather, but people did what they could to watch the big win by Mayweather over McGregor, and avoid zombies (from the annual pub crawl or those newly nuked?) at the same time.

— At first I thought there were enough young adults to be waiting for two party buses. On a recent Saturday night there were about 70 people gathered on the sidewalk next to front glass windows of the Agave Kitchen, and were at one point joined briefly by a police officer, to watch as best they could the latest Ultimate Fight of the Century shown only by a TV pay-per view situation. (That means there was about one such spectator for every weigh-in, fight-before-the-actual-fight word that McGregor uttered). I even saw a couple known years ago from the Beach Bar in Lakeland, and now living as polar opposites from Hudson by residing near Roberts, who said they just don’t get out much anymore but this was a special situation. Around the downtown, there were people gathered in small groups and “fighting” for the best spot to view the bout on individual’s social media equipment, such as on outside patios, even though it drizzled occasionally.
— Upstairs at one of those places, the Smilin’ Moose, dancing the night away were members of a bachlorette party where the theme was old pro sports jerseys. Between all of them, they covered virtually every major pro league, and it had been a while since anyone honored ol’ No. 91, Dennis Rodman, that way. The woman was swaying as much while she strutted as one of the missiles, say at around 2,000 feet, from a launching pad of No. 91’s buddy, the nuke-happy, North Korean dictator.
— They are at once the problem and the answer. I saw three zombie signs on a Minnesota car, one of which said zombie infestation response team. Is that to save us native Wisconsinites after they all come over, say from the annual, Twin Cities zombie pub crawl? And another oddity: A car’s license plate had a “Packer” plastic frame around the edges, but it was a Minnesota plate. Is that legal? Or do you end up paying things such as taxes on both ends of Minnesconsin?
— My neighbor, a former Pepper Fest king, has a figurine of a little girl in a summer dress and hat sitting on the stone wall of his immaculately landscaped front yard. To the point that a biker who happened by gazed at it all the way through his left-hand turn. Just the other day, the figure was replaced by that of a Roman soldier all decked out in gold foil. Just in time for Pepper Fest? Coincidence …?
— The Pizza King and active local crooner, Rich Raley, said that over Pepper Fest he was extremely busy delivering not only pizza there, but his new side dish, cheese curds — to the tune of a case or two every few hours all weekend. That would seem to relate to what was said by a guy a few bar stools down, a transplated Chicago resident, who was experienced for the first time Pepper Fest; and what are these new, cool things called cheese curds?
— The festival is ripe for more humor. As I told as a joke to a North Hudson friend who jokingly declares me as her “fun stalker” — don’t read anything into that ladies — what do us stalkers do in our spare time? They go to Peeper Fest, of course!
— The I’m Trying To Be Trump singer on America’s Got Talent lost this time, to the hoots and chagrins of people at the sports bar. But as Trump being Trump, in typical Trump fashion, he carved out a win anyway by giving the judges tickets to his upcoming show in Vegas. At a Trump owned hotel?
— Two similar odd moments on bar TV: (1) The closed captioning for a commercial on the best brew in Minnesota must not stretch into Wisconsin, as it repeatedly listed Schell’s beer as Shell’s, minus the C, a miscue that has also been seen at some nightclubs on this western end of the Badger State; and (2) the captioning praised the rapping done by a late-night talk show guest, but they had it as “wrapping.” All wrapped up and nowhere to go? And one more related possible gaffe: A pro athlete was in the sports-bar-TV news, by the name of Lucky Whitehead. Guess what he’s feeling good about is that he’s not known for blackhead pimples.

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