festival

Another Weekend of Fire is in the record books. While there are always things that can be improved (more on that later), I feel the experience overall was a positive one for virtually all parties involved.

My own journey began on Friday afternoon. Shortly after my two boys came home from school, my youngest son, Kevin, and I hit the highway eastbound and down towards Cincinnati. It was rainy all day in Missouri, so I was hoping for a little break in the wet weather. We had no such luck, as torrential downpours followed us all the way through Illinois and Indiana. Right after we crossed the Ohio border, the rain slowed and ceased completely within 30 seconds. Kevin and I made our way to the familiar confines of the Holiday Inn Express in Fairfield (where we were sharing a room with Al “Buddah” Goldenberg of I Love It Spicy, just down the road from Jungle Jim’s International Market, and crashed.

Saturday

Our morning began with breakfast and a trip to the Jungle Jim’s store. 12-year-old Kevin was enthralled by the shear enormity and selection of the place. I stocked up on a few hot sauce items not sold at the Weekend of Fire Show in the Oscar Event Center upstairs, dashed out to my truck to grab my laptop bag, and went into the show. It was still T-minus one hour before showtime, so Kevin and I had ample opportunity to stroll around and view all the booths as they were being set up for the day and got to meet some of the vendors, both old friends and new exhibitors to the show…