Carnival Week Arrives With The Hum Of Weed-Eaters
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Hill Country Living
By Coulter Fussell
This is it! We made it to our annual Watermelon Carnival Week! In the interest of accuracy, I think the days leading up to Saturday’s Watermelon Carnival should actually be called “Weed-eater Week.” The whole town has those things buzzing! Collectively, we sound like a bunch of human cicada bugs.
There’s been an exciting turn of events this for this year’s Watermelon Carnival. Have you all checked your Matt Laubhan’s Mississippi Live Weather app to see the forecast for Saturday? The temps are in the 80s. THE EIGHTIES! Dropping down, just in time, from what seems like weeks in the upper 90’s. What did we do to deserve this great fortune? Was it painting City Hall to match the town auditorium and the dentist office? Was it dropping the food requirement for a beer purchase in the city’s alcohol ordinance? Was it…well, I can’t think of anything else that’s changed but whatever we did, I think our town deserves this drop in temperature. We are overheated.
The sun and humidity have been absolutely brutal. It’s a terrible time to do projects like, say, build four very large garden beds featuring heavy rock borders or construct a giant fire-pit patio containing pea gravel or stain a giant, unshaded deck a very dark mahogany color. But, boy oh boy, the heat didn’t stop me from doing any of that! For reasons I know not, my household’s home improvement roll hit on the hottest week of the year. But one has to take a home improvement roll when it comes or else the home improvement will never get done and you’ll live in frat house conditions forever.
I got so hot and miserable doing my yard projects that I can honestly say my personality changed and I’m a different person now than I was before I stained the deck. It’s possible that I experienced some mental trauma from sweating so much. The deck was the final tipping point. I’ve lost all will to throw a watermelon party on it which was the point of staining it in the first place. But, no worries, this won’t stop me from attending watermelon parties on other people’s decks.
Despite the predicted lower heat and in the interest of public safety, I must remind everyone to stay hydrated this weekend. Drinks lots of water and in any way you can get it! A traditional, town-wide preferred method of intaking enough water is via the natural waters contained in frozen watermelon cubes that have been blended in combination with triple sec and tequila. Another trick to staying hydrated is adding salt to your slice or watermelon as salt aids the body in retaining water. Other things to add to your check-list for Watermelon Carnival are sunscreen, a sun hat, a paper fan, a shady spot and $85 in case you want a corndog.
I can’t reiterate how many hours of organizing, coordination and good ol’ fashioned work goes in to throwing a public event. Hats off again to the hardworking and devoted crew at The Chamber of Commerce and all the town businesses that are prepping for the weekend. We appreciate y’all and see ya at the Carnival!
