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Blog Entry 20 of 44 Welcome to The Retroplex
I'm usually in full-blown reminisce mode anyway, so why not make the rest of you poor saps suffer along with me, right?

Here, you'll find no shortage (well...unless I can't think of any new material) of meaningless but ultimately harmless bits of ephemera covering the past 20 or so years of pop culture, and my occasional interactions with it. Whether you're into the iconic or the ironic, sooner or later, I'll probably get around to it.
Watch, as the hilarity ensues! Or, if you prefer, gawk like a shocked passerby witnessing a horrible accident!

Blog Url: http://denver.yourhub.com/~TheRetroplex

Yee-HAW!
Contributed by: Jared Keller   on 1/16/2007

I reckon it's 'bout that time again.

Yup.

For the bulk of January, the National Western Stock Show & Rodeo once more brings our area's western heritage to the forefront, along with the attendant abundance of, um... aromas, agricultural displays, fastidious livestock owners, gorgeous cutting horses, zippy barrel racers, crazy bullriders, rodeo clowns, and of course, knicknack hockers.

I love this town.

The National Western has been a Denver fixture for the past century (this year's is the 101th Annual edition, actually), and it's like no other experience on earth. Tens of thousands of people, animals, and agricultural/livestock-related industry representatives decend upon the stock show complex in north Denver, and there is little more fascinating to watch than the transformation of a fairly industrial, rather seedy neighborhood - more accustomed to the sounds of booming subwoofers in passing lowriders and the occasional police siren - to the rural hotspot of the region over a two week period.

I've been going, on and off, since about the age of seven. My elementary school - a little Baptist academy that no longer exists - travelled en masse to the stock show and rodeo each year, and eventually, it became a highlight for me. Sure, I loved the rodeo, and the chance to see some truly gargantuan creatures (the Percherons, the angus bulls, etc.) up close, and I truly enjoy those things more than ever now, but back then - at its most fundamental level - the stock show was about one thing for me: cheap stuff.

The exhibit hall and surrounding complex were filled to overflowing with booths from agricultural equipment manufacturers, radio and television stations, and, most joyfully, trinket sellers.

The stock show was truly a bonanza for the savvy kid shopper with pockets stuffed full of allowance money. Those stock show trips in the 80s provide perhaps the most stark example of the way in which our world has changed. For example, one of the highlights of my stock show each year was a visit to any one of the many knife seller booths, where, for the ridiculously low price of $5, a third grader like me (as well as any number of my friends) could pick up a Rambo-style, chinese-made "survival knife", with a massive, serrated blade, a compass in the grip, and inside the hollow handle, a kit consisting of a wire saw, some fishhooks, and some ostensibly waterproof matches. The thing came with a sheath, a sharpening stone, and some truly awesome little kid mojo. Without fail, our vans would return to the school full of little kids who wereeach armed to the teeth, and ready for at least a half hour in the wilds of Colorado, Wolverine-style, should the godless Soviet horde descend. I'm sure it was a sight fit to make a teacher's blood run cold: a van full of sugared-up kids, at least half of whom were packing 7"steel blades, itching to try them out, and under the influence of a distinct lack of common sense (a well-known hallmark of small children, but one which is expanded exponentially when they gather in large groups). I admire the courage, and despair for the fundamental stupidity of the staff members who blithely volunteered to chaperone us.

Granted, the knives were worth slightly less than their $5 price tag would suggest, and always lasted approximately three days after their purchase, at which time the blade would inevitably detatch rather dramatically from the handle, and sail across the room/yard where you were swinging it recklessly at your similarly-armed friends, sticking in a fencepost...or wall. Then, you'd simply chuck the thing away, and wait 'til next year, when you'd refit.

Someday, archaeologists will excavate my parents' yard, and determine that the area was briefly ruled by a clan of small warlike people, who must have been undone by the truly crappy quality of their arsenal.

In addition to the knives, my classmates and I would by all manner of cheap plastic knockoff toys, and occasionally, tiny plastic versions of the mighty Japanese robots we loved so dearly. One particularly happy year, my friend Bill and I each came home from the stock show with Rambo knives, genuine leather bullwhips, tons of shwag from the local TV stations, and toys from the Macross and Orguss anime series, though neither of us knew what the heck they were. We knew they were robots, and we knew that they came from Japan, on account of all of the crazy katakana on the little boxes.

The whips were fun, in that they allowed you to play Indiana Jones with more authority than could be lend by the substitution of a rope, and they had the added benefit of providing a way to more efficiently destroy your parents' shrubs and trees than was conventionally provided to a kid. Granted, like the knives, they were worth their $5 price tag, and after several good cracks, would begin to disintegrate, sending leather straps flying, and, on many occasions, simply breaking neatly in half, rendering it useless.

So, this year, we once more snatched up The Girl™, and made our way up North for the National Western experience. It was a blast, as usual. I'm hoping that my daughter will grow to love it in the way that I have. And hey - I'm in pretty good shape here; she's a very girly little girl, so I likely stand a better than average chance of building into her a love and appreciation for horses, etc., without also risking a $5 Rambo shiv between the ribs the way that those who first exposed me to the thing once did.

Good times, man...good times.


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CONTRIBUTOR INFORMATION

Jared Keller

Littleton

Jared Keller has posted 44 blog entries and 57 comments since joining on 12/1/2005. Jared Keller 's average blog rating is 5.
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