# Local Man Achieves Perfect State Fair Score, Promptly Dies of Diabetes and Regret
Okay, look. We all know the State Fair is America’s last great bipartisan institution. It’s the one place where a MAGA hat and a BLM shirt can sit side-by-side, sweating profusely, both wondering if that deep-fried stick of butter on a stick is going to be the thing that finally breaks their will to live. Spoiler alert: it is. But this year, one brave, foolish, magnificent champion decided to go for the gold. And by “gold,” I mean a quadruple bypass.
Meet Chad Thundercock, 34, of Des Moines, Iowa. (Name changed to protect the identity of the man currently being airlifted to a cardiac unit). Chad, a regional sales manager and part-time CrossFit enthusiast, went to the Great American State Fair with a spreadsheet. Not a joke. A laminated spreadsheet. It had columns for “Caloric Load,” “Oil Absorption Coefficient,” and “Regret Factor.” He wasn’t there for the Ferris wheel. He wasn’t there for the prize-winning zucchini. He was there for one thing: The Perfect Fair Score.
What is the Perfect Fair Score? It’s the internet’s newest, dumbest challenge. You see, Chad posted his journey on Reddit. The thread title? “AITA for eating my body weight in fried cheese curds and then blaming the cow?” Classic. The premise is simple: You must consume one of every “iconic” food item at the fair, in order, within 12 hours. No skipping. No sharing. No puking. If you puke, you have to start over from the corn dog.
The list? Oh, you sweet summer child. Let’s break it down.
1. **The Corn Dog (11:00 AM):** A warm, misshapen phallus of processed meat and cornmeal. Chad describes the first bite as “euphoric.” He claims he felt the spirit of every state fair since 1853 enter his body. Spoiler: that spirit is just lard.
2. **The Deep-Fried Oreos (11:15 AM):** A mistake. A war crime against the concept of a cookie. Chad says the powdered sugar gave him “the lungs of a coal miner.”
3. **The Funnel Cake (11:45 AM):** This is where the spreadsheet gets sad. Chad notes “Oil absorbed: 400%. God is dead.”
4. **The Turkey Leg (12:30 PM):** Ah, the paleolithic prop. The thing every guy buys to feel like a hunter-gatherer while standing next to a ride called “The Zipper.” Chad reports the bone was “still warm, like holding the hand of a dinosaur.”
5. **The Deep-Fried Butter (1:15 PM):** Let’s be real. This isn’t food. It’s a dare. It’s a stick of butter, dipped in batter, thrown in a vat of boiling grease. Chad says it “tasted like a rich person’s last meal and a poor person’s only meal at the same time.” The spreadsheet notes: “Heart is now audibly complaining. Ignoring it. Like my dad.”
6. **The Giant Pickle (2:00 PM):** A desperate attempt at “health.” It’s a cucumber the size of a newborn, brined in enough salt to kill a horse. Chad’s notes: “Salt content levels: Oceanic. Blood pressure: Breaking records.”
7. **The Candy Apple (3:00 PM):** A trap. You bite into it expecting candy, and you get a mouthful of raw, sour apple flesh. It’s the fair’s way of saying “fuck you for having fun.” Chad lost a filling.
8. **The Deep-Fried Twinkie (4:00 PM):** The final boss. The point of no return. Chad reports that after consuming this, he “saw God, and God was wearing a greasy apron and flipping a pancake in Hell.”
Now, here’s where it gets spicy. Chad, being a true Redditor, decided to livestream the entire ordeal. He had a GoPro strapped to his chest, broadcasting his descent into madness to a subreddit that was 60% supportive, 30% “bro, you’re gonna die,” and 10% “NTA, the cow deserved it.” At hour 8, Chad started crying. Not from the pain. From the sheer, unadulterated profundity of it all. He looked into the camera, eyes glassy, grease dripping from his chin, and whispered, “Is this the American Dream? To eat until you can’t feel feelings anymore?”
The chat went wild. “KING SHIT,” someone typed. “BROS GONNA ACHIEVE NIRVANA AND A B12 SHOT,” another said. But then, the grand finale. Chad, with 15 minutes left on the clock, declared he was going for the “hidden achievement.” You see, the Perfect Fair Score isn’t just the food list. There’s an underground rule: you must also ride the “Tilt-A-Whirl” immediately after the Deep-Fried Twinkie. Why? Because the internet is cruel.
Chad got on the ride. The camera footage is… haunting. It’s 4 minutes of a man trying to keep a Twinkie down while centrifugal force tries to rip his soul out through his esophagus. When he got off, he was a changed man. He was pale. He was sweating. He looked like a ghost who just saw another ghost.
And then, he did it. He checked his final item: “Pass out in a pile of hay near the prize-winning pig.” It was the final box on the spreadsheet.
Chad Thundercock achieved the Perfect Fair Score. He became a legend. He also immediately went into cardiac arrest.
The paramedics found him face-down in a pile of goat droppings, clutching a half-eaten corn dog like a teddy
Final Thoughts
Having covered state fairs from coast to coast for decades, I can tell you the "Great American State Fair" is more than a collection of rides and fried food—it’s a living, breathing snapshot of our cultural contradictions. It’s where the hyper-commercialized spectacle of midway games bumps shoulders with the earnest, soil-stained pride of 4-H livestock judging, all under the same August sun. Ultimately, that chaotic, sweetly synthetic aroma of corn dogs and diesel exhaust isn’t just nostalgia; it’s the stubborn, unvarnished scent of a nation trying to remember who it was before the screens took over.