Do you have a minute? Do you have a couple of minutes? This column is somewhat of an emergency. I could really use your advice on a subject near and dear to many of us.

May I use the F word? Will you be offended if you see the F word in print?

OK, let’s do it. I’ll say it first.

The F word to which I refer is Fair, as in Island County Fair.

When I moved to Whidbey over 20 years ago, the Island County Fair was the premiere community event. Volunteers roamed the fairgrounds all year long cleaning, fixing, fretting and doing. All age groups were represented. All the service organizations were involved. All the 4-Hers smiled and groomed and competed and showcased.

In recent years, many of our long-standing and long-serving volunteers have disappeared. Some of this has been because of age and health issues. Some of this is due to burnout over political issues and personalities. As you can imagine, there are as many reasons for plusses and alleged minuses as there are persons.

My question to you, our community, our leaders, our followers, our doers and our thinkers, is simple — what needs to be done to bring you back? What needs to be done to see you smile when we use the F word around here?

Monday night I was asked to attend the monthly Island County Fair Board meeting.

While reading the minutes of the November 2005 meeting, I noticed that the board was looking into a half-page questionnaire with our only local newspaper to seek opinions and suggestions about what you, our community, want to see at the Fair.

These questions may be too numerous for this space, but a few can be asked. If you would like to provide your assistance and wisdom, I invite you to please drop me a note at my e-mail address, fun@whidbey.com, or by calling my voice mail at 360-331-2617 or by dropping me a card or letter to PO Box 996 in Freeland, 98249.

Some of the comments and remarks which I heard at Monday’s meeting and which I have collected since last August’s Fair include:

“The people in Oak Harbor don’t want to drive down to Langley to see local musicians they do not know. We want national acts.”

“You spend too much money on entertainment. Your budget is five times the total dollars spent at the San Juan County Fair and they have bigger crowds.”

“That’s the worst parade we have had in 75 years. There weren’t any horns.”

“No matter who we have at the Fair, the crowds have been about the same for the last 10 years. It’s all about the weather.”

“Why do we have entertainment at 10 in the morning? No one is there. We shouldn’t have entertainment before 5 p.m. And why no beer garden? That they can open at 10 in the morning.”

“No one wants to see local acts. They can see them anytime at the Rod and Gun.”

“We need more local acts. Amelia’s Only Daughters wants better times.”

“Why do we have to put these musicians up in hotels? Why can’t the locals house them? Can’t they stay on our school buses?”

“Why do we have to pay people to help move equipment on the stage? We used to have volunteers do that. How can I help? My Grandma makes a mean deviled egg.”

“I don’t like Foghat. They play way too loud. The rafters in the quilt building were vibrating 20 years of ceiling dust all over our beautiful quilts!”

“Why don’t we put the carnival out in the school parking lot so we can have a bigger stage built and get Blue Oyster Cult?” I can see the Crottys calling United Van Lines now.

“No one comes for the entertainment. They come for the curly fries.”

“Was that really Eric Burdon?”

Oh yes, this reminds me of a great one-liner, uttered by Eric Burdon at the top of the backstage steps before he came out for his first of two shows years ago on our Eva Mae Gabelein Midway Stage.

If you are not familiar with Eric, he and his group The Animals sold and continue to sell millions of records. I first saw the band at Ohio Wesleyan University in 1966 before I was kicked out of school for drinking beer in my dorm room. Horrors!

So, right before Eric steps out on the stage to sing “The House of the Rising Sun,” “Please Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood,” “Boom Boom,” “San Francisco Nights,” and “We Gotta Get Out of This Place,” one of our hospitality girls asks: “So, Eric, are you born-again?”

Without missing a beat, Burdon quips in his thickest version of a English/Scottish brogue, “I was born-again from the very beginning.”

By the way, local blues rocker Tom Hoeflich of DA Sharks gave Burdon Tommy’s original CD Mercy’s Hand after that Island County Fair gig.

He must have liked our local musician’s effort. You can hear Burdon’s version of Tommy’s song as the bonus track on Burdon’s latest European CD Athens Traffic Live. Now that’s hometown cookin’! Congrats Tommy!

If you have a comment or want to volunteer in any of a number of essential capacities, entertainment or otherwise, please feel free to share with the Freeman in Freeland. Your confidentiality, if sought, is secure, particularly with my memory.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Go Seahawks!

Jim’s columns are archived @ www.southwhidbeyrecord.com.