Home Show Offers All Sorts Of Solutions
Someone intent on understanding Spokane in one gulp could do worse than take in the annual Home and Yard Show.
The event is an all-weather window on this area’s communal psyche. It’s the answer to the question “Are Lilac City residents apathetic?”
Not about rain gutters and deck furniture, they aren’t.
Sunday at the Spokane Interstate Fairgrounds, hundreds of families inched through exhibit halls lined with booths celebrating seemingly every cocooner’s home-and-hearth fantasy. There were water-softeners. There were stained-glass shower doors. There were skylights.
There were radon abatement systems and a free “Radon Coloring Book” for any kid who wanted one.
Around practically every corner, show-goers encountered someone wearing one of those ubiquitous head-set microphones. These people demonstrated the virtues of a microwave steamer or a miracle mop.
“Let me show you how you can cut your mopping time in half,” said an up-tempo guy at booth 306.
It was sort of like getting trapped in a zillion-channel cable TV lineup consisting exclusively of infomercials and home and garden shows.
Not that anyone was complaining.
One has to assume that, for the most part, the people for whom this show would have been an inner circle of hell weren’t in attendance. And judging from expressions and overheard snippets of conversations, the men and women who were there couldn’t get enough of riding mowers, fireplaces, carpet cleaners, closet systems, chain saws, awnings, kitchen interiors and gazebo kits.
More than a few people lugged plastic bags full of brochures they had collected. Countless others concentrated on navigating baby strollers or toddlers on leashes through the thick crowd.
Once in a while, people looked away from this or that secret to better living and encountered someone they knew.
“Bob,” chirped a guy near a hot tub display. “How’re you doin’?”
“Hangin’ in there,” said Bob.
If you didn’t care about stove tops, patio umbrellas and lawn-sprinkler systems, you would have felt like an alien from another planet. A planet where everybody lives in apartments.
Of course, appearances can be deceiving. The people standing around listening to demonstrations of shower heads and window cleaners didn’t really think those devices were the answer to all of life’s problems.
But sometimes it’s nice to pretend for a few moments.
Shortly after noon, a guy near a display of picnic tables looked at his watch and muttered something about still wanting to make it to the gun show across town.
, DataTimes MEMO: Being There is a weekly feature that looks at gatherings in the Inland Northwest.