If you’ve ever been involved in a group event with a deadline such as a school play or a craft fair or art exhibit, you know how frenetic it gets as the date draws near.

In Carding, Vermont, the Fair has been an August event for several years now, and its steering committee thought it had seen everything that could go wrong by now.

But mishaps large and small are plaguing this year’s event. Charlie Cooper, who’s been entertaining kids by making balloon critters, is out of action. Ruth Goodwin reserved the Fair’s biggest vendor space but is suffering an extreme case of self-doubt about the quality of her handmade critters.

And then the company which has provided the Fair’s carnival rides for years doesn’t want to send its trucks down the narrow roads in the center of town.

But the folks in Carding are a resilient bunch as we’ll see in tomorrow’s Carding Chronicle. Here’s a sample of what’s to come.