You've got to be there!

The News Sentinel has a big splash about The 1982 World's Fair today. As part of the coverage, all these people have given their memories about the fair -- even those who were about 3 at the time.

I was there -- once. And how bad is it to admit that I have no memories of the fair itself?

I was 18, and it was one of the last hurrahs before I graduated from high school. I went with my FHA chapter. (That's Future Homemakers of America.) Here's what I remember:

-- While on the bus, we passed a bus from the Tennessee School for the Deaf. They were using ASL and, being smartasses (dumbasses is more like it), we pantomimed what we thought was sign language. We should have had our heads slapped.

-- Minutes later, we heard a helicopter overhead. One of the girls dropped the bus window, stuck out her head and yelled, "Hi, Pete!" in hopes that she'd just spotted Pete Michaels, traffic watcher from the sky for our favorite radio station, WOKI-FM.

-- We all talked about trying to get free beer from the pavilions. Talk is all it was. I was a good Baptist girl and my mom would have tanned my hide smartly if I had followed through. It didn't matter that Mom was 60 miles away. She would have known.

-- I was with my friend Wilma. Don't remember what we did or saw. I just remember her being there.

-- We stopped at a McDonald's on the way home. The place was decked out in sea theme. The biggest chuckle of the day was when one of the girls pointed out the restrooms which were, in bad punese, marked "Buoys" and "Gulls."

It was a trip I'll never forget -- even if the fair was forgettable.