Validation is really hard to come by.

Once you're out of school, there's no one to give you that quarterly "you don't suck" rap sheet. Work reviews don't count, since they're always bogus and skewed toward company profits over self worth.

So aside from the occasional breathless "wow, you should be in a movie or something" after a particularly inventive sexual favor, the only validation you can really count on is a mall parking stamp.

UNLESS...you kick ASS at your county fair. Then validation comes in the form of this:

an enormous purple ribbon that proclaims your adequacy � no! your SUPERIORITY! � to the world. Ha ha! This ain't no "thanks for playing" ribbon! This isn't any "meritorious participation" crap. This is the PURPLE, baby! It means I'm the best! The BEST! Kiss my rings! I am queen! Queen of the world! Czarina of the planet! Empress of the freakin' universe! Woo hoo!

(Okay, so it could be that I'm just slightly above average in a lilliputian county in the middle of nowhere. Shut up.)

Of course you're dying to know what I did to win such an incredible prize. (The lovely ribbon was accompanied by cash money - ten whole dollars!) I made gorgeous, scrumptious cakes. With beautiful chocolate and marzipan decorations and lovely accents piped in buttercream.

The only problem was that it is the middle of July in the midwest. And our little county fairgrounds have no refrigeration or air conditioning. So basically everything sat out in a Shoney's Always-Hot Breakfast Buffet steam tray.

By the time I came back to see what ribbons I'd won, everything was melty and gooey. The marzipan fruits were leprous. The buttercream roses were little puddles of pudding. The chocolate bow cake looked like a juicy cowpat from a fiber-deprived bovine. (The judges had to wrap it in plastic to keep it from oozing onto other people's stuff.) And my chocolate truffles looked like something left on the swine barn show floor.

But still.

But STILL.

I got Best in Show. The purple ribbon. Proof of my worth and value.

And something for my grand-nieces and -nephews to say "what the hell is this?" and throw away.

I am validated. Are you?