IT rained for a good chunk of the Nottinghamshire County Show but although the precipitation (rather, the forecasts of precipitation) wiped a few thousand off the gate, I was amused and stimulated on both days.
The event was once held on the first Friday and Saturday of May, the second day invariably clashing with the 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket, the first important afternoon in the summer calendar of the national sport.
Then the show days were changed to Saturday and Sunday in the hope of drawing a bigger crowd and, to the relief of Turf devotees, the event was put back to the second weekend of May to extend the odds of rain from 100/30 to 7/2 against.
A few years back the Sunday of the show turned out to be the hottest day of the whole year.
The show-jumpers and hunters sweated up and the perspiring bipeds made it a day to remember for the canny hatter who had packed his stand with Panamas. The Newark and Notts Agricultural Society may have been slightly discomfited by 2013's meteorological deal, but actually there was only one shower on Saturday and although rain was persistent on Sunday afternoon, it was irritating rain, not charge-for-the-car-park rain.
Organisers could hold the show in July or August but find themselves competing against countless other outdoor events.
Furthermore, although the layers might go as big as 8/1 for rain at that time of year, when it does rain in July and August, it tends to be the ruin-your-day rain that bounces a yard off the Tarmac, often accompanied by thunder and lightning.
So the society must be philosophical in recording the weather for its 130th county show. It could have been worse. As for the event itself, it could not have been better.
There is no point in staging an agricultural show unless agriculture is at its heart. It's what country-dwellers expect. It is what day-out townies want to see (you don't get a lot of tractors in NG1 to 11).
Here, the Nottinghamshire County Show, while throwing in plenty of crowd-pleasing turns, remains true to its, er, roots. And surely there is room to develop one of the great success of the 2013 event – the Food Experience – into a produce event of regional importance: THE spring destination for East Midlands foodies.
For that, the show needs the support of major Notts producers: the Stilton dairies, the pork pie and bacon brands and the county's wonderful young breweries. Lime Tree Pantry, butcher Johnny Pusztai, Gonalston Farm Shop, Teresa Bovey and Simply Cakes were among those flying the county flag, but it would be good to see even more local talent in an even bigger marquee.
On the Sunday of the show, thousands stopped in their tracks to watch the fly-past of the Lancaster bomber in the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight. Everybody looked upwards and many a rheumy old eye was moist.
The aircraft was noisy but slow. So easy to shoot down, thus a poignant mechanical memorial to the 50,000 bomber crew who were killed in the Second World War.
In its championing of local food, in its acknowledgement of the 70th anniversary of the Dambusters' Raid (some of whose airmen would have been trained on the very airfield on which the showground stands), the Agricultural Society shows it has its finger on the pulse of rural and local life.
And at the President's Lunch, hosted so warmly by Sir Andrew Buchanan, it was gratifying to meet so many people for who the word "county" means more than a local government boundary.
God willing, I will be there in May 2014. Even if it rains.