The cotton candy was ready to go, but you needed wading boots to get to it Monday at the Georgia State Fair.

With rain falling throughout the day, fair officials decided Monday morning not to open at all on what was to be the first day of a weeklong run. Standing water soaked the midway - in many places more than ankle deep - and vacuum-pump trucks will be on hand this morning to help with the drying process.

Fair officials plan to open today at noon, assuming the weather cooperates. The rides should open at 3 p.m., giving fair workers a few extra hours to re-inspect them and a little more time for things to dry.

"About like a Braves game (rain delay)," said Harold Carlisle, executive director for the fair. "We're going to play the game, just going to be a little late getting started."

Of course, all that is dependent on the remnants of Hurricane Jeanne, which dropped more than 5 inches of rain on Macon on Monday through 7 p.m., National Weather Service officials reported.

The weather service forecast for today is partly cloudy skies and a high in the 80s.

Carlisle and Frank Briggs, who owns Midwest Midways, the company supplying rides and games this year, differed on whether Monday's closure would have a serious effect on the fair's bottom line. Carlisle said "people that are going to the fair are going to the fair" and those who planned to attend Monday likely will just pick another day. But Briggs said Monday is usually a big day, especially for children.

Briggs spent much of Monday under a multi-colored tent, where fair workers kept busy getting ready for today and just generally trying to stay dry.

"A lot of the food concession people are laying back in their hotels and trailers, watching The Weather Channel," Briggs said.

Fair worker T.J., who said, "I don't have a last name," hung out inside a large tractor trailer on the midway Monday afternoon, doing a bunch of nothing except watching it rain. The weather may change his barking protocol today.

"Look at the sky," he said, "Before you buy."