* You know how to polka, but never tried it sober.
 
* You know what knee-high by the Fourth of July means.
 
* You know it is traditional for the bride and groom to go bar hopping
 
* You know the difference between 'Green' and 'Red' farm machinery, and
would fight with your friends on the playground over which was better!
 
* You buy Christmas presents at Fleet Farm or Farm and Fleet
 
* You spent more on beer & liquor than you did on food at your wedding.
 
* You or someone you know was a 'Dairy Princess' at the county fair.
 
* You know that 'combine' is a noun.
 
* You let your older siblings talk you into putting your tongue on a steel
post in the middle of winter.
 
* Football schedules, hunting season and harvest are all taken into
consideration before wedding dates are set.
 
* A Friday night date is getting a six-pack and taking your girlfriend
Shining for deer.
 
 
* Every wedding you have ever been to has the Hokey Pokey and the Chicken
Dance.
 
* Your definition of a small town is one that only has one bar
.

 I grew up in a Wisconsin town but it wasn’t so small. We had two bars and most of the people who lived in towns around us didn’t come to our town because they thought they’d get lost.

 Sure, I liked to polka but my dad and mom had strict rules and said God won’t let you dance the polka if you’re sober. My old man was one smart guy. He went to farm school a couple ‘a months and all the time he was saying smart farm school things like “knee high on the Fourth of July.” Of course, that was way over our heads.

In my town we did things almost always the same all the time because we had tradition. For instance, when a guy and his girl got married it was sort of understood they would spend their honeymoon night bar hopping.

Getting married in my town was really a big thing. The father of the bride spent more money on beer and liquor than he did on the food. Oh yeah, the crowd got kind of rough when the local band played the Hokey Pokey and the Chicken Dance to only 14 encores and wanted to go home.

When my uncle got married, his girlfriend had a hard time picking the wedding date. She had to check all the football schedules, the hunting seasons, the harvest and county fair. They ended up getting married on Feb. 29, and my uncle only has to remember his anniversary every four years.

 Kids today, well they don’t get anything right. Like for instance they wouldn’t know a red farm machine from a green one, and which one is best. In our town, we had the green kids and the red kids and we fought every day about which one could pull a manure wagon further. I liked the red ones but I don’t think anyone else did because I got beat up a lot.

Well, we had our fun at Christmas too, but my brother and I always fought over where we should go to get Christmas presents for our mom and dad. I liked the Fleet Farm, but my brother, he was older, so he always dragged me over to Farm and Fleet. I have to admit that Santa at the Farm and Fleet was better because he wore an all red suit. But pretty soon the manager made him put coveralls on and he looked just like the Santa at Fleet Farm.

My uncle bragged about living in a town crawling with celebrities. Every girl there, he said, had been a Dairy Princesses at some county fair someplace. 

You know what I can’t stand about city kids? It’s the way they think they’re so smart. I heard one of them talking the other day and he used the word combine wrong because he said it was a verb!

 My brother thought it was one big joke when he told me to stick my tongue on a flag pole in the middle of winter. How often do you think he got away with that? Well maybe it was funny two or three winters. Then it got kind of old.

 I got pretty excited on my 20^th birthday when dad said I could take a girl on a date. I got a six-pack and we went deer shining. Nothing happened. I swear. No. Really.