Well, well, Stephen: Interstate rivalries are good natured.. or at least I always thought they were. Why would people from Wisconsin wear those yellow foam rubber wedges of cheese on their heads? I remember kidding around when I was doing a concert in Massachusetts talking about interstate rivalries, and asked the audience if there wasn't a neighboring state where they thought people were fools. (I live in Connecticut now.) Someone called out, "yeah, Connecticut!" And I almost fell of my chair, laughing. Truth is, in the fifties and sixties, farmers in rural areas swung their tractors and whatever they were pulling over into the on-coming lane so that they could make a right turn. They did the same thing when they were driving a car, out of habit. Whether they were living in Illinois, Wisconsin or Iowa.

Chip 2447: Yeah, I've also stacked hay in a barn and it is hot work. My buddy was driving his Father's pickup and slid into a ditch and we couldn't back it out. There was a farmer in the field and we asked if he could pull us out. He said, sure, if we'd just unload some hay for him and put it in the barn. When we saw how big the wagon load was, we knew we had been suckered. It took us a couple of hours to unload the hay and the farmer about five minutes to get us out of the ditch.

"I spent that morning, stacking hay, without a drop to drink
So darned hot and thirsty, that when I tried to talk I just sqeeked
By five o'clock, I'd raised a crop of blisters on my hands
I swear to God that this stackin' hay would kill an honest man

My wife and I will be flying in to Madison, May 15. Coming out to visit family in Janesville. I went to school at the University and always enjoy the town.

Jerry