I resemble most of this.

[Eugene]

Perloined from an Allis Chalmers BB.


YOU MAY BE A FARMER IF:
1. Your dog rides in the truck more than your wife
2. You convince your wife that an overnight, out of State trip for parts is a vacation
3. You wear specific hats to farm sales, livestock auctions, customer appreciation suppers, and vacations
4. You have ever had to wash off in the backyard with a garden hose before your wife would let you in the house
5. You've never thrown away a 5 gallon bucket
6. You have used baling wire to attach a license plate
7. You have used a chainsaw to remodel your house
8. You can remember the fertilizer rate, seed population, herbicide rate, and yields on a farm you rented 10 years ago, but cannot recall your wife's birthday
9. You have fibbed to a mechanic about how often you greased a piece of equipment
10. You have driven off the road while examining your neighbor's crops
11. You have borrowed gravel from the county road to fill potholes in your driveway
12. You have buried a dog and cried like a baby
13. You have used a tractor with a loader as scaffolding for painting or roof repairs
14. You've used the same knife to make bull calves into steers and peel apples
15. You wave at every vehicle whether you know them or not
16. You always look when a vehicle passes your house, even at night
17. You have used something other than paper as toilet paper
18. You refer to farms by who owned them 50 or more years ago
19. You give directions to your farm by using area landmarks, not road names or number
20. Your wife agrees to observe Mother's Day after the beans are planted
21. You have animals living in buildings more expensive than your house
22. Over 50% of your clothing came from feed or seed dealers
23. Family weddings and special events are planned around spring planting and fall harvest
24. You've been stopped by the deputy sheriff for a cluttered dashboard
25. The rusted out areas of your truck are sealed off with old tee-shirts or duck tape
26 Your know that checkoff is not a Russian diplomat
27. Your family instantly becomes silent when the weather comes on the news
28. You pick up all the free stuff at the State Fair
29 You'll skip your own cousin's funeral for the first day of deer season ( and you know he would approve and would do the same if you died )
30. You can eat an ear of sweet corn with no utensils in under 20 seconds
31. You don't bother to clean up the dog's mess because it's just fertilizer, and the dog knows to stay out of your way
32. You know enough to get your driving done on Sundays before the "Sunday drivers" come out
33. It takes 30 seconds to reach your destination and it's clear across town
34. You can tell the difference between the smell of a skunk and the smell of a feedlot
35. The meaning of true love is that you'll ride in the tractor with him
36. The meaning of true love is that you'll pose for a picture with both him and his favorite tractor
37. You consider a building a mall if it's bigger than the local Wal-Mart
38. Your husband drives a friend home from the bar when he only lives 3 houses away
39. You know you should listen to the weather forecast before picking out an outfit
40. Your excuse for getting out of school is that the cows got out
41. You know cow pies aren't made of beef
42. Your early morning prayer covers rain, cattle, and pigs
43. You consider a romantic evening driving through Hardees and renting a hunting instructional video
44. You listen to "Paul Harvey" every day at noon and never get tired of him saying, "Gooooood day"
45. You can tell it's a farmer working late in the field, know who it is, what they're doing, and not think it's a UFO
46. Your nearest neighbor is in the next section, and you know what a section is
47, You actually understand the geographical neccesity of correction lines
48. Your other vehicle is a tractor
49. When you were little, you "beat-up" another kid on school bus arguing over the color of tractors
50. You have enough ball caps to match every shirt you own, but you only wear one so you don't get the others dirty
51. If you were given $1,000,000.00 you would keep right on farming. You'd farm differently, but you'd keep farming because that is who and what you are

[deputy jailer]

[Bigdog]

You don't know how accurate those are!

[Bob McCarty]

Okay, I admit I'm a city boy gone country. I got all of them except checkoff and correction lines. What are those?

Bob

[Bill Hudson]

Okay, I admit I'm a city boy gone country. I got all of them except checkoff and correction lines. What are those?

Bob

Bob,

The "checkoff" is made when commodities like corn, soybeans, live beef animals, live hogs, and other commodities are sold. A small sum is deducted from the sale receipts and forwarded to the commodity organization for promotion, research, etc. The promotion that comes immediately to mind is "Pork, the other white meat."

As for the "correction lines," they are part of the Global Positioning System" (GPS) used by many farmers to plant, spray, harvest, apply fertilizer and other activities. The tractor or implement being used is electronically tied to 3 satellites in stationary orbits above the earth. A laptop is in the tractor/power source receiving this data from a tower nearby and making the necessary "correction line" required to keep equipment within inches of where it needs to be. Pretty neat, yes?

Hope this helps. If you have more questions feel free to ask.

Bill

[Ike]

Here is a variation of #51 that I have heard over the years.

If you were given $1,000,000.00, you would keep right on farming until it was gone.

Ike

[Jim Becker]

Correction lines go back a lot farther than GPS. They are required because most of the country was surveyed into neat rectangular townships and sections that don't fit on the surface something resembling a sphere.

Different parts of the country weren't originally surveyed following the exact same rules, but this page from Wisconsin gives the general idea.
http://www.sco.wisc.edu/plss/patterns.php

[Bob McCarty]

Bill and Jim, Thanks for the explanations.

Bob

[Eugene]

No. 50. Ball Caps.

I have two green Edward Jones ball caps. One seldom used, Sunday go to meeting, and one well broken in; greasy finger prints on the bill, wood chips, weed seeds and dirt on top, sweat stains and a salt ring around the hat band area.

Yesterday I was spot spraying weeds. Drove under a tree and a branch pulled the hat off my head. Next round I stopped near where I thought the hat would be. I looked all over on the ground. Freshly cut grass and me being color blind in shades of green and black. No hat. I even check in the tree branches.

90 plus degrees, 90% humidity, I was sweating so hard it looked like I pee'd my pants. I searched for the cap for at least 10 minutes. Really PO'd. I finally gave up looking for the cap and dejectedly walked back to the tractor. All the time thinking I gonna get sun stroke or a breeze is going to come up and I will catch a cold.

The cap was laying on the tractor platform.

Eugene