PRAIRIE RAMBLINGS

(Farm) Man Laws – Men of the Square Bale Table

By Tracy Sayler
Prairie Grains Editor
tsayler@prairieagcomm.com

I love the “Man Laws” commercials on TV by Miller Lite, in which ‘Men of the Square Table’ discuss a beer drinking dilemma until the group resolves the issue by concurring on a “Man Law.”

The dozen guys discussing unwritten codes men live by includes Burt Reynolds, former Steelers running back Jerome Bettis, boxer Oscar de la Hoya, former NFL coach Jimmy Johnson, bull rider Ty Murray, and the grittiest of them all, Aron Ralston, the mountain climber who cut off his own arm when a boulder fell on it and pinned him during a climb.

Some of the dilemmas discussed in the Man Law commercials:

Issue: If a friend gets you a beer from the bar, is it acceptable for the friend to stick his finger in the opening to bring back several beers to the table at once?

Solution: “You poke it, you own it.”

Issue: When toasting with beer, should you clink with the top or the bottom of the bottle?
Solution: The bottom, because clinking the top would qualify as kissing.

Issue: Is it permissible to hide your beer in the fridge so that others can’t find it?
Solution: No, sharing is caring.

I respectfully disagree with some of their Man Law resolutions, however. The Men of the Square Table concluded that a garage fridge is for beer only, but I would argue that it is also permissible for pop, snacks, milk, leftovers, and for ranchers, colostrum during the calving season.

They ruled that “no wasting beer in the pursuit of humor,” but I would say that tapping the top of another guy’s beer bottle with the bottom of your beer bottle, causing the other man’s beer bottle to fizz over, will always be funny. They also stated, “don’t fruit the beer,” but I think the group would rule otherwise if they were drinking Corona, in which a slice of lime is perfectly acceptable.

Check out all the videos in the commercial series as well as unaired footage and outtakes online at www.manlaws.com. – there, also see the ‘Manlawpedia’ where visitors to the web site have added further Man Law entries, such as:

• Beer may be used as payment for work performed.
• No man shall wear leopard underwear.
• The phrase “working hard or hardly working?” shall be deleted from a man’s list of witty sayings.
• There are no ‘bad hair days’ for men, there are only baseball cap days. 
• An arm rest belongs to the first arm to claim it.
• A man may engage in gardening, but he must call it ‘farming.’

These philosophic ponderings inspired me to bring about the Men of the Square Bale Table, where questions of rural male relevance are pondered, and ultimately approved as Farm Man Law and published herewith:

Issue: You go to town wearing your red cap.  You stop off at the green dealer.  Do you wear your red cap in to the green dealer, or leave it in the pickup?

Solution: If you are just getting parts or stopping for coffee, leave it in the pickup.  But if you are pricing equipment, leave it on, for subliminal negotiating leverage. 

Issue: A tractor is heading west on a township road, a combine is traveling east. Who has the right of way?
Solution: The tractor should yield to the combine.  Like Rock Paper Scissors, combine beats tractor beats truck, although loaded truck beats tractor, and all must yield to the school bus.

Issue: Pickup or truck?
Solution: In farm country, it is not permissible to call a pickup a truck. To be called a truck, it must be able to hold at least 400 bushels of grain. A pickup is what you use to pull your Crestliner or snowmobile.

Other Farm Man laws:

• It is not appropriate to wear a belt buckle east of Hwy 281 (Devils Lake/Jamestown/Aberdeen) unless you own horses or livestock, and/or you’re over 55. And in such cases, the only circumstance the belt buckle may be larger than one’s dinner plate is if the person has won it by participating in a rodeo. 

• When three men are forced to ride together in a pickup, it is the smallest, youngest, or oldest who should sit in the middle, and that person is exempt from opening any fence gates.

• It is permissible to pee outside, as long as you are at the far side of the field away from the highway or public view, and if you are up wind.

• In a pinch, or in the absence of a Shop Vac, it is permissible to take the vacuum cleaner from the house to clean out the seed box of a grain drill, provided that you are prepared to buy a replacement if insisted upon by the female of the household.

• If you serve on the board of a commodity promotion group (ie wheat, beef) you must consume at least one food item with the promotional ingredient during meals at any official commodity group function.

• Unless you are female or do not farm, it is not permissible to wear shorts and/or sandals to a field plot tour.

• It is obligatory to buy something for the landlord at Christmas, unless the land will be given up or a rental agreement has already been arranged for the coming year.

• It is permissible for two men working in the field to drink from the same water jug, so long as you wipe the top with your shirt sleeve, and/or follow the guideline to “hold it high and let it flow, don’t suck on the bottle like a weaning calf.’

• After harvest, always have the other guy give his yield estimate first – that way you can trump it.