You must be from Indiana

Because we live out...as in out in the country, and I was home alone for three nights this past week and then we were both out of town the last couple of days- I've waited to tell you about his after the fact.

Doug rode his bike from Bloomington to Goshen. For those of you who are not from Indiana, that may not mean much, but that is two hundred miles. Day one was past Wednesday and he rode from Bloomington to Westfield, near Indianapolis. Day two, he rode from Westfield to North Manchester. He stayed with a kind couple, Dorothy and Barney, who open their home to bicycle riders doing long distance. Dorothy asked Doug his approximate arrival time and told him she would have dinner ready. Not only did she have dinner ready, she had arranged for a reporter from the North Manchester paper to interview Doug and take photographs. I hope to get to see the story, but I would imagine the headlines will read "old fart rides bicycle a very far distance." Doug has been wanting to ride his bicycle to Goshen for quite some time. He will turn fifty-five (no, I am not that old) soon and I think he just thought "the time is now!" ready to go
on his horse

there he goes!

Doug had studied the weather and on Wednesday and Thursday it was clear and dry. On Friday, it rained but he only had to ride forty miles, then he was in Goshen where he has family and he was able to get a hot shower and get out of his wet clothes.

Yesterday morning Chelsea and I drove up to Goshen to fetch Doug home. I took 37 North to 465 East to 69 North to 13 North to 15 North which goes straight in to Goshen. Again, if you aren't from Indiana, this may mean nothing to you, but the further north you get, you are into desolate farm land. A couple of times I didn't even have any cell reception! I saw a sign in a small town that read "hog roasters for rent." I was stuck behind a farm truck pulling a tank of Anhydrous Ammonia. (You don't want to get too close to that!) and anther time I was stuck behind a semi with a load of Beck's seed corn. These experiences made me think about the email I've received entitled "you must be from Indiana if..."

You must be from Indiana if...

-Down south to you means Kentucky

(All of my life I heard people say "down home," which meant Kentucky.)

-You know several people who have hit a deer

(I once hit a deer with a Chrysler Neon only seven months after I drove it off of the lot.)

-You have no problem spelling or pronouncing "Terre Haute"

(My Great-Grandma lived in Terre Haute.)

-Detassling was your first job
(Not my first job, but many of my friends...and my son had a brief detassling stint.)

-There's actually a college near you named "Ball State."

(I am a proud graduate of Ball State University. Founded by the Ball brothers of the Ball jar fortune.)

-Your idea of a traffic jam is ten cars waiting to pass a tractor on the highway.

(This sort of traffic jam was my only traffic jam experience until moving to Columbus, OH.)

-You measure distance in minutes.

(This is true.)

-Stores don't have bags, they have sacks.

(This came from the time when a paper sack was your only choice.)

-You've heard of Euchre, you know how to play Euchre.

(This is true, except I don't enjoy Euchre. I talk to much and never know what is trumps.)

-You've seen a running car, with nobody in it, in the parking lot of the grocery store, no matter what time of year it is.

(This is also true, and environmentally stupid.)

-You carry jumper cables in your car regularly.

(Doesn't everyone?)

-The biggest question of your youth was IU or Purdue.

(The biggest question of my youth was IU, Purdue or Ball State. I was accepted at all three and Ball State gave assistance, so I went to Ball State.)

-Indianapolis is the BIG CITY.

(The biggest city in Indiana and our state capitol.)

-Getting stuck by a train is a legitimate excuse for being late to school.

(Getting stuck by a train is a legitimate excuse for being late to work, too.)

-To you, tenderloin is not an expensive cut of beef,

but a big, salty, breaded piece of pork served on a bun with pickle.

(Don't knock it until you've tried it. I once dated a man from Connecticut who said "why does everyone eat pork tenderloins all of the time and why do they eat pork tenderloins bigger than their head?")

-You know what the phrase "knee-high by the Fourth of July" means.

(Corn.)

-You can say "French Lick" without laughing out loud.

(Floyd's Knob makes me giggle, though.)

-You know Batesville is the casket-making capital of the world.

(That is what they claim.)

-You say things like catty-wampus and kitty corner and know what they mean.

(My mother always said these sayings.)

-You know that strangers are the only ones who come to your front door.

(The house I lived in for eighteen years before moving here and...true of this house, too.)

-High school basketball games draw bigger crowds on the weekend than movie theaters,

IF you have a movie theater.

(My home town, New Castle boasts the world's "largest and finest high school fieldhouse."

And, to this day, only has one theatre that shows one movie at a time.)

-Driving is better in the winter because the potholes are filled with snow.

(As long as it isn't icy.)

-The local paper covers national and international headlines on one page but requires six for local sports.

-You end your sentences with prepositions, as in "Where's it at?" or "Where's he going to?"

(I don't, but most do. They also say "the Wal-Mart" and make business names possessive plural.)

There you have it.