Friday Night with the FFA

We went out last night. This is a rare occurrence. Especially for me. However, last night was the annual fundraiser for the Future Farmers of America. So we went.

Now, just where do you think the Future Farmers of America would have a fundraiser?

DINGDINGDING! Yes! On a FARM! Specifically, on a giant dairy farm, in that farm's absolutely enormous shop. Really. HUUUUGE. The shop has to be big enough to fit all the massive combines and other large machinery that are now a part of farming, so it's about the size of a high school gymnasium. And insulated and heated. Sort of. It even had bathrooms. Well, ONE bathroom indoors, which was allocated to the women. The men were directed to an outside porta-potty. Except it didn't look like there was any light out there, so I'm guessing a good number of the intoxicated males in the crowd--and there were many--probably just wandered into the dark and peed on the ground.

I didn't investigate, however.

BUT ANYWAY.

The venue was none too big, because there were at least 300 people in attendance. There was good food (chicken barbecue--a local institution), giant tubs of iced beer and a whole table full of wine (sometimes being pregnant is kind of drag--this was one of those times), a silent auction, and . . . The Farmer's Challenge.

Cue gameshow music!

The Farmer's Challenge is a quiz contest. Think Jeopardy! for rural people. The questions were all about animals and tractors and stuff. Which meant I knew the answers to exactly four of the fifty questions--the miscellaneous category questions about movies and country music. Luckily, we were in teams, and A. and the MiL, plus a retired dairy farmer, were on my team. Unluckily, it was a really hard quiz and we only answered 23 out of 50 questions correctly. So we didn't win.

However, the winning team only got 28 correct, so we didn't do too badly. And the prize is a big, ugly trophy in the image of a grain silo. So, you know, no hard feelings that we didn't go home with that.

What we did go home with (from the silent auction) was a literal ton of grass hay (though we did not literally go home with it, as we were driving my car and a ton of hay is not going to fit in a Nissan), a giant container of Round-Up weed killer (with feed cap included!), many tickets to university sporting events, and some free Arm & Hammer products (baking soda, toothpaste, and deodorant--wheee!), because one of the organizer's best friends sells Arm & Hammer products and donated like $20,000 worth of products.

Chicken barbecue, beer, The Farmer's Challenge, hay, and free Arm & Hammer products. Does a Friday night get any better than that?