tradition

You've got nearly half a ton of butter just lying around, so what do you do? If you're in the state fair business you get to work sculpting a cow, of course.

We used to have to wait to hear what the weather-prognosticating groundhogs had to say until Groundhog Day, but thanks to social media, we get a preview.

Folks in Bunol, Spain get together every year and throw 30,000 pounds of tomatoes at each other in an event they call "La Tomatina." Well, we have tomatoes here, too.

It's just not the holidays until a 43 foot goat finds itself under attack by arsonists.

When you hear Jim Nantz say the words "A tradition unlike any other," you probably think of the Masters golf tournament. When you hear someone in Rockford say it, especially a member of Alpine Kiwanis, it can mean only one thing. Brat Days.

In the interests of full disclosure, I must tell you that I am married to a woman of Swedish decent (how did I find someone like that in Rockford?). Around holiday time, I've come to expect things like krup kakar, lutefisk, vörtbröd, and, if I play my cards right, glögg. At no time, however, in 25 years of marriage, has she suggested we set fire to a goat.