This weekend I went to Madison Wisconsin because cheese.

You guys. Did you know that Wisconsin is known for cheese? This is the best possible thing to be known for. One of its slogans is "America's Dairyland."

There isn't a better slogan. Whatever your state slogan is, it is crap compared to Wisconsin's.

It's like a bunch of people sat around the table and were like "now let's see. What is the best possible thing in the entire world . . . OMG. CHEESE!" And then they based their lives around this.

I have never been this disappointed to belong to "The Beehive State."

Seriously, Utah? Beehives? WISCONSIN HAS BASED ITS ENTIRE SELF IDENTITY AROUND CHEESE AND THIS IS THE BEST YOU COULD DO?!

So when my friend Skylar told me to come to Wisconsin and eat cheese at some festival I made as many arrangements as needed to be made and I got myself the Hell to Wisconsin. Even though I knew there was a 75% chance I would be framed for murder by the Manitowoc County Sheriff's Department the moment I showed up.


My relationship with cheese has been a rocky one. I was raised in a home without it. Bob hates it because I guess he hates America so Bob and Cathie never cooked with it when we were children. I was told for many years that I hated cheese. Bob informed me of this on a regular basis. I call it "indoctrination" now.

Bob and Cathie should be imprisoned for what they did to their children all those years. I know there's this really compelling argument that we are locking up too many people but as far as I'm concerned if we aren't making parents serve jail time for not feeding their children cheese THEN I GUESS THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM IS BROKEN.

I swear to you that I was in college before I found out that normal people consider cheese to be a key ingredient in lasagna. I was seriously blown away by this revelation. You guys. Cathie's cheese-less lasagna was not traditional?!

Also, I don't even want to tell you how I thought lasagna was spelled until just now.

And so, turning my back on the way I was raised, I rushed to Madison Wisconsin this weekend.

But there was one very serious problem with doing this.

In my absolutely fanatical excitement to eat enough cheese that they would have to ship more cows into Wisconsin to make up for it, I failed to consider that I was going to basically the North Pole in the dead of winter.

Y'all. Do you understand how cold Wisconsin is in the dead of winter? I'm about to tell you. It is exactly too cold for happiness.

There is no happiness in Wisconsin in January. None. Even though they have CHEESE.

It is so cold in Madison that not even cheese can overcome the despair!

This is because Wisconsin is so far north that it is almost actually south. You guys. It is so far north that I could practically see Lee and his probably-Eskimo family riding through the forest on their dog sled.

Also, I don't even want to tell you how I thought Eskimo was spelled until just now.

Before I went to Madison, my friends there tried to warn me. They told me to pack warm clothes because it's cold there and they strongly advised me to try to prepare mentally for the horror I was about to experience.

I pridefully rejected their advice, confident that a lifetime in the Beehive State where we have THE GREATEST SNOW ON EARTH could prepare me for any winter conditions.

When I got to Madison I was informed that it was like negative 10 degrees Fahrenheit outside.

NEGATIVE.

TEN.

DEGREES.

Also, I don't even want to tell you how I thought Fahrenheit was spelled until just now.

You guys. That is not a temperature at which man should live! Why did they build a city in such a place?!

WHY!??!? WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!?!?!?



I spent the weekend making people promise me that whatever thing we were doing next would not require me to be outside for more than 5 seconds at a time.

I felt like I was living in a space colony and I had to figure out a way to get to and fro without ever going outside.

Do you know how hard it is to try to stalk Dean Strang's office without going outside at all?!

The locals acted like I was a crazy person for crying as much as I did this weekend. They wandered out into the misery like it was summertime. Like it wasn't negative ten degrees with excessive wind.

By the time I escaped that horrible place I decided that Wisconsin can keep its slogan. It needs it more than the rest of us. Wisconsin needs cheese.

Please keep Wisconsin in your prayers this week.

~It Just Gets Stranger