From The Art Of Manliness:
For most men and boys-soon-to-be-men, long gone are the days when milking a cow was a chore as common as doing the dishes. Now mostly done by high-tech machines at commercial dairies, the task of milking a cow by hand once brought farmers and their families into close bonds with the animals that helped to feed them every day. If you’re a city dweller, it’s unlikely you’ll come across a situation that demands you milk a cow, save for some post-apocalyptic future where healthy, milk-producing dairy cows are readily available and you’re in desperate need of some ice cream. But that’s not the point. The point is, milking a cow by hand is a tradition deep-rooted in the blood of our agricultural ancestors and learning how to do it is as much about preserving that knowledge as it is about practicing it.
