Update 23:

America. The United States. What a juxtaposition of people, of attitudes, of beliefs, of scenery and of food.

I have by now probably been in more than 40 of these states, most likely about 39 more than most Americans. It must be interesting to be less than 100kms from the nearby state and never have been there.

It reminds me of growing up in New Brunswick and having neighbours that had never seen a traffic light. Or when in Saint John the mall got the escalator and people actually drove hours to ride on it. Is that normal?

I have to say that I am in the mid-west, an area of the US of A that is well known as having somewhat of a more conservative belief system. It is a far cry from the hippies in North Cali and Oregon, or from the yuppies in the affluent northeast, or from the local yokel rednecks of the deep south.

America cannot, similarly to Canada, be summarized as one unified or united group, people so different from each other yet only miles apart. It’s a beautiful country, full of regular people, great people, not so great people, a country of diversity, and what I have learnt after living here for only two months, a very unhealthy country.

I was at my heaviest weight when I left Vancouver, bound for the prairies. Two months of eating in diners, in all-you-can eat restaurants, eating the only “food” that can be found in a truck stop in Nebraska, or Kansas, or Oklahoma, yields high cholesterol, high fat content, low nutrition value food. Almost every restaurant in Oklahoma and Kansas was an all-you-can eat, something I (and the majority I have seen down here) mistakenly took as a personal challenge. Needless to say, I haven’t weighed myself since Van and am pretty sure I have another 10-15lbs on my dept. weight.

It’s also rather bizarre how financially strapped the population is here. I remember first noticing this on last years motorbike trip, but it’s really hitting home here. I’ve driven through neighbourhoods that would be envious of some developing countries (I’ve also driven through hoods that give West Van a run for her money). The majority though are surprisingly destitute.

Workwise, I’m coming to the end here. Our manager has some issues that he takes out on us, in a lot of ways my conflict with him stems from certain similarities to me, to the way I used to be, from the way I am today. It’s a huge lesson to be learnt, to see how I have managed in the past, how I have grown since then, how much I still have to grow.

Update 22:

I’m not too sure where to start here. There have been a number of reasons why I have chosen not to be writing that much anymore. I won’t discredit being lazy as one of them. Today I’ll talk about one of them that is actually self-imposed.

I put pressure on myself to write these. I don’t want to write about some of the more negative experiences, mostly because I can’t really imagine anyone being interested in coming back to read more posts. Perhaps more importantly I don’t want to write about anything boring. I value my readers; I appreciate the comments, the feedback, and like the thought that you like to read about me since I’m not currently in your neighbourhood.

If I started writing about the less pleasant times, the troublesome times, or the downright boring times, I could easily see my “readership” decreasing. Not that this is about numbers or trying to get the biggest audience. Rather I have over the past 21 posts, received some tremendously humbling comments and emails, and in a way don’t want to disappoint.

Self-pressure comes in when I want to start writing but don’t really believe that what I can write today will be up to the standards that I have put on myself. Yeah, I know, it’s another hang-up and I have to get over. I just wanted to give you a bit of explanation for one of the reasons I haven’t written much.

On to other matters:

Some interesting facts that I forgot to mention about Tisdale, Saskatchewan, not only is it the home of rape and honey. It is the town that Corner Gas is based on. The dude (Brent Butt I think his name is, Buttsy as known locally) is from there. Most of the characters are also based on people that were in the town when Buttsy was growing up. Best portrayal is the lady cop that was based loosely on the actual cop that would, when pulling over young men, would either give them a ticket or force intimate relations. I never speed in Tisdale, just in case.

The other interesting titbit on Tisdale, there was a German reality TV show that was about living in Tisdale (since is it so far from anything Germans can relate to). The show was such a hit, and out of this world (and probably only to a select audience), that there was at least one German family that just had to move there. The guy works on the farm that I work for. All of this information comes from Tisdale natives, and well, could be subject to embellishment, but I like to think not.

I’m in Flagler, Colorado at the moment. We are waiting for the wheat to ripen. We finished the harvests in Oklahoma and Kansas, despite all of the problems we had with our completely brand new equipment. Anyway, some numbers, my combine has harvested about 2500 acres and almost 3 million pounds of wheat in about a month. Cumulatively, between the 4 combines we’ve hacked off about 10,000 acres or 12 million pounds.

Harvesting is pretty fun, I get to listen to audio books, do my Spanish lessons (although driving and reading is pretty hard), and think about my next plans. I never had any idea how big the custom-harvesting scene is. Not many farmers actually own their own combines down here. So when we rolled into Oklahoma a couple days before most of the other harvesters we were greeted by parking lots jammed pack of semi-s, trailers, combines and grain carts. I was quite surprised by how many harvesting companies there were.

Then when the harvests started and the rest of the show came to town I was blown away. Companies with 6o plus combines, 60 plus truck and trailer units, and 20 or so tractor and grain carts, not to mention the trailer parks jammed pack with RV trailers, probably all tallied up the equipment assets alone would be up in the 50 million dollar mark for that one crew. So being on a 4 combine, 4 truck, 1 tractor & grain cart crew that I had thought was a decent size when I started, I realized that in the grand scheme our crew is not so big.

So far no tornado’s despite the broadcasted warnings. When it rains or when we are waiting for the wheat to turn, the crew spends it’s time watching movies, playing video games, playing on the internet looking at the grossest stuff ever. Ahhh, after the all female expat staff in Juba, Sudan, living with 9 other guys is surprisingly very refreshing. Perhaps a bit crude at times, thank God for the tinted windows in the pick-ups, nothing better than 4 or 5 guys rubbernecking for the one girl that was foolish enough to walk downtown while the harvesters are in town.

As I mentioned before I have been thinking about my next steps. So far I have a bunch pretty ok options if I can’t find work. In no particular order;

1. Finish the harvest in November, go do a Masters in Engineering.
2. Find work before the harvest is over and get my P.Eng.
3. Finish the harvest in November, get on a motorbike and head down to Panama and back up in time for the Olympics.
4. Finish the harvest in November, go do another short mission with MSF and be back in time for the Olympics.

Unfortunately internet comes only at hotspots, ie some poor neighbour or house that has unsecured wireless, so looking for work, or at schools for Masters is a bit tricky. Hopefully we’ll find some at our next stop in Montana towards the end of July. That’s all for now folks. I think I should start writing smaller and more frequent posts, judging by the size of this one in particular.