Caranx Loc: Atlanta

From brown cows, of course😇

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

My father was really interested in sports. So much so that he became a pitcher for a farm team of the New York Giants. He chipped an elbow and that was the end of that profession for him, although he became a coach for the local college.

I did not inherit that gene. He tried, but I couldn't throw a baseball worth a farthing. Still can't. I became a nerd, completely uninterested in any sports. In my 50s I would occasionally join a pickup group for soccer, but that was because after 40 years of desk work I needed exercise. I didn't really know what I was doing. Just exercising. I know the basic rules of baseball and basketball and football, but none of the fine points.

I'm still a nerd. Uninterested in any sports. Baseball may be an all American sport, but not all Americans are into it.



I was a vegetable farmer so I didn't do hay, but up at 5 every day and working. (Even when I had the paying job I would get to work at 5. It gave me time to get things done before everyone else came in and the meetings started). When I first moved to New England we would have maybe 3 days a year that got to 90F or above. Around 2015 I had a weather station on the barn and it recorded 30 days above 90 and 3 above 100. The over 100 days I only worked a half day. We had a refrigerator on the farm. I kept half gallon bottles of water in it. On the 100 days I would go through six of them. But I never had to stop work to pee.

bikinkawboy Loc: north central Missouri

Suddenly my life is worth living again! Thanks for rekindling the magic of living! Yeah!!!

bikinkawboy Loc: north central Missouri

In reference to several of the previous posters, I’ve found that after working all day on the farm, the thought of me going out and playing sports doesn’t have much appeal. I can’t play golf but I do enjoy whacking balls down the driveway, but going out running around just doesn’t cut it.

When your butt’s dragging your tracks out, it’s hard to dredge up the energy for more physical activity.

SteveR Loc: Michigan

I think that different things are for different people. I have no problem with that. My Dad was the son of a coal miner in W.Va. He lived 25 miles from his high school. If just happened that Dad was blessed with innate physical ability, although he said that his older brother Sam was the best athlete in the family. Dad's best friend was an all-state tackle and was recruited by many schools, including Michigan. His teachers encouraged him to go there since it was a good school. Dad wasn't too bad. He scored 33 touchdowns in high school, 18 his senior year, and he was recruited to go to Michigan as well. At one time, there were three players from the same county in W.Va. starting for Michigan. Dad played four sports in high school, despite living 25 miles from the school. After he got out of the military after WWII he became a teacher and a coach. It was always his belief that students would do better in school if they were involved in athletics. He also believed athletics would keep them out of trouble. I think he was right on both counts. Through the years, as a teacher, coach, counselor, athletic director, I know that he had an affect on many students lives. They've told me. At 18, as a student at Michigan, he was working one day in a peach orchard with the son of the owner. Dad started talking to the boy about the benefits of higher education. In the 70's, Dad got a letter from this boy, now grown. Dad had inspired him to set a goal to get a Ph.D. Well, the war intervened, and afterwards he became a dentist, but he still held on to that goal. Eventually, he did get his Ph.D., and wrote to Dad to tell him how that 18 year old's inspiration had finally come to pass. This was my Dad, and he did this through athletics. He was a special person. It's the day after Father's Day, but I remember him all year round. P.S. Dad always said that if it hadn't been for football and Michigan, he'd have been a coal miner.

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

If we were all the same it would be pretty dull. We would all have to be jacks and jills of all trades. There is a lot of pressure on kids to be academic and get into a good school and be educated to get a better job. If everyone did that, who would do our plumbing? Collect our trash? Mine our coal? The 'lower echelons' of trades are just as essential to our good life as the doctors and lawyers.

Going to a 'trade school' was at one time a sign of failure. Now not so much. A good tradesman can beat out a mediocre stockbroker in salary. (If I were a stockbroker I would probably be a mediocre one. I flunked economics in college). I spent 40 years in academia doing research. If it were money that drove me, I should have been a truck driver. But I enjoyed what I did and made a reasonable living at it.

In grad school we had a machinist who was pretty smart. He used to say he was just a dumb farmer. I became a dumb farmer when I was almost 50. I had never been a farmer and didn't know much about it but I bought a tractor and that suckered me in. I discovered that there are very few dumb farmers. If someone is a farmer and they're dumb, they won't be a farmer for long. A farmer has to be a little of everything. So I did my own plumbing and electrical work, shoveled manure, swept the barn floor, kept the books, planted, cultivated, harvested and prepped the crops for sale, etc. I managed to be a farmer for 30 years without going broke. (For those who are counting, the farm and the academic research overlapped so when I retired at 78 that doesn't mean I started at age 8).

ImageCreator Loc: Northern California

The condom

bikinkawboy Loc: north central Missouri

Ages ago, my dad said that when he was a boy, if you couldn’t do anything else, you could always farm. By the time he was an adult, he said that if you couldn’t farm you could always do something else.

I’ve never been big into sports, especially team sports. However, practicing martial arts has helped my addict son stay clean, so in his case it has been a life saver.

RodeoMan Loc: St Joseph, Missouri

Well there you go. Thanks for not clobbering me.

SteveR Loc: Michigan

In my Dad's day it was the rare few who went on to college. I grew up in Pontiac, Michigan, where Pontiacs and GM Trucks were made. We had a lot of pretty smart tradesmen that worked for GM. Metallurgists, etc. However, I graduated from high school with guys who also spent years in the foundry. Very hard work. If anybody tries to tell you that working in the plant for GM is easy work, I've got friends who tell a different story. I also know what the City of Pontiac was like. The guys that worked in the factory were not making a ton of money. I know what kind of houses they lived in and the cars they drove. Yes, some of the young guys drove some nice GTO's, but very few had two cars in the family. The houses were modest.

As far as farming goes, my Grandpa started out with a mule to plow his fields. When I first saw him in the fifties riding a tractor, his a/c was an umbrella. He was bitten twice by black widow spiders. My Dad met my Mom in '45 while he was in the Army. They got married three months later. Her parents weren't so sure about him until he came out to the farm. They found out that Dad enjoyed work and helped them out on the farm. Suddenly, he was their favorite (and only) son-in-law!!!

Wallen Loc: Middle Earth

Lending; It creates money out of thin air and literally makes the world go around.

Money; Never has nothing of real value has been magically transformed into something so desirable.

Art trade; Never has something so ugly been so priceless

Wallen Loc: Middle Earth

I forgot to add insurance in my list of goodies. The kind we pay to be unscrewed by screwing us first.

Speaking of screws, that reminds me of the the lawmakers and the politicians, the lawyers, the police and all inventions that replaced good ol logic and common sense. We loved them so much we have and army of those supported by another terrific invention, taxes.

Wow, I've never really counted my blessing and these are really making my day. I feel so happy and blessed now.

Abo

LOL she should be blond

craneman

Leatherman super tool. Not a day has gone by in years that I haven't used mine.

SteveR Loc: Michigan

She's pretty perfect as she is!!!