Southern Minnesota

   Land of the farm.  Driving around in southern Minnesota, I remember what rural America is like.  Miles and miles of corn fields.  Lots of fields of soybeans as well.  Scattered throughout the countryside among these fields are groves of trees.  Each of these groves is a windbreak for a farm.   Everywhere are cornfields and trees.  In Eastern Oregon the ranch home sites are 10-15 miles apart.  Around here the farm sites are about a half mile apart. 
    Today we drove to Windom to visit an aunt of R.  It is harvest time.  Everywhere you look, you see huge dry fields of corn and beans.  I thought they were dead from the drought, but that is just what they are supposed to do at this time of year.  As you travel, you see large combines working through rows of dry brown corn stalks or equally brown stands of soybeans.  You will also see parked combines using their comveyor shutes to load the corn or beans into waiting grain trucks.  Farmers are very busy right now spmetimes working into the night to get the harvest in.