Catching Up

Hey guys.

Haven't written in a while and for my avid readers, I do apologize. Things get busy. You understand. Let's whip around to a bunch of things to catch up a little.

A third year is in the books in Brookings and I'm happy to be celebrating summer again in the Rushmore State. (I think that's misleading because Mount Rushmore is distinctly West River. In Minnesota, if I say "Land of 10,000 Lakes," I'm not really concerned because the whole state has lakes. (Except Rock County, which is the only county in the state that doesn't have a natural lake. There's some trivia for you.) If I say "Mount Rushmore State, I feel like I'm leaving out the rest of the state and really South Dakota is two different places when you consider West River and East River. The whole idea of "place" interests me. I should have went into a geography field. Always have loved maps.)

They said "Go further west, young man." So, I went to Pierre.

I'm in South Dakota for another summer, this time in Pierre working at the Capital Journal. I'll be here until the middle of July and so far, so good. Much like last summer in Mitchell, I don't know a single soul. That is more intriguing to me than anything else because it has forced me to truly get to know people. The staff at the paper is from further away than I am, with a pair of reporters from Arizona and Michigan.

Last week, I visited a ranch for a story. And I mean a true ranch. Driving 20 miles out of town, down a gravel road for five miles and then down another gravel road that was two miles straight to the ranch type of ranch. Now, I'm from farm country but this was pretty interesting given that the road just went to his house and that was it. Not like the back roads of Le Sueur County, where there is a gravel road on basically every other section line.

In the last month, I've been to Rapid City and the Badlands and Mount Rushmore and now to Pierre and its own interesting sibling Fort Pierre. Fort Pierre is smaller than my hometown, just a bit under 2,000 people. It is distinctly "west" if you will. They have a stockyard and a rodeo ring and at the county commissioner meeting last week, they were all wearing cowboy hats and boots. I was a bit out place in slacks and a polo shirt.

Pierre is interesting because it is in the confluence of newspapers. Both the Rapid City Journal and the Argus Leader are dropped off here but their focus is, of course, on their respective cities. Yet they make the effort to be a part of these communities. The Capital Journal is first and foremost, a community newspaper. The communities have a lot of pride in it and it's something to admire, really.

Congrats, class of 2013. You don't need my advice.

I watched both Pierre and Stanley County (Fort Pierre's) graduations on Sunday. They reminded me of two things. 1) I know I tweeted about it last graduation season but speeches at graduations by seniors are pretty much meaningless. It's nice to let the smartest kids in the class speak and impart their thoughts on me but what does it really matter. If I'm graduating, they are the same age as me. Do they really know anything more than I do? Whoever is speaking usually ends up talking down to their classmates and that's as much fun as it sounds. If you're speaking, you can share fun antidotes from your time in school with your classmates but 90 percent of the people in the crowd will have no idea what you're talking about. It's a big inside joke and you're leaving everyone out. Nobody knows your fourth grade teacher Mrs. James from a hole in the ground. Sorry. And I swear that I didn't remember half of the stories the speakers from my class told when they gave their speeches. We only had 40-some kids and I didn't know what these people were talking about. Three people spoke at my graduation and I only remember that one of them lit a candle while they were speaking. I don't remember anything else and I wasn't under the influence. It's ridiculous.

The same can be said for college graduation speeches. I'm hearing about Oprah and Robert Redford speaking to schools and I'm thinking that nothing they have to say applies to me. They're famous and better than all of the graduates. We get it. Next spring, I will probably be sitting in Frost Arena and someone will be telling me something that probably won't have anything to do with what I have to do. I hope I can speak to a graduating class someday because I will tell them that nothing I have to say to them matters and that they have to figure things out for themselves. That's it. That's all I would say.

/rant over

2) I'm thankful that Le Center had a gym with all of the seats on one side because then all of the ceremony for graduation is in front of you. You don't realize how nice that is until the commencement ceremony. With seats on both sides, you have to have the diploma distribution (that's what it should be called in the program too) on one end of the gym. That means the kids have to be on the floor and maybe some parents too and then they can't see what's going on. There's a lot of neck craning happening there. I've given this more thought than one person should.

The Office ended last week. It was a good finish and I was a bit worried about how they would close out all of the characters but it worked well. I was a bit sad about Kevin getting fired but it was a necessary move considering how badly he did his job for nine years. Last week was also the 15th anniversary of Seinfeld concluding and of course, everyone hated that finale because it was stupid. I've relived most of the show through reruns and the DVDs. I have some of the DVDs with me in Pierre and I'll probably skip watching the finale because I know I don't like it.

Oahe Dam power plant. Missouri River marvel.

I went up to the Oahe Dam last night and checked things out. I now understand why my friend Nick Lowrey rants and raves about it for fishing. There's a lot of places to try and catch a big one. Also, I've long liked dams and despite my lack of knowledge in the engineering fields, the Oahe Dam has to be a modern marvel. I'm calling the History Channel.

I golfed Saturday. The pros are so good at it. I am not.

Also, I'm writing this from a laundromat. I've never been to a laundromat before. There is a very heavy set man in front of me and his fat gut is hanging out at me. I'm not comfortable at all.