One constant in journalism is you just never know what's going to happen or who you're going to talk to.

Another constant is that journalism is a ongoing education; you always meet people who are knowledgeable in their field, and your knowledge grows thereby. I have never worked in the oilpatch, for example, but I have had innumerable interviews and tours on service rigs, drilling rigs, the EnCana CO2 operation at Goodwater, and most recently, even watched as a custom-made drilling rig was manufactured here by Panther Drilling, as president Bob Schad patiently explained what each step and each component of the rig was.

Then, more recently, we've been working on our Salute to Agriculture, which is featured in this week's edition of the Review. I have worked on a couple of farms, but I'm hardly a farming expert or knowledgeable about agriculture - on the other hand, I've learned a lot about agriculture from those who do know what it's all about.

I've talked to such people as Dave Pulfer and David Pattyson and Lonny McKague, all producers, or experts like agrologist Elaine Moats, with whom I've talked many dozens of times over the years about the growth and development and problems crops have weathered in our area.

And what farming have I ever done? Well, just farm labour; the first farm I worked on was my first summer after graduating from high school in 1979. The farm I worked on was, even at that time, a living anachronism, a phenomenon of living unreality.

See, this farm had no electricity and no running water, so I had sponge baths in the evening, listened to a radio by battery power, and read by Coleman and kerosene lamps. They had two milk cows, both of which had to be milked by hand (which I readily learned), and they mainly raised sheep, which I learned to shear by hand. They had a 1945 Case tractor that was parked on a hill; why? Well, since the starter was broken, you put it into neutral, rolled it down the hill and jammed it into gear to get it started.

Now, I know many people grew up with just that sort of scenario, but that would've been back in the 20s and 30s, not in 1979. Anyway, the work was hard and very physical, but at the end I learned a lot and could appreciate a lot better how hard life was for our pioneers. Until spending a summer doing this kind of work, I wouldn't have had any idea.

Modern farming involves hard work too, of course, but with a whole different set of problems these days: low commodity prices, jacked-up prices for inputs, long hours of hard work for a return that sometimes doesn't pay the expenses to put the crop into the ground. For those into cattle, we're finally over BSE, but now it seems cattle prices and hog prices are softening this year, not exactly news that would be welcome by producers.

Finally, the latest twist on this is a story I was able to do about a girl who grew up on a farm at Colfax, and graduated from the Comp, is now owner of a thriving mini-doughnut business in L.A., and she's met more celebrities than you can imagine - and her business is all by word-of-mouth. Some of the stars include Dustin Hoffman, Denzel Washington, Danny DeVito, John Travolta, Martin Sheen, Charlie Sheen, Denise Richards, and Oprah's husband. You'll have to wait for a future edition to read all about that.