What's a Sugar Beet?

Finally the day is over, and long one it was. Had to turn in a homework assignment in for class, chair a meeting at work, go to class, pick up a friend from the airport, and then proceed to lose in tonight's soccer game. Luckily, the night ended with a good note by watching 24 at a friend's house in which his wife has some left over Adobo I had for dinner. The day was made even longer because I didn't get home until 2 AM last night. Why?

Stupid snow. My friends and I came back from Forest River, ND last night. A trip that on average takes 6 hours was an 8 hour one for us because of the heavy snowfall last night. Ironically, it all melted today.

But what were we doing Forest River, ND? The answer is Curling. Yes, the good old Canadian sport of curling. The essence of shuffle board, bocce ball, bowling and household chores mixed into one goofy game on ice. It was the 11th annual Bonspiel, so they called the outdoor curling tournament. For being first time curlers, our team won 2 games but also lost 2 games. Not too shabby, being that the teams we lost two ended up placing in the tournament of 54 teams. Much like ice fishing, this curling tournament was not so much about the sport as it was another excuse to booze it up in the winter weather. Yeah, the crazy things you do in the Midwest. "Doncha know?"

The long trip was well worth it for it had many laughs along the way. The funniest moment was when our friend, Jesse who is from Forest River, pointed out the local sugar beet processing factory. Raised in the suburbs of Seattle, I had never heard of a sugar beet, nor did the other passenger in the car who was born in Chicago. I always thought all sugar came from sugar canes. Well, apparently Jesse tried to convince us that many farms around ND harvest sugar beets. And being as we've never seen a sugar beet before, we proceeded to laugh at her because we weren't convinced that sugar beets existed at all. Minutes later, we pull along a semitruck with an open-aired cage trailer that was completely empty, and Jesse says, "See that truck. It carries sugar beets." I glance at the empty truck, and can't resist the family sarcasm charm, "Oh yeah, I see lots of sugar beets. It's amazing how INVISIBLE they are. Those mythical vegetables, probably planted by unicorn turd."

Oh the laughs of North Dakota, Eh?