Get that picture of sitting on the porch with a piece of hay sticking out of your mouth while you order your workers around right out of your head. Farming is hard work. Instead, maybe think of crap farmers (at least on rainy days in the summer), flies, and the smell. Oh, the smell. There's a reason they call it "dairy air."

You'll be responsible for a bevy of responsibilities. You'll need to know your crops backwards and forwards—when and how to plant them, how to cultivate them and make them grow, when and how to harvest them, how to get rid of weeds and pests, and how to make a top-notch salad.

^{This would be a…bottom-notch salad.}

What is a crop, by the way? Wheat. Corn. Sorghum (source). Anything that attracts bugs and that, when ripe, humans will pay for. And yeah, there's pot, too, but even though it is legal in some areas, just don't go there. Lotta downsides. Unclear upside.

Anyway, in the land of normal, legal crops, you will, every now and then, find the occasional crop circles claiming your crops have been adopted as alien mating places. It's likely that they'll have a new website coming: ADate. You'll need to find buyers for your crops, sans crap, and negotiate prices. And you'll need to engage in a whole lot of manual labor.

It's not an easy life, but if you want to be away from the hustle and bustle of the city (high-fiber, yes; high-smog, no), enjoy working outdoors, and like freshly baked corn muffins, then maybe this gig is for you. And if you've even bothered to stop here and read this missive, it is likely that you were reared on a farm or had a lovely day as a kid visiting one. Do it again before you step in. Tough life.

If it's so tough, why would anyone want to do this? Well, you get to be your own boss, for one thing. You aren't waiting every two weeks to get a paycheck from The Man—instead, you work hard, harvest as many crops as you can, and the more you produce and the more diligently you find buyers for your goods, the more money you make.

That's good news if you have an excellent work ethic; not such good news if you're a slacker. In fact, if you're a slacker, you may be better suited to being one of the farm animals. They don't have many chores. 

Also, farming is perfect if you don't go in for all the hustle and bustle of the big city. You can live at your own pace, out in nature, close to the Earth. Real close to the Earth, if you ever fall off your tractor.

But even if you're the type who would prefer to work out in the elements and make your own way, don't delude yourself—it's incredibly hard work. You'll be physically and mentally exhausted at the end of every day—and we're talking long days—then you get to wake up a few hours later and do it all over again.

It's more a life than a career. You don't just farm—you are a farmer. If you don't want your career to define you, too bad. Be something else—a waiter or a secretary, something you don't wear on your sleeve. Trust us—people will be able to tell you're a farmer just by looking at your sleeves. They'll likely still be covered in fertilizer residue, right up to the elbows. 

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