Am I naive? too idealistic? Two life lessons - at a farmers market and from lunch with a friend.

[jtuck004]

25. I was at a roadside stand where I buy honey from one of our local producers, and the

fella who owns the stand is an old-time farmer, back when there used to be a big irrigation ditch that ran through the area where there are homes now, was how they watered all the crops that used to grow here.

He remembered the time when he brought in blue potatoes - he had the only ones, it was a novelty, and won a prize at the state fair. By the next year, several of the farmers around him, people who had purchased his, had them too.

While it lowers prices, having these grown by a variety of people makes the line keep going, one might see improvements, etc. And it's not like they get it for free - they still have to plant, fertilize, water, and hope bugs don't eat everything.

On the other hand, someone that can't just go buy 10 of the plants and tell the seller they plan to grow them too? What kind of person is that? So just because they have them doesn't mean the plants will thrive, eh?

It's funny - when drug companies try to monopolize, people hate on them. When farmers do it, we applaud them. They are both doing the very same thing, but the consequences and stakes are wildly different.

But I am guessing the first one doesn't have that much to worry about - I bet, at that level, through personal service and caring they can keep enough of their market that it will just nibble at the edges, so they will have to find another way to bring in the money. That's how you compete with others and I see it done every day.

Buddy doing ok?