August 25, 2015 • Page 10 shop online at www.missourivalleyshopper.com I-29 Soil Health and Cover Crop Field Tours Posted Monday, August 17th, 2015 by SDSU iGrow Categorized: Agronomy, Other Crops, Profit Tips BROOKINGS, S.D. - SDSU Extension will be hosting several soil health and cover crop field tours this fall. “These tours provide growers with firsthand information on management practices to enhance soil health as well as an opportunity to have their questions answered,” explained Anthony Bly, SDSU Extension Soils Field Specialist. During the tours, SDSU Extension staff and other industry experts will evaluate cover crops for beneficial soil health properties and forage/feed value for grazing livestock. 2015 Tour Schedule Sept. 8 Minnehaha County: Al Miron Farm, tour begins at 11:45 a.m. (25935 469th Ave, Sioux Falls, SD 57107) lunch is provided; Sept. 10 Clay/Turner Counties: Southeast Research Farm Fall Tour begins at 8:30 a.m. (29974 University Rd, Beresford, SD 57004) rolls and coffee, and noon lunch provided; Sept. 14 Lake County: Mustang Seeds, tour begins at 1 p.m. (1001 10th St SW, Madison, SD 57042); Sept. 15 Brookings/Hamlin Counties: East Dakota Soil and Water Research Farm tour begins at 1 p.m. (20940 470th Ave, Brookings, SD) supper provided; Sept. 17 Clark/Codington Counties: Kopriva Angus tour begins at 1 p.m. (41577 169th St. Raymond, SD). More details will be released during Dakotafest. Cosponsors and cooperators include: S.D. No-till Association, S.D. Soybean Research and Promotion Council, Millborn Seeds, Mustang/ Coyote Seeds, USDA-NRCS, USDA-ARS, Southeast Research Farm, Northeast Research Farm, and S.D. Soil Health Coalition. To learn more, visit the iGrow events page and search by event date or contact Bly by phone 605.782.3290. niGrow The Bookworm You’ll Enjoy This ‘Mess’ “Mess: One Man’s Struggle to Clean Up His House and His Act” by Barry Yourgrau, © 2015, W.W. Norton; 276 pages ——— BY TERRI SCHLICHENMEYER Once again, you couldn’t find your keys. You were pretty sure you put them down on the kitchen counter. On top of last weeks’ mail. Which you’d laid next to a shirt you bought on sale in April, breakfast dishes from who-knows-when, five plastic bags, and a dead plant. Yeah, your house is cluttered, but it’s not so bad – which is what Barry Yourgrau thought until, as he says in his memoir “Mess,” he began to look around … The apartment hadn’t always been his. It had, in fact, belonged to Barry Yourgrau’s girlfriend once, and she’d bequeathed it to him when she moved and he needed a place to stay. So when Cosima knocked on the door of the apartment one afternoon, she was surprised that Yourgrau wouldn’t let her in. He couldn’t, because Yourgrau was a hoarder “at wit’s end.” Postcards, old calendars, paper bags, souvenirs, and bric-a-brac littered the floors of his home, covered with dust, stored in boxes, slung across furniture and countertops. Not only were the rooms cluttered, but so was Yourgrau’s mind: as a writer, he couldn’t seem to stay focused. His home was too much of a distraction. Cosima gave him an ultimatum: clean or else. So why not make it a “Project”? Yourgrau decided that de-cluttering – and understanding his compulsion to hoard – might make an interesting story, perhaps even a book. A twin with a younger singleton brother, Yourgrau had spent his childhood helping his family to move; his father was a professor, and had worked his way around to a series of jobs. Yourgrau remembered his mother’s death with deep sorrow, but recalled his father as “domineering.” Still, getting rid of their “stuff” was an emotional struggle. But, then again, getting rid of his own possessions wasn’t easy, either. Yourgrau sought counseling. He read up on hoarding and its psychology, attended a twelve-step program, accepted help from several places, spoke with other hoarders and experts, procrastinated, and tried tackling the mess on his own. Of his struggles, he says, “A man who cannot let go: that would be me.” There are a lot of pages here in which “Mess” lives up to its title. That disappointed me; I had such high hopes for this memoir, but a firsthalf hodgepodge makes author Barry Yourgrau’s story initially very hard to follow. It doesn’t help that Yourgrau sprinkles his narrative with highbrow literary references and other edge-ofmainstream nods; a sense of mania and referring to people by a series of nicknames only adds to the chaos. Fortunately, things turn around about halfway through the book. There, Yourgrau starts to dig into the reasoning and psychology of hoarding by consulting experts, which tampers the frenzy. Indeed, the second half of this book is more introspective, more down-to-brasstacks, and much more interesting. Ultimately, I don’t think this will help much if you need advice on hoarding or cleaning. It’s just too cluttered for that but, if entertainment is your goal, here’s your book. If you can, then, “Mess” is something to find. REAL ESTATE RENTALS AUTOMOTIVE EMPLOYMENT MERCHANDISE COUPONS the Missouri Valley Shopper and missourivalleyshopper.com is your complete source for buying and selling. Everything you need is just a click or call away! 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