Out of the city, talking to a farmer friend of mine as we walk over the concrete-like fields awaiting the spring planting. Day cold, grey, April. I say: "How in hell are you going to get by without any rain? You had virtually no snow this winter, and are not getting any rain; the ground is as hard as a rock." He replies: "Corn these days, and the way we work, you don't need much rain: a bit at the right time is nice." We keep walking: hard, hard ground. He says: "The whole point of a farm now is a factory with invisible walls. The whole point of all this work for 100 years is to regularise and bring under some kind of control this damn working out of doors. Weather, drought, bugs, the whole shebang. That's what all the chemicals and boys in white coats and gasoline replacing horses is for." We keep walking: his outside dog bounds around us, barking and jumping in the sculpted furrows. I say: "I thought you liked farming because it wasn't factory work." He smiles at me: "You can't escape it, brother. One planet: one factory." It starts, spittingly, to rain.