During college, I worked two summers on a pig farm. It’s still the best job I ever had because of Brown Kimbrough, the man I worked for.

Fifteen things I learned:

1. Ten- and twelve-hour work days go by quickly when you’re discing a field on a tractor, and not so quickly when you’re standing ankle deep in pig muck.
2. Even when you’re making less than minimum wage, you can save money because you’re too tired and busy to spend it.
3. Few people will want to be around you anyway.
4. One shower will not remove the smell of pig shit from a person’s skin.
5. Two showers won’t guarantee it either.
6. Sixteen-ounce bottles of Mountain Dew taste like nectar on a hot July afternoon in a pig lot.
7. Castrating pigs is a great way to understand the concept of empathy.
8. Young pigs have a high mortality rate.
9. Dead pigs must be removed quickly from pens.
10. If you leave a dead pig in a pen overnight because you’re tired of dealing with carcasses, your problem will be solved when you come back the next day. Nothing will be left.
11. Pigs are cannibals.
12. When you go back the next morning, you’ll swear the pigs are eyeing you hungrily.
13. Somewhere in the distance, a dog howls.
14. Seriously, don’t leave dead pigs overnight.
15. Someday, you’ll be able to use this information in a book.