Wow. You nailed the culture right on the head. I spent a number of formative years in Minnesota, and being a 4th generation Scandinavian immigrant, I couldn't

Wow. You nailed the culture right on the head. I spent a number of formative years in Minnesota, and being a 4th generation Scandinavian immigrant, I couldn't agree more with your assessment of the area. I'd also add that conformity is a very strong value in the upper Midwest. It's really hard to break out of the box because there are such strong cultural morays against doing anything different from what the people in your community are doing. Finally I'd like to add as a data point that most of the smart CS/Tech guys that I went to college with in Minnesota spent the majority of their spare time playing Dungeons and Dragons and participating in the Society for Creative Anachronism.