State Stats

The other day at Jack's Cub Scout Pack meeting we had an activity to get to know the leaders. One of the questions was "how many states have you been to?" I was very suprised that only one of the eleven leaders had been to more than half of the states (40), and even more surprised that only three of the leaders had been to more than 15 states. Four of the leaders had visited less than 10 states! (In their defense, however, two of them grew up in other countries--Brazil and Canada.)

Maybe it's just me, but don't these numbers seem awfully low?

I suspect part of the reason people here haven't visited that many states is that out west there just aren't that many states. And they're huge--it takes hours and hours of driving to get out of Utah!

Or maybe I'm the odd one out with a lifelong goal of visiting all 50 states.

Both Roger and I have only got one left--Hawaii. A few years ago it came down to two--North Dakota and Hawaii. So Roger and I made a point of going to North Dakota. Hawaii seems like a much more exotic place to finish up (although we did enjoy our drive through North Dakota!). And Jack has officially visited more than half of the states so far!

P.S. I just have to share a related incident that still makes me laugh when I think about it. One of our employees at the bookstore was a student at BYU and she spent a semester studying in Nauvoo, Illinois. The program was administered through the study abroad office, and so naturally the students referred to going to Nauvoo as "going on study abroad." Maybe crossing the Mississippi River counted?