Ralph Beer has worked as a ranch hand, swamper, clerk, cannon cocker, logger, heavy equipment operator, battery rat, carpenter, and whiskey taster. He and his wife, Maggie, recently sold the Howard Beer Ranch and have gone on to other things, though they dearly miss their cows. Beer is the author of the Spur Award-winning novel "The Blind Corral," and his essays have been included in the anthologies "The Last Best Place" and "Montana Spaces."