I've had two recent dealings with people from the Mid-West which just blew my mind and renewed my faith in people. Unfortunately, up here in NY, people just don't trust each other as much.
1) My buddy and I were looking all over for a place to stay at Sturgis and came across an ad where a guy and his wife decided to rent out their 5th Wheeler. Long story short, while trying to figure out a way to pay them and "protect myself from getting ripped off" (they had no idea what PayPal was), he replied with "Hey, I'm old school. If you give me your word that you are going to be here, that's good enough for me".
And then he followed it up by saying that he can get his old lady to get her car off the car port so we can park our bikes there and offered help in getting our bike off the back of the pickup if we decide to go that route, welcomed to their cookouts, etc., etc. Just nice, decent, hard working people. I was so taken back by his attitude that I sent him a down payment check.
2) I was looking for a used seat for my bike but didn't want to spend $3-$400 because I was going to hack it up anyways. I came across a craigslist ad in Oklahoma where they were advertising a seat for $100. I contacted them and after going back and forth a few times, finally spoke to them on the phone. Again, the payment question came up and again, they had no clue about Paypal so the wife finally says to me "You sound like a nice honest guy so how about I sent you the seat and if it fits, you send us the money?" Again, blown away. She spent $30 on shipping and I got the seat (which looks brand new) yesterday. I called her immediately, thanked her and will be sending the money out today.
I told my wife we need to get out of this Liberal bastion state of NY and move out West where the people I admire and respect live....