Good God. I think this person really is serious. When I read this passage, I had to double back and re-read, thinking that it was going to be a funny piece, but...he is apparently dead serious.
For anyone who has gone apple picking (or strawberry picking, etc.) it isn't about imitating work. It is about doing something with other people (usually small kids) being outdoors, and...getting the produce you want.
With one lone exception, I don't engage in this kind of thing because my time is valuable to me and I am not using the exercise to entertain kids. I haven't gone apple picking in decades.
But I do fish and I have manually dug for clams, because they offer me something I cannot buy in a store. In the case of fish, being on the ocean, being with buddies, and that taste that only freshly caught Cod can provide. And drinking beer. In the case of clamming, deciding which clams you keep, and eating them with the knowledge that you know where they came from and that you did it yourself, with an aching back to prove it. And drinking beer. (I created this logo as a joke some years ago and made t-shirs for my buddy and others of us who used to clam when we were all staying up in Maine...
Reading this article (I actually did read it) all I could think of was...this guy needs to get get outside, get laid, get drunk, put down his phone, get off the computer, and probably all of them.
How pathetic it was to read.