Ode to the great pumpkin

With Halloween just a month away, and Thanksgiving just weeks beyond that, let’s celebrate the pumpkin, that gourd-like squash of the genus Cucurbita, that will find its ways onto our porches and later onto the dinner table. Consider the wisdom it has inspired: “I would rather sit on a pumpkin and have it all to myself, than be crowded on a velvet cushion.” - Henry David Thoreau “Produce Great Pumpkins and the pies will follow later. - Anonymous “Men are like pumpkins. It seems like all the good ones are either taken or they’ve had everything scraped out of their heads with a spoon. “ - Anonymous (but surely a woman)