History in Corn

The weather in October was, for the most part, gorgeous. We took advantage of one particularly beautiful day and had a roommate outing in a cornfield.

The field was on an equestrian farm and lay adjacent to a pumpkin patch. More on that later.

I guess I've never spent any quality time in a cornfield before, because I was enamored with the roots of the stalks. They are strong enough to hold the plant off the ground and look like creepy spider legs. 

The day was good training time for Christy, whose future holds corn. A lot of corn. What else is there in Iowa?

This cornfield, however, was not your normal field. History was the topic of the day, and we traversed the entire southeastern portion of the U.S. that afternoon, following in the steps that Union and Confederate armies first took 150 years ago. At one point we lost Courtney, only to discover she had disappeared on the Underground Railroad and was making her way steadily north on unmarked trails we had not noticed.

We started the day in Florida and I insisted we follow the seacoast north to my home state. We left the coast in North Carolina and ended up in Richmond in no time. (Note that this picture includes history, Virginia, AND Apple all together. Throw in a piece of Psych paraphernalia and it would have summed me up perfectly.)

While the history aspect held my attention, Courtney turned hers to perfecting talents no one knew she had. Maybe one day I will understand where the planking phenomenon came from…but I highly doubt it.

Being stuck in the middle of a maze of corn brought up the inevitable references to Pocahontas. Being around each other brought up the inevitable references to Harry Potter. Christy carried around her wand for most of the journey, perfecting the "Expelliarmus!" spell.

Sam then got on the wrong side of the stupefy spell, but recovered quickly enough that we were only momentarily sidetracked from our journey.

After a long and desperate journey that took us from Florida to Maryland to Ohio to Louisiana and then to Kentucky, we celebrated our successful exit from the maze with much joy. Our excitement and relief could not be contained.

Shifting our attention from corn to pumpkins, we began the hunt for the perfect gourd. When we search for pumpkins, we are serious about it.

I was skeptical that our freezer would be able to hold puree from four pumpkins, but I was proven wrong. We are now in the market for any good recipes that contain pumpkin. Suggestions are appreciated and will be given serious consideration to be included in future cooking frenzies that seem to happen all the time around here.

Most people go to college for four years, but we decided that wasn't a long enough for us to spend together and went with extended college for our post-grad life. It's more fun that way.