a factory-farm processing experience

Yesterday, due to a momentary lapse in sanity, I found myself accompanying the entire kindergarten population of Calum's school, plus assorted other suckers... errr, volunteer parents on a field trip to a pumpkin farm.

I've taken my kids to a pumpkin farm a couple of times (we've also gone berry and apple picking numerous times), to get a pumpkin straight from the field. I think it's nice for them to understand where food really comes from (ie, not the supermarket) and besides, a trip to a farm makes for a fun outing.

One thing I've always disliked about those farm outings, though... the school groups. It makes me shudder to see a noisy pack of kids, accompanied by adults barking out orders, descend on us. Usually our policy is to give those groups a wide berth if at all possible. Yesterday was my first experience on the other side of the fence; this time I was part of that noisy, bustling pack of kids.

The experience was very... regimented. There was a list of things that "had" to get done during the time we were at the farm, only one of which involved selecting pumpkins. There was a small corn maze, a barn with a few animals (including a very unhappy trio of sheep in a too-small pen), a play area with some wooden cut-out animals that you could "milk" or "feed" or gather eggs from, a very short hay wagon ride around a boring fenced patch of dirt, even a small forest with hilariously ugly wooden cut-out animals and dinosaurs (?!) nestled in the trees. We were herded from one area to another, and much like farm animals, we were shut into the area that we were herded into for a pre-set amount of time, and then herded out of that area into another one. I kid you not - they roped off each area so that nobody could leave until the farm employees gave their permission. There were enough parents around that we each had only two children in our care, so I could certainly have managed to supervise the two boys I was looking after while they proceeded at their own pace, but even so, we were treated as just part of a mass of kids needing to be processed through the farm visit experience.

It was all just a little bit ridiculous, and a pale imitation of the outings we've done in the past, where we could take the time to explore the farm, enjoy the sights, sounds and smells of the fall harvest, climb around on hay bales and choose *just* the right pumpkin, then troop back to the car covered in mud but satisfied and happy. That said, we are now the proud owners of a very fine pumpkin which will no doubt make as good a jack-o-lantern as any we've had in the past - so I guess no matter how you go about getting your Halloween pumpkin, the end result is just as good.