Kanlaon

Today has been a day of surprises, dear blog readers.  The first surprise is that we left for the Half Moon Bay Pumpkin Festival at 10 a.m., which was a rather late start for us.  So of course we got stuck in a humongous traffic jam, and it took us an hour to get there.

As we got closer to downtown Half Moon Bay, self began to worry where hubby would park.  In earlier visits to the Pumpkin Festival, hubby has insisted on parking in a high school on top of a hill, and it’s at least a good mile from there to Main Street.  And today self was not thinking straight and wore four-inch-high espadrilles.

Anyhoo, it was with great relief that self heard hubby instruct her to get down with brother-in-law at the corner of Highway 1 and Main Street; hubby said he’d join us after he parked.

At first self thought brother-in-law might want to have coffee while waiting for hubby, but he insisted on going straight to the festival.  On the way, we passed the Flying Fish Market, and self inquired of brother-in-law whether he had an inclination to peruse the produce therein.  To which brother-in-law replied in the negative.  And so we arrived at Main Street, and at this point, self began to see many many things that delighted her in all sorts of visual and olfactory ways:  such as a glass-blowing demonstration; and a table manned by Greyhound Rescue; and vendors selling all manner of pumpkin delicacies like pumpkin bread and pumpkin pie.  But brother-in-law was walking in a straight line, and self had to scramble to keep up with him.

So we were walking.  And brother-in-law was walking.  Fast.  And he uttered not one word to self, who was always lagging just a few steps behind.  And he walked and walked and walked.  And after an hour we were still walking.  And it occurred to self that hubby must have parked by now.  But he had not called.  So self, who could not even call out to brother-in-law to stop (for he is very deaf, and only hears what you are saying if you are standing directly in front of him and he can read your lips), decided to chance losing him, and called hubby on her cell.  And lo and behold, hubby was waiting in a coffee shop, which was, oh, about 30 blocks behind us.

And self told hubby:  “Your brother is going like a rocket.  I think he wants to walk the entire festival and then head back.”

And hubby said OK, he would not move from the coffee shop, because if he tried to give chase, he would never catch up.  Which, to self, sounded like an exceedingly good plan.

And wonder of wonders, self did locate brother-in-law, still walking in that dogged and purposeful manner, never stopping at any booths, and self felt she was ready to scream.  And then self hit on a simply brilliant idea, which was that she would pretend she was alone, completely alone, and she would just forget about brother-in-law and hubby.  And she would take her time, stopping at any booths that caught her fancy.  And, isn’t it amazing, dear blog readers?  The minute she stopped thinking in terms of “catching up”, brother-in-law stuck close to her elbow (self means:  closer than he’d stuck before), and she never had to worry about losing sight of him.

Oh, she did once briefly lose sight of him, for about 10 minutes, but by then she was with hubby and, like a beagle to the scent, hubby seemed to know exactly where to find his brother, for he headed straight for a sausage booth, and there was brother-in-law, standing first in line.  And, after that, both men kept asking self where she would like to stop and have brunch.  But she was afraid to say anything, for she thought both men were crazy/unpredictable today.  And, in fact, hubby surprised her exceedingly by deciding we would have breakfast in Pasta Moon.  And, OK, that was quite a nice place for a repast (though self sincerely wishes that she knew in advance when hubby will be overtaken by the rare fit of generosity, so she can have time to refer to her list-of-restaurants-reserved-for-such-moments), but after that both men declared that they’d had their fill of the festival and wanted to drive straight home.  To avoid the Highway 92 homeward bound traffic, we had to detour through Pacifica, which was a very long detour, and along the way self saw many many fruit and pumpkin stands, but in keeping with the theme of the day —  which seemed to be:  moving on Auto-pilot —  hubby seemed to speed up whenever we approached any of these.

So self can’t really say much about the Half Moon Bay Pumpkin Festival.  She didn’t get to taste a single pumpkin anything, she didn’t buy any wonderful Halloween doo-dads (such as the orange wool berets, shaped like pumpkins), she was always tense, and she thinks that will probably be the last time she and hubby go to the great Half Moon Bay Pumpkin Festival.