A neighborhood discovery
The house is basically home now, but we’re still discovering unexpected aspects to our new location. It’s odd to be finding things so long after moving, but it seems like we’ve spent more time away from home than here for the past several months. Some things also relate to the changing seasons, like our furnace troubles and the magnificent colors as the sugar maples in the yard changed color.
Since I keep finding new aspects to the house, I shouldn’t be surprised at finding new things about the neighborhood. I haven’t really explored yet, apart from figuring out how to get to the grocery store or to meetings. I haven’t even biked to the library yet, which is a goal I’ve had for a while.
This past weekend, the day after Halloween, Maggie and I went down to Thompson Park for the pumpkin launch (yup, you read that right). I thought that the park was pretty deep in the neighborhood to the south of us, so I hadn’t made it out there yet. It turns out that although it’s about four blocks away as the car drives, much closer than I thought, it’s only about a block walking, which is much closer still!
It’s a nice little park, with basketball and tennis courts, baseball diamonds, a playground, shelters, and a couple of trails. Of course, the highlight when we were there were the pumpkin launchers set up on the field.
For the past several years, Bloomington has had a pumpkin launching contest the weekend after Halloween. There are pumpkin flavored goodies, pumpkin seed spitting contests, and teams of pumpking launchers. For some reason, this was the last year they plan to do it, so Maggie and I decided to take a picnic lunch and enjoy the spectacle. It didn’t hurt that it was 70 degrees out and sunny… a perfect day for throwing pumpkins as far as possible.
There were three entrants: a trebuchet powered by a coordinated team of burly individuals and two PVC cannons that seemed to be powered by springs. The cannons were able to shoot a pumpkin over 200 yards! They did less well with accuracy, however. One shot a pumpkin into the ground only 20 yards in front of it while trying to hit a target 50 yards away.
The trebuchet was only able to loft a pumpkin 90 yards, but consistently got within 10-15 yards of the target. It was also much, much faster to load and shoot. The best part, though, is that because it wasn’t shooting as hard, the pumpkin didn’t go as high, so it was much easier to see. It’s amazing to shoot a pumpkin 200 yards, but it doesn’t look very impressive until it hits the ground.
Overall, we enjoyed an afternoon outside on a sunny day, had a great time watching exploding pumpkins, and found a nice park within walking distance. I’d call that a successful All Saints’ Day.