PUMPKIN SHORTAGE

"You can't find a can of pumpkin in the country,"  the manager grocery-man explained to the older woman.

She was at the check-out across from mine and that sentence caught my attention.  My cashier girl was busy scanning and bagging, and when I laughed at the idea of no canned pumpkin she just smiled at me.

Manager-man went on telling her she wouldn't find a can in the area and wasn't sure when they were going to get any in...and I stood there thinking it had to be a joke.

No canned pumpkin?
Insane in the membrane.
And also--who wants to make pumpkin pie when it's 95 degrees right now?  Well--older people do.  And maybe those who love pumpkin pie for breakfast, yummmmm....

But then I thought, really who says those kind of things unless there's a bit of truth behind them.  So I went to play librarian and googled pumpkin shortage...and
low and behold--there's some truth behind it.

Craziness!

What about Halloween?

What about Thanksgiving?

And then I started considering our farming.  Our American farming.  According to The Washington Post, in central Illinois their farming pumpkinlands make for 95% of the US's canned pumpkins--and then when you read on further you see that Libby's which is affiliated with Nestle is responsible for 87% of pumpkin sales from Sept. to Dec. 

Ok.....

that's alot of math and I generally suck at statistics, but I definitely see that the average farmer isn't in the loop on pumpkin sales.  I find that hard to comprehend, having pumpkin farms in my hometown area--but after watching the movie

Food, Inc. I believe it.  And if you haven't seen it--I recommend it.

So really to save Halloween and Thanksgiving I say we all start growing and canning our own pumpkin -- sharing it with each other:)..especially the old people.