At half-past two on the 31st October 2020, I was turfed out of the house by my mum to buy Halloween sweets and a pumpkin. Unsurprisingly M&S had sold out of both. But I asked a lovely shop assistant (whose name I didn’t catch) if there were any pumpkins left. She had a look in the back of the shop and came out with a pumpkin. However, this wasn’t an ordinary pumpkin but a 16 pound one, yes I know, ironically named ‘Monster Pumpkin!’ She asked me if I’d like it and, in the moment, I answered yes, so it was graciously dumped in my arms. I was stranded with a 16-pound pumpkin in the wine aisle of Marks and Spencers.
I then had to find sweets. I was on the phone with my mum, who was cackling a great deal on the other line as I told her I had a 16-pound pumpkin in my arms, which was rather in keeping with the Halloween mood as I was walking around M&S receiving some odd looks from other shoppers. One man even asked me where I’d found the pumpkin and if they were on the shop floor, and I laughed ‘no, but I think you can see why.’ Anyway, after 2 laps of the store, I realised that they were probably sold out of Halloween sweets so picked up some Christmas chocolates wrapped as mini brussels sprouts and some “salted caramel mallow” and made my way to the self-check-out. I attempted to use the bag that I had brought to the shop to put the pumpkin in, but it was too large so instead, I found a big bag with Percy Pig on it, which, thankfully, was large enough for the pumpkin. I couldn’t carry the pumpkin home, and my dad had taken the car to work, so I called my mum again and asked her to meet me halfway to give me a hand.
We finally got home with the pumpkin, and just to top off the series of events, when the delivery man came to drop off my mum’s new coat from HOBBS, he asked “was it you carrying the large shopping bag down the road?” Sheepishly I replied, ‘yes.’ Anyway, we carved the pumpkin and are going to watch The Others after dinner. Happy Halloween!
