Pumpkin, Anyone?

I feel perfectly safe confessing my indiscretions in this space. My husband would probably never venture into this part of the Internet anyway. He was not home this evening, so I was left to my own devices (is that the expression?), literally. A rather large pumpkin graced our front porch for Halloween. I did not go to the trouble of carving it but instead drew a black cat and wrote a greeting, both with magic marker. It is two weeks past Trick-or-Treat, and the nightly temperature is reaching down into the 20's, so I concluded it was time to bring in the pumpkin and cook it. We have done this before, either boiling or baking until soft enough to peel and mash for use in pies, cookies, and bread. I think my husband must have cut and gutted the pumpkin in previous encounters because I do not remember fighting through that tough flesh before. Naturally, I took what my husband would refer to as a woman's approach. I tried the largest of the carving knives in his set--probably over $100 per knife--and could not get enough leverage to even halve the vegetable (or is it a fruit?). Then I tried the more expensive cleaver. No luck. So I inserted the cleaver or the carving knife by turn and used the other, butt end of the handle, to ever so gently tap the sharp object into the seed cavity. Had poor Terry walked in during the process, he would have surely lost consciousness. I was successful, of course, but I doubt I will share the story with the owner of the knives.