What’s The World’s Largest Garden Gnome Going To Be For Halloween This Year?

A witch:

I saw this bastard over the weekend during an upstate jaunt. Perched on Route 209 in front of Kelder’s Farm in Kerhonkson, NY, the world’s largest garden gnome draws wary tourists in with his friendly face and pointy, presumably buckled shoes. Of course, this time of year, Das Gnome is all gussied up for Halloween. I think the group of bats affixed to his hat really accentuate the true witchiness of the entire ensemble. He’s a regular Margaret Hamilton over there!

The happiness on my face is genuine. I defy you to visit the world’s largest garden gnome and not feel all warm and gooey inside.

[SAD UPDATE: As of 2010, Kerhonkson’s gnome is only the second largest of his kind. That’s right—they built a larger garden gnome in Iowa. Can you believe that? Well, this guy will always be the world’s largest garden gnome in my heart.]

Also on this trip to the Borscht Belt, I met a randy young goat who was not the least bit camera shy…

…got lost in a corn maze…

…saw some amazing foliage…

…watched my friend drink soda out of a Mets glass in a fancy restaurant (said restaurant served said friend this glass apropos of nothing)…

…drank soda out of a glass with a Frank Viola baseball card taped to it after demanding the fancy restaurant serve my beverage in a glass bearing the likeness of Keith Hernandez (in retrospect, it’s amazing they had any baseball cards in the kitchen, let alone any Mets from the Hernandez era)…

…looked like a typical Brooklyn hipster while chilling in a fancy bed and breakfast…

…and discussed the faults of the American voting system over a bountiful feast at a rest stop Arby’s. I have no photos of this magical event because I didn’t want to get roast beef grease all over the camera lens.

Other Catskill happenings not captured on film: the box of cigars my friend John found deep within the corn maze; the amazing vittles served at the bed and breakfast; the 1950s-themed eatery boasting a sign that read “ELVIS PARKING ONLY—Violators Will Be All Shook Up”; the seemingly miserable teenage scarecrow greeting traffic near the entrance to the corn maze (who later told us he was pulling down around fifty bucks a day and was “way into metal”); the splinter I got on the hayride up to the corn maze that prompted the following exchange between myself and some impossibly loud Asian child…

ME: Ow. I got a splinter
ILAC: DON’T WORRY. THAT’LL COME OUT.
ME: Do I have to pay you for that medical advice?
ILAC: NO.

…and the totally bad-ass horse riding my party did on steeds with names like Neo, Comache, and Savannah. Surprisingly, my horse did not buck me off while we crossed the Tanglewood River, nor did he take a massive and unthinking shit all over the brand new Italian loafers I wasn’t wearing. Thanks so much, Horsey Doo.

All in all, it was a great way to kill two and a half days. I give the Catskills four stars. JG2 sez checkitout.