How DO you peel a Pumpkin?

Yesterday being Sunday I decided to try a new recipe I found on eDiets... it sounded like a recipe I could change around to fit what I like... I used to be a fairly good cook, being one of the things I truly did enjoy doing. Of course I rarely follow a recipe exactly like it is ... the challenge is to see if I can change it and have it still come out good...

CLASSY PUMPKIN PASTA
10 oz dry fettuccini noodles*
1 tbsp vegetable oil**
1 pound peeled, seeded and grated pumpkin***
2.5 tbsps tomato paste****
4 tbsps lite sour cream
1 tsp chilli powder

* OK the first thing I decide is that this might work really good with Spagetti Squash instead of fettuccini noodles...and I just happened to have one already baked and ready...

** Now I don't have ANY oil in my house, all I use is spay Pam, so figured I would just keep spraying until I had enough...

***This is where the real fun began... I bought a couple of small pumpkins at the grocery store...now I have carved them before and I have even baked one before but I have never ever tried to peel one before...You would think that something this small would be easy.. NOT... I get my cutting board out, my old fashion type grater and my big butcher knife. ...Now I know how to pick out a good squash by thumping it and I 've gotten the knack of cutting it open down... but damn if this little old pumpkin didn't almost defeat me... I decide that I first needed to cut it in half so I can clean out the middle of seeds but it kept rolling around on the cutting board while I was trying get the knife into it... then the knife got stuck half way in and I had to almost jump on the thing to get it out. Finally I succeed in cutting it in half, take all the guts and seeds out... rinse the seeds so I can bake them and have Pumpkin seeds to snack on this week, then I try to peel it... the butcher knife is way to big for peeling so I look around for a knife that would work, I don't have one of those handy dandy peelers and I lost my nice sharp paring knife years ago.. I usually use a steak knife for cutting up veggies so I grab one I think might be sharp enough... NO WAY is this going to peel this baby...it comes off in small pieces only at this rate it will take me 3 hours just to peel the dang thing....so I start to think to myself... this needs to be grated so how about taking a fork and running it across the meat of the pumpkin... this works for about a minite but it's hard to get the fork in the middle of the half of the pumpkin so I decide that I need to cut the halves up smaller. By now my kitchen is starting to look like a hurricane has hit.. I have bits of pumpkin all over me and the counter...I still can not get the damn thing peeled and only have about 2 tablespoons of pumpkin ready...I have no patience for this... so I drag the grater over... God only knows why I didn't get out the food processor, I do have one but haven't used it in many a years... I now have small slices of pumpkin with the peel still on but decide I can grate it anyway without peeling... this work all right for a little bit until I hit my thumb & finger on the grater,.... now we have blood in with the pumpkin... great... I struggle on this way and finally get 1 1/2 cups of grated/chopped up pumpkin with only a little shell in it....whew...so I follow the next step in the recipe which is to cook the pumpkin in a large skillet over medium heat for about 10 mins or until it begins to break apart..I spray the pan with Pam, add the pumpkin and decide that it is too dry soo spray more Pam over it....
I take a minute to clean up the kitchen and have a glass of wine while this is cooking.....
Take a look at the pumpkin cooking, it's browning but not breaking apart (what ever that means) and remember that I do have some EVOO so decided this might just be the thing to add.... It seems to do the job and the constency changes.
The next thing that it calls for is Tomato paste****... well of course I don't have tomato paste but I do have some spagetti sauce that I use in my Cabbage/Tofu/Spinach Cassorole (which is delicous by the way) so I decide to use that instead. Didn't seem to hurt it sooo added the no fat sour cream and a few shakes of chili powder that I found in the back of the cupboard.(I don't like spicy).. It all looks like a big orange thick glob but the recipe says "The mixture should be mushy & an even golden-orange color".....it is a golden orange color I'll give it that. So I'm thinking that once I mix it with the spagetti squash maybe it won't be such a glob...

I dish out some Spagetti Squash onto a plate add a spoonfull of the mixture to it and try to stir it in.. Ok it doesn't stir in, it just sits there on top... I finally get my nerve up to taste it...... Ok it doesn't taste too bad, kind of blah, must be why it called for so much chili powder...
I'm thinking that I will add more tomato sauce, sour cream & chili powder to the leftovers it might just work....I mean after all the work I did to PEEL that dang thing I'm not giving up on it.....