Golly Bob Howdy

Holy Thanksgiving breaks!

I got an email yesterday from my friend Jo Lynn (Single Track Junkie) wanting to know if I was still among the living since I hadn't posted anything or left my comments on any of the blogs that we follow. To summarize...still living. Diagnois...computer-lazy over the past week.

I had last week off of work and since I spend most of my day in front of a computer, I tend to shy away from the machine when I'm off. Howev

er, I was still checking in and reading all of my favorite blogs (see the blog list on the right). I didn't actually leave any comments for anyone, but I was interested to see what people were up to.

Ok, now how about this running thing? First of all, I didn't end up doing the Thanksgiving 10k like I had planned. Apparently, nobody else was motivated enough to get out there. Ok fine. I headed out at 7:00 in the morning and did my own Delta levee 10-miler. What a great frickin' day it was. Clear skies and a little cool but perfect weather for running. Felt grea

t and got me ready for a fantastic day of food, family and fun (fun = drinking a sh!tload of beer). Since I do

n't have any actual races to detail, here's my Thanksgiving "race" report...

As previously mentioned, I headed out of the house at 7:00 AM and had a great 10-mile run along the Delta levees here in the Central Valley (about 1.5 hours). After getting home, it was time to prepare for the day. My wife and I host the family every Thanksgiving (my favorite holiday). This year that meant 38 people (31 adults and 7 

children). My job for the day was to cook the turkeys (2 of them) and make the stuffing (cooked separately). My method of choice for the birds is on the barbecue.  This year, since someone else was bringing ham, we

 went with a 20-pounder and a 14-pounder. (Last year it was (2) 22.5-lb birds) I put the 20-lb bird on the charcoal 

grill and smoked the hell out of it with hickory chips and put the smaller bird on the gas grill with very little smoking. While those were cooking, we watched really bad football and continously drank several varieties of beer. As more family showed up (and more people started drinking), we were approaching full volume. Good Times.

Now time for the stuffing. (This is usually the highlight of Thanksgiving). I stole the recipe from an old Williams Sonoma Thanksgiving book and I usually triple the recipe so I can feed everyone. I'll take a big turkey roasting pa

n (since it's not being used for the bird) and fill up the entire thing with bread crumbs/crouton/thingies and then pour all of the rest of the recipe (onions, celery, seasonings, etc.) on top and mix it all up - a giant portion of stuffing that gets thrown into the oven for about an hour and a half. Yum! (Btw, when did this turn into Food Network?)

Before sitting down for dinner, the youngest of the family usually do a reading of a prayer or something that inspires everyone else and reminds us of why we're doing what we're doing. Very cool stuff. (I just wish I could remember what it was this year - Warning: bad parent alert.)

The rest is all food comas and more beer. Older adults take off and the younger ones stay behind to be jackasses. Oh yeah, the kids did get put to bed at some point by a random grandma or aunt or nina. Like I said, I'm responsible for cooking and that's it. (Goodbye 'Father of the Year' award). I'm kidding, Child Services.

So that's done and I've put on the standard 4 - 5 lbs. I've been running and hitting the gym about once every 3 days. Not much else is going on as far as events. Sign-ups for some 2009 races that I want to do are approaching (Miwok 100k, Way To Cool 50k) so I'm in the process of registering for those.

I'll be throwing around my comments to my fellow bloggers and trying to update this blog more often. (Bad grammar and sarcasm are back!)

Thanks for stopping by. More to come...