Merry Christmas!

The night before Christmas.....

Nice day, actually.  Not much done, I guess.  But I did make a trip to the grocery store and get some items for tomorrow's feast.  I was going to make a rib roast, but company coming, so I got another one, smaller, much smaller lol, should be enough to feed everyone. One of them I'm going to smoke the other will be baked.

Tomorrow looks cool enough to have a nice fire in the fire pit. Which is good since I'll be out there smoking that nice rib roast : )

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Merry Christmas!!!!

Christmas Day - almost over.  Spent the day just hanging out, smoking some meats, making a big feast.  Actually we started it off with a Christmas tradition of going to IHOP and eating breakfast. We beat the crowd. The waiter was quite young but did an excellent job.  Waitresses were dressed in pajamas lol.

I took my $6 ham I bought the other day, dressed it up with spices and brown sugar drowned in olive oil. After dressing it with that, I took spicy mustard and rubbed it all over it.  I put it on early, around 9:00 am I think it was.  Not a huge ham, but it seems to take forever to cook them.  Yes, I know they are pre-cooked, but I still cook it to 160 degrees.  After that, I bathed it in a brown sugar/honey/orange juice coating every 45 minutes or so. 

The roasts - one I smoked and the other I baked.  Both turned out very nicely, but the ham had such an amazing flavor that the roasts - far more expensive - took the back seat to the ham.  Char-Broil Brown Sugar Mustard-Glazed Smoked Ham was the recipe I found on the internet.  Saved that one, it's a keeper.  I also made a potato dish that turned out wonderfully nice - the recipe is found on Good Housekeeping's site and is called Scalloped Hasselback Potatoes With Cheddar.  Super easy recipe - well I mean there's a bit of work peeling potatoes and slicing them thing, but the rest is pretty easy stuff.  Cooking time was off tho.  Cook it for an hour covered, then cook it for another hour uncovered.  Uhhh, no. Cook it for another 15 minutes uncovered and it's perfect.

Baked asparagus, Texas toast and salad were the remainder of the feast : :  Amazingly, there wasn't that much meat left over considering 2 beef roast and a half ham.  Well, cause' I sent some home with Maria, but we still ate a ton of food.

I'm toast. probably a few pounds heavier as well.  I haven't gone back on the diet yet and seroiusly considering just pushing it out to January 2cd as everyone else is doing.  I dunno tho.  I've gained 8 pounds and I'm not really wanting to gain any more.  10 pounds would be the max and then I would say enough, it's time to get back into the diet. 

OOPS!! Mom sent some presents home with me from Arizona and I forgot to open them!  Wow not a bad haul!  A nice tote bag - I needed a new one for the truck for my shower stuff, a nice pair of gloves, a gift certificate to McDonalds and a pair of men's fleece pants.

Of course, the big present was the TV soundbar with big box for deep bass sound. I got that earlier this month. 

I had given up on working tomorrow. Wanted to - definitely need to, but at 6:00 pm, it was too late.  I figured my manager had given out tomorrow's routes yesterday.  I was wrong. 10 minutes later, a text from her with a picture of the trip sheet she always sends - a run to Brownsville! Yes?!! Yes, lol.  Okay, no looking forward to getting up at 4:00 am, but definitely looking forward to getting the dollar signs going again on my paychecks. I'm actually not getting a paycheck this week - my vacation pay she had added to last week's pay.  Now, if I got back Friday night from this run, I would likely get it added to next week's check. 

I dunno, but I knew I was toying with small paychecks in taking all that time I did off and then taking Christmas off after only going on one run. 

Now? If the work is there, it's time to go back to work! Lmao. 

Hope y'all had a nice, cozy, fun filled Christmas Day : )