Wow, was that a three-day weekend or something?  I feel like I’ve been beat with a stick, or maybe BBQ tongs.  We spent our entire weekend on a large swath of asphalt in Raytown, participating in a BBQ competition.  Day one of this debacle was Friday, when Donette met her parents at the BBQ grounds to set up their motorhome.  They arrived to find the campground looking like something of a tractor pull;  There was a very steep, very muddy hill leading up to the grounds, and people weren’t having much luck pulling campers, smokers, etc, up it.  They decided to play it safe and just park in an adjacent parking lot.  This location ending up serving several purposes, mostly positive.  Most obviously, we didn’t have to deal with the mud.  Secondly, we didn’t have to deal with any neighbors.  Also, this was the first time we attempted to keep Gabe with us on such an event, so his potential for failure was minimized.  I didn’t go to the trouble to verify this, but I am pretty sure that doggies of Gabe’s persuasion are not welcome in the city limits of Raytown, despite the fact that they welcome every other type of miscreant in the universe.  Anyway, we set up a cozy little home roughly 500 yards from the nearest campsite, and went about our business.  We had the obligatory, if very small, gathering on Friday night, and then set about process of prepping everything about midnight.

Saturday was a blur of activity, as most of these nightmare competitions are.  It proved to be a lot harder trying to manage all the different steps without the full team there.  (It was just Martin, Donette and I.)  We got everything submitted on time though, so that was an accomplishment.  As for the results?  Well, in her grand debut of competition BBQ, Donette got a ribbon in chicken at ninth out of 60+ entries.  As for the other three entries that Martin and I managed, well, we’re seasoned veterans so our results were not of that much concern.  You know, we were just there in kind of a supporting role, so I don’t want to go into our entries and risk taking away from her moment of glory.  I’m not pouting or anything, but I will never wield a set of tongs again as long as I live.  I quit.  Screw it, I’m done.  Stupid dummy-head judges wouldn’t know a competition brisket if I smacked them with it.  Which I might have done, had I not thrown a fit and winged it in the woods.  I’m not going to pout though.  As for the competition overall?  Well, the motorhome was great, the A/C paid off handsomely.  Gabe also did very well;  He spent the majority of his time asleep, just like at home.  We took him up to the awards ceremony to test his limits a little bit, and he did just peachy.

Sunday was a write-off.  I spent the entire day on the couch watching TV and trying to recover, with the exception of our routine lunch at Jalapeños.  I honestly can’t think of another thing we did, just several things we should have done.  High on that list was unpacking and cleaning up from the BBQ, but we just didn’t have the energy.  Everything is still piled high in the middle of the living room, where we threw it when we got home Saturday.  Some of it is biodegradable, it should decompose over the next few years.