We’ve been playing pickleball most mornings here at Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort. With the Covid-19 restrictions in place, the round-robin play has been a little different. Round-robin games this year are timed events – we play for 13 minutes, then rotate players. First team to 11 wins, but play continues until time expires. If there’s a tie with less than 11 points scored, the team that reached the tying score first wins.

This is done to prevent everyone from huddling together inbetween games to get the next court assignment and record scores. The real downside to this is the lack of records of wins and points scored. We usually record this info to help establish what level you should be competing in. For example, if your average score with a variety of pickleball partners in round-robin play is five or six, you are probably dragging your partner down and should move down a level. On the other hand, if you average eight or nine points per game, you’re fine at that level.

We’ve been playing at the 3.5+ round-robin on Monday mornings and hold up at that level. Last week, Donna signed up for 3.0 play on Friday. They didn’t have enough people signed up so I told the organizer, Dennis, that I would fill in. I had an unfair advantage – I won all six of my games fairly easily. Yesterday they were short a player again, so I sand bagged again. It was fun. Donna played in a Santa Claus outfit.

I mentioned in my last post that I was going to Basha’s for some pork – specifically a Boston butt, also called pork butt, for pulled pork. I wrote about Boston butt in this post – Boston butt is a name for the upper shoulder portion of pork.

I went to Basha’s, but they were out of pork butt. I remembered a new butcher shop that opened last year on McKellips at Power Road, it’s called Chuck’s Fine Meats. I stopped there and found a super selection of meats. All of their beef is USDA Prime. They had one pork butt left, but it was a nine pound cut. That would be way more pulled pork than I wanted for Donna and me. The butcher said “No problem, what size would you like?” He proceeded to cut the shoulder in half for me.

A lot of guys like to keep about a quarter-inch of the fat cap on one side of the shoulder. The theory is the fat will render and keep the meat moist. I don’t subscribe to that theory. I think leaving a fat cap means one side of the pork is unseasoned and can also dilute the seasoning on the rest of it as it drips off. Plus, there is more than enough intramuscular fat on pork shoulder to keep the meat moist. I prepped the pork by trimming it and seasoning Tuesday afternoon. I wrapped it and put it in the refrigerator.

The next day, I put it on the Traeger around 11am, thinking it would take five or six hours to cook. I had the Traeger wood-pellet fired smoker-grill set at 225 degrees to cook the pork low and slow. There’s always an unpredictable point in the cook where it stalls. When the internal temperature of the meat hits 160-170 degrees, enough of the fats and moisture content begin to evaporate and provide evaporative cooling and the temperature quits rising. Pork shoulder should be cooked until it reaches an internal temperature of 195 to 205 degrees – just like brisket.

Some cooks will increase the pit temperature to break through the stall or wrap the meat in foil at that point to reduce evaporative cooling. I don’t like to do this, because raising the temperature too much can toughen the exterior of the meat. Conversely, foiling the meat can leave the surface a bit mushy and ruin the bark formation. I waited the stall out. I ended up cooking the pork for more than seven hours! We ate late, but it was worth the wait.

When I took the meat out of the Traeger, my instant read thermometer registered 195 degrees in the center, away from the bone. A couple of weeks ago I ordered a new utensil from Amazon called Bear Paws. These take a little bit of practice, but they’re great for shredding pulled pork.

The result was tender and tasty! Lat night, Donna made a favorite comfort dish again – piggy mac. This is mac and cheese laced with lots of pulled pork. Delicious!

In my last post,I hinted at something we were working on. After much thought and deliberation, we’ve decided to purchase a park model home here at Viewpoint. This will become our winter residence. We made an offer on a unit with one bedroom and a large Arizona room. It’s about 800 square feet and it’s on the golf course on the east side of the fairway for hole 6 of the nine-hole course. We have a golf course for our back yard! There’s a new deck in back and a large patio deck by the entry. We’ll sign on the dotted line this afternoon, but we won’t take possession until March. Moving forward, we intend to still travel in our motorhome in the summertime and stay here in the fall and winter months.

The weather forecast held true. We had rain on Thursday as a cold front moved through. The thermometer only reached 64 degrees on Thursday and Friday. The forecast calls for clear skies, but the daily highs are predicted to be in the mid-60s for the remainder of the month.

*Just so you know, if you use this link to shop on Amazon and decide to purchase anything, you pay the same price as usual and  I’ll earn a few pennies for the referral. It’ll go into the beer fund. Thanks!