Ugh... my feet hit the floor and I slowly shuffle over to the couch in a half-crouch to grab a pair of pants. Time to make coffee for TheWife™, who is off to work this morning.

The half-crouch comes from several hours of crazed housecleaning in preparation for early evening family dinner. My back isn't happy about it. Sometimes, I think my back would like to live in a slightly less cluttered house. Oh well, you can't have everything.

I ate way too much yesterday. It wasn't the amounts so much as the content. I mean, it's not that turkey, stuffing, squash, green bean casserole, biscuits, mashed potatoes, gravy, or pumpkin pie can, all by themselves, do much damage. Taken together though, gees, for a while there it felt like my eyeballs would pop out. At one point I was attempting to carry on a conversation with Stepson #1 and his girlfriend but, in the back of my mind, a vision of my expanding self kept floating past — a gas-filled Macy's Thanksgiving parade version of me. Not pretty.

Another thought was a constant yesterday: the health of E Street bandmember Danny Federici. It's weird, here I am enjoying a day with the family and I'm just a little saddened by this news. These "relationships" that some of us have with musicians/celebrities are somehow both imagined and completely real. Yes, Danny doesn't know me and yet he's been a big part of my life. The same can be said for anybody else in that band: they feel like they're part of the family.

Something happens to a member of your family and in an instant your world is changed. Maybe forever. It's not always the best feeling in the world, but, hey, it's not like you can do anything about it. Everybody is wishing for Danny's successful treatment and return to health. Melanoma is serious business.

TheWife™ has left for work and me and the dog are back up here on the couch, doing the big post-holiday hang. Through the magic of the great Internets, I have been listening to Monday's E Street Band concert from the Boston Garden (yeah, it's the Fleet Center... sorry, I ain't callin' it that). There were some amazingly intense and sweet moments at that show. Federici's accordion play during "4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)" brought a tear to my eye.

Here's hoping that Danny returns to the family soon.