Going Whole Hog

Normally, the night before the branding I am up late cooking what seems like TONS of our beef for the branding crew. It is always delicious BBQ beef, but it is pretty labor-intensive to prepare alone. So, when Chad presented the idea of barbecuing a whole hog, and that he would do it...well, lets just say I wasn't going to try to talk him out of it. Of course, as the branding drew near, I realized this was risky business. First, the whole process was going to be even MORE labor-intensive (getting the pig, butchering, cleaning and cutting, storing overnight, hours in front of the grill). I felt pretty guilty about it actually, just passing off my responsibility to Chad, only the responsibility suddently was exponentially larger--not to mention the fact that it was a busy time without the pig project, and he had a million other things he needed to get done anyway. Then, I started to get scared when he asked me about the "backup". Hunh? Backup? Why would we need a backup? Are you going to totally ruin a whole pig? Worried you won't make it at the last minute?... Well, it turns out, he actually never had bbq'd a whole hog himself before. What better way to test Murphy's law? I got worried, and we had a couple of discussions about how to cook it (I wanted to pit cook it in the ground, he wanted to grill it on the Q). Well, obviously he was the boss and got his way, and I did an excellent job of trying not to micro-manage. There were certainly moments of panic, and for a short while we thought the "backup" (sloppy joes) was going to be the sole source of protein, but in the end he pulled it off, and going whole hog completely surpassed all my expectations. It was fun, and funny, and a ton of work, but it was well worth it and absolutely delicious....well, at least it was the first 5 days. Do you realize how much pork is on a whole Hog? We fed nearly 40 people and STILL have most the pig left. Five stars reviews for Chad; everyone loved it. Errr...maybe only 4.5 stars because, well, I don't have a clue why he wanted a "backup". I mean, what am I supposed to do now with all this sloppy joe meat?