The brothaman is back on the blog. I know it’s been a long time and we have a lot of catching up to do. Where should we start? How about with a big THANK YOU to all of our great NHRA fans for their support not only throughout the entire season, but for all of the congratulatory messages for me and my Matco Tools boys on our 2012 TF championship.

It’s been a busy start to the off season so far. We celebrated on Monday night after Pomona at the NHRA banquet and then I flew straight to Louisiana to relax and race my RC boats. I cleaned up at the event, bringing home eight trophies. Baby, my nickname for my wife Billie Jo, won’t let me keep them in the house. They are in the garage with my boats. She’s not a big fan of my RC boat hobby. Speaking of Baby, I planned a surprise party for her in Louisiana with all of her friends and family for her birthday. She turned the big 4-0, so I had to do it up right.

Once we got back to Indy our team and their loved ones joined us for the Brownsburg Holiday Parade of Lights. I never thought I’d be hanging with Santa in a parade. LOL It was really nice to see all of the support from our home base. There were a ton of people lined up on the streets of Brownsburg on Dec. 1 as our black Matco Tools team Toyota Sequoia was decked out in lights.

After the parade everyone headed back to the Brown household to celebrate. It was really great to be able to hang with my guys and celebrate such an incredible 2012 season. I can’t thank them enough for all of their hard work and we really need to thank Kyle “Happyham” Cunningham at DSR for the fantastic season-long recap video he did of our team. All those still photos from Auto Imagery and the GoPro video footage came in really handy.

Last week I went to downtown Indy for the IMIS show before heading off to New Jersey to celebrate with all of my family. Our pink Matco Tools “Tools for the Cause” dragster was on display along with “Fast Jack’s” Valvoline NextGen Funny Car at the IMIS show. More about the pink dragster shortly. It was a great weekend and so many of my Jersey friends and family came out to see me. Check out the mini Matco Tools dragster they put on the cake! It’s missing the wing though. I’m gonna have to try and hook up with Buddy from Cake Boss next year at Englishtown. Now, I bet he could make an awesome dragster cake.

You all remember when the brothaman sported a pink dragster, fire suit and helmet for Matco’s “Tools for the Cause” breast cancer awareness campaign back in October at Reading and Las Vegas? Well the boys that run the DSR eBay store at @shoeracing just put up all of the pink gear for auction. All proceeds go to directly to Susan G. Komen For the Cure. My helmet and firesuit are up for bid along with crew shirts, hats and an awesome 1/16th scale pink die cast done up by my boy Jim Ledbetter in Cali. Happy bidding!http://www.ebay.com/sch/shoe_racing/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_from=&_ipg=25&_trksid=p3686

The Brown family will be spending the holidays here in Indiana. I wish you all a very blessed Christmas and a Happy New Year! Time for some love, peace and @Valvoline NextGen grease. I’m out… like a shout!

Antron