On Monday morning, Nate Schmidt sat down with a sigh in his stall in the locker room at Kettler Capitals Iceplex. After having an off day on Sunday, Washington had just concluded a hard, training camp-style practice. Schmidt, though, claimed he had other reasons for being zapped.

“I usually get my energy from being outside and it’s been raining,” he told Katie Brown of NHL.com.

Schmidt is a fun guy and a great hockey player. He’s also American, which means unlike most Capitals players he celebrates our annual feast. Last Thursday, he visited some extended family in Virginia. There, Schmidt had a “double dinner” at two and seven, taking “an absolutely comatose nap” in between.

For Schmidt, even eating two meals was weak compared to the Thanksgivings he used to celebrate at his aunt and uncle’s farm in Minnesota. As a professional hockey player, Schmidt’s schedule no longer allows him to attend, but he recalled the days fondly to Katie. More than 20 members of the extended family would pack the house, playing roller hockey and football. More recently, the family has been holding skeet shooting competitions. Schmidt and his uncles would hunt pheasant and geese and “crock pot them for days.” Schmidt relished those meals.

“My favorite thing is like mashing everything together,” the 24-year-old defenseman said. “Yeah, I’m one of those guys. The only thing I don’t like is salad touching. That’s just weird. Other than that, I like to throw everything together. I like all my chicken and meat, all the meats together. As long as you don’t get a stray bullet when you’re chewing. That’s happened before.”

Schmidt’s favorite dish, however, is not his meaty blend. Instead, it’s pumpkin pie, as he wrote to us in a tweet on Thanksgiving Day.

“If I had anything, it would be pumpkin pie,” Schmidt said. “It would be a part of my last meal. Oh, I love it.”

Schmidt’s aunt even makes her own.

“She grows her own pumpkins and makes her own pumpkin pie,” Schmidt said. “That’s kind of the reason I love it so much. It’s next level. She just retired so she spends little bit more time on it. It’s even better. I didn’t think it could get better but it’s better. They somehow manage to get me a piece every year.”

There is really no point in running any more interviews on this site now.