F3 Knoxville

Category: Asylum AM

Founding AO

Durn Curmudgeons

THE SCENE: Sunny, temps in low 70s.
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-RAMA:
Plank raises, 20 Plank Jacks, 10 Rockettes, 10 Cherry Pickers, 8 Wide Arm Circles Forward and Backward
THA-THANG:
Mosey to stop sign on northeast corner of Admin Bldg.  We will go back on the road that semi-circles around the Admin Bldg stopping at various cones to do exercises.  The exercises at each cone are as follows:

  • Cone 1:  10 Burpees.  Then, Barry Sanders to Cone 2.
  • Cone 2:  20 Big Boys.  Then Bear Crawl to Cone 3.
  • Cone 3.  20 Squat Jumps.  Then Mosey past parking lot to Cone 4.
  • Cone 4:  20 Imperial Walkers (both legs = 1).  Then Sprint to Cone 5.
  • Cone 5.  20 Squats.  Then Hop to Cone 6.
  • Cone 6.  20 Merkins.  Then Mosey to Cone 7
  • Cone 7:  20 Hello Dollies (4 count), 20 Iron Mikes, 20 American Hammers, 20 Dying Bugs, 20 Flutter Kicks

Mosey to Shaded Area near Park Entryway off of Northshore.

40 Baby Crunches

Mosey to Bottom of Mt. Everest.  40 Baby Crunches.  Then run up to top of Mt. Everest.

Rinse and Repeat on the 7 cone run on the road that semicircles around the Admin Bldg.

Mosey to AO.

COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
Ten men, no FNGs.
CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
Helping the Curmudgeons of the World

As HIMs we try to help others in our community.  Some folks take our help graciously.  Others do not.  Some people are mighty difficult to help.  I have been giving a number of messages about helping such “hard to help” people.  Helping difficult people, the curmudgeons of the world, is hard.  If we can trust that God is also working with them, it might make it easier for us.  Our efforts may not reap rewards quickly.  Rather, we might be planting a seed that will lead to blossoming that is very slow to come.

Furthermore, we must remember that we are sinners ourselves.  The curmudgeon’s pride, disrespect, and lack of kindness may be sinful but that does not make us somehow superior to the curmudgeon.  In fact, the curmudgeon might be able to offer us something that helps us to grow as humans.

A wonderful illustration of how Curmudgeons can involuntarily be helped by others and help others as well is the book A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman.  Ove is a true curmudgeon.  He can be downright rude and cruel to others.  He is 59 years old, has been forced to take retirement, and is pissed about it.  He hates life and wants out of it.  We find out, in the book, that the one person whom he did allow to get close to him was Sonja, his wonderful wife.  She saw beneath his outward stiffness.  But we also learn that Sonja has died of medical causes.

Ove contemplates and tries various ways to kill himself in the book.  But they are foiled by heaven, fate, or crazy people in his life that he just can’t get away from.  Two of those people are Patrick and Parvaneh, new neighbors who back up their U-Hual right over Ove’s mailbox.  Others are an overweight neighbor named Jimmy, a diffident mailman named Adrian, a flamboyantly gay young man named Mirsad, and a crazy cat that keeps on coming around Ove’s house when Ove would like it to go the hell away.  Ove begrudgingly helps each one of these characters (or animals in the book).  He feeds the cat and finally allows it to come into his home.  He helps Jimmy get a job.  He teaches Parvaneh to drive and takes her to the hospital to deliver her baby.  And, these people, also help Ove.  Although he wants out of life, they give him a reason to live.

It isn’t that any of these characters made the choice to help this curmudgeon called Ove or that he sought them out.  Rather, it is through their sloppy, confounding, odd, and downright hilarious interactions and relationships that each character grows – and takes Ove away from the incredible depression that was leading him to try suicide.

So, our interactions with others need not be smooth and on target to derive benefit.  Your attempt to help curmudgeons will be downright difficult and sometimes seem impossible.  But if you can be patient, who knows how God will work in your relationship with the curmudgeon.  You may plant a seed that brings about change.  And, God may work with your relationship in such a way that the doggone curmudgeon actually helps you!

ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Iceman gets married Saturday and Hooker’s wife, Carly, is due with baby in April!  Prayers for the aforementioned.

Must Be Fall Break

THE SCENE: Finally feels sort of fall-like… About 60 and cloudy.
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-RAMA:
SSH x30 IC
Travoltas x15 IC each side
Imperial Squat Walkers x15 IC
LBAC x20 each way IC
Hindurkins x10 IC

THA-THANG:
Cuper Cimple CMUesday recipe:

10 Burpee w/hop over block
1 lap

10 Burpee w/hop over block
20 One-Hand OHP (10 each side)
1 lap
1 more lap

10 Burpee w/hop over block
20 One-Hand OHP (10 each side)
30 Lunge w/ Twist
1 lap
1 more lap
Plus an additional bonus lap

10 Burpee w/hop over block
20 One-Hand OHP (10 each side)
30 Lunge w/ Twist
40 CMU Swings
1 lap
1 more lap
Plus an additional bonus lap
Recovery lap

20 One-Hand OHP (10 each side)
30 Lunge w/ Twist
40 CMU Swings
1 more lap
Plus an additional bonus lap
Recovery lap

Time’s running short…
20 CMU BBS
Bonus lap
Recovery lap

MARY:
Flutter kicks x50 IC

COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
2 PAX this morning, plus some creepy guy who sat in his truck the whole time, his beady eyes and puffy face eerily illuminated by the dim yellow-green glow of Flappy Bird flitting across the screen of his iPhone X.
CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
Brief… Goes along with the EH cards I brought. As Abscess mentioned this week, don’t stop the EH when an FNG shows up. Reach out and continue to encourage! (also, Q.)
MOLESKIN:
Well, OK the dude in the truck wasn’t necessarily creepy. And made up all the detail. Couldn’t see that much… But he was on his phone just about the whole time, except when I went over to put on the ol’ EH. He was asleep. Left a card on his windshield…
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
BroLympics!!!!! November 9! More info to come…

Hidden Figures and a Farewell to 90!

THE SCENE: Hot as heck… again… temps in the mid-90s and a blazing sun overhead.  This is OCTOBER??!
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER

Check.

WARM-O-RAMA:

  • 10 SSH (4-ct, IC)
  • 10 Baby Arm Circles Forward/ Backward (4-ct, IC)
  • 10 Moroccan Nightclub (4-ct, IC)
  • 10 Tempo Squats (4-ct, IC)
  • 10 Cherry Pickers (4-ct, IC)
  • 10 sec high knees/ 10 sec butt kickers
  • 10 merkins (OYO)

THA-THANG:

  • Mosey to shady grass field by closest parking lot to Lyons View entrance.   Partner 1 Hops to first cone, Bear Crawl to second Cone, then Duck Walks to third cone and sprints back, and trades off with partner 2, who is working on the following exercises (cumulative reps):
    • 90 BBS
    • 90 LBCs
    • 90 American Hammers (2-ct)
  • Mosey to CMU pile
    • 30 Curls/30 Overhead Presses/30 Rows.  Try to complete in 90 seconds.  Rinse and Repeat x3.
  • Mosey to Cardiac:
    • MODIFIED DORAS:
      • Partner 1 run to first corner do 30 reps, Partner 2 do 30 reps, then run to catch up with Partner. Then do the last 30 together (15 each) “Patty-cake” style. Exercises:
        • 90 Merkins
        • 90 Shoulder Taps (each shoulder = 1)
        • 90 Bottle openers (?) (each arm = 1)

MOSEY TO grassy area at the road intersection: 30 BBS

MOSEY TO shady northeast corner of perimeter drive around admin building: 30 LBCs

MOSEY TO AO: 30 American Hammers (2-ct)

MARY:
90 squats

COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
9 strong! 0 FNGs!

CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM

I recently watched the movie Hidden Figures, which is about three young women who worked “behind the scenes” at NASA in the early 1960s and did the calculations that enabled John Glenn to launch into space.  It’s pretty obvious that we did a lot of exercises totaling 90 reps. This was to celebrate the last afternoon workout in the 90s. But did you realize:

    • We did 9 exercises and 10 reps per exercise in the Warmup?
    • We did 9 different exercises during Tha Thang?
    • I’ve spoken 90 words so far?

So we had some Hidden Figures in our Workout, and we also have Hidden Figures in our lives. These might be co-workers who do tasks that “keep everything moving”, which for me would be the data analysts that crunch the numbers so I can perform my modeling and write my reports. Maybe it’s a secretary, or dispatcher, or just someone who brings a positive and enthusiastic attitude to work every day. Maybe it’s someone at church who does a lot of unnoticed things that make events special… At my church up in Chicago there’s a woman, Fern, who washes and irons the tablecloths for special events and organizes cabinets, and there’s Anne, who stitches hats out of leftover yarn to pass out to homeless shelters.  Maybe it’s a Friend that you don’t see very often, but is always there when you need them, to offer words of encouragement, a shoulder to cry on, or a hand to help you up. And then there’s our relationship with God, who is Hidden from our earthly eyes, but is always with us in our time of need.

Seek out those Hidden Figures in your lives and thank them.

MOLESKIN:
Thankful that Jinxy’s heart procedure and diagnosis were favorable! Thanks to Sparkler for taking the lead on the Asylum PM obstacle construction for HH.

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

8 minute abs, and solving baseball problems

THE SCENE: Maybe it’s starting to cool down?  At least a little?
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-RAMA:
SSH x 20, CP x 5, Imperial Squat Walkers x 10.  Short, to the point.
THA-THANG:
There’s a pattern here: Run up the hill to the top of the Dragon, and down the dragon and then back to the AO, talking out our issues as we go.  Upon hitting the AO, we have 8 min of work, 1 min for each exercise, doing as many as you can.  Then run again.

  • First 8 minutes is Abs:  gas pumpers; Freddy Mercurys, side crunches left, then right, V-ups, LBCs (with a 2 sec hold at the top), flutters, American Hammers
  • Next 8 minutes after run down the dragon is arms and shoulders:  (Grab a CMU for some of these) Merkins, Overhead press, In-outs (or back and forths – not sure what to call these.  Move the CMU into your chest and then straigten the arm out and then back against the chest, so on and so forth), Curls, Carolina Dry Docks, Lat pulls while on your six, and more Merkins.
  • Next 8 minutes- Head to the Cloud this time for leg work.  Really, after the run, we only have a few minutes, so call audible, do about 45 seconds each of box jumps on the benches, squats and lunges.  If we’d had time, we would have included step ups, mountain climbers, more box jumps, Iron Mikes and a couple of other leg exercise I can’t remember.
  • Recover to the AO.

MARY:
None, no time.
COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA

CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
Life is so much better, easier, nicer when we show grace to others.  God has shown us the ultimate grace.  How we treat others is not about who they are.  It’s about who we are.  Gibbler’s addendum:  the brother of murder victim in Dallas, who demonstrated tremendous grace in forgiving the person who shot his brother, is the ultimate example.
MOLESKIN:
So, we want home run and strike out celebrations in baseball and maybe a shorter season.  Also, we are tired of the hypocrisy of rich celebrities taking up the mantle of climate change while flying around in private jets and living in gigantic mansions.   Those were some of the discussions on the mosey.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Healing The Wounded

THE SCENE: Humid, temp in low 70’s.
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-RAMA:
20 Plank Jacks, Plank arm and leg raises, 10 Cherry Pickers, Michael Phelps, Little of This and That.

THA-THANG:
Mosey to Southern Ball Fields Parking Lot.  Do 20 Hello Dollies, four count.

Mosey to perimeter trail near the Pavilion of the south ball fields.  We will do Nickel, Dime, Quarters (run one light do five of exercise, run two lights do ten, run five lights and do 25 of exercise) all the way to the beginning of Cardiac Hill.  These will be the exercises we will go through:

  • Star Jumps
  • Merkins
  • Big Boy Sit-ups
  • Squat Jumps
  • Dive Bombers
  • Imperial Walkers (four count)

At Cardiac Hill we will run up the hill, stopping at each of the turns and finally at the benches to do the following exercises:

  • Turn 1:  20 American Hammers
  • Turn 2:  20 Flutter Kicks
  • Turn 3:  20 Decline Merkins
  • Benches:  Bench Dips
  • Rinse and Repeat

Mosey to parking lot where we keep CMUs.

We will go around the parking lot, stopping at each corner to do exercises.  We go around the parking lot four times, doing the following exercises at each corner:

  • Corner 1:  20 Carolina Dry Docks, 20 Shoulder Taps (both shoulders = 1), 20 Squats, 20 Diamond Merkins  (sprint to Corner 2)
  • Corner 2:  20 Mountain Climbers (four count), 20 Smurf Jacks, 20 Iron Mikes (four count) 10 Burpees (bear crawl to Corner 3)
  • Corner 3: (with CMUs) 20 Overhead Presses, 20 Curls, 20 Rows, 20 Coupon Swings (Bernie Sanders to Corner 4)
  • Corner 4:  20 Bicycle Kicks (four count), 20 Box Cutters, 30 Baby Crunches, 40 “Mississippi second count” Boat Canoe  (Lunge to Corner 1)

Mosey back to AO.

MARY:
30 Baby Crunches
COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
Ten Men, No FNGs.
CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
As HIMs, we desire to help others.  But how to we handle people that are difficult to help?  Who resist or slap down our offers of assistance with “yes buts”, turning their backs to you, snide remarks, or an attitude that says either that “people aren’t no damn good” or “to hell with you and your advice.”  In my last message I talked about the need to resist the urge to strike back with caustic words; the need to be patient with such people; and, the need to stay Strong with them hanging in there with them.

One thing that can help you is to try to understand where the person is coming from.  These are often folks who have been hurt in their pasts.  Because of that, they lack trust in others and also lack trust in themselves to overcome difficulties.  There is a song by Nick Cave that, I believe, captures well how past painful experience can lead to a tragic attitude of “people ain’t no damn good.”  Ironically, the name of the song is “People Ain’t No Good.”  I don’t think this is Nick Cave’s stance on life although I am sure that, like all of us, he has certainly felt this way.  Rather, it is the stance of the narrator of the song.

Throughout the song, the refrain is “people they ain’t no good.”  Then we find out more about the narrator.  We find out how he married his love under cherry trees and under blossoms they made their vows.  We hear how the sun would stream on the sheets of their bed, how they were awoken by the morning bird, how they would buy Sunday newspapers but never read a single word due to their love for one another.

But, then we hear about how the winter stripped the blossoms of their love.  How like a fist, the difficulties hit them.  How his wife drew the curtains, made of wedding veils, on the narrator.  And, so the narrator cries, “to our love send a coffin of wood. . . to our love a valentine of blood. . . to our love let all the jilted lovers cry “that people just ain’t no good.”

Then, we hear how others may have tried to help this narrator but how he (and, this is the gut-wrenching tragedy of the story) bitterly turned down their help.  Here are the tragic lines about the people who tried to help him:

It ain’t that in their hearts they’re bad
They can comfort you, some even try
They nurse you when you’re ill of health
They bury you when you go and die
It ain’t that in their hearts they’re bad
They’d stick by you if they could
But that’s just bullshit baby
People just ain’t no good
Through the song, we come to understand the stance of the narrator.  It is a tragic stance but we have empathy for him because we can understand the reason for his pain.  Let us, as HIMs, be patient, be loving, be kind, be strong.  Work to understand those who turn away our attempts at love.  Help those who are bitter to learn that, although all of us screw up, some people are pretty damned good.

MOLESKIN:
Prayer of thanks that Mr. Jinxy received good news from the cardiologist.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
The REWARD at Panera!