F3 Knoxville

Tag: Lebowski

Alphabet Soup

THE SCENE:
Frosty with increasing Gloom.

F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER:
I am not a doctor.  Keep your brothers distant and your snot to yourself.

WARM-O-RAMA:
SSH x 21 IC.
BBQ Squats x10 IC
Mosey around the parking lot to collect Archie, and head down to the block paved lots

THA-THANG:
The Q presented a sheet of 26 exercises – 1 per letter.  With a battle buddy, for more mumblechatter and letters, PAX worked their way through each F3 name with a run to the top of Baby Everest between each letter.  At the top of B.E. do one more merkin than last time, then back down to the start.

e.g. K=10 x Windmills, ascend Baby Everest, 1 merkin
E=Bear Crawl to other side of the road, ascend Baby Everest, 2 merkins
N=10 Merkins (4ct), ascend Baby Everest, 3 merkins,
T= etc…

MARY:
If this is a Kentucky workout, we have to finish with the Bicycle Race.  Freddie Mercurys to the tune of Bicycle Race, with a Big Boy every time FM sings Bike, or Bicycle.
To the eternal shame of the Mall Walkers, they watched and didn’t join in.

COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
16 Strong, including 5 Mall Walkers, who couldn’t manage a single Freddie between them.

CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
Eddie the Eagle was an Olympic Athlete and example to us all.  He was bad at ski jumping (relatively), but kept going to matter what.  As Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the Olympics said “The important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle, the essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well.”  Fight well my bothers, fight well!

ANNOUNCEMENTS:
CSAUP at the end of the month.  Order a new Asylum T-shirt to show off at the event!

These Are Crazy Days, But They Make Me Shine

THE SCENE: Upper 40s or so, wet, but no rain
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-RAMA:

SSH x 21 (4 ct)

Little baby arm circles forward x 21

Little baby arm circles backward x 21

Little bit of this and a little bit of that x 2

Michael Phelps

21 merkins

21 squats

THA-THANG:

Mosey to Rocky Mountain High

21s – Incline merkins at the top, squats at the bottom

Mosey to Everest

20 burpees at the bottom, run to the summit, 21 burpees at the top

Mosey to the Colosseum

21 derkins at the bottom of the loop, 21 calf raises at the top on the steps of the admin building

Rinse and repeat

Mosey to the Cloud

21 box jumps, 21 dips (no running in between)

Rinse and repeat

Mosey to the Pavilon

21 bench pull ups, 21 CDDs

Rinse and repeat for 4 total rounds

Mosey to Little Cardiac

Sprint to the AO

MARY:

21 flutter kicks (4 ct)

20 hokey pokeys (10 each leg)

1 merkin w/ a clap

Plank until time

COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
24 HIMs, including FNG Flo and Jetlag and Chugger (who are not tagged)

CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
I Q’ed at the Equalizer on Wednesday, the last Equalizer Q for 2020.  I reflected back on my Q from 1/4/20, almost a year ago today, which was the first Saturday workout in 2020 at the Asylum.  I wrote this in my back-blast for the 1/4/20 workout:

It is a new year and a new decade and no one knows what it holds.  It could be the year that someone is added to your life, or it could be the year that someone is taken away.  It could be the year of the promotion, or it could be the year of the demotion.  It could be the year of kindergarten, or it could be the year of graduation.  It could be the year of the big win, or it could be the year of the big loss.  Regardless, you don’t need a resolution, you need a constitution, a foundation.  On a big scale, it should be God, your family, your friends, etc.  But, it can be anything that grounds you.  It can even be as simple as the F3 workouts.  The asphalt, concrete, and grass do not change, and they are always there waiting for you whether you have a good day/week or a bad day/week.  They are checkpoints after good times or bad and before whatever lies ahead.  If nothing else, start there and build.  Have a good new year but not just for what good fortunes may come your way during the year but based on what you keep your eye on and focus on while the year goes by.

I wrote this for my back-blast on 12/30/20:

I certainly did not know (nor could I have imagined) how 2020 was going to play out.  It has been a year of a whole lot of something and a whole lot of nothing at the same time.  It’s been a long year and one that has hardly existed.  I’m usually reflective at New Year’s, but this year is different.  The usual events are not there to reflect on.  But, it has been a good year to get back to those basic foundations that I mentioned in January.  I’ve spent more time at home and with my family.  I’ve attended more F3 workouts thanks to my telework schedule.  I’ve prayed a lot.  A lot people are happy to end 2020 in favor of 2021.  Those people need to be careful.  We should not wish our lives away in hopes of better days to come.  Find the joy now.  If you can’t find any, then look harder.  If you still can’t find any, then make some.  We have to live the days we are given as there is no guarantee of tomorrow.  Also, things are not going to change just because the year changes from 2020 to 2021.  Things will change with positive attitudes and actions.  When you look back on 2020, look for the good and don’t dwell on the bad.  As you look forward to 2021, look with hope and with the intention of doing something positive with it.

Wednesday night, Noel Gallagher released a song that summed up what I was trying to say about the struggle to be positive with all of the endless negativity being thrown at us.  Before I talk about his song, I wanted to provide some context.

Noel Gallagher was the lead guitarist, primary songwriter, and secondary vocalist for my favorite band – Oasis.  As I have said before, I was born in the 70s, I am a child of the 80s, but I am a product of the 90s.  Few bands captured the essence of the 90s – its brash positivity, its depressing angst, and its impenetrable rebel spirit – better than Oasis.  The band’s music, as with most music of the 90s, was about being yourself, challenging authority, pressing the boundaries, and pushing the envelope.  It was dreaming and aspiring for greatness while being burdened with existential philosophical and theological questions of right and wrong and simply “why.”  Noel wrote some of the great songs that defined that era.  Those songs also contained gems such as:

I’m free to be whatever I/Whatever I choose/And I’ll sing the blues if I want/I’m free to say whatever I/Whatever I like/If it’s wrong or right it’s alright/Always seems to me/You only see what people want you to see/How long’s it gonna be/Before we get on the bus/And cause no fuss/Get a grip on yourself/It don’t cost much – Whatever

Listen up, what’s the time/Said today, I’m gonna speak my mind/Take me up to the top of the world I wanna see my crime/Day by day there’s a man in a suit who’s gonna make you pay/For the thoughts that you think and the words they won’t let you say – Listen Up

Some might say they don’t believe in heaven/Go and tell that to the man who lives in hell – Some Might Say

Look into the wall of my mind’s eye/I think I know, but I don’t know why/The questions are the answers you might need/Coming in a mess, going out in style/I ain’t good-looking, but I’m someone’s child/No one can give me the air that’s mine to breathe/I met my maker/I made him cry/And on my shoulder he asked me why/His people won’t fly through the storm/I said listen up man, they don’t even know you’re born – D’You Know What I Mean?

Take the time to make some sense of what you want to say/And cast your words away upon the waves/Sail them home with acquiesce on a ship of hope today/And as they land upon the shore/Tell them not to fear no more/Say it loud and sing it proud today – The Masterplan

I need to be myself/I can’t be no one else – Supersonic

(The title of this back-blast is also a line from one of Noel’s songs – All Around the World.)

I could go on.  Those are just a few and are not even from some of the more widely known songs.  But, I am not trying to sell anyone on Oasis.

My point is that music today has changed.  It is not only missing actual instruments, it is missing its revolution.  Ever since Buddy Holly challenged the status quo and the comfort of the established class in the 50s – through and including Elvis on the Ed Sullivan Show, Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, and, of course, the Beatles, music has reflected a “we are not going to take it,” “we are who we are and we are proud of it,” and a “we are going to live our lives and no one is going to tell us otherwise” mentality.  Music is the mirror that the youth hold up to everyone else to keep them in check and to improve things.  In a way, music is society’s conscious.  Not today.  Today’s music does not even have a Madonna, let alone a true revolutionary.  Everyone falls in line and sings the same tune.

Want proof?  Old-school British rockers have been rising up a lot lately against COVID masks, protocols, and things of that nature.  The list includes Eric Clapton, Van Morrison, and Ian Brown from the Stone Roses.  Noel has also chimed in.  He did not say that the virus wasn’t real.  He did not say that people weren’t dying of the virus.  He simply pointed out that a lot of liberties had eroded and questioned why he has to wear a mask in public unless he is eating – will the virus recognize that he is eating and skip over him, he asked.  He was attacked for his comments by some.  I say that not to raise the usual debates about COVID, but to get to this. 

Noel has a 20-year-old daughter.  She was asked to respond to Noel’s comments.  Her response is the point, and it demonstrates a larger problem that was revealed in 2020.  She said: “I get where he’s coming from but I’m less full-on than him.  I’m generally less revolutionary than my dad.  I’ve never not worn a mask.  I think my generation is quite lenient and that’s not necessarily a good thing.  We do what we’re told a bit too much, we come from an era of fake news and Facebook telling us what the news is.  We are also hugely afraid of being cancelled.  It’s very dangerous to stand up and be your own person in my generation.  If you are going against the grain, you can be totally cut out.”

That’s scary.  In one generation, the Gallagher line has gone from striving for greatness and revolutionizing the world with such great lyrics as those mentioned before and countless others to being afraid to speak out and being afraid of being cancelled.  If the children of rock-n-roll rebels are falling in line, then where does that leave the rest of us?  If the youth movement is not there to keep the older generation in line and on its toes, then where does that leave the rest of us, not just now but with whatever lies ahead in 2021 and beyond?

Luckily, Noel is still around and still willing to comment.  So, back to the song that I mentioned earlier.  I don’t think it is controversial.  I think it is hopeful and positive.  Here are the lyrics:

Remember the dream that you’re keeping alive/Remember your love for the loved outside/Don’t fight the feeling/Don’t stop believing in what you know/‘Cause you can’t let go, my friend/We’re gonna get there in the end/Tonight!  Tonight!/Gonna let that dream take flight/And when the morning comes/Will you wake up by my side?/Love, real love/Is all I’m thinking of/Give it half a chance/And the world might find a way/Don’t be afraid when you’re rolling the dice/Life is a trip that you don’t take twice/If you think that your faith is enough/The weight that you carry is love/We’ve spent too long inside/Take a walk outside/It’s a sad, sad song that the world keeps singing/Well let love try to sing along/Don’t fight the feeling/Don’t stop believing in what you know/‘Cause you can’t let go, my friend/We’re gonna get there in the end

The video with the song shows what appears to be drone footage of a locked down city in England.  It ends with a shot of a crowd of people filling the streets as they walk across an intersection on both sides.  I’m not sure when that footage was taken, but let’s hope that it becomes more common in 2021.  Who would have thought that such a simple and mundane daily task like walking across the street in a crowd would be the focus of so many hopes and goals of a new year.  But, here we are.  And, I hope that Noel is right and that we’re gonna get there in the end.  And, while we are trying to get back to better days, I hope that we also get back to a point where we are all free to be and say whatever we want, especially our youth.

MOLESKIN:
Prayers for Jordan, Ribbed’s wife and family, and for a great 2021

ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Asylum CSAUP on 1/30

Festivus

THE SCENE: 32 degrees clear skies cool and miraculous
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-Rama

arm circles 10x

reverse arm circles 10x

Cherry pickers 10x

Tempo squats 10x

Tempo Merkins 10x

imperial walkers 10x

side straddle hops 10x

high knees 1/2 cross lot butt kicks other half and jog back

THA-THANG:

Feats of Strength:

6 per side mountain climbers

Bear crawl to festivus pole

6 merkins

Crab walk to other side

6 lunges (6 per side)

Crab walk back to pole

6 dry docks

Bear crawl to curb

6 Big Boys

Bear crawl to pole

6 LBCs

Crab walk to curb

6 squats

Crab walk back to pole

6 shoulder taps (6 per side)

Bear crawl to curb

6 hello dolly

Bear crawl to pole

6 burpees

Crab walk to curb

6 overhead claps

Crab walk to pole

6 star jacks

Bear crawl to curb

Plank until everyone is done

Grab a CMU

1 min plank hold on CMU->1 min squat holding CMU->1 min overhead hold

Airing of grievances

1 man carries Santa’s bag up mini cardiac

PAX choice of exercise until man comes back

Next man up Rinse and repeat

COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
15 pax including 1 from Chattanooga see tags below
CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
Festivus was created to battle the over-commercialization of Christmas. We are asked to remember the only gift worth celebrating and that’s the gift of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year!! (Music Included)

THE SCENE: Balmy, Humid, 26 degrees for “The Best Sunrise in America”.

F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER: Don’t cheat yourself, treat yourself. 

WARM-O-RAMA: 

100 SSHs in cadence. Is there another way to warmup??

THA-THANG:

Chest Station To the Pavilion (pronounced “pav-i-lahn”)  

  • Regular Merkins x 12
  • Wide Merkins x 12
  • Ranger Merkins x 12
  • Bench Dips x 12
  • Bird Dogs x 12 (with each leg)
  • Run to the ticket house and back.

Do this complete cycle three times…Mosey time.

All My Benches

  • Three sets of box jumps x 45 seconds per sesh

Abs Station under the Church/Gazebo Looking Thing 

  • Two sets of 25 box cutters
  • One set of flutter kicks 4-count (20)
  • One set of hello dollies x 25
  • Planks (60 seconds)
  • Elbow planks (30 seconds)
  • Elbow planks with left leg out (30 seconds)
  • Elbow plants with right leg out (30 seconds)
  • Planks (60 seconds)

***Pickett’s Charge*** followed by star gazers at the Coliseum 

Grinch’s Hill – 7s 

  • Lunges at the top, Carolina Dry Docks at the Bottom. Mosey up Area 51, with Box Cutters in transition.
  • Squat Station by the Asylum Building. 10 Tempo and 10 OYO (4-count)
  • Mosey back to PM AO Parking Lot..

Fat Burner Station

  • Happy feet (45 seconds)
  • Mountain Climbers (45 seconds)
  • Jump Squats (45 seconds)
  • High Knees (45 seconds)

Everything you got up Baby Everest to the AO!!

COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
Yep. 19 including one FNG (Spinal Tap).

CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
After the Pandemic “normalizes”, we will never be the same. That may be a good thing in some areas. What things do we have in our lives that never need to be the same? That we need to peal away and keep that way. Spend time alone in the coming days identifying what has changed (or needs to change) during this year that is a good thing (or will be).

MOLESKIN:
The Saturday before Christmas is by far the funnest Q of the year. The Christmas music (wireless speaker) throughout the workout was clutch.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Triple Birthday Q next weekend at the Asylum!! AYOOOOOOOOO….

Hardship

THE SCENE: Insert info about the weather, etc.
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-RAMA:
20 Side-Straddle-Hops.  5 Burpees.  10 Windmills.  4 Burpees.  10 Rockettes.  3 Burpees.  10 Little Baby Arm Circles Forward.  2 Burpees.  10 Little Baby Arm Circles Backwards.  1 Burpee.  Little of This and That.
THA-THANG:
Mosey to Caribbean.  We will run around Caribbean stopping at cones to do the exercises listed.  We will then Bernie around and do the same exercises.  Next we will Butt Kick around with the exercises.  Next, we will High Knees around with the exercises.  Finally we will run around again with the exercises.  Here are the exercises:

  • 20 Merkins
  • 20 Jump Squats
  • 20 Big Boy Sit-ups
  • 20 Star Jumps
  • 20 Hello Dollies (4 ct).

Pickets Charge to Coliseum.

We will stop to do 20 American Hammers and 20 Flutter Kicks.  Next, we will do two loops around sidewalk that goes by admin bldg.  At Coliseum area we do 20 Bench Dips.  At steps of Admin Bldg we do 20 Calve Raises.

Gander from the Coliseum at Beautiful Water and Mountains in the distance.

Mosey to parking lot with CMUs.  Each man grabs a CMU.  We will do the following exercises:

  • 30 Overhead Presses
  • 30 Curls
  • 30 Rows

Next we will split into two teams.  There will be two CMUs set up at western end of parking lot.  Team members line up.  The first member of Team One and Team Two throw frisbees at their particular CMU on the other side of the parking lot.  Whoever has the frisbee farthest from their CMU must run with their team to end of parking lot and back, grabbing both frisbees.  Then the next team members do the same thing.  If Team One always wins they will always be watching while Team 2 is running and vice versa.  Hopefully, it will be a fairly even split.

Replace CMUs.  Sprint back to AO.

COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
19 men, no FNGs.
CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:

Seeing the Opportunity in Hardship

James 1:2-4

Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

We read in Self-Help Books, learn from experts, and hear from the wise among us that hardships help us to grow.  And, if we look back on difficulties we have faced in our own lives when we were younger, we can see how life challenges have helped us to grow stronger.  If we can remember this principle, “that hardship helps us grow”, we may be able to face our current challenges in a more optimistic way and forego much of the anxiety and angst that can sometimes bewilder us.

So often in the midst of challenges, anxiety can get the best of us.  We face fear and may think things like:  Why is this happening to me?  I don’t have what it takes to do this.  I am not strong enough.  I wish this would just go away.

I have a patient who is a female in her senior year of high school.  She copes with social anxiety, a condition where she gets very anxious in public situations.  Yet, she got a job as a hostess at an Aubrey Restaurant.  She has liked the job and has found that she has been able to interact well with the customers who come in to eat at the restaurant.  I have been so proud of her.  Here is a young person who has social anxiety, yet is working in a very public setting where she is seeing new people constantly.

Although she likes the job, she is facing hardships there.  The job can be very stressful when the restaurant gets crowded and busy.  The waiters and waitresses, who are friendly to my client, can still get harried when too many customers are seated in their area.  Also, my patient must face the ire and wrath of customers who have been waiting for a table and get impatient.  Who is the frontline person that these impatient customers see?  The hostess.  So it is my patient who receives their angry comments and complaints.  That is difficult for a young teenager to take, especially when she has an anxiety disorder.

But think about what my patient is learning in the face of these challenges.  If she can handle these hardships now, think about how much better she will be prepared for challenges she will face in college and as an adult in a profession.  Life isn’t always going to be cozy.  If she can handle these early challenges then she will be better able to handle the disappointment of customers she serves at future jobs whatever jobs those might be. She will be able to tolerate negative comments of bosses or supervisors and handle the mistakes she will inevitably make as an employee or young professional in the future.  The hardship she is facing now, with the corresponding discomfort in the pit of her stomach, is actually building strength in her, making her a higher impact woman.  It certainly helped my patient to be able to see this – to think that what is leading to anxiety within her is also helping her to grow.

In the face of hardship, the lesson that the hardship is helping us to grow can be difficult to remember.  But, if we can remember that principal, it will help us to face the challenge better.  The next time you experience anxiety, think about that.  Maybe anxiety isn’t a totally bad thing.  Maybe it is a natural response to a challenge that we can learn from.  And maybe that anxiety in hardship that we are feeling now will be replaced by the growth we experience from it.  As our brother, Tank, would say:  Hardship Hill is a mighty fine thing!!

MOLESKIN:
Prayers for those coping with coronavirus; for those dealing with solitude or illness where they don’t have the opportunity to gather with friends like we do in F3; for our country do end racism; praise for Curveball’s wife doing well with her surgery; prayers for Ribbed and his wife as she has surgery this Monday to remove a tumor by her spine – we pray the surgery goes well and that the tumor is benign.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Birthday Triple Q on Saturday, December 26 where the three Q leaders will provide Hot Toddy drinks after the workout!