We had a awesome warmup with the visiting Q for Gashouse ,Wire Nut . Then after the warmup we headed out for a 2 mile ruck with some stops on the way. At each stop we did 10 merkins, 10 squats, and 10 box cutters. We keep the packs on for most of the exercises. Finished up with the Plague and circle of trust
Day: August 6, 2022
Roscoe had a great idea a few weeks ago when we were talking-do a Q swap to let guys see other AOs. I put something on Slack and Wirenut jumped on it. He took over GasHouse and I got the opportunity to Q at Old School. I’ve been on IR for awhile and honestly was a bit unsure of how it would go because I really had not pushed it since Luigi was set free.
I got there a little early and as I drove up, I got a sick feeling in my stomach. Last time I was here we did Murder Bunnies for part of Iron Pax challenge. No worries, I’m not afraid of some Merlot….
Stogie was there waiting and Freight pulled up shortly before 0700. We started with the Pledge then a quick warmup and moved on to the thang.
We started on the track and did 4 Bojangles Biscuits: sprint(-ish) the straights then mosey/walk the sides. On each end throw in 5 burpees (10 per lap). Next was the parking lot-start on one end and move to the other side (longer than I remembered) ((that’s what she said-NOT!!!)). You can hop, bear crawl, or lunge but can’t do the same thing 2 times in a row. Every 5 parking space lines, do 2 burpees. Go to the end then mosey back to start. Quick word while we catch our breath then mosey to Kotter Corner for some Hip Slappers. I can’t remember the last time I did these so I was a little excited on the inside. We did a set of 10 IC then 25 squats and 10 Big Boys. After 2 sets of this, I saw that look in Freight’s eyes that say “surely he won’t do a 3rd set.” I’ve given that look more times than I care to admit and maybe I am just projecting, but he did say he was hoping I was not going to say 3rd set….One more set. On rep #9, I made it clear we would keep going past 10 but this was met with much disdain so it did’t last very long. As Shortsale has said in the past, Hip Slappers are my love language. I don’t really have a reason. I think it’s because they are painful and I really hated doing them early on but found, like most things, doing them more often really makes them less painful.
We moseyed over to the town square for some 4 corners with escalator stuff: 10 Merkins at corner 1, repeat at corner 2 and add 20 Monkey Humpers, repeat at corner 3 and add 30 LBCs, repeat at corner 4 and add 40 SSH. Second round was 10 Flying Squirrels, 20 Shoulder Taps, 30 Squats, and 40 Freddie Mercuries. Final round of 4 corners was just SSH with 25, 50, 75, and 100 SSH at the corners. The shirt came off part way through this but not sure it really helped me at all.
We moseyed back to start and along the way Freight said he was going to petition to change Kotter’s Corner to Kotter Avenue and find a way to insert that into the song Electric Avenue. It was a lot funnier to me at the time than it is now as I write this…probably because I was a low on the oxygen and sweating my ball$ off.
We got back in time for some Mary then quick COT with some good discussion.
I mentioned that I was reading a book now given to me by Strogi a few months ago called Sea Stories. It is written by William McRaven-he’s the SEAL who is known for his graduation speech about “making your bed.” The book is outstanding. It is easy to pick up and read for a few minutes then put down and read later: < 10 pages per chapter for the most part and stories about his life in the military. Sorry Boudin, no pictures in this book. One of the underlying themes is about (not) ringing the bell, or quitting during BUDs training. The training and especially Hell Week weeds out the guys who can’t fight the desire to quit, or ring the bell. All through training, the SEAL candidates are pushed to exhaustion and the Cadre offer them a break to end the suffering by ringing the bell and quitting. The guys who stick through it often say they don’t quit because of the man on their left and their right-their brothers who are depending on them to stay in the fight and keep pushing. I know what we are doing does’t compare with SEAL training, however I think this concept of being there for your brother is no less important for us. Think about this. How have you done lately with this? Is it enough to just post and say “at least I am showing up?” There are guys in our region who are struggling. You know some of them, but I am certain there are some that we don’t know how much they are struggling. Check on your brothers. Check on the one’s you don’t see. Stay involved in the ones you do see and make sure to hold them accountable for what we all know is important: Don’t ring the bell. No matter what, don’t ring the bell.
Thanks for the opportunity to lead. It really felt good to get back out there today.
Whoopee