On Thursday, December 6, 2018, 10 brothers willingly braved the dropping 20 degree wind chills to attend Tater Tot and Bubbles’ (CO Q) shake weight shakedown. The theme,“Brotherly Love” was inspired by Bubble’s desire to VQ alongside his brother Tater Tot and take a step closer to leading the PAX solo style in the future. In addition to this hug filled beatdown we celebrated Bubble’s 29th birthday by incorporating the popular infomercial phenomenon “Shake Weight” which had become an ongoing joke at previous Maize workouts. “Brothers don’t shake hands, brothers hug….”
The PAX: Point Break, Waffle House, The Plague, Bubbles, Wait Time, Ethanol, Brazilian, The Big One, Placebo, Tater Tot
QIC: Tater Tot and Bubbles
WARM-A-RAMA (Bubbles): To warm the heart and soul a little and on behalf of the “Brotherly Love” theme Tater Tot kicked off the workout with a call to all PAX to greet one another with a brotherly hug followed by mosey to the basketball court where Tater Tot and Bubbles had earlier shoveled an area because of the icy parking lot and snow-covered football field. This shoveling proved to be the most difficult task of the day and questioned quickly after the first two or three paths…
Side Straddle Hops
Imperial Walkers
Cherry Pickers
Tappy Tap (front to back and side to side)
Derkins, oh wait, Carolina Dry Docks (Tater Tot mislead Bubbles and the naming which was quickly corrected by Wait Time – Wait Time was credited later with his favorite color song “Purple”)
THE THANG (Tater Tot and Bubbles)
Neighborhood Indian Brethren or “Brethrun”: PAX where taken on a 1/3 mile jog through the Copperfield neighborhood (great looking house Ethanol..) while passing the shake weight baton to the lead PAX. PAX were encouraged to take a moment to think about people in their lives that have had a positive impact while carrying the shake weight. A knife was found on the street during this jog which could have been from Ethanol’s latest neighborhood deer hunt?….
The Purple Song (Inspired by Tater Tot’s kids): After returning to the semi-shoveled basketball court and holding an Al Gore, Wait Time (in honor of him calling Tater Tot out earlier) was asked to name a color that started with the color “P”. PAX were abruptly greeted with a 1:42 “Purple” song that consisted of children singing the word purple and spelling it out. PAX did mountain climbers during the music and merkinsevery time the word purple was said or being spelled. It is unknown how many merkins were actually completed but was roughly 17-40…… (We are still not sure what we would have done had Wait Time said the color pink…) Here is the song for those interested in attempting at home – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaijgHfptKc
10 Minute(ish) Shimmy Shakedown (Tater Tot)
One group of 4 and one of 5 were asked to complete an exercise that consisted of PAX completing air squats and planks while one team member did lunges from cone to cone shaking the shake weight above their head. This seems as strange as it does to type out. There were audibles called to those doing planks such as adding shoulder taps, merkins and pickle pushers. Tater Tot asked Wait Time what his favorite song or artist was and seemed to be not only a difficult question to answer but also find once Foo Fighters was mentioned as “Lean On Me” by Bill Withers played (very brotherly). Eventually a Foo Fighters song played which completed the 13 minutes of Shimmy Shakedown.
Second Neighborhood Brethren Breth“run”: PAX where taken on another 1/3 mile jog through the Copperfield neighborhood (great looking house still Ethanol..) The shake weight was not needed and chatter was much less this go around.
The Push: Pax stayed in their same groups and were challenged to a one push hill sled-off (basically which group could go down the hill farther). After too much discussion on who was going first Bubbles and Waffle House represented team one (I think) and were pushed by their other three members. Their sled came to an abrupt stop after it was blown up into 4 non-fixable pieces. The expression on Waffle Houses face was priceless (Tater Tots kids did not have the same expression when the sled wasreturned home). Team two was Placebo and Tater Tot pulled to a resounding victory from Ethanol as no rules were placed against using the rope to be pulled down the hill. Both teams were greeted with 10-20 snowy burpees depending on who you were listening to. This was quite funny.
6 MINUTES OF MARY (Bubbles)
Flutter kicks – 26 in cadence (Inspired by Bubbles love for coaching swimming)
LBC’s – 25 in cadence
Heel Touches – 20 in cadence
American Hammer-it – PAX did 29 American Hammers in honor of Bubble’s 29th birthday and motioned the shake weight in cadence. Bubbles attempted to use a shake weight during this while leading and failed miserably but was enjoyable to watch him attempt.
CIRCLE OF TRUST
After a quick mosey back up to a lit parking lot near the flags we completed Count-a-Rama and Name-a-Rama of the 10 PAX.
Announcements consisted of bundling up for the next couple of beatdowns with the wind chill approaching 0 or negative temps. Continued prayers were asked for Rollbar and his family and a speedy return to join his PAX. The Plague thanked those who joined Wednesday’ s new Paradise Island workout followed by the third F. Tater Tot recapped the importance of having a brother figure in your life and thanked Bubbles for not only having the courage to take the necessary steps to join F3 but how proud he is of who is he is becoming as a man. It was reiterated that F3 is the core of brotherhood and brings those together that may or may not have had that connection in their lives prior to F3. The power of the hug was introduced as a symbol of positive energy and strength between all those you come in contact with on a daily/yearly basis. It was encouraged to reach out to someone that has positive meaning or impact on their lives and also to give a hug to someone today, this week or someone in the near future that they don’t normally hug to pass on the deep connection and love that lives within us.
Take us Home: Bubbles took home in prayer by leading with a book that he references to often in his daily life called “Uncommon Life” and read the December 6th reading as it translated to his date of birth.
“We need to live carefully and wisely. Everything we do and say will have an immediate impact-positively or negatively-on at least one other person, possibly affecting them for the rest of their lives. We should make the most of every opportunity, many of which don’t look like opportunities at all. What looks like hard work or uphill battles, God may have put in our paths to make us live up to our potential.” – Tony Dungy
The prayer was followed by hugs, obviously…. I was honored to lead you this day with Bubbles on his birthday. Until next time gentlemen!
Tater Tot