What could be worse for a pax count in the gloom than a forecast of 22 degrees?  An actual temp of 21…  Yet 7 pax including YHC arrived in the gloom with great confidence we’d stay warm – and we did.

5:29, pax emerge from vehicles. 5:30, last pax arrived with urgency and caught up before warm-o-rama began.  Mighta been Smokey smokin’ the tires on the way in – not sure.

The Thang:

Warm-o-rama:  SSH’s x 25 IC, IST x 10 IC, Long Snappers (b/c the snap and hold is important in kicking winning FGs) x 12 or 13 unsure as there were 2 different counts then end the warm-o-rama with windmills x 10 IC.

Let’s mosey.  YHC thinks 6 out of the 7 pax wore hoodies with hand pouches today, so YHC attempted to offer as much of our 45 mins as possible to exercises accommodating the use of the front pouch.  Stories of Prison Squats emerged as we began the mosey, so YHC made a quick left turn to say in the parking lot so Mulligan and YHC both could tell stories before leaving the AO and attempting to keep the volume down among the residents of Bdale.

Off the grid we went – in this cold we should climb a mountain, so to the right and up the hill we climbed.  We’d stop at the cart-crossing, the speed hump and at the top at the stop sign.  Merkins 10 IC at both the 1st 2 stops, then squats x 15 IC and Christian McCalf-raises on the curb x 23 (duh) IC.  Then back down, and yes – stop at the same spots for the same amount of merkins.  You’re welcome.

Now we’re back at the AO, but we would not enter – too cold in there.  Instructions were given to circle-up, Al Gore and in complete silence find a partner for the next exercise.  YHC volunteered to not have a partner while the other 6 would partner-up by eye contact alone.  No idea if this worked or not.

No exercise – more mosey.  To the left, to the intersection.  Instructions given to mosey to the left to the end of the cul-de-sac where you and your eye-contact partner would do 5 Helping Hands each hand, each partner in total silence (semi-silence).  Then a 10 count and we’d go back to the intersection.

Same thing – find a partner without saying anything.  Mosey the other direction to the end of the street, same exercise, same count.  Then to the right, to the cul-de-sac for the same.  Then back to the last intersection for the same… again.  Different partners each time.  Helping Hand x 5 each time.

Finally back to the main intersection where we would not have time to complete the full round of partner-swapping.  We would acknowledge which partner we’d been avoiding, then mosey back to the AO launch.

Back at the AO, we would gather round YHC’s big, long, thick, black… rope.  MWAR.

Recover-recover.

The frigid moleskine:

2.02 miles on YHC’s ancient Garmin watch by the end.  Plus 80 merkins plus 5 rounds of Helping Hand for a total of 20 each hand/arm.

Starting off by running the hill with merkins were designed to immediately get the pax’s body temp up as well as meet the needs of any pax doing the merkin challenge and thus needing 50 or more merkins today. Then the continued mosey would keep the majority of the core warm while partnering up for Helping Hand was planned to keep our hands warm. 

YHC noted Mulligan had the warmest hands of the pax this morning.  Just sayin’.

While at the far cul-de-sac (where round 3 of Helping Hand would take place) the pax witnessed sprinklers come on for one of the yards.  While all the pax were in shock and agreed we would not send Mulligan into the yard for monkey humpers, we assumed the homeowner was not aware the system was running.  Perhaps and electrical short had occurred?  Then the homeowner emerged to start his vehicle, go back in, come back out, roll the trash bin to the road, slip on the ice from the water, get in his vehicle and drive away.  Sprinklers still running…  What. Is. Happening?

No blocks today, which is rare for a YHC Q at a bootcamp, but we knew those blocks would be 21 degrees just like the outside temps.  Think we stayed mostly warm from the fire within which also burned some weekend calories away.

Prayers around the pax but specifically lifting up Mulligan’s mom who fell and broke/injured(?) her hip.

YHC’s mom says she’s doing “okay” and “okay” is rarely how she ever describes herself.  Significant fatigue and finding it hard to be active in the extreme cold.  The 13 months of chemo and now multiple rounds of Clinical Trial rounds at Duke have worn her down a bit.  YHC plans to lay eyes on her this weekend again.  Please keep her and my dad in your prayers.  They’ve known and felt them through this entire journey and we are greatly appreciative.  

Aye