Zoolander’s Birthday Q BackBlast (finally) at #theHurt 4.14.18

I’m very deliberate with my back-blasts. I take pride in them, and try to give the PAX that posted – a laugh. And I try to get those who betrayed me (I think that’s the phrase the website gives for those who skip a Zoo Q)… to feel “like they were there. ”

So I’m 11 days late on this one. I told CI on Monday evening, while flaking on the Carpenter Q for travel reasons (Milan fashion show) that, “If F3 were my job – I’d be fired.” He assured me I that would be on double-secret probation at worst. What a guy.

So why is it late? Maybe I am trying to test my memory after becoming one year more Advanced. To see if I can capture the post accurately after 11 days (think F3 for the brain)… Maybe I am an ultra narcissist, and wanted to see how many people asked for my back blast… maybe I had two birthday beers courtesy of Busssssch, before 9 AM… And didn’t stop… and Just woke up…..and maybe I’ve got too much going on (like everyone else)….didn’t want to rush the B.B., kept putting it off, acted like if I ignored it – I didn’t really get older….and blah blah blah. I’m sure the votes amongst the pax are tied between reasons 2 and 3……and I’ll never tell.

Ok. Sorta apology over. Got up, got dressed, and was giddy about Qing on my birthday. I was anxious to see the PAX. In fact, I was so anxious-that I arrived at The Mutt at 6:58.14. There’s no other way I wanted to start my birthday! I was stoked.

Gearlander: I was boring. I wanted to wear my Sperry’s, but wasn’t sure it’d be a good idea based on the Weinke…..and I wanted to wear a nice chambray button down – but knew it’d get real dirty. Again, based on the Weinke. So I woke up late and threw on my baby blue 7 inch seam nike dry fit shorts, my least favorite neon yellow kilo look alike gator swim shirt, and the saucony’s.

Paxlander: Awesome! Just fricking awesome. These boys get me, and brought a big ol smile to my face at 6:58.21!! Old Bay had the preppy sweater over the shoulders, BackDraft matched his socks to his shorts, Gepetto had his closest tank top to pastel (neon orange) on that he could find, CI gave me my first hoorag!!, Pope dry cleaned his tank top, Wham and Noxeema Jackson had matching pastel polos on, Buschhh had his finest, (free) pastel Patagonia beer shirt on, KV not only actually showed up- but dressed up….Face looked dapper, and my lil bro (who was up late hydrating-and was a very LC) even showed. Wow. I loved the planning and coordination involved to make Zoolander feel like he’s at a real life fashion show. Ok. No more 3rd person. And this may be part of the 11 day delay syndrome… I know others participated and I am not giving them credit. Just know, that in that moment-I saw everyone – and it brought the biggest smile to my face!

COP

Run 200 yards to the tree planted in my father’s honor. This is the second time I have held COP at this location (the other being his birthday). It’s a neat feeling having all the pax circled up around that tree. Especially on my birthday. He would’ve thought that was really cool.

SSH 0. As always. I told the PAX that they would be giving me many gifts today. Their first gift was Qing COP. Pick an exercise…any exercise. Just not SSH.

PLANK JACKS 14 IC. Wham reminded me that these were SSH’s in a plank position. Well played CI

We then did other COP stuff. IC. 14. I recommend writing backblasts within 24 hours.

Then Moira, Who was taking my 2.0 Hansel to an 8 o’clock soccer game drove by with the windows open. The 3 of them yelled “happy birthday Zoo!!!” It’s the small things, that make you smile. F3 made that moment and memory happen. Cool.

Thang 1

Burpee Native American run down Leland. stop at st. Matthews Ave. Do Burpee’s and plank waiting on the six. Get back into two lines and continue down Saint Matthews Avenue. Stop at an easement we have never ventured down before. Do a 3/4 AYG to the end of the grassway and stop between st. Matthews feed and seed, and that store next to it that nobody goes into. There we saw 9 concrete pillars 3 feet tall. And a 25 yard clear concrete path. Count off into 4’s. Yes. This did take 14 minutes as usual. 1’s bear crawl back and forth on the concrete twice. Half of group 1 bear crawl… While the other half plank. The other three groups gathered at the first, second, and third row of pillars. Derkins. (Very steep derkins) AMRAP until bear crawling complete. Switch to the next station. Next station was dips. Then back to derkins. Everyone rotated through the 4 stations. Nice work. Sorta organized. Really hard. Good stuff. Let’s head back to the Mutt.

Thang 2

But wait! There’s more.

As we were catching our breath’s… I called out to 14 pax. They thought we were dividing into two groups for another Native American run…silly pax. Not so fast my friends… Mulch addition! If I called your name – go grab a bag of mulch that I bought last night and asked the cashier to set outside unlocked. If you don’t have a bag of mulch, go find a buddy and stand next to him. Sidenote… The fertilizer was heavier than the mulch… So pope grabbed that. Luckily, fertilizer is less expensive than mulch… So I don’t think we can get accused of stealing. Side side note–That whole interaction with the cashier Friday evening deserves a back blast…It sort of looked like this:

Zoo: “yes ma’am. Please put those 14 bags of mulch over to the side unlocked so that I can grab them tomorrow morning. I’m going to tell a few friends to run a half mile to your store around 7:30am ,before you open, to grab them. I’ll then tell them to run another half mile (with PT) with the mulch – to my house and drop them off in my backyard.”

Her: ummmm. Wha? Excuse me?

Zoo: I’m confused. Is there a problem?

Her: you’re not worried about them getting stolen?

Zoo: “umm nope. Do I push green for credit? Or is it the X. Why are all of these machines different?”

Her: Ok. But… But… Don’t you just want to wait until after we open? And how exactly are you going to get 14 of your friends to run up here and carry them all the way back to your house?

Zoo: “Oh. Sorry. I should explain. It’s F3. I’m the Q, and basically the PAX has to do whatever is on my Weinke.”

Her: “iI’ll tell Roy to put them outside. Please leave. You’re not making any sense.”

Sometimes we just take for granted that everyone knows the F3 culture and lexicon. Oh well. The deal was done.

Pax 1 grabs the 50-ish pound bag of mulch and jogs with his buddy until I say stop. Then, the pax without the mulch planks. His buddy puts the mulch on his back. Mulch Merkins. The PAX doing plain old Merkins looks the mulch Merkin pax in the eyes (as usual) and laughs, and counts to 20. Run some more… Switching the bag of mulch. Sidenote. Lots of different ways to run with mulch. Not sure we found a clear winner. Ran until I said stop. You guessed it… Switcheroo for more laughing, staring into each others eyes, and counting during mulch Merkins. We made it to my house. Everyone grinned. I think. I hope. They thought it was clever, and got a kick out of the whole thing. Plus… We got better. That was tough. Wet. Ouch is heavy. Let’s run down Leland on our way back to the Mutt. We hadn’t seen Zartan in a while. He was resting up for a four hour ruck, with PT, later that evening. I get it. (CI did both. Woof) But, I thought he would enjoy watching us doing Squerkins in his front yard while having his morning joe.

Pax 1 planks. Pax 2 grabs pax 1 ankles real hard and lifts them in the air while squatting and yelling for pax 1 to go hard and do 20 derkins. Unfortunately, there were non – F3 folks doing things they think are normal on Saturday mornings too. Things like walking their dog…….jogging…….driving to soccer…..staring at 27 men doing Squerkins in another man’s front yard. Oh well. We’re used to it. Fortunately, we saw someone peeking through the blinds. Can’t say if it was Zartan, or the M. We have our guesses. And we won’t say.

Thang 3

We finally got back to The Mutt. Time to have some fun. Count off into groups of two. This went remarkably well. We decided that the group with the best abs would go skins. You guessed it. My group. Time for ultimate burpee football. Simple. Throw the football forward. Stop when you catch it. Continue throwing to a teammate until you cross the goal line. Do 2 Burpee’s every time the ball drops. Everyone. Simple right? Wow! The Pax is great at burpees, mulch merkins, and Squerkins. Catching footballs…..not so much. But that’s not the point. We laughed a ton. Mostly at each other’s expense. But we laughed. A lot. And we tied 2-2… We tried so hard to get a winner… But we got worser and more worserer as time progressed.

Back to the flag for NOR BOM.

Pax

VINCENT (R)

OLD BAY

BACKDRAFT

WHAM!

MIYAGI

GLAUCOMA- big thanks for making the flight!

FRIDGE

GLENN ROSS – ummm. Yeah. About him. Glenn is a HIM and Q’d at Bayside at 6am. Those guys never sleep. After he Q’d… He drove over to the mutt to celebrate my birthday. He couldn’t find us in the neighborhood, but stuck around. I can’t believe he didn’t see the trails of mulch leading to my backyard. Big props Glenn. Thanks.

BUSSSSSSSCH

POPE

CI

MAD COW

OZONE

ESCORT

FACE

AIRPLANE

NOXEEMA JACKSON

SNOWMAN

KIDNAPPER VAN

WHAM-O

TIGER

NEVERLAND (FNG)

TUREEEEEEN

GEPETTO (thanks for the nudges. All 12 of them)

FATONE

SUMP PUMP

ZOOLANDER-Q

NOR Was fun. Neverland is an anesthesiologist at Baptist. We got from there to Michael Jackson to Neverland. It was great.

BOM

Many intentions were given to the sky Q. I gave thanks to the men that not only joined me for my birthday Q… But who also put in the effort to coordinate their fashion to pay an ode to me. Or to make fun of me. Or both. I lived it! So fun. This group means a lot to me. They make me laugh and make me better every time I’m around them. I’m also in way better shape. F3 was the 2nd best gift I’d received that day. And one of the best gifts I’ve ever been given. Thanks Zartan and CI for the HL. Best gift of the day? My brother posting was up there….but the cooler full of 420’s provided by my friend Bussssssch was awesome. The pax sat around for 2rd F (my favorite F) for a while. Some of us for an hour. We laughed, Learned about the new priest, learned about CIs planning for the ruck later that evening, made stronger bonds, and just had a great time. You know…normal dudes doing normal things on a Saturday morning.

I’m humbled by this group

Zoo