Wednesday, March 16, 2022

A Chat with Jim Bob

Jim Bob stopped by the house Wednesday morning. I was in the backyard drinking coffee and listening to the birds. He squeezed through the gate, careful not to let Pee Wee out.

"How much you got?" I asked referring to his coffee.

"I'm full," he answered taking a seat on a jump box. "What did you guys do yesterday?" he asked after pausing to listen to a dog bark.

He's always asks about the day before. He wants the full day's news not part of it.

"We maxed out on the bench."

"And?"

I was silent awhile. I didn't really want to talk about it, but my momma made me. She always makes me be nice to people.

"Tyler set an all-time Big ASS world record with a monster 305." I was silent for a bit more not wanting to explain about my lift. 

Finally he asked. "You?"

"160." I saw the look on his face. That hurt my feelings, my pride.

"What happened?"

Ouch. The dreaded 'What happened?' question. What that really means is: tell me why you failed.

"That's all I could do. I want to blame it on the swim the night before, but Tyler did the same swim."

"So what's the answer?"

"I don't have an answer, just questions. About a year ago, I decided never to bench over 140. I thought that would help preserve my shoulders. Then when Quadrathon came along, I switched back to power building."

We watched a squirrel run across the top of the back fence. Pee Wee gave him heck.

"You know I hadn't maxed the bench in about two and a half years."

Jim Bob took a dip of Skoal and kept right on drinking his coffee. How does he do that?

"Well, I'll be stronger for Quadrathon. You can take that to the bank."

"You mentioned a swim," Jim Bob spoke. He had so much snuff in his mouth that some of it spilled out onto his dirty white T-shirt.

"I'll save you a question. I ran 6.12 miles."

"In that rain?"

"Yeah. In the pool, we swam

  1,000
  2 X 50 build
  400 for time 

  Oh heck. I already told you about Monday night's swim already. Tuesday, I went alone in the afternoon and swam

  2,400
  2 X 50 build
  800 for time (13:45)
  2 X 50 back
  8 X 50 medium paddles
  total: 3,800 yards."

"So what do you guys do tomorrow?"

"Max deadlift."

He got up and made his way to the gate. "I'll see ya."

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