Whazup?
March 19, 2003

After returning from a weekend business trip to the big city, the farmer asked his handyman who picked him up at the train station, “What’s new?” The old geezer said in a slow drawl, “Nothin’…… ‘ceptin’ the cow died.” After further questioning and coaxing and coaching, the world-weary farmhand went on to explain how the cow kicked over the kerosene lamp in the barn on Friday night and the barn burned down consuming all the animals and the tractors and the harvester and the pickup and the tools and the seed and silo filled with grain. The sparks reached the house and that went as well. “It went faster than a cardboard box soaked in gasoline.” The water tower came down in a steaming fiery burst and set the corral ablaze, the horses and goats and turkeys running off with scalded tails and feathers. “Too bad about the 13 acres of timberland; they still be smoldering,” he said shaking his head. And then, as if a fine thought occurred to him, he exclaimed with a toothless grin, “At least ya won’t need to gather the alfalfa, bail it and haul it to market this fall. Them fields are lookin’ like midnight at high-noon.”

The moral to the story is this: Sometimes it’s better to accept a short answer to a short question. Ask anybody.

How are you?

How’s the attitude, your mental acuteness and focus, your general health and fitness level and your spiritual life? You feeling positive, hopeful and content? What about money, your economy and financial security? Your job situation or career, is that area of your life promising, aspiring? And relationships -- family and friends, your spouse, your sweetheart – are they contributing to your happiness and wholeness? Is there an evenness and balance in your emotions and an understanding of them – your emotions -- which serves you well? Do you have good thoughts and a constructive imagination; are you uplifting among people, offering encouragement and affirmation? Are you optimistic should you find your mind drifting to thoughts of the future? Is the stress of life under which we all function within control? Do you relax, laugh out loud and do you love?

How are your workouts going?

How’s your strength, your energy and endurance? Is your training in good order? Do you have a solid plan with legitimate goals and a routine to achieve them? Is your training intensity sufficient, that is, are you blasting it? Are you applying common sense as you engage in your weight lifting, listening and feeling as your body guides you? Do you train with enthusiasm or a remnant of enthusiasm when the loving and driving force is in short supply? What level of concentration do you achieve as you seek a constructive workout, total or near total? Besides your extreme focus, is your pace and groove and form near perfect or very good? As aches and pains and injuries visit you, do you submit beneath their rage or do you rise above them, mastering them rather than being mastered by them, using them to learn and grow? Is consistency in your workouts held above all the variables that influence your muscular achievements? Do you allow negative imaginings to corrupt your training or is your mind clearly set on your goal? Do you do supersets to saturate the muscles and develop cellular energy? Do you include heavy training regularly to build power and muscle mass and confront gravity with valor?

As you train day after day, are you gaining an understanding of your body in relation to different approaches and systems of training and not merely imitating programs suggested by trainers or magazines or dumb newsletters? Have you discovered inspiration for your workouts within yourself and the purpose you have, the motives that compel you and the goals that you clearly envision? Does desire – a heart for training – swell inside you regularly like a love for a pony? Do you seek with strong endurance the burn within the muscle during hard training? The pain and sacrifice associated with weight lifting, do you avoid it or embrace it? You like the pump, the afterglow, the taming of stress, the arousal of endorphins, right? Are you discovering the control and command of the weights, the expression of lifting and are you reaping at least a seed of discipline and perseverance and patience?

How’s your eating plan?

Have you been getting plenty of protein? Do you stay far away from the sugars and do you eat smaller meals more often throughout the day? I’m sure you’re getting adequate fueling and nutritional support prior to your workout and shortly afterward for fortification and muscle repair, aren’t you? And you know that a superior quality whey and casein protein drink serves you effectively in providing added muscle-building protein and nutrients throughout the day, especially around training sessions, don’t you? Have you been taking your daily dosage of vitamins and minerals and antioxidants to assure your proper intake of those ingredients needed for the healthy functioning of your entire system? You know your need for plenty of water is vital to your energy, cellular health and growth, detoxification, moment-to-moment function and long life, and your intake is high and consistent, isn’t it? Am I correct, of course, in assuming you don’t smoke at all or drink in any way approaching excess? Allow me to be silly, but do you eat fast food and junk food or lint from your pockets? You don’t eat too much, do you? You don’t eat too little, do you? You don’t go on binges or forget to eat for days, do you?

Just thought I’d ask.

And what’s that you inquire? How’s the Top Squat coming along? Are we, Odis and I, making the needed changes to suit the various users? When will it be available for purchase and delivery and how much will it cost? Do you have a picture of it for us who burn with interest?

I thought you’d never ask.

The answers are good, yes, ASAP, still evaluating and maybe next week.

Odis and his team at Product Kreation are spending serious hours with the Davedraper.com Research Clinic in finalizing the coveted Top Squat. The secret weapon has gone through five prototypes in two months, each subsequent model a little closer in angle, radius and length. The most recent version was perfect in function with trick removable handles for compact transportation. It was strong as a tank and precise as a derringer. It came in its own cool tote bag and cost more than a cruise to the Bahamas. Back to the drawing board.

It was agreed that removable handles were for rich kids and not men and women of steel. A tote bag was for pencil-neck geeks and not staunch and brawny muscleheads. The TS is now one piece solidly welded and has the appeal of total iron. The bar cross-member comes in a three-inch radius achieved by a heavy polyurethane coating or a 1.75-inch radius of uncoated steel. For the powerlifting brutes with extra large shoulders we have a monster-size width in either model.

The pricing will be determined after one or two more calculations. Production takes a few weeks for acquiring materials and setting up tools. We should see the revolutionary (miraculous and magical) squatting apparatus guaranteed to put power and size on your legs before sunrise by the end of next month.

It might be a good idea to put a really super-amateur tape together demonstrating the darn thing and delivering a funky explanation of the Top Squat’s features and usage. I can do that. Can you stand it?

One more thing: Is the Draper Dungeon imaginary or real? What are its features and when will it be available? Do you have any pictures? Please, please, please…

Tune in next week, girls and boys. And don’t forget to drink your Bomber Blend and take your vitamins. Be good to your neighbor.

Fuel’s getting low. I’m taking her in and putting ‘er to bed. God’s speed…

The Bomber

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