Unpaid And Underrated - 177 : 14 Post Rack (ft. Big Adam)

Episode Date: September 29, 2026

This week Keith and Curt get to know Big Adam. They dive right into great topics like GLP-1s, metal, Godzilla, grip, and decks. Links Ü&Ü Hoodie Massenomics x Ünpaid and Ünderrated Colab Get Your Own Keith Head Follow The Podcast On Instagram @unpaid.underrated.podcast Online UnpaidInternPodcast.com On Youtube @Unpaid.Underrated.Podcast Our Guest On Instagram @tubtubjubjub Our Hosts @keithhoneycutt73 or his orange gym, @thenowhinecellar Big Curt On Instagram @curtlifts1988 Special Guest: Big Adam.

And welcome back to episode 177 of the Unpaid Ninerator Podcast, a podcast by crew for crew. I'm one of your host, Big Keith. And this week I am joined by a special guest host, Big Kurt, C-U-R-D, Kurd, Kurt. One and the same. Yeah, yeah. We do have so many Kurtz. Like, I think tonight, even Stephanie was like, who's the guest host? And I was like, uh, Kurt.

And I think, I think she knew I was talking about you because I think I may have been mentioned it last week, but then I, like, went through like a, like a three-minute thing of, it's not this card. It's not that card. No, it's not that one. It's this one. And our guest this week is big Adam Moulson. How you doing, buddy?

I'm doing good. How are you do? Good. Good to see you again. It's good to see all you guys again. We just, we just hung out. What is it? It feels like yesterday, but it's, it's the end of September now.

And July was, it kind of, it's kind of those things. It feels like, yeah, it feels like last week. It also feels like six months ago. And what is it? Yeah, three, two, three months? Just yesterday. clear liquor keep yelling at me that he couldn't remember my name. Did I say that?

I don't think I talk to you much at Lift Hard Living. No, no. By the time I introduced myself, you were already well on your way. Yeah, I do remember you being a good, you were, well, we'll get into your Lyft Hard Living experience, but from my memory of it, you were a wallflower most of the time I saw you, from what I remember, but I'm sure you tore it up with the snack pack a little bit, I bet. This week, the general topics, we basically, what do we got?

What were we going to cover? I think we got a hit on the Chip episode. That was a hit. That was the Hall of Fame, the Hoff Chips, if you will. They took the reins last week, and I think they knocked it out of the park. I don't think we've had that much feedback in the Discord in a while. Popping on. Mostly positive.

There was a little banter going there, maybe. A little, I think everyone, I think everyone that listened to the episode had a good time. At least anyone that I'm friends with. So I was happy with it. And never say never on that round two if that's what you guys want. So I'm completely okay with giving up the reins a few times a year. And if anyone liked that episode and thinks that they have a good solid plan on making their own, you know, start to finish, run their episode. Don't just throw out a random idea and then like expect me to do it for you kind of thing.

like put a plan together, put a team together, plan on doing it, and we can make it happen if you guys want to run an episode. Definitely fine doing that quarterly or what's more than quarterly. What's what's every two months? What is that? Is there an acronym? Bimonthly, yeah, that would be by monthly. One of the two possible meanings of bimonthly.

Oh, yeah, because is it every two months or is it four times? Yeah, it's four times. Fortnightly. Oh, yeah. Is that where the game? name came from at all. Is that fort? I couldn't tell you. I'm curious. That's

maybe the, it could be a fortnight is what is an actual fortnight in time measurement? It's two weeks, okay. I wonder if the, I mean, I don't know anything about the game other than just like, you build shit or you play, I don't really fucking know, but. I do know it is a video game. I do know that that

discussion about what is and is not a video game recently. Let's not get that started. Well, anyway, the chip episode they knocked it out of the park. Adjacent to chips, little food related. What the fuck is up with Grayson and Hannah

putting the goddamn regular peanut butter in the fridge? Like, that's wild. And I don't understand the concept. I do get, people are talking about, hey, it's this natural peanut butter. It's got to be kept in the fridge. You got to stir it up. I think I had that at one point in my life also. But I'm just imagining just basic

Peter Pan, Jiff, whatever, just sitting in the fridge, just hard as a rock. And you got to go. up on a watch list for that one. I mean, I'm not being perfectly candid here. And he's like, oh, I put it on hot toast. I'm like, well, not everyone

eats like hot, you know, not everyone like makes toast for the peanut butter. They just want a regular bread sandwich. Try, the only reason you have to eat it on toast, Grayson, is because it won't fucking spread on bread that's not toast.

So it's like you're doing extra work to solve a problem that you created. Not to say peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on toast are definitely the superior peanut butter and jelly sandwich. but it's not really a travelable

travel. It doesn't travel well, I wouldn't imagine. But if I'm at home and I have peanut butter and jelly, I'm definitely eating it on toast, but definitely not keeping my fucking peanut butter in the fridge. I don't know. I don't know what that maniac's doing. I'm the natural peanut butter guy. Well, that's different

though, right? Your children eating your Giff and you're skippy. Get out of here. Yeah, I use peanut butter as a treat for my dog pretty often. And when I'm doing that, I don't want to have to get it out of the fridge, stir it up, get an entire knife shaft all buttered up just to give my dog a gram and a half of peanut butter. I think just the regular. I'm good with the plain stuff if I'm being honest. I feel like there's a variety of condiments. There is a discrepancy on too because

like ketchup sits out at a restaurant 24-7. Is that different ketchup from the stuff in my fridge? Like, do you leave your ketchup on the counter or in the cupboard? I'm curious if it is a different, I can't imagine. It's literally just fucking Heinz ketchup, isn't it? Yeah. That's a good point. It's mostly vinegar and salt and sugar. It's not like it's not super dangerous to leave out.

We did, growing up, we left it out in our house, but now as an adult, I refrigerate it. Yeah. Any other condiments that are debatable on their room temperature storage versus fridge storage before we move on? I can't think of any other controversial ones. All right. Well, then. I do you know some people leave butter out Yeah

Oh yeah do you not No well I we do brummel Which is like butter adjacent I think I don't really exactly know I think it's I don't know how much butter is in brummel Or if it's a complete like yogurtty I think it's like a yogurty substitute I'm not positive but it's damn tasty

But definitely don't leave it out Yeah we don't get through it fast enough to leave it out So it's fridge for us My wife likes to spread butter under beagles as though it is like cream cheese or something. There's always a thick layer. We go through it fast. It does sound tasty.

The opposite of tasty. I wouldn't on last week because of the ship episode, so we weren't able to bring up the high rocks situation. Do we even want to touch on that? Or is it too, did the Discord kind of run with it enough? Do we want to share our opinions on shitting yourself in an endurance athletic event and letting your, you know, co-com, your competitors have to run through it and get smeared by your fecal matter and get

pink eye and the such. Like, is that something we even want to talk about? Because I listen to a podcast and talked about it today. And I was like, oh yeah, I didn't get a chance to talk about that. But it's like, I'm good either way. It's just a wild situation. But I'm sure we all have the same opinion. Yeah. I'm against it. Yeah, that she was in the right, right? You know, that like, that she will, what did she say? It's like, I think the snarkiest thing was like whatever her like post-conference press conference thing was like whatever it takes to win or a win as a win I think it was a win as a win was like her caption

but I don't know how much that was taken out of context but it's just like and from what I from other thing I gather it's not like she just did it and it was like right at the tail end it was like halfway through and there were like just yeah I'm assuming there's like four it looked from what I gathered from the videos there's like there's like four you know two to four lanes

and so if you're in a lane behind her and she was the leader it means every single person in that competed in that lane had to go through her shit and like I saw the videos and the pictures of like the, the rower that just literally looked like you just diaper smeared all over it. You know, it looked, I mean, yeah, I don't know.

It was trying to make it. They had a rule against spitting. Yeah, and excessive sweat, too. You, like, they basically, like, mentioned every bodily fluid except shit, essentially. It should be a given, but it wasn't. Well, I think the rules have been amended now because, you know, it's like strong, man.

it's it's not a you're not breaking the rules if it's not you know if you're not told about it in the meetings I guess so she took that one a little too literally but yeah that was a wild situation um yeah I just that was uh I'd hope that's something not something we have to see again in the future amen and then uh yeah let's we got a couple more segments but I want to get into what's going on with big Kurt uh what has uh you know what do you want to talk about buddy yeah well I mean this will probably be a surprise to no one that follows me on social media, but I have been getting pretty heavily into running more and more grip contests. So obviously ran the one at the Lift Hard Live Easy this year. People seem to

enjoy that. Since then, Tanner and Tommy told me I had no choice but to come back and do it again next summer. So that's already confirmed. Outside of Macedomics, I ran a regional championship for grip sport international. So sort of the main way to qualify for grip national. So actually big Gary came out and helped run that with me. So he was helping loading plates and stuff. And we just hung out for a few days. We got some, you know, film some content on the big text bar in my basement.

So it was great seeing him outside of the Chili's that looked like. Yeah, we had a date to Chili's. One of the other podcasts. Was the sister podcast? I couldn't remember was Chili's or Applebee's. And I feel like they talked about that for longer than anything else. So the Chili is there Applebee's? I can't remember.

Yeah. So obviously always good when you can see. outside of the crew events. So that was that was always nice. And then this has been a little bit on the download, but I have hinted at it in the Discord, but I'll also be helping run the grip gauntlet at Crew Falls this year.

So Tanner and Tommy made me an offer. I can't refuse. And, you know, I just was putting pen to paper. And I just couldn't afford not to help run that this year. So it'll be similar to previous years. All the events will be mystery events until you show up. Um, you know, going to keep it casual, going to keep it fun.

There will be some tried and true events returning. There also will be a couple new twists. Um, I think everyone's going to really like it though. Um, so, you know, especially if your name is Paul and have, you know, pizza pantin sized hands. That's always a competitive advantage. Are we burying the lead that there is going to be a, uh, a element of the, uh, Wilkes involved this year. So, you know, all the, all the lightweight guys will be able to beat Paul like dramatically on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the. final tally. Yeah, well, we're going to divide everyone's numbers by the length of your fingers.

Yeah. That's actually true. Yeah. Your, your finger length to, yeah, there's got to be a ratio there to where if you have small hands. But you can have like, because you, your thumb is more dramatically long than your fingers, isn't it? Yeah, I have pretty long thumbs compared to my, my hand size. It's not as dramatic as I make it seem in photo. If you've seen, I mean, I'm sure you've probably seen me post photos of my thumb. It's very flexible though, so I can put it in weird positions that make it look even bigger than it is. It's slightly bigger than normal for my hand size, I would say. There's so many different things that could make jokes about, but yes, so there's. And none of them would be accurate.

Nice. Fair enough. And then, so were you at Crew Falls last year? memory of like who's been what events is so blurry. Okay. So that'll be fun. You'll be running that back with us. That'll just be a good time. That's that's coming up too. And then another thing is coming up like the Arnold. Like I've been talking with Hogan about, um, you know, some, some, some, some Arnold stuff. And it's just like, man, it's, it's, it's, it feels like it's so far away, but like, like, you kind of really do need to start like figuring out the eagle and shit now.

Because like, the eagle ballroom sells out and we don't get it. If they don't try to like book it, because they're all, I understand Tanner Tommy. They're always like, oh, we, we want to do one event. and then book the next one. I'm like, yeah, but if you wait until, like, January to book it in March, like, who knows if it's available kind of situation. So, but I know they're busy guys, but I got to figure out what I want to do for the Arnold this year and how many days I'm going down, et cetera. But, yeah, Kurt, good.

That might be one I'm skipping this coming year. That's a, well, yeah, it's a hall, isn't it? What is Denver to Columbus, like a 20-hour drive? This year, I flew to my parents' house. They live near Allentown, Pennsylvania. about an hour, hour and a half north of Philadelphia. And then I borrowed one of their cars and drove seven hours to Columbus. Dang.

So it's definitely not something I would want to drive. It's probably, I don't know, 18 hours from here if I were to do that. So, and then to just stand nuts to butts with a bunch of kids in young LA gear and stuff. Like that's not quite my scene. And, you know, obviously I had a blast at the Eagle, but, you know, it's kind of. I got to pick and choose the for sure sometimes. Well, yeah, when it's like, okay, well, this is going to cost me $1,500 or even doing what you did, it's still probably cost you $800. And it's just like, okay, do I just want to focus on like the two other big, two or two or three other big crew events?

You know, it's always a financial decision. But we do appreciate everyone that makes it out to whatever they make it out to. If you're listening to this and you haven't been to a crew event, why not? We'd love to see you. It's definitely worth hanging out with the boys and girls. I think I'm actually going to run a grip contest here locally around Denver a few weeks before or after that. So I'm trying to, I know there are a couple of crew members who are already considering coming out for that as well. So we might end up having a little mini crew get together out here in the, in the Rockies.

So in comparison to Strongman and Powerlifting where there's a dozen, well, Strongman, there's two or three federations. Powerlifting, there's a billion federations. What does grip competition have to be like sanctioned and how many like recognized and like respected bodies are there and which ones do you dabble with? Yeah. In the U.S. there are two main ones. The one that people probably know from things like the Arnold and the Olympia is armlifting USA. That's I would compare that one a little bit more to powerlifting.

There's less variety in the events. Most things are to lock out. And then the other one that I mostly dabble. in these days is grip sport international. It's probably a little bit more strong man-esque in that there's quite a bit of variety in the events, but there aren't like the real big ones where you're going to lift at a convention.

Although for the North American championships this year, I know Mad Cow was there competing, Big Mad Cow, they actually had space in the Mall of America, which was pretty cool because it's like a three or four level thing where people are looking out over the balconies at it. So that was pretty cool. But those are the two big ones. There's, you know, gods of grip.

They run a league in England. And then there are a couple sporadic throughout other countries as well. But GSI is a little bit more international. And then armlifting USA has the big events. Those are kind of the two main ones. Oh, anything else before I got one. What other question? unless you had anything else you wanted to drop the knowledge on the crew with on your life update?

Oh, no. Is there a question? Oh, sorry. I was, it was a poorly phrased. I have one more thing. Do you have anything else before I asked me one more thing? That was a very, very poorly phrased question. Go ahead and ask.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, I mean, Hannah kind of inspired this. How's those squats going? Big, big squat guy. Good. I actually recently acquired an SSB. So I had surgery last summer at the end of August. And in my recovery to that, I ended up getting a little bit of nerve damage in my left elbow.

And barbell back squatting has been very uncomfortable for me. So for quite a while, Bulgarian split squats with dumbbells was my main squat pattern movement, which is certainly going to build character. But I was craving a little bit of variety on that. So I ended up using some work money to buy an SSB. So that's kind of been my main squat movement recently. Just been doing four or five sets of like eight to ten on Sundays. It's nothing glamorous. But I see it more as an accessory to my deadlifting, which I definitely prioritize.

Actually, deadlifting three times a week right now because I'm a little masochistic. But yeah, that's kind of how it goes. Squatting is an excessive. for me, but I still do it. Nice. Well, good to hear. Good, good catching up with you, my friend. I can't remember. I can't remember. It's so hard for me to remember who's been on the round tables over the years and when you're, I don't know, your episode was probably about

a year and a half ago, maybe ballpark. Yeah, it was so hard to remember all this stuff. You have been on before. We do know that. It's probably right around a year ago now. Okay. So that's your anniversary. I'm glad to have you back. All right. We got a couple more things where we get to the guest. here. So the drop, what do we have today? We had the camo long sleeve. We had the, I don't know how, was it like a neon sign font, Lift Hard-Live-Easy? Is that what I said? Or was it Lived-Livisi?

And then the restock of the Pizza Hut Cup. So I did not partake in any of that, but it definitely looked like some neat stuff. Anybody get a chance to pick anything up? No, I had to give myself a little bit of a timeout from buying stuff. I'll just say that the 10-order checkmark on the Hall of Fame card came pretty quick. Nice. I got the point as well where I kind of need to get the wife's blessing, just not from like a financial standpoint, but just from how many shirts do I need standpoint.

So I was tempted on both the shirts this time. I already have the proper country cups. But one thing I was thinking about is I'm pretty sure the camo long sleeve was a pretty popular item. And I'm guessing quite a few people will be wearing that at crew falls. So it's going to be really tough to just see each other at Los Campionos especially with the lighting situation.

Fair. It is, uh, yeah, God, I love it. That's a bit. A lot of John Cena cosplay there. Yeah, good deal. Um, let's see. The Massonomics YouTube video dropped today. A little late in my opinion.

of, you know, I had a little early lunch and I was getting ready to go back to work and I'm like, where's this fucking video? I ain't got time to watch it when I get home. Busy guy, obviously. And I was able to just squeak it out before I had to get back to work there. And so it would have been the 2026 updated gym tour.

So it's just wild even in the last like few months since we were there. Oh, that wasn't there. That wasn't there. That wasn't there. The talking about how the expansion, I think he had hinted at the expansion previously, but not too much in depth.

So that would be really cool. I think that would honestly, the expansion would help out dramatically for running the grip contest at the gym there too, because it was tight. It was very tight quartered. I don't think he could get too much more equipment. Like, yeah, I'd be worried if just even getting the ATX chess press, that was kind of like right where, I mean,

all that's kind of like right where the group contest was going on. I'm like, so that big alley on the other side would be pretty dope for running the grip contest next year. Maybe get a bigger roster if that's like, well, it's harder to get a bigger roster and still keep it done in time before everyone's got to catch their flight. So that's always a double-edged sword, I guess. Brunch is also extremely important the Sunday after Frontman of Powerlifting.

But I was thinking the same thing watching the video is like, yeah, there's a lot of cool stuff in here. But this is going to get a little spicy because this year, the grip contest was announced quite a bit later than everything else. That was kind of a bolt-on addition afterwards. so a lot of people had already booked their flight to leave early on Sunday. So I don't think it's going to be less crowded next year from a spectator standpoint. I think we are going to have to cap the competitors at 20, maybe 25,

but it's probably still going to be, have to be a smaller event just from a space and time constraint perspective. Makes sense. I don't think Tanner was hinting about where the vulture might end up to. It's, uh, so there's some, uh, stay tuned on his, his, uh, new expansions, wherever he might be training periodically. It was, it was very cool to see that. And then like, oh, I've been there now.

And like, just like seeing it and then thinking back to, even though there's stuff different, but just like, it was much different than the last time I had watched one of the videos. And because I remember when I showed up in July, I was like, oh, this, this seems very different. I mean, it looks, it's like same stuff, but somehow, I don't know. I'm sure a lot of people have that same experience, but yeah, I was trying to get a glimpse of my sticker on the Smith machine. Oh, yeah. I feel like everyone that has stickers kind of, like, don't, you're not alone in that circle. And every time I see my sticker or my podcast sticker, I'm like, oh, that's pretty cool.

Yeah. And I was aggravated again that I forgot to put a pin in the map. And North Carolina is just empty. I don't think he would I mean if you like somehow never went back maybe he in the fact that it was already there when you were there maybe you'd be like a little DM pinning for you but yeah

he's gonna be number one on my list next summer yeah yes honestly like making a checklist isn't the worst idea or like physically putting on pin and like literally put it on pen and paper like like agenda and things you need to do because you just get overwhelmed with just shooting the shit with people and you kind of forget. And then it's just like, oh, well,

now we really do have to go to this next event. So, you know, it's nice to, don't be super over, I'll be over regulated, but it is nice to, if you have a punch list of things you have to get done, you know, it's not the worst idea.

And then this week's podcast, was it the, 18th time? We've done a military fitness test adjustment recap video, or is it really just, it might honestly be the second. I feel, I swear to God we've talked,

that they've talked about, that I've listened to that same podcast three or four times. But maybe it's just because I've done the backlog a couple times, possibly, or at least that episode. It's at least the second. Yeah, I know it was the second. I swear it had to be the third or fourth. Maybe I'm going to say it's the third no matter what.

They had to have talked about the military fitness test on other episodes or maybe on other podcast. I don't fucking know. But yeah, the funniest thing that stuck out was when Tommy, Tanner still has his AirPods one, like, non-pro AirPods with no noise cancellation. And, like, Tommy was trying to sell him on, like, just noise cancellation. and Tanner is just like, I don't give a shit. And I'm just like, you fly without noise cancellation headphones, like that's just fucking wild man, like...

You shove them in hard enough, it cancels the noise. Yeah, that was... I'm like, come on, man. Put that on, at least let your kids, like, let's like the one gift that you could, like, your family could pull money together for. Like, this is your stocking stuffers, a nice new pair of AirPods. Like, oh, man, that's just, uh,

but yeah, I don't know. I'm a big AirPods pro guy. Apparently I don't know how to use them. I didn't know it actually had the swipe up volume. I just stick them in and, you know, adjust it on my phone. I always do remember going from like the original to the second one and being like, man, I used to be able to like push buttons and it would stop. And I kept, I always like would push my AirPods, my AirPods for a while, but nothing to have and not realizing there was like the actual swipe pad that does everything.

And three years later, now I know. So I only listen to the Mathonomics podcast for, you know, these bi-monthly, bi-weekly, bi-annual, whatever we're talking about, uh, tech updates where I learned something new about a device that I own that I didn't know how to use. Right. I want to say to the bit about dry heat being cold. It's so stupid, but it makes me laugh so much. I love it. And then was it, and then the picture with Toby, Toby's tits are just soaking wet, like, sweating through the shirt. Like, was that a bit? Like, was it a, they literally just, like, shut, like, spray them down with water? Or was that group photo taken, like, after they just, like, tore his 100,000-degree gym? I don't know either way, but it was so funny that Toby was just completely sweat-saturated,

or at least his shirt was from what I remember. So that made my day. And I'm excited. There was a slew of gym tours I'm excited for. But is that this week's episode then? Or the one it recorded last night is that when they basically were going to recap? I fell asleep last night on the pre-show. So I feel like I've missed like seven or eight of the last like 10 pre-shows.

I'm just not been good at keeping up on that. I don't know what it is. It's just a timing thing or I'm already asleep or I just occupied. And when I look up, it's like, oh, I missed it. They've been majorly grease edging us here for a few weeks. I'm excited to hear the story they've been teasing. Oh, no. I have to.

Yeah, the actual grease session, I was like, oh, I don't know what that is. So it wasn't. Yeah. I'm excited for next week's Greece. Yeah. That's what they always say. It's always next week. Always next week.

Always next week. It needs 60 people, 70 people. Fucking salesmen over there. Which is funny because they're like, they're selling the pre-show, only the people that are already in crew. So there's like, there's literally no financial benefit other than just, I mean, because having how much people on your Zoom call doesn't really help you out. The people are already in crew. You're not talking to the public when you're trying to push the pre-show grease because

you're just saying it in the pre-show or in the discord that people already pay to be into. So it's like you're selling something to something that already people bought. I don't know. I do always look forward to the Discord banter leading up to the pre-show, though. Yeah. You know, the shared anticipation is great. Stolt was it? And it's like new people don't understand that like there might be a massive delay for a link.

And sometimes the links in the event calendar and other times it's not. But I think it was Stolmat Matt responded to someone. Oh, the link was posted. So it'll be live anywhere between five and 90 minutes or something. Yeah, yeah. I was just like, oh, that's the most true thing ever. All right. Anything else this week we missed, boys?

No, that was it. All right. Well, we got some affiliates for you, if anyone's listening. Plate snacks and barbedo rescue code unpaid. It'll save you a little bit of money there and get you some pretty good products. So go check that out. And Big Adam wants to hit you with a sponsor read here for our sister podcast and or Jim Radar, whichever he chooses. Lore.

Your favorite books and movies have it. lore about space wizards and regular ground-based wizards, lore about sandworms and wormholes and some third worm-related thing. Let's face it, it's been done. What we need now, in this modern era, with everything going on, is lore related to a podcast from Western Northeast South Dakota. Lore about expensive gym shorts and which exercise is a version of an exercise from a different part of the body.

Lore so impenetrable that it's more fun not to know, like the tale of Gabe, who does insanely aggressive vent over roos, and then rants at everyone in German before leaving to go back to fighting. Anyways, sharing this lore is only a small part of what is shared when you join Massonomics. You also get friendship, community, and tips from lots of insanely strong people on how to improve your lifting. Plus, memes galore. Not to mention the equipment talk among a group of home gym nerds who may or may not be enthusiasts, but will definitely congratulate you on your latest purchase or DIY concoction.

Only 10 cents a day, you can't afford not to. Massonomics.com slash join. Oh, yeah. Well done. My favorite part of that was like, how long? Oh, I mean, we can get in.

You haven't been around very long, right, Adam? My year is next. Okay. So, like, you, Gabe predate you, like, a year to, maybe two years. I feel like gay,

like, it's time fucking travel so fast. Gabe might have been three years ago. I don't know. He was at least two years ago. So the fact that that's like, still lore because mofo keeps it alive, with posting the fucking, the recap video.

That fucking video cracks me so much. It's so good. Gone but not forgotten. Yeah, Nathanomics is Karens. Oh, that's good stuff. All right. Well, we're going to pivot a little bit now and get into Big Adam and all things Adam here on out. So, my friend, who are you?

What's your Instagram name, what's your handle? What's your name name? Where we're going to find you? Uh, find me on the Discord, Big Adam, NC. I have an Instagram, but it's really only for submitting a horse doll Matt Gripper lifts. So there's nothing interesting there. And which Adam are you? I know there's so many.

I'm the NC because I live in North Carolina. And as far as I know, I'm the only Adam in North Carolina. That's in Massanamo. All right. I know some people know you by your last name, but if you don't want to share that, that's what I think I already. Oh, yeah, Mulsin. Yeah, that's what everybody calls me in real life. Well, I figured people might, when they hear that, they're like, oh, yeah, that guy.

Yeah, yeah. All right. Well, you said it's been a year. So what brought you to us and why did you stick around this last year? I think this is probably an unusual origin story, I'm assuming. So lifting very spotty for me until beginning of 2025. and I will get into that. But then I got really into home gym stuff.

And so watching a lot of YouTube reviews. Gluck, obviously, the big one. Watch a bunch of his stuff. And I think Carp and some other people. And I started seeing these flags in the gyms, you know, in the background of the reviews. What the hell is Massonomics? And then Gluck, you know, has got drink spotters everywhere.

I was like, that looks like the same loophers. go, what is it? And finally, I was watching something and I was like, there's another one of those banners. And I was just like, what the hell is this? And so I, you know, look them up. Because I'm not on Instagram. I don't do any of that stuff. Like none of these other things penetrate my brain. And so I was like, oh, okay, they have a podcast. And I thought they were like equipment reviewers. I think I found one that was like, oh, it's a tier list of, you know, barbells, I think maybe. And I turn it on. and it's, you know, the classic 30 minutes of bullshit at the beginning. And I was just like, you needed a timestamp.

Yes, exactly. It was like, when do they tell me what barbell is S tier? And so they did an episode where they did that at one point. Well, no, yeah. I mean, they didn't actually get to it. So I just, I listened to like the first like 20 minutes and I was like, I don't, it's not that I just like this, but I don't know what it is. And so I already like, so I used to commute to work and I listen to podcasts all the time. And so I have like just tons of podcasts.

And I was like, am I really going to commit to trying to listen to another podcast? And so I was like, let me try one more. I don't even remember which one I listened to. But I just like, whatever they started talking about must have made me laugh at the beginning. And so I listened to an entire episode. And I was like, oh, okay, I get this now. Like I see what's going on. And so, like I said, I listen to lots of podcasts, and I like to try to financially support, like, if there's somebody that's making something that I like.

And so I was like, okay, let me look up the supporting member thing, like, oh, $3 a month, whatever. I think I might actually sign up for six. I can't remember. But so then I was like, oh, it comes with this Discord thing. And I, like I said, not on social media, like I don't like interacting with people on the internet, like, at all. all. And so I was like, well, I'll just log into this thing because maybe people will be talking about something interesting, was not planning on having conversations or anything like that. And then after I was in there for a while, I was like, oh, this is a place on the internet where people are not like horrible to each other constantly for no reason. This is refreshing. And yeah, I just, you know, started jumping into the conversations a little bit more. And I was like, oh, I, like, oh, I, Like, I really like it. Like, I like interacting in here.

Like, I like the vibe. I obviously really like the podcast. It makes me laugh. No matter how stupid the jokes are, or actually, stupider the better sometimes. And, yeah. And so, like, a few months after I had joined was a sign up for Lift Hard Live Easy, and I was really getting into lifting, like, more and more. And I was like, this sounds good.

And so I just was like, hell with it. And I, like, jumped in. So, yeah, I can't imagine. I can't believe it's only been a year. It seems like I've just been here forever. Yeah, that's actually a very similar origin story to mine is I first noticed them from seeing their merch in other videos I was watching. I think the first time was, I think it was a Jen Thompson, Juji Mufu video, and she was wearing the Yeah, Buddy, lightweight shirt. And I was like, man, that is just a killer shirt idea.

But I couldn't find it. It had already been banned at that point. And then I ended up listening to a podcast episode where the title topic was something that I was interested in and then just kind of ended up sticking around. So a lot of parallels there. So that's good stuff. So you've already mentioned that you're in North Carolina now. Is that where you originally from?

No. I grew up in Texas in Houston. Houston. And then I went to California. of Wake Forest, North Carolina, that's where I met my wife, and she's from D.C. So I moved up to D.C. after college, and we were there for quite a while, and then moved to North Carolina 2014. So, yeah, I still miss some things about D.C., but I do love it here. Yeah, it's a nice area for sure. I used to travel there occasionally for work in my younger years.

So speaking of the Yeah, Buddy lightweight, sure, is there any whether or not it's banned, is there any massonomics merch that at this point you see other people wearing it's like, man, that's one I'd really like to have for metalomics. Yeah. I need it. Yeah, I know it's not banned, but I'm just waiting for it to come back. And actually, you're wearing the raw power shirt. I remember

I had noticed it somewhere like right when I first joined. And I was like, that is cool as hell. And so when they then came out with it, I was, that's definitely one of the, like, 25 shirts that I've already bought. I love that shirt. But yeah, metal now is because I'm sure in my submissions, people must talk about metal. It may have come up a time or two. Yeah. I know kind of my thing.

I just saw you really like country music, that's all. I mean, I think. Country and rap a lot of people are saying you're into. Europe and Texas. You'd think I would like country, but no. I do like graph actually But it has to be underground All right

Well you had mentioned Getting that 10 order check mark So where does that put you on the Hall of Fame status Where are you out on that? Let's see So today Being on the U and you podcast is number Let's see

One two Six for me And then when I hit a year I'll be at seven So that's about to happen Nice And I did scope your Instagram out Are you counting? I don't think I saw

there wasn't a single sill photo so you can't be counting a picture with crew because I didn't sure hell didn't see one. I don't think stories count if you're counting that

so you might have to get a Oh, it's okay. I don't know, Tanner can rule on that one. I know Joey and I talked about it in the past. I think we gave Anthony enough shit because he didn't,

like he keeps his profile really clean. So I think it has to be an actual post that's still on your wall and findable. So I'm going to talk yeah i think you're down to only five hall of fame check marks but so that sucks that's fair that's fair i can get that one yeah i'm i have no authority on anything i just you know that's just

my individual opinion um and then you wouldn't have you got in on any of tanner's runs of the sporting membership numbers when he's uh firing those off no i assume i must be like in the eight hundreds or so yeah i would guess well this is actually if we play along because i think seven let me go. So we're like nine something now, right? Yeah, I'm, I've only been crew for maybe six months or so longer than Adam, and I think I just dropped under the 500 mark recently.

So you might be, that actually makes me somewhat happier, because that means there's a lot of the new guys that might not get it, they kind of come and go quickly, which, fay, yay. Um,

there's a lot of, a lot of people, I think that do the sign up and then don't fit in. And yeah, I think that's why there might be such a high turnover, but the ones that are sticking around, there's some good ones in there. That's interesting foreshadowing for the question I was going to ask you later. I have opinions.

I'm not ready to share. I try to be somewhat politically correct, but I also don't want to, I'm big on not lying. I can skirt and not answer, but if I'm asked to direct question, it's hard for me to just straight up say false information as a rebuttal. or as a response that is.

We'll see. That's why I haven't moved up very high at any type of corporate level. So your gym came up in the Discord recently just two or three days ago. So I want to hear a little bit more about your certified training facility.

What's the name of it? How did it come to be? Tell me everything. Thank you for this chance to respond after being readily interrogated. Oh, it's not over yet. So, yes, so my gym, obviously on gym radar,

is Pillars of Madness, Strength, and Forium, which I purposely picked kind of a goofy name. From listening to your episode, Kurt, I know you steered away from the sort of like macho, hardcore type of name, and I had the same sense where just something like that, just it's not me. But I did, I was trying to evoke metal. or something. And then the pillars that are in my gym. So there's these cinder block pillars that are in the

middle of the room. And so there's a basement gym, right? It's a basement gym. And where I started was just one. So it's split up into a bunch of different rooms, our basement. So it's like pretty big overall, but there's like the laundry room, the workshop, there's a TV room. And then there's the room I made into the gym because it's the only one that has higher than eight foot ceilings in our entire house. So that room, it's like if you go to the very outer edges of the room, you would say, oh, it's a 20 by 16 room. But then there's this humongous, humongous, humongous bump out for our chimney at one end. And then these pillars are like right in the middle. And so, and also the HVAC is in there.

And so that fills up huge corner. and it has all these ducks that like hang down. Anyways, it's very, it's made me completely mental, trying to fit stuff into there and figure out like the best way. And I got completely obsessed with what's the most efficient way to do. And part of it too is like I'm consistently lifting for the first time in the last year or so. And so it's like I'm sort of figuring out what I even want to do. So I've got to be like maybe 15 different setups in a year.

Like drastically different. Like one rack to the four post rack, then it became a six post with a functional trainer. Then it became the same thing, but then rotated a different way. And then there were two different four post racks. And then it's different anyways. So the thing that was so controversial the other day is I've got one rack that has a functional trainer. It's in between the pillars. Then I have another rack that's for like squatting and I can overhead press it there. Then I have it's sort of a rack, but it's like a bunch of

upgrades that are going around the wall. And so obviously if you put two uprights and then you connect them and it's just like, you know, like an open doorway, that will fall over if you touch it. And so it needs to be stabilized somehow. But the room is not very big. So if I put like feet or something on there or make like a full rack, you can't walk around at all. It's like you're tripping over stuff. There's you can't get around at all,

let alone like do anything with the FAR Palt 30. So I connected to the rack, like to the functional trainer rack, which is obviously extremely heavy. I have like a central pillar. Then I have it goes out and it connects to a, a four post rack, which has no weights hanging on it, so it's unstable if it doesn't have that connection. Then going the other way, I have like these up rates that have a bunch of storage,

but then I also put some G cups on there so that I can load a curl bar if I want to or just like, you know, I have a bunch of stuff hanging on there too. And then I can also in these two other upgrades set it up for incline bench, and it's not in the way of anything else. So I like it. I feel very justified in my setup. How many uprights do you have in total? Is this a 12 upright rack? Looks like a lot. Come on.

That's 14. Plus I got a monster strip acting as an upright. And I'm probably, so I'm probably going to give it to 15 at some point. You are a fucking nerd, aren't you? Classic 15 upright rack setup. We've all been there. Mm-hmm.

Yeah, maybe. Oh, that's good stuff. I mean, like, it actually came up in the questionnaire responses several times that you have an unusual setup, but it also brings you a lot of joy to just figure things out and piece things together. So who am I to judge, but I am judging for the record. Yeah, yeah, that's fair. Yeah, my wife is constantly like, are you okay? Like, do you have some, is there, because I'll have an idea. And then it's like I've literally just finished setting up something very complicated.

And then the next day, I'll be like, oh, I got to go pick up some more uprights from the sky of Facebook marketplace. She's like, what are you doing? You said you were done. I'm like, why? But now because then I also in the other room, I forgot to even say, I have a completely separate bench press. Yeah, I saw that. It's built on a random stuff. Yeah.

Sorry. I'm not a professional podcaster, so my... Better than some of the past, guest. Okay. Yeah, so your wife, obviously, is at least somewhat in the loop of what Massonomics is and what crew is and everything. But as far as everyone else, you sent the questionnaire for this podcast to, how did you phrase that up? You know, for me personally, I'm not the most social, so I found it to be kind of awkward. So I'm just kind of curious how you teed that up your friends and family.

Yeah, I mean, with my, it's really just my family. And so my sisters set them in. And I just was, because they know I went to South Dakota and then I've been doing powerlifting and they were, they're very impressed with me, obviously. Well, of course they were. Right. And I was like, oh, it's this podcast. It's, you know, for the lifting stuff that I do.

And they were like, oh, yeah, okay. And then I told my one sister like, oh, yeah, you know, any embarrassing stories you want to put in there, that's fine. And she was like, oh, boy. So I don't know what she put in there. We'll see. There's some funny ones. Yeah. Yeah, then I really like, I go through phases in my life where it's like, okay, I'm friends with a bunch of people in high school, and then I completely lose touch with them, and then I'm friends with a bunch of people in college, then I completely lose touch with them, and then I make friends with people from one job, and then I least touch. So it's like, I got one guy from college that I never talked to you,

so he submitted one. And then I didn't send it to it. anybody else. So I didn't really have to explain it very much. Good enough. Well, yeah, let's see. So I got a little least fun, most fun for you. Adam, are you familiar with this game? I am. Do you want to explain it to your sisters that are for sure going to be listening next week? I'm assuming. Yeah, so you're going to give me a topic. I'm going to say, what is the least fun thing about it and what is the moose fun thing about it? Yeah. So I got one that I want to ask, if you're not comfortable sharing in depth about,

it. We don't have to. We can pivot. It was submitted. So I figured it would fair topic. So lease fun, most fun. GLP once. Oh yeah. That was me. I wanted to talk about that because that's how I got it. I think most fun will be a very good. And so obviously do least fun, most fun and then tells your story or. Yeah. So I mean, least fun is dealing with all the insurance bullshit, trying to get it, you know, covered, which I am lucky that my company does cover it. So that's a good thing. But having to go, like, I have to do constant follow-ups with my doctor just to, I really have to do anything.

Just I have to spend money to go to the doctor. And he, like, checks my blood pressure and that's it, basically. And, like, you know, they have to approve it. What's the, I completely forgot the term for getting the insurance company approval. whatever. That was definitely the least fun. But then most fun is, at least for me, what happened was it completely flipped a switch in my brain where I went years. Because I've had a home gym since 2013, but I barely used it for over 10 years. And it was just like, could not motivate. Like, I always eat too much. Just like, miserable.

basically in my own body. And as soon as I started taking the injections, it was just like instant. Like the next day, I was like, oh, I'm going to go down to the basement and work out. And I just like every day was down there. And then obviously it helps you not eat too much because it's not. That's the other thing that I always struggled with is just constant thinking about food. It was like I would log in for work at like 9 a.m. And I would be like, you know, what fast food place should I go to for?

lunch today, like that kind of stuff. Lots of just like huge bojangles meals and all that kind of stuff. And it's just, you know, then I would be like, oh, why am I eating this? I don't even like this sucks. But it was like, couldn't stop. And then take the drug. I don't even want to. It's like, you know, once in a while I'll have something good that I like to eat. But it's like I can actually use like my, you know, my willpower, my actual, you know, this is what I want to do. Like, yes, I want to eat some fried chicken today. You know, tomorrow, no, I'm just going to have healthy stuff. And, you know, just constant, like, here's my four days a week I'm going to lift.

And I do it. And like, I don't have the, just, that was a thing in my brain. I was like, oh, you don't, that's going to be hard. Like, don't do that. And then I wouldn't. And now I do. So it's, yeah, I've lost 115 pounds. Damn.

That's awesome. Yeah. Nice work. So, yeah. anybody that can get them or at least try them, I highly recommend it. So I'm not over, I know, I only, so give the like two minute description of what a GLP one is for anyone that's not 100% aware of like, how do you, how do you qualify to get it and what it actually like medically does? Because I'm somewhat ignorant. Well, yeah.

In terms of the science medical stuff, I don't know. Well, ballpark. I have a less than a 10,000 square, you know, mild view, or if you will. Right. So, yeah, I'm not even going to try to describe, like, how it works in your body. It has to do with, I don't know, hormones. Is it appetite suppressant, though, at the end of the day, or is it not? It is.

And so the reason I didn't want, I wasn't interested in it initially because what I thought it was was something comparable to, like, gastric bypass, where oh, if you eat way too much, it just makes you sick. And so you just like limit yourself so that you don't feel bad. And it's not like that. I mean, at least for me, I think it has different, different people have different experiences. So I don't want to over generalize. But for me, it's instead of just constantly thinking about food, I like get hungry and then I eat a normal meal and then I stop. And what's that like?

That's a struggle. Exactly. It was always a struggle. I mean, my entire life I battled with, I mean, yeah, I was 325 pounds. Like, I've been struggling with it for decades, literally. And so, yeah, what it does for me is I don't think about food all the time. People talk about the food noise going away. And then, yeah, it does also limit you.

Like, if you do eat way too much, you don't feel good. But I think it slows down your digestion and stuff like that as well. But yeah, for me, it's like I take a shot once a week and then I'm able to just like be a normal person about food. That's like the biggest thing. And then I'm motivated to exercise, which I used to not be at all. Which I don't know why that is. You know, either way. Like, I don't know why I wasn't motivated.

I don't know why this helps me motivate. But it happened literally instantaneously. So I was just like doing pushups like every day. like after the first injection that I said it was crazy. That sounds like it's, at least in your situation, it was for a big benefit. Because it is somewhat, it's like it's blood pressure related to, right? That's like a main qualifier to get it or what it initially was created for possibly. So yeah, in terms of like it's getting approved actually for more stuff.

So obesity is one thing like just by itself. But it's it's based on like existing. existing medicines are used for diabetes. And so that's one of the qualifiers. And then like pretty much any, like for me, my company requires certain like underlying conditions to be able to get it covered. Gotcha. So, yeah, like when I, I had sleep apnea, my sleep apnea has actually gone away with this.

Oh, you're off the team. Yeah, I've no longer CPAP crew, which, I mean, at least I still have the same. sticker, so that's good. Did you like, did you have to like bury this, this, this, this, this, the CPAP in the backyard or give it like a, uh, a, a, a C burial for the scene. I should, I should do that. I have three old CPAP machines just sitting in my closet. I'm like, I don't know what I'm supposed to do at this.

Bring him to the next crew, man. I'm sure some fucker will. Yeah, yeah. We'll put them in the grip medley. Yeah. They'll just be prizes for upcoming contest. Interesting. Okay.

Yeah. It was something I wasn't really familiar with. And it was like I said, it was in the notes. I was like, hey, I like learning new stuff. And I'm sure a lot of people have their strong opinions. Yay or nay towards it. We're not really here to judge. So I was just more curious for your story and journey.

And I appreciate you sharing that. Yeah, I will say, like, there are, like, when celebrities are taking it to lose, like, five or ten pounds. Like, it's, there's definitely aspects of it that are not. Yeah, you clearly, I mean, at 325 pounds at what, like six foot or so? Like, like, with shoes on. Yeah, I'm sure you want to see your daughter graduate or your son or daughter, son, right? If you want to see your son graduate high school and at 325 pounds, as a 40-year-old man, that would have been getting harder and harder. Yep.

Yeah, those underlying conditions were really piling up. Yeah. Sounds like in your case, it might have been life-saving. Yeah. And getting into that habit of lifting is the hardest part. Once you're used to doing it four times a week or whatever your schedule is. then it's way easier to just keep going. So that should hopefully be a nice lifelong change for you.

So I know we met at the Lift Hard Live Easy this year. I believe that was your first crew event. Correct me if I'm wrong. Are you planning on any others coming up? I, well, yeah, I'm not going to be able to make crew falls this year. Oh, Jesus. Wow, you're such a, not putting in the work anymore. I have a good excuse.

It's hard to do. I think you said in Discord. It's right. We get it. It's hard. It's hard enough to get approval for one a year, let alone two or three. Well, and we are doing a family trip because it's my, it's our 25th anniversary, wedding anniversary. And so we've got like a big, you know, family thing that we're going to go do. So it's like right around the same time. And so I think, yeah, I was kind of like, uh, could you not go to South Dakota again? Yeah, that's fair. And I was like, oh, yeah, okay. If you had shown up to South Dakota by yourself and you, you were like saying, yeah, I left the old ball and chain at home. And she's celebrating the 25th anniversary by herself.

We all would have told you, you were a piece of shit. So we're glad you made the right decision, but. Yeah. Yeah, that's fair. So I'm going to, I won't make you trash talk me, but I'm going to recap a little bit of how we bet at the Lift Hard Live Easy, if that's all right with you. Sure. So, um, we like a little trash talk every now.

So a few weeks before the Lift Hard leave easy, you had message me and asked about getting into the grip contest. And I told you there was a little bit of a wait list and it's probably unlikely. I wrote your name down on my list. But it was far enough down on the list that it was kind of out of mind for me. And then I believe it was the Thursday afternoon when they were getting the booth ready to open up. Here comes this guy. He comes up to me, excited, says, hey, I'm Adam.

And I'm like, oh, hi, I'm currently. Like, you clearly knew who I was. And I was just not connecting the dots who you were. And I, it stuck with me. I'm like, who is this Adam guy? Like, I, like, he seemed. You didn't see my sticker. Why was he wearing a white t-shirt and standing in front of the weekend?

Like, he knew something I did not know here. And what he knew is that we had already talked over, you know, DMs or something at that point. And so then later in the weekend, I had heard you mentioned to someone else that you were Adam from North Carolina. And it still didn't dawn on me that that's Big Adam NC. Even though I had written Big Adam NC down on a piece of paper on the wait list for the grip contest. Well, that NC could have meant anything. That's also. Because we have so many Adams.

That's Adam's fault for not, like, not to, sorry to cut you off. Like, that is 100% Adams fault. for not saying like hey I'm big like there's I how many atoms do we have I don't know especially if it's your first event there are enough atoms for me not to yeah but your first event you can't just be like I'm big John like you know no well I got to jump in here okay okay you defend yourself so my little what's the little icon called in discord or whatever I got the little dinosaur that my kid drew yeah so I had stickers of that and I had I had a dinosaur sticker on my shirt every time I met people. And then I would say, I'm Adam, big Adam NC,

and I would point at the dinosaur. And everyone else was like, oh, yeah, Kurt's the only one. Yes. Who did not make the connection. I think you should lean into I'm Adam Moulson, because that'll be a more memorable. I mean, everyone knows you to it back Adam Nc now, I guess, but like, I think that last name is a little more memorable. And it might be that. I guess I'm so used to it. I don't think about it that way. I don't know. Then anyway, fast forward. a couple days and Adam was there early for the grip contest

helping to set up and we had a couple people drop out and no one ahead of him on the wait list was there when it was time to make a call for for who got in and who didn't so ended up being able

to lift despite you know at the time it was I like I didn't want to just tell him no but in my head I'm like there's no way you're getting in at this point so

that's good stuff now I think you were like fifth or sixth on the wait list at that point. But it just how it worked out, you made it in. It was funny, by the time I got in, I was like, oh shit, really?

And then I was like trying to figure out like how to do any of the stuff. And what was really funny is, I mean, I did terribly. But it's because when we got to the, the midly thing at the end, the medley was the best. It was the best. I only used my right hand the whole time. Like my left hand was just like this useless appendix.

like flapping to the side. I don't know why I did. I don't know what was happening in my brain, but I finished and I was like, God, why is my right forearm so like sword worn out? My other arm feels fine. And then I'm like,

oh, and I'm like feeling my fingers. I'm like, oh yeah, this did not touch any rocks or dumbbells or anything. Like, shit. I think I was in the same boat.

There were like a couple things I could probably even pick up with my off hand. but I had never felt a forearm cramp or I guess pump maybe. I felt fucking pretty crampy, not very pumpy, but I had never, I had never done that much consecutive grip. It was wild how like blown up my forearm was.

Yeah, I mean, the first time you really push grip, your forearms are just going to feel awful for a few days after. It's like the first time you do like ab wheel or Bulgarian split squats or something. It's, it just kills you. I think it'd only be fair since Paul has it.

you know, an unfair advantage that he has to, like, you have to assign Paul, like, a grip contest to do on, like, Wednesday by himself. And then he has to come in Friday, like, beat, or maybe even third. Like, he has to be, he has to, like, show proof that he, like, beat himself up before he comes in to, you know, kick all our asses again. What I will say is that not all things favor large hands. And that is something, you know, picking up some pennies. You may keep in mind for certain events. Good, good, good.

All right. Well, Big Adam. as little or as much as you want to share about that nine to five? Yes. So, yeah, I'm a corporate accountant. I guess, I mean, the specific type of accountant I am is consolidation. So I work at a big company. It's a multinational.

You know, everybody closes the books in all the different countries. All the numbers come in and then me and my team work on kind of cleaning stuff up and getting it ready for the financial statement. And so at least I don't have to do taxes. I'm going to say that aggressively to the, I know the tax people in the Discord are going to be listening to this. So it's, you know, it pays the bills. It's not the worst job in the world, I will say. But it's not like exciting or particularly interesting.

There's some little puzzles to solve just like the puzzle of, you know, connecting uprights in my gym. I got the puzzle of working out. whatever, your company balances in the balance sheet, whatever. Multiple of your loved ones refer to you as an accounting nerd in the feedback form. Yeah, my sisters are rare, because they're like not that. So the fact that I'm like constantly in spreadsheets and I think just that like my brain is more of an accounting brain than theirs.

But I definitely like, there's aspects of, you know, any kind of like research. you have to do like you know there's other people writing memos about accounting stuff like keep that away for me i stick to the numbers so i like you're freaking the sheets yeah we get it we get it well speaking of your sisters they uh they were little mean to you when you're a kid huh they dressed you up and what what what they call you and they dressed you like a girl well that was not really them doing it to me oh no okay Because it's, you know, I was the oldest. You know, I got two sisters.

Sometimes we're just in the house. And it's like, well, I got nobody else to hang out with. So I guess I'll hang out with my sisters. And so I'm sure the thing that they're talking about, they had this board game. And we play lots of just like normal board games, obviously. They had this one that was called slumber party that was geared towards, you know, like, I guess tween girls. And I don't remember anything about. like what the actual game was or the board or anything.

I probably had something to do with like, you're a babysitter and you, I don't even know. Or I guess it's slumber party. It's like you're talking about boys or something. So I think there are like cards involved. I can't remember, but I would just pretend like I was a girl named Alicia

because I was like, we're going to play slumper party. And so I would just like put on this completely ridiculous, like super high pitched voice. And I would crack them. up. And so, you know, that's, that's, that's better than that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, and that's, and that's, and, and, uh, and, that's, and, and, uh, and, and, uh, and, and, is, pretty skinny kid, from what I gather, is that correct? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay. And were there any other

nicknames that maybe didn't quite fit that that, that you'd like to talk about? Yes. Yeah, my, my, my, my buddy and I, and this was just purely us seeing, I don't remember if it was clerks or mallrats that came out when I was in high school or maybe both. And so every time Silent Bob would be off screen, Jay would say, where is that Toby bitch anyway? And so me and my other buddy just started calling each other tubby bitch, like basically for no reason. And it was funny at the time because I was very skinny. And he was too. And he actually had a T-shirt made up for me to take to college that just said, tubby bitch. It's just like a white shirt and I had black block letters and so I wear that to parties. And again, I was very skinny at the time. So it was like ironic and funny. And then like a couple years later, when I wasn't really skinny and the shirt didn't really fit anymore, I was like, okay, I'm retiring this nickname and the shirt is going in the trash.

Yeah, it's real. It starts to hurt. Right. Exactly. So how has that lifting journey been like? so we know what you're doing now, but why did you get into it? How, you know, your, all that stuff? So the aforementioned struggle with, you know, fitness and wheat, which has been, I mean, basically since, you know, I got out of college. And so I, over the years, I went through just a series of like, and this is the joke. Like, what's the thing I can buy that's going to, you know, get me in shape or give me strong? And so I would just think about, like, what can I do?

And so I remember back when we lived in D.C. And, you know, we didn't have a ton of money. So it's like, okay, I'm going to buy some rollerblades and I'll rollerblade around. And I did that like twice. And I realized that I was not able to stop. And so I rolled out in because I was like on the sidewalk in D.C. And I like almost rolled out in the street. And I was like, no, I hate this.

Those went in the closet. And then, you know, bike riding, tried that at a rower. I mean, I still have that. So just like things. after thing after thing after thing and nothing really stuck. And so I don't really remember what initially gave you the idea, but I was like, well, what if I lifted weights? Because I used to belong to a gym that I would go to like maybe once a month. And it was like $120 a month. And this is back in the DC money. Exactly. It was like 2010. Yeah. I don't mean, I couldn't afford it. It was

one of those things where it's, you know, people say like, you know, oh, if you commit financially, like then you're going to go because otherwise you're going to not want to lose the money. And like for me, I just was like, oh, that money went down the toilet. That's too bad. I got my one gym visit for the month. I just hated it. I just would never go. And even when I did go, I didn't know what I was doing.

It was the usual story of like, a peck deck, you know, bench press. Obviously, everybody bench press. And so somehow in 2013, I got the idea, well, what if I, like did like actual like weightlifting with like barbells and I like literally knew nothing about anything. I played basketball in high school and like they didn't really teach us any actual lips. I had never done a squat. I'd never done a deadlift.

I had bench pressed. Everybody's bench pressed. That's a failure on your coaches and any type of weight room you might have had. Like I don't know if you went to a really small school or something, but to not be squatting. How old are you? Like, when were you in high school? I'm 47, so it's like mid-90s. Yeah, like, there was definitely like weight training in fucking high school gyms, you would think.

I don't know how consistent, but damn. I can tell you what they, I mean, we had a weight room and I mean, it has a squat machine. It was like one of those, you know, like the shoulder pat kind of deals. I'm sure that has an actual name. Is it a linebacker machine? Maybe, but yeah, that's the idea. And they would just, I think it would be like after practice or before. I don't even remember.

They would just, like, put us in the wait room. And then it was just, like, 25 guys that we would just, like, mill around. Like, none of us had a program or knew how to do anything. He doesn't jump so much higher if you fucking were all squatting. Yeah, exactly. And, yeah, back then, I actually could jump high. Like, imagine what I could have been able to do. But anyways.

So I got on the Internet in 2013, and it was, I mean, I literally, I think I've said this to somebody on the Discord, like, I didn't, I was like, is it deadlift? Is that the one in the Olympics where they like lifted over their head? No, no. Yeah. And so I'm like looking up definitions of stuff. And so in that research, I ran across starting strength. And so I was like, okay.

And you know, got recommended like, you know, some Reddit threads or whatever. And so bought starting strength, Reddit very carefully, you know, got a camera. Like I bought some stuff off a Rook, which as far as I know is the only company that was selling stuff back then. I don't know. and so I just like had a barbell. I got a rack off of Amazon and a bumper plate set because I was like, I don't know if I'm going to do, you know, power lifting Olympic. I barely knew anything.

And so I just started doing squat bench, you know, to lift, overhead press, and then power clean, you know, starting strength. So I like, bo, bo, bo, bo, bo, and like six months. And I was like actually getting kind of strong and then completely derailed. And so then I had, you know, the stuff. And I moved it to when we moved to North Carolina and then when we moved to a different house in North Carolina and it was just like always in my basement. And so as of March of 2025, I had and if you think about the pictures of my gym now and try to picture this, I had a flat foot Amazon rack that was like 80 inches tall. I had a deadlift platform and had a bumper plate set.

and then I had some spin lock dumbbells with like some one inch plates that I had gotten from somewhere. I don't even remember where those came from. And then everything else was just like concrete floors. So you lose 100 pounds and you spent 20 grand on gym equipment, huh? Is your wife okay with that? Because that sounded about like what you did in the last 18 months. Keith, come on, man. It's going to blow up my spot.

She's going to listen to this. Just ask Nate to edit that part out. Yeah. But yeah, so I started, and like I said, I started watching like all these things. And yeah, when I got on the medicine and I was like really getting into stuff. And, you know, I was back into the, I did starting strength stuff again. So I was just doing the big lifts. And then I had found 531 like a few years back.

And so that's what I had done periodically. So I was doing that more. And I was doing like, you know, pushups of like all the stuff. And I'd always like I said, like Roeb was the only company that I was. aware of back in 2013 and then, you know, I never like got into anything or looked at anything. So I would just be on the Rope website like periodically. And, you know, they got the different colors for the racks. Like my rack is the bright green rack.

And so it's like three or four years before I actually bought that thing. I was like, God, I love that break green rack. That's so cool. But I've only lifted like three months out of the last year. Like there's no way I can justify to myself buying. So then once I got like four months of solid lifting Three wasn't enough but four Yeah

That's the that's the fucking numbers For December January February And then March Which honestly that is like As bad as if you were doing You know three or four days a week or four months straight Like that's not bad As more than I had done in a decade

Yeah fair And so I was like All right I want this bright green rack And you know I figured out how to fit a hundred inch tall in the right spot in my basement so I didn't wreck my each back ducks and then it's like so then and it was just one little four post rack

got in there and then I was like four without a teen yeah and then uh yeah we're not going to talk about totals because I may have an idea of what the total is but there's no totals in the jungle no totals in the jungle no we're not going to we're not going to talk about that yeah and so it's just like we'll lean from there and so every time i come up with something neat that i tell her i'm like but look i'm using it like look how well i'm doing just for clarity of the story in the timeline like when was the weight loss during the getting inconsistent with the gym or did you kind of like do the shot lose the weight and then be like all right i feel good enough now to actually train because i can imagine training at 200 pounds is a lot better than training at fucking 3 30 so like

Was it a combined thing where they intermingled or was it like two like distinct black and white like times? It was combined and actually because I started on it in is like the very end of 2024 and I lost, I mean I lost the first 50 pounds like by the next summer I think. I mean it was pretty fast. But I did like mess up my shoulders from overuse from working out and I'm sure that was partly because I was still pretty heavy. but I was not being very smart about what I was doing. But yeah, it was kind of like a constant. Starting things, you can only get you. I mean, if you're doing the add five pounds every week and not undulating that a little bit,

it's going to beat you up, I imagine. Well, and I don't even know, I don't think it was really even that. It's just because I was so, like, gung-ho that in between the days I was lifting, I remember I had like a hundred push-up program that, like, you know, gets you into doing it. Yeah, and so I was like, I was doing tons of put. I just was doing like everything. Like, you know, I was like, oh, also you were probably feeling like alive and, like, energetic for the first time in 20 years.

So I could. Exactly. I could see it would be hard to restrain yourself. But once you hurt yourself a couple times, I'm assuming Adam now, after hurting himself, is probably a little more intelligent with load management. And everyone's gone through that phase where you just want to do everything. Yeah, 100%. You know, picking priorities takes time.

Exactly. And it helped me to. This is another conversation we've had where, you know, I know some people like programming themselves. Some people like having a coach. Some people like. And it's like I was doing 531. And it's like I understand the cons. I could not stick to, you know, I would pick accessories.

I would do them for two weeks. And I'd be like, no, I want to do these other ones. Because it was just like I would want to do. And even I would know in my head like, no, you got to be, you got to stick with this stuff. You got to. And it's like I couldn't. It's the same like I have these. I just can't control.

brain is some of the stuff. Same with with the uprights. I can't control my brain. And so getting on juggernaut like in the fall last year and then just being like, okay, I'm going to, you know, there's still a little stuff I do extra, but in terms of like major lifts or extras, I'm like juggernaut, tell me what to do. And then, you know, if it gives me something where I don't have the ability to do it, like I'll sum it out or whatever. But it's, that has helped me so much and just sort of like focusing and sticking with what I'm actually doing. But yeah, like you said, Keith, like the undulating the pew, and having that built in, like, I could figure it out on my own,

but it's my, my brain doesn't cooperate. Maybe when I'm in it longer, maybe, but not for now. Life's been better with Joggi. Big time. Well, I can say at least one of your questionnaire respondents is very happy with your results. assuming the comma is from your wife, but you are now a fine-ass muscle man, and I quote.

Oh, yeah. I mean, yeah, compared to what I... People talk about, like, oh, you know, you do power lifting or bodybuilding or, you know, or strength or hypertrophy, and it's like, well, when you start off from a certain level, it's like it's all bodybuilding

because, like, it all makes you look better. They don't have to worry about it. you know, changing the training style or anything like that. Yeah, she's, that's why at a certain point she was like, you don't have to talk to me about how much this stuff costs anymore. Like, I trust you not to bankrupt us. I was like, yeah, yeah, I won't. I mean, you just keep reminding her, honey, I am an accountant, you know.

I know what I'm doing here. Right. I mean, I didn't embezzle this money for nothing. Amen. Awesome. Yeah. All right. What are we moving on to?

kinds of hobbies, what not. Let's see. I think that came up quite a bit is the heavy metal music. We've kind of hinted on it a little bit earlier. We don't necessarily need to make this a game or anything, but I am curious to,

you know, metal has so many sub-genres. There are lots of bands on different ends of the metal spectrums. You know, curious, like, which sub-niche of metal is the one that really tickles your brain? I got to say, lately I've been like I don't know people call it like trad metal or traditional and then black metal that's been like my big things but all the like oh yeah I just there's so many different ones like there's really no type of metal that I like actively dislike other than maybe hair metal but uh yeah um that like a bunch of black metal bands where they're like mixing in like different instrumentation and stuff like like that. There's a band called Blackbreed that they put out three albums that are just like bangers. I love them so much. I saw them in like this little tiny concert place in Greensboro

and it was just like the legit like, oh, here's a bunch of dirt bags and like jean jackets and like the sound quality is terrible. I was like this, I love this. Awesome. Right. I want to hear a story. It's at least a paragraph on paper, but I remember that you tell me your memory of how did you meet your wife at the fish party? And I want to hear that whole story, that whole night. If you leave anything out, we've got the receipts here. So we will call me one here bullshit. Definitely, definitely knew this one would come up. So yeah, so my wife and I met in college. I was in a fraternity, although I always have to say it was the fraternity for guys that didn't want to be. in a fraternity. And so at Wake Forest, the frats are like huge, or I should say back when I was there, which was late 90s.

I graduated in 2001. Maybe it's different now. I have no idea. But when I was there, the- A little less hazing probably. Yeah, I mean, that was like we didn't really have hazing. Like I, somebody could try to really- Is that what you were trying to-

No, we were, but we were like a very half-ass. fraternity. Like, we didn't, a bunch of people had been kicked out, like, two years before, so there was, like, very small. It was a bunch of, like, hippies who is, yeah, it was a weird. Like, I met all these guys playing Ultimate Frisbee. Like, it was not the typical, like, you know, quote unquote frat guys. So it's a big part of the social scene, though, because the fraternity, week force is, like, very, like a bubble. Like, everything's all on campus. And so the fraternities have these towers within the dorms. And then they're like around the quad.

It's everybody could just walk to these lounges or they would have the parties that were like connected to the dorm. And so the fraternities would kind of team up with a sorority. And I'm sure there's there's some like negotiations or whatever. I'm sure went into like if they would agree to show up at your fraternities party. And so the parties would open like an hour early, the sorority would show up. And then like it was like this fraternity and a sorority theoretically are like mingling those people. And before they open it up to like the broader population. What would always happen with us is like maybe a third of the sorority would show up.

And then they would like almost immediately leave because we were not like the cool guys at all. And so it was a big thing for us where it's like, okay, if some girls actually show up, like, people need to talk to them so that they don't leave, like, so that our party doesn't completely suck. Like, let's try to keep the people here. And so I was a pledge. This is my sophomore year. And I remember thinking, because I was not like a swab. I mean, I'm sure I seem like, I'm sure I seem just like a Casanova. It's serenated me right now.

Yeah, I'm being. seduced as we speak. And so I just remember I was like, I have no chance with any of these girls. Like actually, so whatever, I have to talk to one because that's what I've been ordered to do. So I'm just going to pick whoever I think is the prettiest. I'm going to go talk to her and like whatever. Like she'll know that I am being forced to do this so it's not like weird that I, you know, whatever. This is like college boy brain.

And so, you know, I see my future wife. and she's just with some of the other girls and I go over and I just like strike up some I'm sure completely inane conversation and you know whatever song is playing so people are dancing and then I think we were talking about music

I don't know if she put this in here or not yes she so I said I'm like with nodding her head yeah yeah I like all that yeah so I'm like oh I like metal I like I forget what bands I list probably rage against the machine because I love them Oh, yeah, yeah, I love the hug.

And so, you know, later she's telling me like, oh, yeah, that was completely bullshitting you. And so it's like, oh, yeah. And so, you know, I introduced myself, whatever. We have a conversation. And then she left with her friends because that was kind of the typical thing, like, because you could walk around all these different parties that would be. And then I got super drunk as I would always do on the weekends. I was a very skilled drinker back in college.

Not really one of my skills anymore, but I was definitely good at it back then. And so, God, can't remember if I, I don't think I called her. Do you want us to read it for you? No, because I know she came back and then I was like talking to her. And I can't remember she came back

because I called her if that was the next night. Kurt, you just want to read that whole paragraph because I think it's funny, but you can probably read it quicker than I can. Oh, okay, I'll prompt you here. She did come back that night. Is there anything you may have consumed between her leaving and coming back?

Yes, obviously, other than the drinking. Yeah, how did I blank out on that? So the theme of this party is a goldfish party. I do not know why this was a thing, but there was a baby pool full of, like, feeder goldfish in the lounge.

And so people were taking turns just swallowing goldfish. hole. Again, I don't know why we did this. Like, it's just some weird tradition. I don't know where it came from. But I did eat a few of those goldfish. And by a few, would that mean seven? Was it sad? I was thinking four, but maybe I'll trust. I'll trust. Very specifically said that you had eaten seven live goldfish. So I'm thinking this may have been a bit of a choice more so than just forced to eat one or two. Oh yeah. Nobody forced me for sure. There was no no forcing involved. I just don't remember how many actually

got down. The seven, that seems right. Yeah. And so, yeah, then she came back and I believe I bragged about that to her. I don't know, did she say that in the paragraph? She said she was pretty hot for you at this point. Here's this metal head that consumes live goldfish. I think it was a sealed deal at that point. She essentially said, tell him whatever

lie it would take to get him to be interested and 25 years later, here we are. That's right. She did something good. because the next night was part of it, too. So we had a, the next night we had a deep function scheduled, and I had a date, and it was this girl that I didn't really even know. It was just like, I don't even know how I ended up.

Did I ask her? I think I did. I don't know. And so the first night, so I was talking, Amanda is my wife. I was talking to Amanda, and I was like, well, we have this thing tomorrow, if you want to come. I have a date, but I can get rid of her, like, pretty early, and then we can hang out.

And she was kind of like, uh, And I was like, okay, what if she just leaves early, can I call you? And then that was when I called her. And I was, again, just hammered. And I don't know. She somehow did not just run screaming away from me. So that was like the perfect timing. Well, you said it would have been like the late 90s.

So it was, well, it was like, can't hardly wait when the, the, a man, duh. Yep, that's exactly what my friend's. Sure you say that. I'm sure you said that to her. Yeah, that was a big movie. What's your issue with deck stairs and why can't you go over improperly? Oh boy. This is some trauma.

So we moved into our house and the deck was probably built in the 80s. So it was a little creaky. We moved in. So our house is. built kind of into a hill. And so when you come in the front door, like, you know, the streets at the front door level, but by the time you get to the back of the house, it's elevated like a full story up. So our deck, when you walk out onto the deck from the kitchen is, I don't know, 20 feet up. So there's a big staircase that goes down into the backyard. So on this,

I'm going to call it the previous deck, as you'll find out why a little bit later, my wife had gone I don't know she's at the store or something and so my son and I were going to go out we have a basketball goal in the back and so you know get our water get some music on our Bluetooth speaker get the basketball

or just trotting down the deck stairs he gets into the backyard I'm on like the third stair up and apparently it was rotten right in the middle of the stair and my leg went just completely through the the step and hit the ground, which thank God I wasn't higher up.

Yeah. And so the, the wood split in half and it was horrendously sharp and pointy in the middle. Oh, no. And it's just like, is this a damager story again? Somebody taking wood shards in the calf? Uh, yeah, actually. Oh, damn. Uh, more, yeah, calf and shin, like, completely, I would,

completely like shredded the front of my leg. and so I just like I was like I mean I wouldn't say I was actually in shock but I was kind of shocked and so I was standing like with one foot like through the middle of the step and the other foot like still kind of like up on the next step and my son's stretch yeah my son turns around you know because he he just heard the noise and so he was I mean this was a few years ago now he was like seven maybe I can't remember exactly when it was was. He was not old. And so he turns around, he looks at me, and I'm just like, oh, can you get my phone and call mom? Because I think I may need to get to the hospital. Because I'm looking down and it's not like gushing blood. I mean, it shredded the front of, I mean, it just like flaps hanging off. Yeah. Nice little scourge from that. Yeah. So he, he like takes my phone and then he's just

staring at me. Like, his eyes are just huge. And it's like, I see the tears starting to well up. Like, he's just as, like, completely frozen. And I was like, oh, it's okay. It's okay. Like, give me my phone back. And so I, like, leave her a voicemail. It's like, can you come home? And so then I, like, had him go get me, like, a towel. And I, like, I, like, hobbled back inside. So, like, I had to walk around the house because I couldn't go back up the steps. I, and yeah, I, it's took me two years probably to fully recover because I was I mean just like the skin healing up to forever yeah there's some wood shards poking in there my leg would just like randomly swell up with fluid basically anytime I did anything for like a year I was in physical therapy it was

horrendous so we have a new deck now and a screen porch it's very nice and it it's very sturdy many uprights does that deck have? Ooh, that's a good question. I think not as many as the gym. Yeah, there's less that's, that's, let's, uh, a lot of just like, random things that I want to ask, but I'm

afraid some of them will be like hour long conversation. So it's where we go. I think there is a new game on the docket if we want to jump into that. Inspired by the Chips episode. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I put that in there. Someone had suggested. that. All right. Big Adam. This was, yeah, I think they, yeah, it was what they talked about on their episode and then Jakey maybe mentioned that we should maybe start at NR. So if this doesn't land, Jake, you're fucking fired. So big Adam. What is that one thing you've done in your lifting

career just the most proudest feet of strength you've done? Like, what's the one thing you look back on and go, I can't believe I did that or when someone asked, like, what do you want to be remembered for? in as far as something you picked up or overcame. I look at it more as it, what is the one lift, but everyone can kind of take it however they want, I guess. I mean, Kurt knew is the one lift that I would say. I have a strong hunch here. Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's just like pure, just like one lift.

So lift hard, live easy. I did hit a PR and deadlift like in the meet. And then the next day we're at MasterNob's Gym, and I was like, well, I want to mess up. around with big techs. And so I put one plate on each side and I did a wrap and I put two plates on each side and I did a wrap. And then I put three plates on each side and I did a wrap.

And I was like, okay, four plates is 500 pounds. Like I can't actually lift this. It's why I was just kind of like joking basically. And then I just like lifted it. Like it doesn't even seem that hard. It was crazy. Coat strip contests or in the morning? In the more.

No. I think the afternoon afterwards. Oh, you were one of the, you guys. didn't leave till Monday. Yes. Yes. Okay. That's right. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Well, so you put four plates on. That was 420 and it flew. So I think we, I think Tanner actually was egging you on to, to go up to the 500 at that point. If I were, no, he came in later because he had told me, he had told me that my third lift was way too easy in the meet. Because he happened to be standing there. And he was like, oh, I bet you got 500. And so then after I'd done it,

he came in and I was like oh you missed it I did it now following up on Tanner's YouTube video tour how where did you deadlift the dead with the big text bar did you straddle like where you did you have one on was it on both platforms simultaneously kind of or how did you not fuck up the no you can like it it it doesn't fit in the sense that it's like sticking out but like so like if I had put enough plates on it. Like that would have been an issue. But, you know, I'm not that strong.

You can get five or six plates on those deadlift platforms on the big techs. But like the biggest deadlifters at Massonomics Gym would not be able to do a one. I can deadlift on the big techs at Massonics Gym. That's all. That's all. I really care about. That work. Yes. Yeah. For me, for me, it was not an issue. That was plenty of room. 500's a good. I wish I had it at, uh, it was such a new bar. It's like, what do you open it? I've never fucking pulled on. I, I lifted like 225. Yeah, like two days ago. at Jonathan and Genelie's house I don't know what the fuck I'm going to open with like I don't know if I could just play with it and just

like really make whatever jumps you want at your leisure I think it could have been who would definitely have a better understanding of if that bars if we see it in the future I think I bet we do see it in the future but it'll be more like just a set weight for reps maybe or part of a medley because it's kind of hard to like have two of them between Tanner and Jake and not use them so

yeah it's a cool piece of equipment. I don't actually notice a huge difference in my numbers versus just a 27mm deadlift bar. Not like I'm the hugest deadlifter by any means, but it's, yeah, I think the length and the added width somewhat offset each other from what I've. Oh yeah, because it's girthier. It's a 20, either 28 or 28. It's 28.5. It's 29. 29. Okay. So yeah, it's, well, that makes me feel better because I think I pulled like 15 pounds over my traditional deadlift on it. I might have a little more in the tank. Yeah, I definitely have not hit 500 on my deadline.

I tried a couple times. Yeah, it'll be there soon. Yeah, yeah. It'll be there on beat day. Of course it will. Are there any, was that your first competition then? Did we just mention that? I can't remember.

That was my first competition. All right. What do you think? Do you kind of, well, I guess technically, I mean, according to Iron Podium, you still never power lifted. So we'll see. No, that's actually a debate. Not to throw shit at Tanner and them, but like obviously it's a unsanctioned meat this year.

And it was just kind of what they had to do. Do you think anyone would prefer it to be a sanctioned meet and pay the extra money and jump through the hoops if it meant they could get open powerlifting to recognize it like the next week? Or most people don't care, even though it's been a few months in open power lifting hasn't acknowledged it just because they're understaffed and nonprofit, basically. Yeah. The whole federation thing, I mean, are sanctioning. I just, I don't feel like I have any opinion on anything. Like, I'm looking forward to it being on open college and just so I can be like, oh, there I am. But like, you know, I can wait.

That's fine. Gotcha. I know some people might have strong opinions about that, but. Yeah, I mean, other people are definitely done a shit ton of, you know, sanction meets and like I'm not show it up there. Yeah. I'm just, you know, some random schmo. All right. Well, uh, Lift Hard, Live Easy as a whole.

How was your week? I feel like there's times that we get someone that was like at Liftard-Levisi and we like didn't touch on it at all or didn't really get to like let them sell Lift Hard-Live easy to some newer crew listening for the first time. So sell Lift-Hard-Live-Easy week to, you know, some new guy that hasn't been there yet. Yeah. So like I said, like, because I joined in October last year and then the signups were in January. So, I mean, it wasn't like I was around for a super long time before I had to make a decision on whether I was doing that. And just even to decide to compete at all because that was a completely new thing for me. And like, I'm pretty old.

Like, I'm set in my ways. Like, it was kind of like agonized over it a little bit. And especially, because I was asking to you, like, it was right in the middle of a really busy time for work. And I was like, well, am I taking somebody's spot that would, you know, like, because I'm a random schmo. Like, but, you know, so I was talking to people. They were people to drop. Yeah, exactly. So I know that.

now. But at the time, I was just kind of like, uh, and then just the fact that I'm not an incredibly social person. And so I was like, oh, it's this, you know, people and it's really far away. And I've never even done this thing, like this activity. And I just, and it was funny because I actually talked to my wife. And I was like, I think I want to do this. So I'm like, really unsure. And she was like, well, how much does it cost to sign up? Well, it's 150. She's like, so mean, it's worst case scenario, you pay the $150, and then you don't go, right? Like, is that the only decision at this point? I was like, yeah. She's like, well, just do it. And so then it got closer and closer and training was going well, so that helped you. But then it was like the more I talked to people

in the Discord, like I was getting like legitimately excited about it and, you know, felt like I knew, like I said to Kurt, when I introduced myself, was like, I recognize you from the internet. That's probably weirded about that's why. Oh, no, not at all. Does it count as introducing yourself if he doesn't know who you are? Like, is there a, uh, is there have to be, is it to be reciprocal? Yeah, the transaction didn't get completed there. He attempted, I,

was there a follow-up DM, Kurt, where you, I know we talked about it. I know if I missed that part. We talked about it at some point that weekend, that about me being an idiot and not connecting the dots. Because I introduced myself, I think it was a Tater's party. And then at some point the next day, then you came over. to me and you were like, oh, you're I was like, yeah, see my dinosaur.

I was very stressed about putting on a good grip contest. I, you know, I trust it. Yeah, well, I had a great support system of people that talked me back to Earth because I was very high-strung the days leading into that. That's going to be the excuse I go

with. Yeah, yeah, I can understand that. The first one I've ever competed in something inebriated, so I mean, go. Yeah, you did a great job considering. I was impressed. For the two of it. Two out of three events I did, yeah.

Yeah. But yeah, so then, I mean, I actually got there and, you know, like I said, like not super social. And so it was like, okay, well, but it was like, you know, okay, there's people whose names I recognize who I've, like, interacted with. And so, and like everyone, I mean, man, just, I know that it's, it's the cliche like everybody talks about. But, I mean, like the community, like the vibes of Massanamo. Like everything was just like, you know, it wasn't hard to try to introduce myself to people. You know, it wasn't hard to try to like get in on stuff. So it's just like a really good time.

Like even though during watching The Strongman's, I was talking to Zach. And we we had a big long conversation with Mark before I knew that that was going to be a whole thing. Oh, yeah, yeah, white T-shirt, Mark. Yeah. I mean, and because he was like looming over us. but yet still talking so softly that I couldn't understand anything he was saying. And, but, man, Zach was a freaking champ that, like, had a conversation. Because at one point, he's, you know, the whole like, oh, I squat 500 thing.

And I was like, uh, yeah, man, that's awesome. Which Zach, we've, like, there's our, like, four Zaks, I think. Yeah, human sausage on Instagram. He's on Discord a little bit, but not a ton. I don't know if I know that, Zach. And his last name is, I don't know how to pronounce it. but it looks like Grownwald. I'm sure that's not going to say it.

Anyways, very cool guy. He, like, adopted me because he's done tons of meets. And so he was, like, talking to me about stuff. So, yeah, yeah. So it was like, you know, I talked to him a lot. We talked to Mark. That was nice. Watch the strong man, like the first strong man event I've ever been to even.

And, you know, then just, like, talking to people around that. And then doing the actual competition, it's funny because I was super nervous about. because I work out by myself. I mean, always. Like, I literally never work out with anyone else. And so I was like, how am I going to react when there's, like, a bunch of people in an audience in front of me? Like, that's going to be weird.

And it was funny because I went out there and it was like nobody else was even there. Like, I didn't even notice the spotters that were like literally with it. He didn't mean we didn't have any fans. He just meant he didn't. No, yeah, exactly. In my place was fucking packed. Yeah. And not to me.

Yeah. It was just sort of like, you know, I was in like fugue state. Like I saw the bar and the wheat's and I like did my thing. And I was like, hey, I did it. So that felt really good. And yeah, just like I can't say enough good things about the experience. Like it was fantastic. I had a miserable time traveling back and even still like the first thing I said to my

wife was like, I'm definitely going back next year. Like that was awesome. How was the warm up room experience? So I can't imagine my. first power lifting meet, my first anything power lifting related being across the country, not knowing anyone really and then having to like figure out how a warmup room works at a power lifting meet and like clicks and bot like like where do you take your attempts, when do you take your last warm up? Oh shit, they're already at 500 pounds and I need to go 365. Like how do I ask

people to take three plates off like the awkwardness? Yeah. How'd that go for the first time? I will say, I mean, I'm sure it wouldn't be like this. in some random meat, but like everybody was very cool there. Nice. And so it was very much like, okay, at that end of the room, it was like Tommy and Larry Legend and, you know, the large gentleman who had many, many plates on like right away. And so I was like, I'm not going to go that far down the room. Let me stay in the middle here with these other racks. And then people were very much like, you know, oh, hey, do you want to take one on here before we put another plate on?

And I had, I mean, this, again, juggernaut. Like, I was like, uh, told me what I should, what should my next work up thesis? Because it was just like thinking was beyond me at that point. Like, I was just like very, uh, yeah, wired. And it wasn't even so much that I was nervous. It was just like so much, like the anticipation of nervous. And so I was like doing math or trying to, it was like, nah, I can't.

And so I'm sure I didn't even do like technically the right. I just sort of like got in there and I was like, yeah, yeah, whatever. Like, I'm fine. And then I almost missed my first squad attempt because I didn't know it was my turn because I'm like looking at the screen and I was like, hey, you guys, what is the what does the color mean on my name? And it was highlighting me because I was next. And I'm like, you know, and they're like, oh, you're next.

And I'm like run around. So it's like in the live stream and I watched it back. You can see there's this huge time gap in between whoever was right before. me. And then the spotters are like, I think maybe it was Cam was out there. They're like, uh, and I like, like, oh, like, I like, trot out there real quick.

It was funny. Yeah, I remember, uh, big, big Eddie thought he was last in the event and he was first and he got all like flustered. Thought he had 20 minutes to go and he had to fucking go out there and do his medley. Oh man. Yeah. Um, but yeah, I'm, I'm signed up for another meet that's more local.

Um, in November. So it would be very interesting to contrast the vibes basically. And like, yeah, you know, like you said, like if they've already got three plates on and I, you know, haven't done my first warm-up wrap, like, are people going to be cooler?

You know, we'll see. What about, so in North Carolina, how many are you, have you reached out to any of the local crew? Have you been scoping out? I mean, I know there's a few guys down there that probably that aren't on Jim Raider because they're commercial gym guy. I don't know if you've made any end room. roads with getting together with any crew in a couple hour radius of you or anything?

Yeah, we haven't done like a big meetup or anything. There's another guy in Raleigh, Big Ald. He does like Highland Game stuff. And he just set up his home gym and he's on Jim radar now. Oh shit. What's it? Iron Oak, I think. I believe that's the new of his gym.

And then Big Seth has the meat locker. He's a little ways out in. Heinhurst. So I met up with him a couple times. Just decided not to get a picture for the Instagram, no, that's all. Look, I don't think about Instagram. It's not part of my life.

You will now that we took your checkmark. I know, yes. You don't you? Exactly. Game-kept. I'm so happy that I did. And I said if I have any authority over it or anything whatsoever, but you know.

By the time you hit 12, I'm sure you'll have a fucking picture and it'll all be. Yeah. The backlog is going to be the hard one because I'm like nowhere on that. The journey. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, there's a pretty good grip strength community in that area if you're ever looking to meet up with some folks to do some hand stuff with. That's why.

I heard big Adam likes the hand stuff. Who does it? I know. You got a rush more for him, Kerr? Is there anything else in the notes you wanted to jump at? We are. No, I think we could jump into it. One, I don't know if I'm allowed to do, too, but there's, yeah, it depends on how long he

he answers. Yeah, well, okay, we'll play it by your hair. One, I think I can put into overrated, underrated here. I can keep it quick if you need to. Oh, no, no, no, no. Well, I think I have one that I want to talk about. So a lot of folks mentioned your big Game of Thrones fan in the questionnaire. So I want to hear your Mount Rushmore of side characters.

So, you know, no, like super major characters, no John Snow, De Nairis, Sircy, anyone like that. I want to know the deep cuts. Who are your favorite ones that play smaller roles? Oh, shit. Man, it's been a while since I read it. I'm going to cast my mind back. Oh, you're going books, not movies. Or books not show?

Well, yeah, I'll have to say if I can even straight anymore. I will say I'm definitely a person. Not super thrilled with the ending of the show. I don't know anyone that is. Yeah, yeah. And also,

God, it's been so many years since winds of winter at this point. Okay. I got to think. Side characters. And you're going to have to bear with me if I say somebody that's still kind of major, that's not side. You got your druthers here. Okay.

Fully engage those druthers. What I'm going to say, it's not that I, this is a weird one. It's not that I think that the character's great. I like that he got as the Grand Master Paisel. He just gets like constantly like shit on by Thursday. It's very amusing.

The guy oh shit, now I'm blinking on names even. Give us context. We can help Yeah, yeah. We might be able to help here. The guy, the wildling guy who. The torment. Yes, Torment Giants fan. All the stuff about the

I love it. Then, let's see. Yeah, so like I mean, I definitely can't say too obvious. No, you're not. That one gets fully vetoed. Yeah, yeah.

I wouldn't even try. I had too much respect for it. I don't know why. It's because you showed him so much respect the first time you met. That's right. God, it's been so long since I went back in there. I'm really, this is taking me way too long.

I'm sorry. Oh, no, it's fine. It's like I almost want to. Well, just think of a main character and then think of the funniest interaction that person had with someone, and maybe that'll help you jog a memory. Yeah. If you're going off books alone, I haven't read the books in 10 years myself. Well, and I have not gone back to watch the show since it ended because I was so,

irritated with it. I do like no. Do you want to get, let him open up to the other two shows too? Maybe that'll maybe something will jump out quicker. If you give him more. Oh, yeah. You can include House of Dragon and Night of the Seven Kingdoms if you want.

I was going to say, because I just recently rewatch Night of the Seven Kingdoms. And, well, he's too major. But I'm going to say that show, if anybody hasn't watched Night of the Seven Kingdoms, because you're annoyed at Game of Thrones. You've got to watch that. That show is so good. I don't know what her name is, but the red-haired prostitute

is fantastic in that show. And then also, I mean, he's kind of major, but, well, no, I'm going to pick a minor guy. The asshole cousin. Yeah. That guy's so funny that

betrays them. And it's just like, oh, you're such a huge. Yeah. Fucking Apple. picking motherfucker. Right. Awesome. Good question.

Yeah. If I had read the books more recently than like 12 years ago or whatever, I don't, I don't remember when the last one of us. That might have been a host failure. I keep letting you down at him. That's kind of the theme of our relationship here. A constant theme. We're for sure not getting the last book, right?

Like he's going to die before he even. I have a theory that he has them all written and is just waiting for. And is waiting for a die to push? Yeah. How many books are we? It's more than one book that we're waiting right here. I think it's two more. It's been so long since I've been.

Well, but then I was at my old job when I read those and that was fucking like a decade ago. Yeah, it's been 15 years. I said that was 13. Yeah. And that one was supposed to be like he had to split that one into two books. So theoretically the other half of that book is already done.

If he's telling the truth. Anyway, so we don't have to get into that. I'm too bitter about it. I think he's just, holding him until he dies so that he doesn't have to hear any criticisms of anything. Okay, I can see that. Whatever gets me those books.

I don't care. I think, I mean, I think I'm going to outlive George R. Martin. Like, there's a good chance that I'm going to be around to consume a book after he dies. So I think we're, I think most of us listening. I have faith in you, Keith. All right. I think I want to hit you with a couple affiliate links here, if that's all right with you. So first we're going to, you know, code unpaid here is going to get you some best.

benefits. Number one, at Beltfed strength for all your belts. I know he loves making just like regular pant belts and things like dip belts. Those are some of his favorite things to make. So if you need any of those things, hit up Chris from Beltfed. And then also home gym con. You know, there's never going to be a cheaper time to book your tickets for next year's home gymcon. So get them while you can. And then also, Jim Radar, Code Unpaid will get you a free account. Yes, it will. Is everything you bolded ones you want to do or just good ones, ones you want to hit on in general? Oh, just ones that I figured would be good to hit on.

Big Adam, explain unpaid or underrated to your, you know, I know your sisters are listening, your wife's list or whoever that other person is that might be listening for you. Explain unpaid or unrated to them, please. Well, you're going to give me some topics, and I'm going to say if they are unpaid or if they're underrated and things that suck and are bad are unpaid and things that are good. are underrated. Fair enough. All right. Unpaid or underrated your Scooby-Doo accent. And in any story that goes along, your mother's, you know, favorite doesn't pours you with it. So from my perspective, it's extremely underrated and also dead on. because my sister, who is very funny and prides herself on being very funny, was always bitter that my mom thought that I was the funny one.

And so I would just do this dumb Scooby-Doo voice, and it would crack her up every time it infuriated my sister. She'd be like, that's not funny. Why are you laughing so much? Why? Why? like, I don't know. How many LaCroys do you need to get in you before you break it out again?

I mean, let me see if I can. Because that's the thing is it's not actually good. There's nothing to brag about. Yeah, like, good one, Sharkey. And then my mom would just crack up. And that's why you're the favorite. Exactly. Okay. Unpaid or underrated, the Dune books once they get past the first couple.

So not not the, not Dune 1, maybe not even Dune 2, Dune 3 plus where they start, like, the main characters kind of all change around. Yeah, I'll tell you what I'm doing. I'm Dune not reading those again. They're unpaid. I mean, it's been so. long since I read them that I possibly have made them worse in my mind than they actually are. I hate them so far. Yeah. I mean, it's just, and I have such fragmented memories of them, too. Like, I don't remember what happened in which book, but it was just sort of like,

what the fuck is happening? Well, I hope you remember my next question is your favorite Dune side characters. They're going to be from the early parts of the series. Yeah. Good deal. Good deal. Yeah, I'm power and, well, I was powering through. I've been customer facing the last few days,

so I haven't had any audiobook time. But the first one I love, the second one was okay. The third one got fucking weird. The fourth one's really fucking weird. And I think there's like seven or eight or something. So it's like, oh, God, this is a, but I have a hard time giving up and, like, stopping, even if it's, like, fucking not my favorite.

But that's how I got through wheel of time. I was like, this sucks, but it will not defeat me. People are probably going to get mad at me for that. All right. Unpaid or underrated leaf blowers, I think gas powered. Was that, I think I saw gas. Yeah. Yeah, let's go gas powered leaf blowers or gas powered, you know, lawn and gardening.

Okay. I have to center myself, so I do not start ranting too much. Definitely unpaid. We moved into this house, and it's a pretty old suburb. there's a lot of trees, a lot of very large trees with a lot of leaves on them. And the leaves fall and people need to use their leaf blower to blow the leaves in the fall. I get that. In my neighborhood, at least, people use their leaf blowers to blow like three leaves off of the grass and into the street, like constantly.

And so, especially now that I work from home, I sit and there will be like a symphony of these fucking leaf blowers. And they're so loud. And then there's something about like the frequency that they like it's because it like a lawnmower doesn't bother me. Like that's fine. And like the electric. It's consistent. Yeah. Yes.

And so it's just like white noise. Where's the leaf blower is revving up and revving down. Yes. It's up and out. And it's like I, oh, it drives me into a murderous rage. You don't rock out just just just noise canceling, you know, or are you like Tanner? So you just keep pushing your non-noise canceling headphones deeper in your ear. I do like a lot of times I'll do that, but it's like, oh, you know, I got to have this meeting for work.

And so I got the thing. But then it's like the leaf blower is going and the side. Oh, it's like, oh, my. And then I look out there and it's like, you know, my neighbor. And it's like, buddy, you've been out there for an hour and there are no leaves left. Turn it off. So one of my backup is least fun. Most fun was going to be working from home.

So I'm just going to assume that least fun would have been noises and leaf blowers. Oh, yeah. Fair enough. Good assumption. good deal. All right, that's all that's all that I got for him, Kurt. All right. I'm going to start off with a softball here.

And since it's kind of topical to a little call back to earlier in the episode, unpaid or overrated. What was that? Powdered peanut butter. You got to. I said it wrong. Don't worry about it, Keith. It's fine.

I think I described it wrong at one point earlier, so we're good. We all know the game. Yeah. What kind of peanut butter? What did you say? Howdered. peanut butter. Oh.

Refrigerator powdered powder? I would say it's underrated because you got to put it in smooth. I've mixed it up with water and made like actual peanut butter out of it and eating it. That's not great. But man, you throw it in a smoothie and it makes the smoothie taste like peanut butter, which basically anything tastes like peanut butter is I'm a big fan of. So definitely, yeah, definitely underrated for that. All right. Awesome.

Unpaid or underrated. Shoah era Godzilla films. Yeah, I mean, I'm going to say, which era is that for anyone not familiar, me? Do you want to take this one? I mean, it's the dopy looking ones. Okay, so like the 70s or something? Or the black and white one?

No. They're color, but they were very much geared towards kids. You know, you got Godzilla, like, dancing around and hitting emotes and stuff during the fights. Yeah, and, yeah, like the rubber costume stuff. I can't even say that I've watched even more than, like, two of them. I'm going to say unpaid. I like my Godzilla, destructive and evil and force of nature. Like, you know, they, I mean, even some of the recent ones I'm getting kind of annoyed at the whole

Godzilla is a good guy type of thing Godzilla minus zero I'm super pumped for Godzilla minus one and I'm super pumped for Godzilla minus zero like that That's the Godzilla I like Yeah what do you think about Shin Godzilla Oh I love that one too

I'm just this sort of like Government bureaucracy satire Involved in that like where they like Have a meeting to decide Which conference room they're going to go to for their next meeting stuff I love that stuff Do you have a favorite Godzilla movie? I've been on a bit of a Godzilla kick here.

I like God's. I do, I don't know if this is maybe me. I mean, the original is a classic. The 2014 one. Define the original, because I think people are going to not know what you mean by the original. Original, like, I was 1950. 1954 or something like that. Yeah, yeah.

It's like not the 1998 Matthew Broderickland. Well, no, because there were a bunch of the capable. before that, so that's not original. I know. But a lot of people might not even know that those existed. Yeah, I know. 1954, black and white,

and that is, it's like obvious metaphor for, you know, nuclear power, you know, all the film critic stuff. That's a great one. The 2014 one,

though, I thought was a really good, like it kept, kept the vibe, but with sort of modern special effects. So, like, I watched all the Godzilla movies with my son.

He loves a lot of the same stuff that I do, thank God. And so, like, we watched the original, and you could see it's, like, because it doesn't have modern movie making techniques, he's kind of like, you know. And then actually, like, there was one part that completely freaked him out where they're testing the oxygen destroyer on the fish. And I was like, I don't, why did that? Anyways, it's fine. But then, like, when we watched the modern ones, and he was just like, oh, holy shit. I mean, that's not what he said, obviously. And just, like, Brian Cranston is really good in it.

And there's just a bunch of scenes that are just, like, very epic. And even King of the Monsters has a bunch of really cool. Yeah, man, I love Godzilla. I think I put a picture of it up. I have this original print of it. It's just, like, Godzilla roaring. and it's done. It's actually a guy who's the lead singer of Conver.

She's also an artist. And it's hanging in our front hall. That's a great spot for Godzilla. Yeah. What was funny, I bought it and I put it in the basement because I was like, you know, my wife's not going to want this giant Godzilla. And it was actually her idea of moving upstairs. I was like, yeah, I'm into it.

Did you give out Godzilla Kaiju stickers at Lift Hard? Or was that somebody else? I have their dinosaur stickers That's what my Well yours Okay so someone else I have a Kaiju

Picture of it What I'm going off memory It's another like there's another Green one it's that he also drew That it's a similar And it says LHLE Gotcha All right

Let's hit you with one more here Unpaid or underrated Pickles I mean Unpaid I don't like pickles I've never liked pickles. Get them off my hamburger.

Get them off. Gross. Are there any other pickled vegetables that you can tolerate? Or is it like all pickled things or just pickled cucumbers? Is it the dill? Is it the vinegar? Yeah. Basically, there's probably some exceptions as I've gotten older.

But vinegar stuff, like especially just vinegar by itself repulses me. To an extreme extent. So, yeah, when you then, like, soak something in it for however long it takes, I'm like, no, that's not for me. Yeah. Fair enough. I like a bread and butter pickle. I'm not a big vinegar guy, but I like a bread and butter. I'm sure that I've accidentally eaten them on, like, sandwiches or hamburgers or something, and it didn't, like, make me vomit or anything.

But I would never voluntarily just, like, take a bite out of one. Yeah, I get pretty excited when I see pickled jalapeno is getting thrown into the mix on something. that'll be one that I enjoy. Just prime up. Yeah. All right. We did have a one from the peanut gallery. I don't know if you're okay throwing that one in as well, Keith.

I don't know. Honestly, I think I forgot to go look at the Instagram submission. So this will count as that. Oh, yeah. All right. So unpaid or underrated. And I'm probably going to butcher the name.

So you're not allowed to make fun of me. That is a grand rule. On Jean de Poitrine. Ah. I mean, that's as good as I can pronounce it. Let's go. Yeah. Definitely underrated.

Those guys fucking tear it up. I don't know if you guys are familiar. I don't know what you're talking about. It's a two-piece band. They, I guess, are supposed to be like aliens, and they wear these insane costumes. And the guy, it's a guy, he, I don't know if there's a name, but he has a combo guitar and bass. and then he does he has all these pedals and so he like plays a baseline

he hits a pedal the baseline keeps going that he plays the guitar and then the other guy's playing the drums and they are like the tightest like it's insane and then I'm going to say this word I don't actually know what this means because I am not like a musical theorist but there's something called micrototototals

is what they use Ryan could probably explain it because he's the big fan But they sound weird and they look weird and they freaking tear it up. Yeah, look them up like one of their live shows on YouTube. It's a site. I know I've seen the name, but I just actually learned today that it's a band.

So I'll have to check it out. I do dabble in the metal music. They are not metal. Oh, okay. Yeah, I'm not exclusively a metal guy. I'm just mostly a metal guy. Nor am I so I'll just make sure to go into it with the With a pure heart and pure intentions

Two quick hitters that I did pull up from Instagram Before we move on What's your favorite short track in North Carolina It's a little NASCAR thing I don't know if you have any opinion on that whatsoever If not we'll move on I do not I've never watched NASCAR I don't know anything about it

This one you should have a good one of the So Kyle at Nap Time wants to know your favorite memory From the back of the Cessonys van and the dean jeez all you're thinking about that shout out to the sesnees just real salt of the earth people right there yeah so i want to say about them listening to them talks i have a ton of family from buffalo that's where my mom was from and being in the car with them and listening to them talk to each other i thought that i was like in a van with my aunt and uncle it was it was mind bending It was so funny

I mean just Getting the ice cream I don't know And then that was that was just so fun Because it was a bunch of people That you know As with the entire Trip

Like I don't know any of these people Except for talking online a little bit And then it was just like Oh here I'm with a bunch of friends And we're going to get ice cream now Nice Good answer Well this is where we kind of let

You know Hand the reins to you if you have any questions for Kurt and the podcast as a whole or wherever you want to take it. This floor is yours. Okay. So this, I assume is probably quick. This is one for Kurt. What is the curb thing?

I have not to figure that out. This slightly predates you. So I joined crew March of last year and then ended up going to the Lift Hard Live Easy just four months later. So I was brand new to the community. and I kind of wanted to do something that would be a little memorable. I felt that would kind of fast track my way into being kind of core crew in a way. So I entered the cottage cheese eating contest that they had in Tanner's backyard.

How did I not put this together? So I also work for a dairy company. So there's just a lot of factors between that. My name being Kurt with a C is only one letter different than curd. So it was just kind of a perfect storm to become, you know, big curd. I mean, Tanner still calls me that over Kurt with the sea. So I feel like it's a little bit of stolen valor since I did not come close to winning the cottage she's eating content. You beat Eddie, so that's, you did not come last.

And rumor has he still chewing. Yeah, I also beat big mini. So there's a two folks. That's like a collective, like at the time, because Eddie was a lot bigger than that. That was a collective like 675 pounds that you beat the shit out of it, like all 170 of you. Yeah, that's not say. Keith, you guessed my body weight closer than anyone ever has in Massonomics and you're still wrong by over 10 pounds. I don't think, well, how tall?

You're taller than me, aren't you? I'm 5'9. Okay, then you've got to be 160, not 180. I don't know. You got some muscle to you, though. You 180? My morning weight is usually like 181, 182. Okay, okay.

That's good. You stronger than you look, apparently. Yeah, yeah. I'm bigger than I look too. Yeah, yeah. It's insane that I didn't figure that out. That's not me. Yeah, that's what you get for not watching the 2025 recap of Lips Heart Live Easy.

No, I have watched that, and I do use it in the kind of TV contest. And I even, I listened to his episodes. I knew he worked for the day. I'm so glad that that event didn't carry over. I would It would be cool Yeah, I would have left Like I do challenge

I necessarily challenge Tanner Because like he's got so much on his plate Doing the little things obviously But like I'd be cool if some like Even one of the local people Or someone that just has the energy Like some random coordinated entertainment game Like not everyone needs to participate

But just like some Like almost like a Like a bridal shower Or bridal shower party Or like a Like those It's a dumb game like that Like running in with the

The plunger between your legs To get the toilet paper Or it would just be funny. The snack pack does have a little bit of a of a game activity in mind. Maybe we could take up the reins and make it happen. I think that would be, I think just like not necessarily intermission, but like just something other than just like, I don't know, even if like, not even anyone has to participate. Like if you're in the middle of a conversation, you don't have to go like study this. But if it's just like, I don't, I think it would be a cool little like just little added bonus

to the backyard party. Like, I don't know. But, uh, sorry, cut you off there, Kurt. No, but I know. I, I think our team has If Tanner's up to it, the snack pack is ready to put on a casual low impact contest that shouldn't involve in any Garrett dry heaving. Guys got my vote because I don't want to see that again.

That was disgusting. I can still hear like so we did hear that Adams is good at fake vomit sounds but fucking Garrett was making real vomit sounds and swallowing his fucking vomit in front of a 200 people. making us all about fucking puke.

Yeah. If he, if it had released mine, I also I would have, I would have puked all over myself. It would have been a horrible. All right. Follow that one up,

Adam. What you got, buddy? Okay, so Keith, I got a question. I'll do my best. We talked about how I have compulsions related to my gym, mostly involved connecting rack up rates, but other stuff too,

that I didn't get into. And I know you talked about like, making sure the plates are facing out when people put them back like what other so i guess this is kind of a dual question what other things you have that are like that you feel compelled you know to fix something or to whatever it is like some compulsion you have and then also have you figured out how to turn that off yeah like stop power lifting and getting to strong man and care less um the dumb the dumbbells since they're york dumbbells they literally do have a proper way because there's a flat bottom on one side and I want to be able to read what the

fucking weight says. So if I look out it and I see York upside down and the number backwards and that's not the right orientation or if it's cock-eyed to the left or the right and I can't see the lettering, that's not the right orientation. So the dumbbells to me will forever make logical sense that there is a right and a wrong way to put the dumbbell in the rack. So that one I won't give up no matter what. The plates, the plate loading onto the bar used to always have to be power lifting addition standards where first plate in, all other plates out and obviously no, like, putting a five on a two and a half or something, like, just because I have one more top set, and I'm only going up five pounds. I don't want to pull plates off. Now I don't, I still will

sometimes, but like, I'm not compelled. If I'm doing like 370 and before that I was doing like 315, like I'm not taking, I'm, or whatever, like, if I have to do more work to then put on like a quarter. If I have to take like two tens off to put a quarter on, I'm probably just going to put a five on. Like if I whereas before I absolutely like wouldn't do that. Even now it's still like maybe 50-50

if I will or not. And I do most of the just like not being obsessed with like power lifting and just kind of picking up logs and axles and sandbags and rocks for the last two and a half three years. It's like you just care less about that

I guess. Makes sense. I don't know how to like, if you haven't really got out of what you're doing currently, I don't know how to, but I'm trying to think of any other ones that maybe I'm not a, ringing the bell, but I feel like that's like a positive thing. That's not like a,

it's not right in the gym. I have to fix it. It's just like, I like to ring the bell. I definitely stick my tongue out after almost every lift. I don't know why. It's just something I do. Like it's not even like a,

a neanor, neater, neater, it's just like, I don't know. It's just like, I hit a heavy set up. something and then like my tongue comes out. It's like, I've watched my stories back.

I'm like, yep, there is. It's like, that's a thing I do. That's a Jordanesque. Yeah, I think basic. I actually know someone else who does that. I won't like put them on blast publicly, but I'll message you, Keith, because it's someone you know. That's, um, as far as getting it over it, I don't know, man.

It's, uh, I don't know that's a bad thing. Like, especially in your situation, like, you're not like, you don't have other people to come use your gym that you can get mad at. Like, that was a thing here for a while that I'd, people put, shit away wrong and it would just be like fuck dude i don't even want to have people over because like for the next like three months i'm gonna be like pulling plates off the goddamn tree backwards like like if i don't like pull that fifth plate off or something i'm like oh all these are fucking backwards and that really even matters less now it's more of like a i don't know i just think

it looks better if everything it's consistent um and you could have your druthers and say that facing in is better than facing out on how you grab the weights but i'm just just how i've always had but I definitely care less now. And I think it's just like, it's so much harder to put a sandbag away, let alone like in a proper orientation that it's like, oh, good enough has become. There's a lot of things now that I can say good enough with.

I still will give the old lady a hard time because she had the, Stephanie uses a lot of the dumbbells from like the one pounder to the 10 pounders and stuff. And she might not always put them back like perfect or in the right spot. And I'm excited to give her shit the other. It was more joking because I was like, how the fuck did like the sixes get where the nines go or something?

And I was like, why are these inverted? But yeah, good, good luck if that is something that you struggle with. It took me changing sports. Yeah, I also see. Like a lot of it was when I was new and then it was like I would. You also paid full price for everything probably. So that might be. I home everything in my gym

like 90% of the shit I've acquired is secondhand Not to say I don't have over $20,000 in the gym But it's uh I have a bunch of used stuff So yeah like That's I got my whole I got this huge set of strength go plates

And Texas Power Bar Was that's Yeah four pairs of 45s 225s Two pairs of tens 5s 2.5s of Texas Power Bar For 800 bucks That's not bad I don't know what that is.

I'll stop my head for a pound, but I know Grant wants an arm and a leg for his stuff. So anything under $4 a pound, your house is better than what you're going to pay new. It's a way below new. But yeah, then that was like, I was like,

oh, my other plates are rogue. I can't put the rogue as a strength code on the same egg. That would, okay, well, then I guess if you factor that, well,

my basement is all the same plate. Like, everything is like the same brand. That's, and so what I've done is, I have like completely separate like here's the wheat tree that has the strength go on it and then here are a bunch of wheat pegs that have the rogue ones on it and they just like and I'm like okay now I feel like I have a plate because over the years I've like I've gotten acquired so many York 45s that like some of them inevitably had to be repainted because they came to me like fucking yellow blue green pink like all different variety of poorly painted plates so the only stuff I've ever repainted or shit that comes to me basically painted a different color that I had to strip down to bare metal. So I have like one plate tree that has, it is solely repainted plates. And then that's not to say that there's not repainted plates mixed in on the other side.

It's just that tree is 100% repainted. So it does bug me if like a non, if like a patina plate ends up in the painted plate tree, that will still bug me. Because it just looks, it doesn't look good at a distance or even up close. So. But yeah, try strong man, especially now that you said you watched it and, you know. It's not just me. You've, uh, yeah. I think, I am working in some of that. Get a sandbag, get an axle, like the little, the, I got them both.

There you go. Then you're already, I can already see you're getting less OCD about stuff by just adding those two items. Thank God. The axle is a gateway drug to, uh, to grip as well. Yeah, that opens. Oh, yeah, I got a bunch. I like grip stuff.

I, uh, I was starting to do more of it and like thinking about how to do more of it. And then I got just like the worst case of not tennis, but golfers elbow, I guess. And it just, so anyways, yeah. I'm going to do weird hand stuff to, Kurt. No worry. Oh, hell, yeah. Well, feel free to slide into my DMs to talk hand stuff anytime you want because I definitely have a hyper fixation there, you know, as a guy with a pacemaker.

Right. Okay. So I've won. Here, this is. more of like an easy one. And then I'll then I'll give you the slightly more serious on. So what would you say, and this is for both you guys, what would you say is your favorite like lift or event versus what you're best at?

And are they the same? And would they always be the same if that makes sense? Yeah, I got you. It looks like you're thinking Keith's all drumping first here. So when it comes to hand. stuff. There's a lot of different ways to test grip strength. The thing I'm best at is called vertical lifts, so things like the Rogue Grandfather Clock, Rogue Anvil, a little big horn, things where you kind of have to like turn your hand down and grab like a vertical something.

Those are my best lifts by far, but I don't particularly enjoy doing those. I really like double overhand axle. That's probably my favorite grip event. But I'm not. not like anything special at it compared to a lot of the other people who take this stuff seriously. You know, I just, I like the heavier events, but I'm good at the weird, turn your hand to the side stuff. I don't know that I'm good at anything or excel at anything or. All right there, Mr. Huge squatter.

Yeah, come on. I do have to squat four or five for reps tomorrow. So I was trying to, if I had gotten home from early enough tonight, I would have done it, but my schedule just I didn't get home to a little bit later. And it's just, I'm not trying to, like, do a squat session of my life, like an hour and a half before I got a podcast. And so that'll be tomorrow morning. I'm actually off tomorrow, thankfully. So I'm excited. Get a good night's sleep and knock that out. Um, I really don't know, man. I've been really enjoying hitting the circus the past couple months as just Strongman Saturdays. That's something I had struggled with so much. And I'm like,

why can't I fucking do this? It's like, I have guys that are 180 pounds. that are fucking lifting like 25 more pounds in me on this one-hand one-arm lift. And I'm like, as soon as I got up to like the number that they were doing like six months ago, now they put another 20 pounds. I'm like, you motherfucker. I was like just constantly always chasing someone. So I don't know. But it's hard to say.

I don't know what I'm perceived at being good at. I don't like technically my deadlift is higher than on my other lifts. But like that's fair. That's true on like the majority of people that squat bench and deadlift. but yeah I I'll answer it and if I could only do one thing it'd be squat and I don't know how I love strongman lifts I don't really know because

to answer this question I have to say I'm good at something and I don't feel that I'm really good at anything I'm just kind of I think you're good at a lot of things Keith I try well it doesn't you know it can just be like what you're I mean I'm like my bad tip but I have a best try to answer the question as it's posed and then it's like and then I get stuck in the weeds so I don't know I've been benching again

I don't know how long that'll stick in competition style because I don't warm up great on bench apparently if you ask Jake and then like I hurt myself because my neck hurts so it's like I don't want to bench if my neck's gonna like I had chronic pain for like a decade of my life probably and then I quit benching and my chronic pain

and my neck went away so like it definitely correlates to some extent so I'd rather not bench than have neck pain for the rest of my life so I think there's a way to still do both to not have neck pain and bench, but we'll cross that bridge. But I don't know. I'm just excited to still be lifting weights, man. When I'm Adam's age, I want to still be lifting.

I mean, you're not that far off. I know, I know. I'm not that. Well, come on. I know, I know. I tried to, it was funnier in my head. That's funny. Yeah, I'm the oldest noob in the crew.

Peck's got a couple years on you You can call him a dube that O.G I've never heard of him until like nine months ago. Oh, I don't mean in like in math. I mean in lifting. Oh, word. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think he's been lifting since.

Yeah. Fucking before my dad was born. Exactly. Yeah, no, I'm like, you know, have barely started and I'm almost 50. Like, oh, shit. I better get going. The thing about that is like you're smart enough now. theoretically to not hurt yourself, but you have a young training age.

Yeah, that's what I... You're older, but your muscles are young. That's, and that's why I'm like, oh, you know, everything's still going up. Like, that's definitely not going to be the case at a certain point. I don't know. I'm like, it's cool, do we have, like, to see Scantz still hitting random PRs every now and then at, like, 57 years old. Like, he's got a decade on you. Like, he's got seven, 15 years on me.

Like, that's motivating to at least. know that like maybe I won't hit PRs but I can like if I can like maintain for 20 years like that'd be okay like I'd be okay with like not losing much strength from where I'm at now in the next 20 years like that would be fucking goal to hit like almost 60 you can hit 60 and like still squat 405 that'd be fucking dope hell yeah I don't know that's good that's my life goal squat 405 for the rest of my life but I don't know that'll happen but that's pretty cool, but I'll make it happen because I'll fucking do some like Mars bar SSB to like a fucking 27 inch

tall box that's just like my little half squat and reverse I stood up 405 motherfucker yeah like 70 years old out there doing some stupid shit in the basement I like it all right so the foreshadowing now is going to come full circle because this is my question for you guys because you've Keith, obviously, you've been around way longer than me and Kurt, you've been around longer. So there's no way for me to know what changes have occurred.

You know, like I'm coming in as one of the new, it feels like a weave of people. I have no idea if it really is. But like, what's your sense of how things have changed, whether it's in the Discord or in general, because things are getting bigger in Masonomics. what would you say that still you know same kind of vibes

what kind of changes have you seen and you don't have to weigh in on whether you feel like things are positive or negative I'm not trying to put you on the spot of like giving opinions you're not comfortable

or anything like that but like I said there's no way for a new person to come in like other than like reading old stuff in the discord you know I don't know how things were

before I got here so I'm curious do you want to do a newer you have a more fresh, like how much has changed in the last 18 months and then I can kind of expand on maybe the last five years? Yeah, I feel like I sort of joined at a bit of an inflection point. They had recently started taking the YouTube content a little bit more seriously. They had already been, you know, into their, you know, maybe four or five months into their weekly YouTube upload journey at that point. But still when I joined, I think the primary way that

people would become a supporting member was through the podcast. And the podcast has a certain vibe and that naturally filters people down in a pretty specific way. Whereas I feel like a little bit more recently, a lot more people are finding massonomics through other ways, which I think is inevitable with the way they've been growing. But with more scripted content like you'd find on YouTube. You get less of Tanner and Tommy's personality in that content. And so people that are joining from areas other than just the regular weekly podcast episodes are a little less kind of pre-filtered. And I think we kind of mentioned it earlier that like I've moved up quite a few spots in my supporting membership number. I think it just there's going to be more

people coming and going from the community that they see a YouTube video that they like, they join, and maybe the vibe isn't theirs, or maybe they're not quite as into powerlifting and strongman as some of the community, or maybe they just didn't quite get the silly goose vibe from the getco. So I think there's always going to be core members. I think the in-person events are always going to be excellent. I think the revolving door of newer crew in the discord will, it already has, shaking things up a bit. So, you know, one thing that I think eventually we're going to need is like Discord moderators. Because you get enough people in there, there's going to be some riffraff that are posting

some questionable stuff. You know, it hasn't reached into inappropriate levels, but I think that's like an inevitability that eventually there needs to be like a volunteer staff of cleanup folks to kind of keep things going. I'm in a lot of discords from video games and stuff. And the bigger the discord, the more problems that just kind of naturally pop up. But you're still getting great new members. People pop up all the time. I mean, Mommy snack back, my powerlifting team and has quite a few newer folks in it that have been putting in the work, as Keith likes to say.

So we still need to find all the good crew members. is just like the more ways people can find massonomics, you're just going to get a bigger variety of people. And sometimes, you know, people are just going to move on after a few months. And that's, you know, probably just, you know, Mike, it is what it is. Kurt said that much more eloquently, politically correct,

and kindly than I probably would have. Yeah. There's been a huge influx. douchebags the last couple years that have come and gone and some have stuck around and some haven't and for the most part like most of us are fun and get along and fit the vibe but I feel like I mean it's pretty obvious there's people that are OGs that don't even get on Discord anymore because it's a cesspool in some of those channels um not every day but maybe assessable is not the right word is it just too busy maybe maybe not I don't know it it's it is a completely different world than

it was a few years ago. In some cases, it's really good. In some cases, if you like the smaller communities and knowing who you're talking to and like, you don't have that as much anymore unless you come to the in-person things. And there's people that like, if I don't talk to them on Instagram or see them in person, like, I know they're not on Discord or unless they're added or tagged, like they just don't get on Discord anymore. And I think that was inevitable, I guess, because I think I remember calling it a few years ago. I was like, like, this is back when our crew was like three, four hundred people. And I was like, what's going to happen when we're like at a thousand?

And we're at like a thousand and it's completely different. And there's, I don't know, it's nothing that Tanner and Tommy did wrong or bad because obviously like they want this to reach as many people as they can. And that's, you know, what helps keep the lights on at Massonomics. And we get that. I just feel that there's a lot of people that don't, that aren't here for the same reasons that I'm here and that makes me not want to interact with them because we're not in the same club. Like you joined because you thought this was explicitly a home gym community and all we talk

about is felt load and there's already other discords for that. So like if you if you came here because of that and then you found the podcast and then you also get the podcast, awesome. There's like 50 of you. I probably met in the last two years that that's what happened. I feel like I'm maybe I have to have Nate take some of this out because I feel like I'm shitting on a lot of people or things. It's like, I don't know, it's the reality, and I'm not the only one that feels this way.

And you can tell that by the fact that there's just hundreds or at least dozens of people that don't communicate on Discord anymore. But they're still active on Instagram and group chats and individual DMs. They're just overwhelmed and don't like some of the vibes in certain discords, I guess. I don't know. But overall, it's still a really good community. It's just different. I'll add that some of those side chats and DMs have been an ad. added benefit for me, though. Because when I first started, like, there were a couple people that

would reach out to me individually. But, you know, at this point, I definitely spend more time talking to people. I mean, even over text, Instagram, Discord messages, you know, WhatsApp in some cases. Like, people can't get on the same page on where to communicate. Yeah, those, like, side conversations are some of my favorite parts at this point. And it's kind of like going to like a big school or a little school. I went to a small college. And everyone was kind of up in everyone else's business and that has its pros and it has its cons. The people I've come to met who went to bigger schools, a lot of them talk about having like a really tight-knit friend group that was a little more secluded, a little more private, maybe a little bit

more enriching. So there are pros and cons both ways, but as it gets bigger, I think you just kind of end up with some sub-clicks. And I think as long as everyone can be cordial to the other clicks, I don't see it as a problem. I guess me calling them douchebags might have been bad then. No, whatever. I still, I will fucking stand by that.

And I'm not saying everyone there actively is now, but we've had a few different instances in the last year where we, you know, racist fucking comments, sexist comments. Like, I don't, I don't get on Discord for that.

And then people, they just want to put their head in the sand and act like it didn't happen. It's like, well, that's making it even worse. Like, I don't know. It's on those lines,

a reminder for the second week in a row that your likes are public. And I've seen some gross. gross shit recently and I will remember it. Yeah, I remember. I heard you curiously. I was like, what did I like? Yeah, see, I don't get on Instagram. I don't have these issues.

If you see something liked on my Instagram, somebody hacked me. I know it sounds like I'm shitting on, like, everything of massonomics is doing is still fits my vibe. They're just diversifying and picking up all these other followers.

that I think are just here for different reasons and we'll never come to lift hard, live easy, and we'll never come to... That was what maybe asked the question is like, the bigger something gets, like, the more different types of people and, like, it's inevitable. But yeah, those, I, you know, I like...

Oh, go ahead. I'm just saying, I've also met, like... I've not to say, like, I haven't met, like, I've met at least 30 people in the last two years that are new crew that are good friends now. Then, like, it's not, It's not everyone that joins is a douchebag now.

It's just like, the ratio used to be like nine out of these 10 people or people I'd want to have a conversation with in all of Discord land. And now it's like not nine out of ten. I guess for me, because to me, the Discord still seems like really good vibes because I was so used to, like, whenever I try to, you know, the only like gym stuff I do is like, oh, I'm trying to figure out like what accessory, you know, movement should. used for my deadlift. I'm like researching stuff. And it's just like everybody is an asshole everywhere. Like I remember running across a, I think it was a starting strength. It was definitely starting strength forum. I don't remember how I got in this thread, but it was a guy who he had like his six year old deadlifting and he put up a thing that was like, oh, you know, how's the, how's my kid's form? And it was like not really serious. Like it was a kid lifting like 15 pounds or

something and all these people are like shitting on the guy's kid for having bad form and then rip got in there and he's like you should put your kids up for adoption before you teach them anything out and I was like fuck this yeah my god that's I hope I didn't just I hope I didn't come off too harsh I might have that's exactly what I thought you were going to say yeah no but but but overall like what changes I if I was to answer as far as crew, like, crew's great. Every in-person interaction for the, like, outside of like a 1% maybe memory of some less than ideal interactions, I've almost had like 99% success rate on in-person crew interactions.

So, like, people that put their money where their mouth is, you know, and actually travel to South Dakota, anyone that travels to South Dakota, I probably had a good time talking to. Anyone that, you know, it's just, it's a really good community. but yeah the different vibe is there used to be like you know and I was I was I was four or five months late getting into discord and it was already like I don't know 150 people there or something and uh it was eventually you kind of knew most people that talked but now looking back to like there's people that like if you go back and look at some of those chats from like 2022 or 2021 oh whatever wasn't 21 like so many people like don't even like they're like not even in the crew anymore like I remember like every now and then I would like when mofo posts. like an old link to something. I kind of like will read through something from four years ago and just be like, I haven't seen this person's name in four years. And they used to talk like every day for,

for two years straight. So it is kind of weird. And I'm curious if the people that have dropped off, if it's just like life stuff or they're just not into it anymore, hobbies change. They don't lift anymore. Because like I can see people. I don't know.

Would you still listen to this podcast if you don't lift? Like, I don't know. Yeah. I mean, I feel like it was still be entertaining. But it is so lifting related now to. Yeah. And like the equipment and all that.

Yeah. But also I can't imagine not lifting anymore because now that I'm into it, I'm like, but yeah, it's a good point. But I think the community is also good accountability. Like if you're a vocal crew member and you suddenly drop off, like Keith's, like people notice. It's like, I don't want people to notice that I, you know, I mean, Keith noticed that I haven't posted a squat video in a while. I don't even post many videos at all.

So it's it's reassuring to know that there's a community that has my back and wants to see me keep going and succeed. And so like, no. Yeah. Oh, you actually want me to say stuff? Okay. But I feel like, yeah, I feel like at the end of the day I'm going to get hated on for some of the shit I said. But I hope not because the end of the day, I love massonomics. I love this podcast.

I love the crew. I love hanging out with people in person. And I just, I don't need to be bullied in Discord. I don't need to have negative things that you see in every other. Like, we came to the massonomics and the Discord because it was drama-free. And it was chill. And everyone did have a good time. And there was some seriousness, but there was a lot of silliness.

And I don't know, it's just the vibe reshoot. But everything changes, life changes. So you just kind of have to adapt, I guess. But it's different. Sometimes you're like, oh, it would be. But also, it's like, the good old days, we didn't really get together and do anything in the good old days. Everyone was stuck at home at that time too.

So like there have been broader changes that some of that gets reflected in how the discord feels. And I'm curious where we're going to be in it. Are we still going to be here in five years? I don't know. Like is this discord doing it exists forever? Maybe it not. But I know my group chats won't ever grow away probably. Like I know my individual friendships that I've evolved in.

you know, that have evolved from this community. Let's see, I've met a thousand people and I'm probably going to be friends with at least 100 of them the rest of my life. I don't know. Maybe more, but I'll casually know 500. I probably met 300 people in person from this, give or take. So, yeah. It's been a cool experience.

I never thought in my late 30s, I would start this like second like life of having a second social life, if you will, like this new thing where it's just like, oh. And then it's, but then it's like this weird combination of this hybrid of like, well, they're my online friends, but I literally spend $4,000 a year or more to go hang out with them three times. So it's like also the most effort I've ever put into anything in my life. So it's kind of, but it all started from being online. And then there's a podcast and then I have a podcast.

It's been a really fucking weird last few years of my life. So that's like being in a cult. Oh, it's for sure, a fucking cult. It's less cult now, though, for sure. I feel like it was more cult when there was like 200 of us. That makes sense. It is funny though people say that to me when I talk about stuff. Oh, oh, that sounds like, yeah, I know.

It's a cult, like, obviously. But like, it doesn't have the bad stuff. it's fine. But what changes have you seen in six months or a year? I mean, I don't think it's drastically changed. I mean, because I've seen stuff like what you're talking about, but it's like, well, that's like one guy. Like, I don't know that I chalk it up to a major change in the whole community.

You know, like, oh, that's one other guy. We might have to cut this whole second. I mean, I'm not saying any names. I'm doing any specifics. Because it's, you know, I'm not trying to be, not trying to be mean. Like, but yeah, you know what I mean. But it's hard to because it's like,

I do think there are people that are much more equipment, home gym focus. And then there's other people that are like super, serious, you know, at whatever, you know, like, there's some like big time power lifter guys and then there's other I don't know, and then there's other guys, like, I'm a random guy who works out in my basement.

And like, I like this stuff, but like, I don't take it so seriously. Like, I'm never going to get in an argument about, like, what angle I should do my lateral raises out or whatever, like, whatever. You know, it's like, I'm 47 years old. I'm just trying to stay in shape. And then you've got the people that are like, no, no, if you're not doing it this way.

But it's like all of that is happening, but it's also so much less in mass anomics that that stuff is a conflict. Like it really is more, there's much more coexistence than. And I'm not saying that it hasn't changed. Like it's definitely because, and this is why I asked the question. Like, you have the perspective from earlier in time. My perspective is just like, Jesus Christ, these assholes are. Reddit are awful and like nobody is doing that in math. You know, it's like I would try to look shit up about how to do some lift and there'd be some

guy who's like, uh, if you can't squat, you know, 500, you're fucking pussy. You're like, that kind of thing. It's just like, what, what am I supposed to do? It's like, can you guys like. It is important perspective that even if there are a small number of crew that don't necessarily fit the vibe, it is still such a better space than general. internet. One thing I do think could be a good long-term move for Tanner and Tommy is have a separate

discord for Jim Radar specifically. Just kind of keep the brands a little more separated. It gives them more room to grow both of them. You know, potentially they could have like a Jim Radar Patreon or something. That's another income stream for them tied to the second discord. You know, I don't know. It's a lot of work to run something like that. But like it also would give them more room to grow without necessarily, you know,

having some of the downsides that some of the, you know, more OG crew are seeing with some of the influx. But on a positive note, I will say, like, obviously if they're not making money, they're not going to keep this podcast going. So if we have to take 5% bad to still get the 95% awesome, cool. I was asked a question. I answered the question maybe too honestly. It's not that I don't love this community and love most of the Discord. It's just every now and then it's like, fuck, man.

What I will say is you can set users to ignore on Discord. Like if there's anyone in particular, like if someone's posting a video of someone's leg snapping, I'm not going to see their posts anymore. That's how it's going to work. And, you know, it's, I got to protect myself here too. I don't want to see leg press failure videos. then I will block that person. Not a bad way.

I've partaking in some ignoring a time or two myself. Well, Adam, you're a big potster over here. You're just causing all kinds of trouble. You're going to get us canceled. You're probably going to get my fucking sponsorship revoked for Masonomics. Hanner's going to block my fucking number and be all mad at me. Hannah's probably going to tell me I did something wrong that I gatekeep some. something. No, no, no. See, it's like, last week, you know, they, they got shit stirred up. So I was like, oh, how am I going to follow this? Like, what's going to get a thousand comments in the discord?

They're fucking, they're, Adam's a big clickbait guy. Yeah, exactly. They're, they're, yeah, the C and NC stands for clickbait. Yeah. To follow up, I got my wife to write down all her narliest period stories and I'm just going to read them out. That's fine. It's okay. Yeah, I missed that whole thing. I was like, oh my God. Come on.

I, yeah, that went, yeah, we'll touch on that another time, maybe. But that was, I was glad a lot of people defended the ladies and showed support to having a normal, healthy body. Like, I don't know. Yeah, I mean, so to be sincere, like, that stuff, like seeing, like, car jump in. and I can't remember who else, but like, it's like, oh yeah, that, that's the kind of, like, you know, the initial, it's not like it was a horrendous comment, but then, but then seeing the, like, attitude of the people coming,

it's like, oh, yeah, this is the kind of people I want to be around and be interacting with. Like, you know, I did, I was actually having to work yesterday, and so I did have to read like a thousand comments in a road, to find out all the stuff was happening. And I was like, dang. But yeah, it's like overall, like, yeah, these are the kind of people that I want to be around. And especially I do, I mean, talking about the Chips podcast, like, I love that they're,

this whole community is also very welcoming to women. And it's not like a fucking weird thing. It's like they're just, that's been a part of the change, the follow up to your change question. Like, yeah, I think there was like three women. men four years ago maybe and you know there's like 30 or 40 or 50 like there's several females several not super

active but a core group of like 15 maybe that chat pretty regularly. Yeah and I love that it's like I don't know I don't like I don't like macho shit and it's like I just there's no like macho shit in Massanomics and I feel like it was well

yeah there's a huge part but there you know there definitely are a yeah I mean but that's in any group um and I mean it in a like like yes I don't know you know what I mean it's not the type of group that need to like you know prove they're a man with their lifting numbers or the size of their truck like you know we're all here to better ourselves if you need to like if you need to convince yourself you're a man like that's you got some problems right yeah just Adam tried me to get to earlier when I was trying to get me to like get me to like, you know, look inside my soul and see how masculine I am. I was thinking about it because I was like, my favorite lift has always been deadlift, you know, out of the three big ones.

If I just keep it to that power. But I was when I first started lifting like when I first started my home gym, my bench was way better than like comparatively. I'm not saying that I could like bench 600 pounds or something. But like it went up like way faster. But I never, I don't know. It was like, I never, I always was like, I want to, it's time to deadlift. I'm excited. And now actually my deadlift is.

So now my favorite and my best are the same. Oh, yeah. But it might not always. You're going to go to your meet in a couple months and be like, oh, this isn't a deadlet. This isn't a tech. This isn't a big text bar. Why I'm only pulling 460? Yeah, exactly.

That's happened at home. I was like, oh, there's a lot. Oh, this 500 is stuck to the floor. Shit. All right. Well, we'll probably have to edit all that out and get canceled and all that, but I think we're good. Anything else where we bring this one for our landing boys? No, this was really fun.

Thank you. Oh, yeah. I was worried that I would be the most boring episode ever, especially after last week. But I feel like there's some good stuff in there. You're definitely in the top 176 episodes that we've ever done. You definitely consume more live goldfish than most. ghost guests of this podcast. I will say the next year, I didn't eat any because Amanda made me promise not to you.

And one of my buddies got in a competition with another girl. And they, between the two of them, ate 100 goldfish. That's fucking disgusting. It was disgusting. Even the other like fraternity guys, we were like, what the fuck are you doing, man? I'm not saying, like, eating raw fishes, like, I love sushi. But, like, eating a live animal to me. So fucking.

humane. Like, I don't know that's just... It was bad. Like, you're torturing it in your fucking stomach acid as it melts and dies. That's fucking... I have a hard time with that, Adam. You murdering, fuck you. I know. You're the guy that I have to go ignore on Discord now because it's actually not. We don't align. We just, we just don't align, you know, epicry. It's all I ever talk about to. All right. All right. Every thread. Other than the, uh, the goldfish store, where they're going to find you at, buddy? Find me on the Discord where the vibes are immaculate.

Big Adam N.C. They are pretty good most of the time. Sorry if we shit on, I'm Tanner. Kurt, where you at? You can find me on Instagram at Kurt Lifts, 1988, or at Firm Handshake Society if you want ultra-niche grip sport memes. And you can find me in the Discord at Big Kurt with a C. I don't think I knew your, what is the, you plug that?

I don't think there's might be a breaking, I mean, I'm sure some people know. I see quite a few people know at this point. I'm unaware. It's the firm handshake society. It's a super done meme page. If you aren't like way too nerdy about hand stuff, you're not going to understand 80% of it. But yeah, that's me.

I just go to Instagram and type in hand stuff and you'll be right up there. Okay. Yeah, hashtag hand stuff will be pretty dominated by the page. Nice. We have an Instagram, unpaid, underrated podcast. We've got the website, Unpaid Internpodcast.com. More importantly, the UNU channel on Massonomics Discord that we love. We love Massonomics Discord.

We love what you guys. guys do over there. Great channel. Great Discord. Go have all the conversations over there. If you want to go judge Adam for anything he said, did, or will do in the future, do it in that channel. And then he gets his one week of fame and then we'll move on to the next guest. Until then, let's see. Nope, not until then. I'm Keenna-Gat 73 on Instagram. More importantly, go follow my orange jam, the no wine cellar. Until then, see you next Tuesday.