In the

continuing saga of my workout experiences at World Gym in

Peachtree City, its proprietor and I added one more

person to our little breakfast times at Shadow's

restaurant. And then there were three. Drew Goss, a

senior from McIntosh High School and also a member of

World Gym, joined Dar Thompson and me for a discussion of

all things macho.

Jeff Foxworthy says that

you might be a redneck if you own more then two shirts

without sleeves. You can bet if I had arms like Drew Goss

I would have so many shirts without sleeves I would

qualify to run for the South Carolina legislature. Last

time out I noted how Dar resembled Arnold Schwartzenegger

as much as I did Richard Simmons. Well, Drew is

the Hulk. He's got more muscles than Regis has ratings.

Of course, all of us have

the same amount of muscles but they can just show more on

some people. I take pride in my all muscles, so much so,

I keep them warm and protected by a nice thick layer of

fat.

Drew joined Dar and me to

tell us about his recent victory in the national bench

press competition in the 227-pound weight division. NASA

(Natural Athletic Strength Association) is an

organization that promotes and supports proper and

natural weight training without the use of performance

enhancing drugs and supplements. They have often

approached me as their poster boy for the terrible

physical side affects of caffeine, cocoa and the

near-illegal Dairy Queen Blizzard.

Drew is an obvious

participant in such a program as NASA promotes. He's a

teenager whom you never see in the news. He's nice,

polite, reserved and nothing like the media wants to

depict the youth of today.

One thing that I have been

learning more and more as I overcome my insecurities

about working out at a real gym is that the other people

that are there are just so nice and normal. There is

every level of fitness there, yet, and like so many

people, I have always been nervous to even making eye

contact fearing others would look down on someone less

than perfect. On the contrary, World Gym is more like a

team experience where even the most muscular is glad to

let you on a machine, help you learn an exercise, or in

my case feed me a nitroglycerin pill.

And by the way, if you are

wondering what weight Drew lifted to win the national

title, it was 370 pounds. Or, in layman terms, 740 Dairy

Queen Blizzards.