#i have entered this challenge partially bc 1. it's fun!

[lovelylogans]

mountains i raise

But the mountains I raise Elude my embrace, Flowing over my arms And into my face.

-gathering leaves, robert frost

ao3 | read my other fics | coffee?

warnings: food mentions, that’s about it

pairings: analogical, royality

words: 865

notes: so, this is for the 13 days of halloween prompt over at @sanderssidescelebrations​! today’s prompt is jumping in leaves!

For the millionth time today, Virgil scowls down at his feet and moves to scrape the mud off the bottom of his boots.

Considering his primary tool is a rake, his rate of success really depends on what angle he manages to contort himself in order to use the edge of it without overbalancing and collapsing into the mud.

“We really should have waited until it got a bit drier,” Virgil comments for the million-and-first time today.

“We really should have waited until it got a bit drier,” Virgil comments for the million-and-first time today.

Logan directs a glance toward him, squinting a little, as he's polishing his glasses on the sleeve of a sweater that went mysteriously missing from Virgil's laundry last week.

"We said we'd tidy up the lawn a bit before Roman and Patton came over," he said mildly. "They're coming over this afternoon. Therefore—"

"Roman and Patton won't care," Virgil tries not to whine. "Roman would probably want artsy pictures of the lawn and Patton would want to crunch leaves with you."

"I don't crunch leaves," Logan says petulantly.

"Yeah, okay," Virgil says, attempting to shake the mud off his rake. "You nearly knocked me into the road on our first date because you saw a prime, untouched maple leaf just ripe for the pouncing."

Virgil's husband—widely seen as a no-nonsense, highly respected professor with a doctorate—sticks out his tongue. Virgil sticks his out right back.

"It's polite to have a tidy home when guests come over," Logan continues.

"One, Patton's your brother and he won't care," Virgil says. "Two, you've seen Roman's disaster of an apartment, he’d have no room to talk."

Logan mutters something along the lines of "Roman being rude shocks no one," and Virgil fondly rolls his eyes before he stomps over to the next section of their backyard that's still scattered with leaves, like a semi-punctual, untidy rug.

Considering that their backyard fringes on the edge of a forest, there’s really only so much leaf raking they can do before it turns into really absurd levels of persnickety. There’s already several piles that nearly come up to Virgil’s waist, and they’re about three-quarters of the way through the lawn.

Virgil cracks his knuckles, and spares a glance for Logan, who’s already back at raking the leaves, frowning at his pile, then tilting his head thoughtfully at the surrounding area of mostly-cleared grass. Virgil stifles his grin and turns back to his section of lawn.

They fall into a pleasant rhythm. It is kind of soothing, really, doing something that has such a visibly noticeable result—the cleared grass, not quite the vibrant green it had been in the summer, but a vivid enough contrast between the burnished oranges and rusty reds and dusty browns that it’s still pretty to watch, still satisfying to see the neat piles stacked as high as Virgil’s hip, the gradient of colors in each of them.

They’re focused, so much so that the rumbling of a car pulling into their driveway startles him. From the way Logan looks up, mouth opening ever so slightly and then glancing down at his watch and then back at the car, Virgil’s not the only one.

They exchange a look. Virgil shrugs, and Logan sighs, just a little, before they both move to drop off their rakes and see Roman and Patton.

Patton gives his usual long, eager hug of greeting, and Roman and Virgil exchange a nod, and Logan’s about to gesture into the house when Patton makes a happy, high-pitched noise that cuts him off.

“Logan!” He squeals, and leans in to hug his brother tight around the shoulders. “You remembered!”

“Remembered what?” Virgil asks blankly.

Logan’s flushing, just a little, a light enough pink that he’d probably pass it off as a reaction to physical exertion if Virgil teased him about it.

“The leaves!” Patton says brightly. “Oh, my goodness, when we were kids we’d spend forever raking up piles of leaves and then jumping into them and scattering them everywhere, Mom and Dad used to just make it a weekend of leaf-raking because we’d spend the first day jumping into them all the time—”

“Yes,” Logan says. “I did. Are you satisfied with the result?”

“Satisfied?!” Patton laughs, and leans in to hug Logan tight again. “It’s perfect!”

Before Virgil can say wait what, Roman’s grabbing at Patton’s hand.

“Then let’s go!”

Roman and Patton both sprint into the backyard, and Virgil hears the aggressively noisy susurrus of crunchy leaves scattering everywhere.

Virgil bumps hips with Logan. “Like when you were kids, huh?”

“I’d forgotten,” Logan says, studiously blank.

“Uh-huh,” Virgil teases, and grins. “Are you satisfied with the result? really screams forgetfulness.”

Logan flushes an ever deeper shade, apple red, and Virgil kisses him on the cheek.

“Babe, if you wanted to jump into the leaves, you could have just said so.”

“Well,” Logan said. “I am now.”

“Come on, then,” Virgil says, and tugs on his hand, and a grin splits Logan’s face before they both sprint into the backyard, ready to catapult themselves into the piles they’d spent most of the day creating.

They can do it again tomorrow.

[jecouture-blog1]

100 Day Challenge: Day 30 Update

You’ll be pleased to know that I not only survived Mexico (the capture of El Chapo made it a lot easier for me to walk around down there), but I lost weight, as well.  The night before heading down there, I came down with a bad cold, which suppressed my appetite for most of the week.  I felt like crap, but it’s better to look good than to feel good.

I weigh in today at 243, six pounds lighter than my last update, and down fourteen pounds overall.  As a result, I’m in a good mood, so I feel like saying some mean things about short people.  Which leads me to talking about....

CrossFit

I don’t know about you, but in my experience the stereotype of shorter men having a Napoleon Complex is only true about 1000% of the time, give or take a percentage point.  My advice to them is to work out their anger through CrossFit, which is a sport seemingly designed for them.

From my experience, the ideal background for a CrossFitter is a 5′6″ wrestler or gymnast.  In fact, of the top 10 finishers in the Individual Men’s competition at the 2016 CrossFit Games, only one is taller than 6′0″.  The winner, Mathew Fraser, is 5′7″, and the greatest of all time, Rich Froning, is 5′9″.

CrossFit involves squatting down and coming back up with heavy weights, so it’s better to only have to travel a small distance.  Plus, you often have to fling yourself over a bar, so smaller distances are your friend in this case, as well.  When I squat, my fat ass has to go a long way to make it down to the floor.

A CrossFit gym is known as a “box”, and while each of the ones I’ve been to does things just slightly differently, the program that my box (CrossFit O’Fallon) follows is very typical.  You start with a Strength session, which is usually geared around Olympic weightlifting skills (snatch, clean & jerk), or working on skills to improve your Olympic lifts.  After that is the W.O.D., or Workout of the Day, which is a high intensity workout combining various exercises over 10-15 minutes, usually.  This includes weightlifting, good old fashioned calisthenics (push ups, sit ups, pull ups, burpees) and/or cardio (running shorter distances, jumprope).  The W.O.D. is almost constant movement, so I’m always gassed  by the end of it.

Here is a partial list of what I love about CrossFit:

Community: the classes are in a group setting, and everyone is supportive of each other.  The owners of my box, Josh and Mendy, are wonderful, and they set the tone for the box.  They started out in their garage, moved to a different location which they outgrew, and moved to a bigger location.   The coaches push you in an encouraging way, as well.  When I worked out at other gyms before, I would have my headphones in the whole time, and might nod hello to familiar people, but it was very solitary.  At CrossFit, there are no headphones and no mirrors.

Diversity of people: it’s quite a cross section of people, from top notch athletes who compete regularly, to older people like me looking to get in better shape.  Everyone does the same movements, but you are encouraged to “scale” to a level that pushes you but is able to be accomplished.  For example, I can’t yet do “toes to bar”, so I do “knees to chest”.

Variety of workouts: no two workouts are the same, so not only do I work out the entire body, it never feels boring.

Core: everything we do in CrossFit works the core, so while a belly is covering them up, I can actually feel my abdominal muscles getting stronger.

Hero WODs: CrossFit is very popular in the military and law enforcement communities, and one of the coolest things we do are “Hero WODs” which honor fallen military, firefighters and policemen and women.  The most famous is “Murph”, which is traditionally done on Memorial Day.  Murph was a Navy SEAL who was one of the guys in the movie and book “Lone Survivor” that was killed in Afghanistan (spoiler alert).  The Murph workout consists of: 1 mile run, 100 pullups, 200 pushups, 300 squats, 1 mile run.  It’s not as much fun as it sounds, but it’s a great feeling when you’re done, and our box always has a cookout afterwards.

If it sounds like I’m evangelizing for CrossFit, it is because I am.  My hope is someday develop enough to enters Masters competitions, but for now, I’m going to keep working to get in great shape.

I hope everyone enjoys Super Bowl Sunday (I’m rooting for my fellow BC alum, Matt Ryan, and the Atlanta Falcons), and I’ll check back in soon.