Another Batch of English Idioms related to Physical Fitness

Some say Summer is not a good time of the year for exercise because of scorching heat. Other active fellas would beg to defer. They say Summer is the best season to break a sweat, soak up the Vitamin D source outside, and drink up lots of water throughout the day without having to make it a chore. This week, let us work on exercise idioms and get more physically active!

1.   to get ripped: to have clear muscle definition/to be toned/have very low body fat and muscle separation is visible

2.   spare tire: the fat around the side of your body/ also called as muffin tops or love handle

3.   to hit the wall: In endurance sports such as cycling and running, hitting the wall or the bonk is a condition of sudden fatigue and loss of energy which is caused by the depletion of glycogen stores in the liver and muscles

4.   to get a new lease on life: to become more energetic and active than before/ or to have been ill for awhile but start to feel better now

5.   to max out: to put far too much weight on a barbell

6.   to get a spot: When someone assists another person with an exercise. ie: “Can you spot me?” or “I need a spotter.”

7.   BMR: Basal Metabolic Rate, which is the amount of calories you burn at rest.

8.   Roid rage: spontaneous anger outburst due to overuse of steroids, this refers to those juice heads who are clearly getting a little help outside of the gym and are in a little bit of a mood.

9.   a weekend warrior: the people who only make it to the gym on a Saturday or Sunday when they can be bothered

10.           beast mode: the state of serious/ focused training at a level of high effort

Wanna use them in sentences now? Let us fill in the blanks below with the most appropriate expressions.

   

   

   1.   A: Have you heard about last night’s fist fight at the gym?

B: Yes, I was there witnessing the ugly scene caused by their _______________ rage between two bodybuilders. They’ve been taking too much steroids.

   2.   A: Excuse me, sir. I think you must be a trainer here. Could I get a ___________  for a minute, if you don’t mind?

B: Sure. I’ve happened to see you training here from time to time. Well, I think you often _____________ out doing the weightlifts.

   3.   Quite a lot of marathoners hit the ______________ at 18- to 20-mile mark of the race.

   4.   Tom and Nate have been in _______________ mode with their training since April, because they are serious about winning the upcoming road race.

   5.   Ted: Felicia, you got __________!! How did you get rid of all the ______________ tires you’d complained about all the time?

Felicia: Thanks, Ted. I started to add more cardio exercises like running or spinning to my daily training, which has also raise my _______________.

   6.   It looks like my grandpa got a new _______________ on life since he started to work out every day. He used to be only a weekend __________________.

Answer Keys

   

   1.  Roid

   2.  spot, Max

   3.  wall

   4.  beast

   5.  ripped, spare, BMR

   6.  lease, warrior

Dr. Jedidiah’s Diary. Episode #23 A Piece of Poem

Eric, the Lunatic

by Vincent Jedidiah

Last November, Eric seemed out of his mind.

All his delusional words along with years of insomnia have led me to a daily grind.

He cried tears of remorse after leaving his wife.

He kept asking me how to overcome the inscrutable caducity of life.

Then I’d say “Just let it be unfathomable. We’re no God. We can’t learn out why.”

Eric thought over my response and went on to say that “it’s YOU that is an emotional cripple rather than I.”

My exhausted soul was shouting inside ‘Alright, alright, I’ve had enough, you Gomer!’

He could have read my mind and angrily wanted to say to me “psychiatrist” was a misnomer.

On my patients file, he was labelled as Eric, the Lunatic.

On Eric’s discerning mind, I must have been Vincent, the quack dramatic.

Expressions

   

    1.  grind: hard/ dull work

    2.  caducity: frailty and transitory nature/ ephemeralness

    3.  emotional cripple: someone who is unable to feel or show true emotion and so cannot form relationships with other people

    4.  gomer: a disagreeable hospital patient (which stands for Get Out of My Emergency Room)

    5.  misnomer: an error in naming a person or place in a legal document

Dr. Jedidiah's Diary Episode #22: Trisomy 21

Dr. Jedidiah is a psychiatrist who loves traveling, meeting new people, and exploring different cultures. As a single father who lost his wife Demi to drug overdose 10 years ago, he has not been his old perky self for the last decade. During those hard years, he has met hundreds of, thousands of people from various walks of life around all over the world. Meeting new people and listening to their stories outside his office have given him different feelings from the ones through the formal encounter groups or support groups for therapy. These people he has accidentally come across were the paths through which Dr. Jedidiah could look back on his own life, being truly honest with himself. Here is Dr. Jedidiah’s monologue that has left him with some food for thoughts in life….or a fodder to justify his own mistakes in the past.

Episode # 22. Trisomy 21

Maddie’s mom, Kirsten always looked focused, poised, and even donnish to me. She was seen at the same spot in this library that was one of my major hangouts. Putting on a serious face doesn’t necessarily mean that she has no sense of humor at all. She often cracked a joke, which made me laugh so hard. It was only when we talked about Maddie and her school life that I found dark clouds all over Kirsten’s face.

Playful, effervescent, talkative, and so thoughtful. That was how I’d felt every time I saw Maddie. She was her mama’s reason to live and the strongest force to carry on with no one in her family to rely on. As a single mom, Kirsten had to hold a couple of jobs from sunup to midnight to provide her darling daughter with the comfortable (though not good enough to be called the best) living condition. 15 year-old Maddie looks like her life was full of prismatic colors as long as her devoted mom could be as her number one cheerleader. Most people outside her home boundary gave her a weird, and sometimes an inimical stare. One night, as Maddie was tucking in her bed, she asked “Mom, why are people always looking at me? Do I look different from them all?” Instead of giving Maddie the runaround, Kirsten answered in her most honest way. “Yes, you do, honey. You look different, because you are special. You are given one more gift in your body from God.It is called special chromosome 21.” Straightforward, but still sweet enough for her teenaged daughter to feel comfortable in her own skin.

Late at night and over the weekend, Kirsten was always at the local library to search for cure or any possible studies out there in regards to prolonging life span of Down Syndrome patients. She didn’t want to believe what Maddie’s doctor said about her time left as a kid with Down Syndrome. Kirsten asked me if the doctor could be wrong about Maddie’s future. In fact, it had always been the unknown. I wanted to say that Maddie will stay healthy and live a long, happy life with her mom, ….but I wasn’t able to say what I did not know for sure to a desperate mother who had been spending all her breather time outside work and the hours with her daughter in searching for hopeful medical report and discoveries. I hate myself looking the other way each time she grilled me about my honest thoughts. I was just wishing her old briefcase packed with copies of articles and papers about Down Syndrome would give me the answer that would make Kirsten feel secure and relieved. Her worn-out briefcase, which was engraved with “Trisomy 21”, still holds a place in my heart as the saddest memory.

Maddie left for Heaven two months shy of her 18^th birthday. Kirsten seemed to have felt the time was coming for her to say goodbye to her sweet, loving daughter, because Maddie did not ask any questions about her upcoming birthday party. On the night she left, Maddie whispered into her mom’s ear “mom, I am different, because I am special.”

Expressions

    

     1.  donnish: bookish or pedantic

     2.  effervescent: vivacious/ bubbly/ high-spirited

     3.   give someone the runaround: to give unclear, misleading, incomplete, or evasive information, especially in a response to a question or request.

     4.   to feel comfortable in one’s own skin: to have a relaxed confidence in and clear understanding of oneself and one's abilities, especially when presenting oneself to or interacting with other people

     5.  to grill someone about something: to question or interrogate someone intensely and relentlessly (about something)

     6.   Trisomy 21: (source from www.medicine.com) A common chromosome disorder, often called Down syndrome, due to an extra chromosome number 21 (trisomy 21). The chromosome abnormality affects both the physical and intellectual development of the individual.

Word Scramble with Law Enforcement Words

This week, let us play Word Scramble with Law Enforcement Words. The first letter of each word is bold faced.

(*Source from the National Law Enforcement Officers’ Memorial Fund booklet)

Example:  gaedB => Badge,         mboB   Suqad => Bomb Squad

     1.   lnhdlaeCgit ligiV => ______________________    ____________

     2.   outCmnyim => __________________

     3.   aylDed pWonea => _________________   ____________________

     4.   Folyne  => _____________________

     5.   ftihF etmndeAmn => __________________   ______________________

     6.   aLw cnrmenofetE  => ____________   _________________________

     7.   Leni Of uytD  => ________________ of  ____________________

     8.   ltianoNa  cPolei  Wkee => ___________________

      ____________________   ________________

     9.   hcSear  aatWrnr => _______________     _________________

10.     cerndreoUv => ___________________

Answer Keys

    

    1.  Candlelight Vigil

    2.  Community

    3.  Deadly Weapon

    4.  Felony

    5.  Fifth Amendment

    6.  Law Enforcement

    7.  Line of Duty

    8.  National Police Week

    9.  Search Warrant

    10. Undercocver

Dr. Jedidiah's Diary: Episode 21 Aliens in America

Dr. Jedidiah is a psychiatrist who loves traveling, meeting new people, and exploring different cultures. As a single father who lost his wife Demi to drug overdose 10 years ago, he has not been his old perky self for the last decade. During those hard years, he has met hundreds of, thousands of people from various walks of life around all over the world. Meeting new people and listening to their stories outside his office have given him different feelings from the ones through the formal encounter groups or support groups for therapy. These people he has accidentally come across were the paths through which Dr. Jedidiah could look back on his own life, being truly honest with himself. Here is Dr. Jedidiah’s monologue that has left him with some food for thoughts in life….or a fodder to justify his own mistakes in the past.

Episode # 21. Aliens in America

Doug was a 54 year-old man that I met at the monthly volunteer visitation to our local Soup Kitchen. His obnoxiously bright colored T-shirts were telling me how deep his midlife crisis was developing. Although he was trying hard to keep smiling while passing the divided plates to the hungry, he looked more like an exhausted straggler than a happy, generous volunteer there. When a homeless guy asked him why the long face, Doug said ex cathedra “I appreciate your concern about me, but I am perfectly alright.” And then he forced a smile to hide his gripe. Most people in need there at the soup kitchen might have thought of Doug as an orgulous, stuck-up type of person. However, with some educated guess and based on my psychiatric gut feelings, I knew that Doug was fighting back some problems in his life.

As an immigration official who interviews various desperate people from other countries with hopes for better tomorrow, Doug must have put on an expressionless face with a strict, blank look most of his days. That wooden face with compressed lips could not easily melt away into an angelic smile in this once-a-month occasion at a place for homeless folks. As Doug and I had gradually become tight with each other, we got to let our hair down and started to talk more about our untold stories in the past. As always, I was the one who showed true colors of myself first by telling him how hard it had been surviving the days without my wife. I was able to see more and more emotions on his eyes, lips, and the way he responds to the sore spots of my life story.

Doug said he would like to leave his job of dealing with immigrants. Throughout more than 25 years, he had seen good, bad, and sad cases of applicants for green cards. Whenever he became suspicious of a married couple, he was struggling to find out the truth about their love. He asked himself over and over again if this woman or man decided to marry this American solely by their love or with their strong desire to become American. At times, some green card applicants wanted to bribe Doug and inserted some cash in between their paper works. Doug felt sick when he found himself perturbed at the hidden envelopes below the thick bunch of documents at his office. Those applicants might have wanted Doug to be a venal official and took a risk of pushing their luck by money to no avail.

Doug said he wanted to stay clean and now would like to leave all this drama filled with immigrants’ prismatic hopes and frustrations. Sometimes he felt himself like Prez Trump’s huge border wall against Mexican refugees. “Even if I had lied to them about what life in America is like in a bad way, quite a lot of the immigrants I interviewed would have fallen for my words without demur.” said Doug. Doug asked me who in this country made of immigrants is an alien and who is not.

I guess I understood why Doug had been volunteering to help feeding the homeless at this Soup Kitchen. He might have felt bitter for the outcast at the shelter and soup kitchen, a lot of whom were staying as an illegal aliens here. Doug said “Maybe I’ve contributed to mass-produce undocumented immigrants to a certain degree….or maybe not. But I still wish to leave this job of evaluating humans based on paperwork, not on their hearts.”

Expressions

    

    1.   straggler: a person in a group who lags behind or becomes separated from the others, typically because of moving more slowly

    2.  ex cathedra: (adjective and adverb) from the seat of authority; with authority: used especially of those pronouncements of the pope that are considered infallible.

    3.  gripe: a nagging complaint

    4.  orgulous: haughty/ proud/ condescending

    

    5.  to let one’s hair down: to behave in an uninhibited or relaxed or honest manner

    6.  venal: showing or motivated susceptibility to bribery