“Worshiping at the Temple”

Of Steel and Iron.

At the turn of the century (yeah, sounds crazy to me too!), or actually just before, I was hired by a company called ‘UUNet’.
‘UUNet’ was an internet services company. For about a decade, from the beginning of ‘dial up’ internet, until ‘hard wired’ internet became ubiquitous, if you had ‘dial up’, you were using ‘UUNet’.
It doesn’t matter if you had ‘Dell’, ‘Earthlink’, or ‘AOL’, ‘UUNet’ had 95% of the ‘dial up’ market, they just slapped a different brand on it.

I was there to build a system in which they could receive their local phone bills and pay them electronically. Upon my arrival, they had a full time ‘data entry’ staff of 300, and they couldn’t keep up. The paper phone bills would arrive in ‘ Reams’. Copier/Printer paper card board boxes.
A single bill, from a single area of NYC could be 1-2 of those boxes.
They were entered into a database, line by line, by hand.

Shortly after I arrived, the company was purchased by ‘MCI/WorldCom.
All original employees, whom had been given stock, up to employee #75 (the 75th hire), became multi millionaires.
I was #78.
The story of my professional life.

One of the perks of a giant conglomerate, are benefits.
One of which I took advantage of was a free membership in the local ‘Golds Gym’, located in Chantilly VA.
Employee #76 a gentleman named Chris, and I began working out at lunch every day, five days a week.
A different muscle group each day.
We wouldn’t allow each other to slack off.
“Oh, you forgot your work out clothes? Too bad, buy them at the Gym.”
That’s how I ended up with three sets of ‘Golds Gym’ muscle shirts and shorts. I worked out barefoot once…
Then I purchased two different pair of ‘weight lifting’ shoes. Basically high tops with a special sole.

We did this, every work day for 18 months. This gym was frequented by local College and Professional football players. Lots of large men throwing around a lot of steel and iron.
I became huge.
Folks thought I was a professional football player or a professional wrestler. I was 6’3” (still am), 277 lbs, with 11% body fat.

One day, while lifting, I hear a deep lisping voice from above and behind me.
“Yo man! Could you g-give me a spot?”
I turned and said
“No problem!”
To five time Super Bowl champion (2 with the ‘49ers’, three with the ‘Cowboys’) Charles Haley.

“Holyyyyy Shit”
I’m thinking; “I’m spotting Charles ‘Effing’ Haley on the bench press… Please Lord, don’t let me kill Charles Haley!”

He’d loaded 325 on the bar.
“Ima do 3 sets of 5, with a 30 second break, last one Ima gonna do more, and you help.”
“No problem Sir..”
Yeah, I ‘Sir’ed him, he had 2” on me, and about 15 lbs.
I spotted him with no issue…

“Thank you God, for not letting me kill Charles Haley.”

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Haley

Picture:Mr. Charles Haley