The Modern-Day Gymnasium: A Sociological Survey
METHOD
Attend an awful yuppie gym in San Francisco four to five times a week and observe the behavior of its patrons. And get pumped up.
FINDINGS
The patrons of this establishment are a singularly self-absorbed group, as one might expect. They stand around for hours preening and primping, blow-drying their hair, and looking at themselves in the mirror. And those are the males of the group. But the degree of their egomania was shocking, even in this subset.
We stratified the gym patrons thusly:
Naked Guy. Naked Guy, as the name suggests, walks all over the locker room buck-ass naked. Strangely, the Naked Guy phenomenon is not confined to men in peak physical condition; in fact, our observations show quite the opposite trend. The more hideously deformed the subject, the more likely he is to walk around bare-assed. Disgusted looks, retching motions, and cries of "Oh, dear God, make it stop!" do not seem to dissuade Naked Guy from being naked.
Lotion Guy. Lotion Guy is a particularly disturbing subset of Naked Guy. This freakin' guy feels compelled to slather his entire body in lotion in front of God and everybody. It's especially lovely when he props his foot up on the sink to get the lotion into those hard-to-reach spots.
Guy with Absolutely No Idea of Personal Space. This guy is certainly prevalent outside of the gymnasium setting, but his behavior at the gym is especially upsetting. I mean, who wants a fat, sweaty naked guy three inches away from them? Not that there's anything wrong with that. But I sure as hell don't. GwANIoPS does things like: picks a locker (or worse: shower) between two occupied lockers (or showers) when there are plenty of other available lockers (showers), thereby imposing himself on the guys on either side of him; decides to do his sit-ups or whatever the hell he thinks he's doing in the middle of the aisle so people have to practically climb over him to get where they're going; milling aimlessly around the gym rocking out to Dave Matthews or Hootie or something equally objectionable, totally oblivious to what's going on around him.
Multiple-Set Guy. Multiple Set Guy is a subset of Guy with Absolutely No Idea of Personal Space. He's the idiot who monopolizes a machine or weight bench by doing a half-assed set and then "resting" for 10 or 20 or 30 minutes before his next set. The resting behavior may or may not be combined with reading the newspaper, breathing heavy, or my kicking his ass.
The Splasher. After he shaves or brushes his teeth, the Splasher leaves the sink and surrounding area looking like a flood zone. I don't think he realizes there are showers, and feels it necessary to bathe in and around the sink. Do us all a favor and use one of the free and abundant towels to wipe up the deluge you've created. Asshole.
CONCLUSIONS
The conclusions drawn from this survey are myriad and complex, but can be summarized thusly:
For an in-depth discussion of these findings, please consult this author's other study, "Why Do People Suck So Bad?" ßßß
The End Is Nigh
Reasons to off myself today:
Reasons not to end it all:
Hmmm. Four to four. A stalemate. I guess I'll wait and see what tomorrow brings. ßßß
Someone broke the Internet.
Toast, the wonderful machine that serves up this site free of charge to me and you, has been wiggin'. Well actually, Toast is fine, but Toast's ISP is wiggin'. Despite Shellen's objections, I blame Blogger. Blawg radio is still jacked up. I need to hire some flip-flop-wearing freak from the South Bay to fix this shit.
So my Mom is flying in tomorrow night from Connecticut, and I'm seriously considering standing her up to go see Alkaline Trio and No Motiv at Bottom of the Hill. I probably won't, but I reserve the right to be really, really late. Maybe her plane will be delayed. Dashboard Confessional is playing too, but I think they're freaky Christians, à la Pedro the Lion, so fuck them.
This just in: the Giants suck. They lost again, and it took 'em 18 innings to do it. I know you don't care. But too bad. I'm going to the game tonight, and if they lose tonight and get swept by the Diamondbacks, I'm gonna do something drastic. Like complain about them a lot on this website.
If you have a weblog or website of any kind and feel like spreading the blawg gospel, please peep the many buttons and banners here. Many thanks to Kevin and Michele who have already saw fit to add them to their sites. Feel the love. And fix the Internet. Quickly. ßßß
Here we go all over again.
Blawg radio is on the fritz as of this writing. Sorry for the inconvenience. I'll try and have it back online soon. It's a pretty good show, so I hope you check back. Thanks.
Question: Why would I waste most of a long weekend fighting traffic to get somewhere everyone else is also going?
Answer: I wouldn't.
What is the strange compulsion to go somewhere people feel when God shines his light down on them in the form of a three-day weekend? 'Cuz I don't get it. If I'm going to get out of town for three or four days, I'm gonna save up some vacation time (Who am I kidding? I've got ~130 hours of PTO right now.) and take off Tuesday though Friday and enjoy the peace and quiet. I guess that's why the concept of off-peak living is so appealing to me.
Here's a partial list of stuff I did this weekend while not stuck in traffic:
Hope your weekend was equally great. ßßß
If I post to tell you that there will be no post, does that count as a post?
No real post today, just a quick note to tell you that the latest blawg radio show is live and direct: Indie Pop 'Til You Drop is available for your listening pleasure. I even added a fancy pop-up playlist that you can take around your desktop with you. Hope you dig it.
Three-day weekends are God's way of reminding us that's it's all good, dude. ßßß
Don't miss last week's brilliant insight.
