Warum?

"So tell me why I gotta feel this way
And tell me why I don't feel the same"
--Why, Pt. 2, Collective Soul

I never did hear "Why, Pt. 1," but I like this one enough, so I'm sure the original was great. It's just a shame that this band only has like one good song (that's a quote from Dave, nothing I would ever say myself, obviously). Okay, the relevance of the question asked in this morning's song lyrics (and in the heading, auf Deutsch):
Yesterday morning at the Fox gym (what's a gym? oh, a gym), I went through the exact same routine I enact every time I'm there: I entered, scanned my badge, put my bag into locker 130, placed the lock on said locker, locked said lock, placed my iPod in my left pocket and my keys in my right and exited the locker room. I then placed my keys on the floor, in the corner by the lat pull machine (out of normal traffic), because who wants keys in their pocket while they're working out, right? And it's not like it's a super-crowded gym, where there's a risk of many sets of keys getting confused or of them getting kicked around or stolen or something. Or so I thought...
I close out my workout (finishing things off with a 10-minute, 1-mile jog on the treadmill) and return to the scene of my key-dropping to retrieve them and head back into the locker room. No keys to be found. Quite vexing. It's possible that I picked them up before I went to the treadmill, I suppose, so I check that area, and again, no dice. Scanned all around the perimeter of the place (it's not very big, so that didn't take too long), and still, nothing to be found. Even took a look at the front desk to see if they had been dropped off up there. Nope. Ran into my friend Jerry, on the way in, and he suggested that I look in the back office. Actually, he first suggested that I not leave my keys on the floor (pointing to the key attached to his shoe as representation of a better idea), but while I appreciated his sentiment, that wasn't really helping me much at the time. The office is usually closed, but the door was ajar, so I poked my head in, and there, on the desk next to the employee with her back to me, were my keys. She was busy surfing the internet (as good gym employees are wont to do), so I grabbed them, said "I'm here to pick up my keys, thanks," and left.
Now here's the why part. At what point do you, as a gym attendee, make the decision that those keys on the floor over there definitely don't belong to anyone still here in the gym working out? Why are they misplaced, not placed? How many people would actually be able to leave the gym and go to work without their keys? WHY did you put my keys in the office and make me a) think I was being very forgetful, b) question my own sanity--I know I put these here, and c) waste 10 valuable minutes of my time so I could walk aimlessly around the outside of the room? This is not something to get worked up about (capital letters notwithstanding), but I really can't understand what would bring someone to that action. If you see a set of keys sitting on the floor, the absolute worst thing that can possibly happen is that they sit there until the end of business hours and get moved to the office at closing time, for the concerned party to pick up first thing the next morning. Otherwise, someone who notices their keys are missing (which would likely take place before they attempt to drive home, sans keys) would return to the scene of the crime and locate them at that time. I'm all for acts of kindness, but this, I'm afraid, would have to be categorized under acts of stupidity. There, I'm done.
Meanwhile, reason #642 why I love my job: As I'm writing, I'm watching a tape of Reggie Miller's 25-point fourth quarter against the Knicks in 1994. It's one of numerous classic NBA games I have on tape at my desk, and on dark days, I'm occasionally able to enjoy something like this. It's too bad the NBA is nowhere near what it was back then. I won't bother commenting on the Spurs-Suns debacle, but I am at least a little bit encouraged by the lottery (though it didn't benefit my Lakers at all). As much as I hated them when they were good, the NBA was better when Portland (1990-92, then again late 90's and early 00's) and Seattle (1994-97) were good. The Lakers often did battle with these guys (big upset to get to the Finals in '91, thank you B-Shaw in '00) and the league was better for it. Hopefully Oden and Durant can eventually bring them back to that level, or somewhere near it. It's pretty great that the Trail Blazers (nee Jail Blazers) have transformed the character of their team in the last few years (Simmons said something about how it says something about your team when a convicted sex offender--Ruben Patterson--isn't even the third-worst guy on the roster), and it looks like Nate McMillan (poorly-treated in Seattle, by the way) has a real solid core (Oden, Aldridge, Roy, Jack) to build around for the next few years. Maybe trade Zach Randolph for a small forward? I'm obviously not rooting for them (or anyone else in the Western Conference), but it won't be bad to see them back. As far as the Sonics are concerned, everybody watched the Warriors in this year's playoffs, right? Why wouldn't Seattle try to bring Rashard Lewis (free agent) back and run him out there with Ray Allen and Durant? Throw a decent big man in there, Luke Ridnour (or an upgrade) to get them the ball, and get out of the way. Good times...
UPDATE: Great video of Blazers fans celebrating like it's 1977 as they hear the lottery announcement...
I've been doing a lot of reading lately, not so much of the book variety (though "Breaks of the Game" by David Halberstam--featuring those Portland Trail Blazers, incidentally--is a very good read, and I should be finishing it this weekend), but more of the internet variety. My Google reader is filled to the brim every day, and I can barely get through everything that comes up before it refills the next morning. If you've never used Google reader (or a similar RSS feeder), it's quite worthwhile. Besides getting all kinds of hilarious stories from numerous sports blogs and news sites, I'm exposed to more bad grammar and misuse of words than a 6th-grade English teacher (or a local youth baseball story editor). Here's a sampling, from just the last two days, starting off with a favorite of you and your loved ones:
New Real Salt Lake Coach Jason Kreis, on Freddy Adu: "...the ball is in his court, literally and figuratively" - you're halfway there, Coach. The ball would be literal, but the court would not be. Unless he's also playing tennis or basketball...
Unnamed blogger on something Scott Skiles did: "...is going to illicit such a response..." - that would be elicit, sorry...
Several violations on this one lately, regarding the US Soccer roster for the upcoming Gold Cup: "...he would ordinarily be a shoe-in for the roster..." - it's shoo-in, but close
Another soccer story: "...both were booked for descent..." - when you talk back to the referee (Sir, Sir), it's called dissent; when you start up high and you come down, that's descent.
These are all off the top of my head, so I know there have been more, which means maybe I'll start keeping track. I'm like that. I care way too much about spelling and grammar and all of that, but somebody's got to, right? This is going to sound pretentious, because all writing does not have to be "proper," as it were, but I think the explosion of blogs has brought about another level of the "dumbing down" of America. More sources for news (and sports, in my case) are coming from less "properly-trained" sources (I mean less in the sense that the sources haven't received as much training, not in the sense that there are fewer sources; I would have used the word fewer in that case), and the AP Style Guide (and the dictionary...) goes out the window. I make no claims about its necessity, and I know it sounds lame to say this (and pretentious, I already said that), but I grow disheartened with improperly-presented opinions, great as they may be.
Speaking of improperly-presented opinions, I have never experienced a worse speech than the one given at my bro's law school graduation on Saturday night. I won't slander the man by mentioning his name, but he did everyone there a disservice by either failing to prepare or just being that bad. Fortunately, my brother already speaks much better than this cat (see Suss's wedding reception and best man toast #2), so I'm not too concerned. I'm just bummed I'll never have those 15 minutes of my life back.
One quick meeting today and then probably home early to prepare for a busy weekend: long work day tomorrow, baseball Saturday, 10 p.m. flight to Indianapolis for the Indy 500 (all day Sunday), back Monday afternoon and then prep for the week ahead before bible study that night. I'm already tired, thanks to a basketball game Tuesday night (Dimes comes in with 2:00 left, our team down 6; we force OT and win)--didn't get home until 11--and the Dodger game last night (much obliged, Shupe), dugout club-style, which landed me home at 11:30 (a conveniently-timed accident on the 110 South right after the game meant it took me an hour to get to the South Bay). Highlights of last night's game (since I was on the wrong side of the stadium, and we missed the game's one big hit--a three-run double by Russell Martin) included a Martin home run that was changed to a foul ball, followed by a pitch from Carlos Villanueva that sailed over Martin's head, followed by a walk, followed by some jawing between Martin and first baseman Prince Fielder, followed by some jawing between Mariano Duncan and the Brewers dugout, which became Duncan and Fielder, and then the dugouts (and the bullpens--God bless the bullpens for running out) cleared, but nothing too crazy happened. Oh yeah, and the sweet and sour turkey was outstanding.
Peace.