Gymstones

The gym is a great place to people watch. While on the elliptical for thirty minutes, you can observe some classic human behavior as well as the not so normal and practically bizarre. I like to call them Gymstones. Take for instance, my most recent observation regarding male gym behavior. Here's the scenario: I'm in the weight room and I notice this guy staring very intently at this well-toned girl in the free weights area. I mean can you believe this guy? I bet he just comes to the gym to check out girls in work out clothes. Totally disgusting. This is all going on in my head. And then the girl moves, but his focus does not. He is looking at something beyond. Wait a minute, he's totally checking out one of the, wait... a guy? Oh, so maybe he's not into girls. And that's when I noticed it. Guys check out themselves and other guys at the gym. While in the weights area, they are totally oblivious to us. It's quite amusing to watch. You've got these guys, looking out of the corner of their eye at another guy on the bench press and checking out how much weight he's lifting and how his muscles look. And then the automatic next step, they turn back to the mirror and stare intently at their own biceps and start pumping the iron with intensity. Oh yeah, now they're motivated - they're totally gonna look like that guy next semester. And this whole time in order to maintain the chronically flexed look, they are walking around like steel robots and seem to by happenstance be in positions that require flexing. All the while stealing glances in the mirror. It's all very Zoolander-like and totally entertaining. I asked Joey about this and he denied it. He said "No, guys don't do that!" But upon our next trip to the gym, I was totally vindicated. He witnessed it himself. And they say we're complicated...