my favorite things

So as a trainer I see a lot of interesting things in the gym. There are things that I see that I can't understand what the person is trying to work, there are funny things, and there are downright dangerous things.
Here are some of my favorites:
-abductor and adductor(inner/outer thigh machines). I can't tell you how many people, mostly women, I see slaving away on these two machines hoping to slim down their thighs/hips. Its not going to work. The muscles of the hip are small and don't lend to high metablic conditioning.
-ab machines are another. All you're doing is opening yourself up for back injury. The amount of weight, along with the flexion of the spine could lead to back problems. Planks, side planks, rotational exercises are the way to go as far as abs are concerned. These should also be followed by supermans, and quadraped/birddog to balance out abs and lower back so as to not create a muscle imbalance.
-Along the lines of doing abs, the ab crunch marathon I see a lot of people doing. Trying to do crunches at every possible angle. Legs up, legs down, legs straight, bent, legs to the side, one leg across the other legs knee..it seems to be endless the amounts of ways people will do crunches. News flash, crunches wont make that belly fat go away. Actually in a study, it was found that it would take 22,000 crunches to burn 1 pound of fat. Thats right 22,000. That would take you forever to accomplish..but you keep crunching.
-People doing the same workout or same body part everyday they're in the gym. Like the guys that do just chest, triceps, and biceps. Or the girls that just do hips(like i mentioned before) or glutes. (Balance out workouts or youll have muscle imbalances = joint pain and bad posture
-People swinging weights around with no purpose( always have a plan)
-People doing exercises wrong or dangerously. Kettlebells for example. (Get a trainer for a session or 2)
-Doing single joint isolation exercises(multi joint exercises are the best)
-Endless boring cardio that keeps people at the gym for 90+ minutes( do some freakin intervals, you'll get a better workout and burn more calories in about 20-30 minutes)
-The people that show up at the gym just for social time. They pretty much just hang out and talk to other people and never really do much of anything but interrupt other peoples workouts.

In the end you see some pretty funny things being in a gym for about 10 hours a day. Gotta love it.