You’re crazy to hunt for those keys yourself. You need to hire a lawyer to do it!
Note to the mods: This is not intended as a personal insult, but rather as a humorous reference to the crapping-upon that Stoid has received in his “I’m representing myself in court” thread.
And no, I haven’t found them! I haven’t yet employed all your tips and tricks though…but I’m beginning to think I’ll be trapped here forever, watching my car rust in the driveway…
Call a locksmith before you end up a prisoner without a locked door. I lost my keys once. I went six months with out being able to lock my doors. I never really cared, because I never had anything worth stealing. YMMV
If you haven’t found them yet, I can share the recent circumstance when I misplaced mine. Since I was inside and would have had to unlock the house door, I knew they were inside. I looked where I normally put them, in a drawer in the buffet, and in my coat. No luck. I was in a hurry so I panicked and began looking in all sorts of very unlikely places. Finally I went to the chair where I had hung my coat and looked under it. There they were. I guess they fell out when I hurriedly flung the coat around to put it on. I hadn’t heard or seen them drop out.
If you have pets there’s a chance they/it knocked them out of plain sight.
The next most likely place for stuff to “get lost” at our place is in the seat of the recliner or underneath it where things can fall through to the floor.
After that we just start going through stacks of things, through trash cans, and all the other places other Dopers have suggested.
If it helps at all, here’s a haiku I wrote long ago:
Somewhere in this snow
As I frolicked and tumbled
I lost my house keys
They are in your coat pocket. That coat you never wear but then you did, just the one time, the last time you went out. Now where did you put that coat when you took it off…?
Clean your house. Or apartment, whatever. Then hammer a nail onto some vertical surface in the kitchen. Hang your keys on that every time you come home. Do not let your keys leave your hand between taking them out of the lock and hanging them on the nail. The nail is the only place your keys reside inside the house. Ever.