Ergonomics

[da]

I just got an ergonomic assessment of my office. It was useful, for helping me track what's causing my shoulder to hurt recently. I knew it was mouse-related, since it hurts precisely when I use the mouse. It turns out I'm holding up my arm too much. Way too much. I should be resting it on the arm-rests. All right then.

I need to investigate:

• a footrest. The assessor said when I'm not using my keyboard or mouse, I might want to be tipping my chair slightly back (something about blood-flow in the back being increased). She recommended putting my feet up. I like putting my feet up.
  
• I still need a windows program that will simply go 'ding' every 20 minutes- to remind me to take a break. Options: many.
  
• a split keyboard without a keypad? She doesn't know of any. I'm going to let this one go, it's only to make my mouse closer at hand and I don't really need it.
  
• I need to ask the kinesiology gym people about two exercises which may be OK for my shoulder, since I've been skipping the arm-lifting exercises at the gym. "prone fly" and "shoulder retraction".
  

20 minutes very well spent.

Comments

[dawn-guy.livejournal.com]

The nice thing about Xwrits (don't think there's a Windows binary. sorry) is that it grabs control of the keyboard and mouse so you can't do anything and may as well take the break you need.

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

That may be a nice thing to some, but it's a deal-killer for me. I want a gentle reminder. I'd rather postpone the occasional break than lose my train of thought every scheduled breaktime. My train of thought is delicate enough as it is. :)

[dawn-guy.livejournal.com]

The headspace I was in during my CTS period meant I needed something to force me to stop.

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

*nods*

My friend and ex-neighbor D. solved that one by connecting a fire-bell to a timer with a pull-cord reset, mounted across the room from his desk.

Every hour, he had to cross the room and pull the cord before the timer ran out, otherwise it would make a hell of a racket.

This was a gradual progression from purely software, to an alarm-clock across the room, to the loud alarm.

I don't remember how long he had to use this. For the sake of his then-workmates, I hope it wasn't long.

[melted-snowball.livejournal.com]

No, the nice thing about xwrits is that the guy who wrote it used to live down the hall from me.

(He's at UCLA nowadays, and is famous for the paper with the title Get Me Off Your Fucking Mailing List.)

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

Oh! We were just talking about him. :)