= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
AspiringKnitter comments on Spend Money on Ergonomics - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
= 783df68a0f980790206b9ea87794c5b6)
Loading…= b715d02e85f7b3b4ae65ca3d3e450868)
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Powered by Reddit
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d)
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (208)
What can I do given that my home computer sits on a desk which comes up almost to my chest, and my mouse is in front of my computer on the edge of the desk, so that in order to use it, I have to let my arm hang down from the shoulder, bend back up at the elbow, then forward with the edge of the desk touching my wrist? I've tried setting the mousepad on my knee, but the armrest of my chair gets in the way. And I still have to move both arms back up to type, and they're sitting on the table to get them into typing position. Needless to say, of late, my right wrist hurts...
AspiringKnitter, one of my favorite values on Less Wrong is that people bet things, or are willing to pay money to settle information one way or the other.
To do this definitively here, I'd like a picture of your ergonomic setup. One picture of you (ideally with a shoe or something on your head to prove it is you) in the ergonomic position and setup you were using at the time of this post, and then another one of you in a different ergonomic setup. Obscured personal details is fine, of course.
In exchange, I'll donate $100 to the charity of your choice. Or I'm actually willing to give it to you if that's your preference.
I'm sorry to keep engaging you on this, but you faced such serious allegations of trollness that were basically unresolved except by Will's very vague denial of being you.
I thought your ergonomic setup was such a hilariously bad caricature of everything bad about ergonomics that I found you unlikely. It's worth it for me to confirm for this community that you are a real person. And $100 is $100, right?
I'll bet US$1000 that AK is a real person... wait, that method of making a point didn' t work so well last time.
Still, as a step towards broadening the minds of AK skeptics, allow me to mention the possibility that she is semi-real. What if she's a non-Christian female, here to see how the LW cult responds to a woman who advocates religion and rationality at the same time?
I might have a better sense of your setup if you take a picture, but it sounds like the main problem is that the desk is much too tall? This is something like a small kitchen or dining room table desk?
Is there a reason that you're stuck with this desk forever? Desks are quite cheap in the scheme of furniture when bought used, or can be improvised out of a spare door and some boxes.
Basically, that setup as is sounds awful enough that there isn't a whole lot of things I can tell you. You could also try making or buying a lap desk and moving the keyboard and mouse off of the desk and onto your lap.
I see. Thanks. Do you know of a good way to raise the height of a chair? I tried to figure out the underside of mine, but...
The internet cord is stretched across the entire room already and can't be pulled much farther than it already is, so I don't know if I could move the computer (which is a netbook, but there's no wifi, and it's hooked up to a monitor because it has a pathetic screen anyway-- so the keyboard is of necessity stuck with the rest of it up there).
And mostly, I just can't change anything around. No, seriously, anything.
Any suggestions for minimizing the risk of RSI, at least?
Getting a cheap wireless router will reduce your constraints.
Cheap enough, and it'll additionally reduce RSI by making you get up out of your chair to reset it every so often!
Here's a standard 50-foot network cable. Also, the fact that you're that afraid to even ask your parents about a new desk is probably a bad sign.
Ethernet cables (and ethernet gender changers for sticking two cables together) are cheap. Much cheaper than furniture.
If your chair looks like it might have a height adjustment, it probably does. The controls are often on the armrests (presumably because it's one of the more frequently used features). If you can't find it by experimentation, look for a model number on the chair and try Googling that. Some chairs have online manuals.
Put a phonebook on your chair, with a cushion on top if you think that's more comfortable? It's good enough to experiment. You may want to spend some actual money eventually.
And buy a new LAN-cable, if the old one is too short.
Ooh, great idea, thanks!
I'm guessing you're under 18 and your parents are annoyingly resistant to change? Otherwise, and perhaps even if those are your circumstances, you need desperately to assume control over your environment.
If I were you, I'd probably get some pillows on the floor and curl up on my side and sort of hunch over the laptop and change my position a lot while using it. Possibly move the monitor to the floor as well.
What kind of chair is it? Most rolly office chairs have a hydraulic lift that will raise the seat when you pull the lever while not sitting on the chair.
No, I'm not under 18 (but I do live with my parents, and my mother would have a heart attack if I tried to swap out this desk).
Now that's an interesting suggestion about the laptop. Except the cord's so short I'd have to lie right in front of the door if I were online...
Thank you. I found the lift thingy, at least.
Your mother cares more about a desk than your future health?
She deserves her heart attack.
Talk to her seriously about the issue involved. You might be worried about her feelings... so talk to her about the fact that you're worried about her feelings. But don't guess at what you think her feelings are going to be.