Category: bliefs

I watched a healthy looking coyote sniffing along behind the chain link fence next to the Sounder train station this morning in Tukwila.

Nice little greenbelt for this coyote, if I do say so, courtesy of The Boeing Company and the previous owners of Longacres.

I have noticed a handful of urban coyotes in the past couple of years including in my neighborhood.
For some reason people get freaked out with these critters running around – I find Pit-bulls to be much more worrisome.

Go coyote go.

These three things have something in common.

* dvorak keyboards
* recumbent bicycles
* standing desks

One thing they have in common is me; I am an advocate for all three and I am committed to them because of the other thing I blief they all have in common.
They are all easier on your body.

Avoidable repetitive stress is something I have actively avoided for most/all of my adult life. It might have been related to any one of those PBS specials about coal miners that spend 14 hour days hunched over at the waist.

I TOTALLY would have invented a lay-down walker thing if I were in that environment.

Anyway, all three of these things also represent a little bit of investment in either time or ingenuity because they aren’t standard. Not too many stand-up desks being sold at Paikea.

They should be.

Most of you work at a desk so…for anyone interested but finding themselves unable to overcome some of the hurdles of a standing desk here is a resource for review.

Home

I haven’t dived in yet, but I will.
One thing I did see was that standing burns about 360 more calories per day than sitting.

The last time I was here a snowstorm brought Nashville to a halt.

This time middle Tennessee has had tornado and flash-flood warnings several times this week and a LOT today.

I was very safe where I am but we certainly saw a LOT of rain in town.

I’m certifiable – I must be.
I stand at my desk, I recline on my bike, I type in Dvorak (on a QWERTY keyboard) and I’ve even recently shaved off a perfectly good head of hair.

What have I done now you ask? I’ve gone and paid good money to ride my bike 100 miles by myself around in circles just because some equally certifiable blogger did it three years ago and then somehow got 500 friends to do it with him – and the thing is, I’m psyched to do it.

Okay, rationalizing now…the money goes for a good cause – Livestrong, yeah yeah. I know plenty of people with cancer who’d appreciate the thought, and I do think of you.
I’ll get some schwag, and a shirt, mostly stuff I don’t want or need.
And I don’t really have money to burn right now but…what am I saying – I’m doing it because it is just goofy enough and somehow cool enough to appeal to that part of me that still remembers what it’s like to dig a hole, an all day hole, for the heck of it.
The part that likes to sleep outside in the rain BECAUSE it’s raining.
The part that once counted 3,000 cars passing by on the way home from Granny’s house.
The part that once dared myself to slap a bee faster than it could sting me.

But did I really have to publicly pick a course with a combined elevation gain of 11,811 feet? (not that I’ve counted) simply because it happens to be part of a 1.0069 mile loop right outside my front door?
Ok – yes, yes I did, for the same reason I tried to slap that bee and…well…I wasn’t faster than the bee.

But I’m older now (much older) and wiser and meh, what’s a hill or two…or one hundred.
The real hard part is going to be keeping track of my laps.

I’ll come up with something.