Yesterday I began the Work/Break Columbia University Medical Center study that I referred to in CALL TO PARTICIPATION: How Much Daily Exercise is Enough?  Fortunately the folding treadmill that I had order arrived in time for me to use it as part of the study. I didn’t know where to set it up and whether I’d want to move it between my two workstations. I thought I’d start by putting it under my sit/stand desk, but immediately discovered that I needed more room forcing me to move my guitar amp/keyboard setup. The plan was to work for an hour sitting and then raise the desk to the standing position and unfold the treadmill for five minutes and alternate between sitting for an hour and standing/walking for five minutes. That was the plan. 

This week I’ve been working on the Academic Portfolio  and balancing my finances to determine whether I need to supplement my income. Fun times. Given my tendencies to ignore what some would consider normal “work hours” I wasn’t sure how this was going to translate with the study. For example I think I worked on the Portfolio Monday night into Tuesday morning and didn’t get to bed until 4 A.M. And when I’m writing I’m don’t usually sit for hours, but will get up and walk around my place while I’m formulating my thoughts. I work for hours but it usually doesn’t conform to sitting without getting up, except… when I’m working on the website or balancing finances. Yay.

So, two things I noticed immediately was that setting a clock for 60-minutes pushed me a bit to stay at it without getting up or wandering into other tasks during the hour and I had to wear shoes because I didn’t want to put on and take off my shoes every hour to walk on the treadmill. Also, I had stepped on glass and cut a toe on my right foot last week so I wasn’t sure how that was going to do with me having to wear shoes AND having to walk five minutes every hour. Actually I started wearing my shoes inside while I was setting up the workstations over the weekend because I was moving furniture, etc. and I noticed that my feet seemed to like the slight compression and protection of having shoes on. 

Like I said, the plan was to work sitting for an hour and then convert the desk to the standing position and unfold the treadmill from under the desk to walk/break for five minutes. Besides having to move the guitar amp/keyboard setup that was behind my chair, I found that the folded treadmill still stuck out a little from my desk and made it hard for me to sit in my chair when it was “sitting time.” Also, once I started walking, five minutes hardly seemed long enough to be meaningful, so most breaks were more like 8 to 12 minutes. I also that thought to begin yesterday’s walks with a walk to my mailbox across the complex (a 15-minute walk there and back). What I didn’t count on was that it would be 89° and that wearing sweats would be such a poor choice. Ack. In the end Day One I got a lot done, not a lot of writing but pretty much finished the balancing finances thing that I had been dreading and the day felt really productive with the 60-minute cycles. 

Today I decided to move the folding treadmill to the high top table where it would poke out less when folded up. That’s where I usually began my day, so that seemed to make sense. Also, I decided that I would do my outside walk to the mailbox at the end of the day after the sun went down, lessening the possibility of dealing with unwanted heat. Funny thing was that I found that I spent the whole day working at the high top and not sitting at the main workstation with the sit/stand desk. I finished up with some of the finance stuff and a little bit more website stuff. But then at 5 O’Clock it was Thursday Night Football time so the sit time was in front of the TV, but I continued the 5-10 minute treadmill walk until 8 O’clock (with the walk to the mailbox at 9). Only thing I’m planing to change for tomorrow is not to sit at the high top all day ‘cause the stool is not padded enough to be sat on that long and I’ll just keep the treadmill unfolded all day because I’ll be doing the sitting-time at the sit/stand desk workstation. Okay. I’m beat. Day Two Done.

2023-10-19 folding treadmill at the high top table
2023-10-19 folding treadmill at the high top table

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