With the disc issues in my neck I began noticing that sitting was the worst thing I could do. If I was on the move all day then my leg rarely started burning but if I sat down for more than about 45 minutes the burn would come on and once it came on it rarely went away for the rest of the day. The most time I would spend sitting was at the computer which is where my worst bad habits of leaning forward and slouching come into play. So I decided to change up my workstation a month ago and bought a stand-up desk unit. With my old school 27″ iMac I was rather limited by weight as to what would work but the Ergotron Single HD unit would hold my system. I opted for the one with the extra shelf so I’d have room for my collection of input devices since I’ve gotten oddly used to using a pen tablet, touch pad and mouse.
The install of the unit was pretty straightforward, the only hard part was getting the iMac stand off and attaching the VESA mount to the back. Luckily there are a few good YouTube tutorials on how to do it and it while a bit nerve wracking wasn’t that hard. If you have a new iMac evidently you need to get one with a VESA or stand, you can no longer change them out like the old ones. Soon I was all setup and able to stand instead of sit when I’m at the computer. The results have been great, I can now go days without having my leg burn. I can sit when I need to by pulling the unit down to seated position but do it very little.
Stand-up desks have become all the rage in the Paleo/Fitness world too since sitting is about the worst thing you can really do and which most Americans do way to much of. Here is a good Ben Greenfield post on the evils of sitting and the benefits of a stand-up desk. Here’s another by Robb Wolf and another from Mark Sisson. Catherine even got on the stand-up bandwagon and moved her laptop to our bar from the table in the kitchen. I’m amazed at how little I sit now since making this change. I sit when I eat and drive, that is about it. At night I lay on the couch a bit but rarely sit at it.
The other new addition to my Paleo life is my ukulele. It is odd, I’ve never read anything about making music in the Paleo world but think about it, all tribal peoples made music of some sort and it seems to me that it should be a part of a full Paleo lifestyle. I had been toying with starting an instrument for a while now but just never jumped on it. Why ukulele? Well, it is easier than guitar and recently it seems I’d been to several uke performances from The Blue Janes and Dana Hubanks and heck, even my naturopath plays uke. Then I was listening to a Ben Greenfield podcast and he, and his side-kick Rachel, were talking about getting ukes for Christmas and how actually playing music does something to the brain that just listening to music doesn’t do. That was it, I bought a Mitchell uke and began to teach myself. Now I’m taking lessons at Dusty Strings in Fremont for the next few months and am having a blast. I can play a bunch of simple old timey music right now (Clementine, Jambalaya, Amazing Grace, …) as well as a few reggae songs like Rivers of Babylon and Three Little Birds and am doing a few Iron & Wine and Death Cab songs. Also working on more Sublime, I’ll be happy when I can play Sublime well.
Speaking of Paleo, I finally met my match with a new Paleo food. I cooked up some yuca fries a few days ago from the recipe in the latest Paleo Magazine. The yuca seemed like a starch bomb and Catherine warned me not to eat too much. I took it easy and ate probably 1/4 of a yuca. That night I seemed fine but the next morning my gut was a rumbly, tumbly mess. A little after lunch I started feeling a bit better but really it took about 36 hours to get it fully out of my system. I think I’ll pass on the yuca from here on out, it wasn’t even tasty enough to warrant adding to my diet on a regular basis, sweet potatoes and even regular potatoes have it way over yuca for me. On the plus side I’ve had oatmeal a few times with no ill results so even though it is non-Paleo it is another cheat-day food I can handle. It is especially good with some Paleo granola sprinkled on top with added apples and cinnamon.
And holy crap, my blog made the list of the Top 5 SIBO Blogs by SimplySIBO.com up there with Riley Wimmenger and Katie Young-Caldwell whose blogs I love. Had I ever dreamed that lots of people would be reading my SIBO stuff I would have probably broken it out of my personal blog which was set up for vacations, fishing trips and run reports but oh well, my life is out there on the internet at this point so why stop now.