Did Confucius really say this? No matter where you go, there you are. The Internet says that he did, so it must be true.
The concept is certainly true regardless of whether the attribution is legit. I sure seem to drag myself around wherever I go.
My latest thing has been an obsession with the idea of desk cycles, those things that fit under a desk and allow a person to get in 8 full hours of exercise a day while holding down a full-time job. I’ve been getting very little exercise lately, so when I heard about these puppies, I knew I had to have one.
I read reviews and searched around. I narrowed my preferences down to two: Desk Cycle and Cubii. Of course, I really wanted the Cubii because it is the most expensive, but I was willing to settle for the Desk Cycle because it got good reviews and looked pretty slick as well.
I ended up purchasing a cheaper variety to test out the concept, the Mini Bike. It is very like me to remain obsessed with something until I make a potentially ill-advised purchase. It is not all that much like me to go the cheapest route, but this is January, and that’s a long month for teachers.
I used this for the first time today, and it wasn’t terrible, but I did learn that I’m too tall for this to really work as planned. I think these devices are designed for short people. I’m really only average height, but my legs are a little too long. I tried this out under my desk, and my knees bumped. I moved it out from under my desk, though, and it worked just fine. The disappointment, of course, is that this minor adjustment considerably reduces the amount of time I can spend using it during the day. I have to at least mostly face my desk to do the larger portion of my work. The eight-hour daily exercise marathon is out.
I did use it for 5-10 minutes at a time about 4 times today. I didn’t record exactly how much time I logged in, but even if it was only 20 minutes, that’s 20 minutes more than I would have exercised otherwise. I was also able to do other things while using it. I read a couple of articles on my phone while cycling, and I made a few notes for myself about a project.
Because I was wearing a Fitbit inside my shoe while I used the mini bike, I logged in a bunch of steps and met my step goal before I came home from work. This might be slightly cheating since the cycling didn’t take much effort, but I will take my step credits where I can get them. I don’t think this is a total cheat. I can feel that my leg muscles have been used today.
You can adjust the tension on the mini bike, but that feature doesn’t seem to work quite as smoothly as one might desire. I believe that would be one major difference in purchasing a higher end brand. Now that I’ve purchased this one, though, I’m going to make myself use it consistently for at least a whole semester before I allow myself to believe I have earned a higher end version.
If you want something that is gym quality, this cheapo option is not for you. If you just need something functional that will do the job and not completely suck, you should go for it. The ride is fairly smooth. The assembly is easy. It only weighs ten pounds, so when you bang your knees, all you have to do is pick it up and move it somewhere else.
I’d say this is a good option for using in front of the TV or in a home office. With a laptop stand holding a computer up higher than at normal desk level, a tall person might even be able to use it while working.
This will not be my only exercise. I also plan to jog in place, take extra trips up and down staircases at work, make extra trips back and forth to my office when I forget things I need, and jump to lots of conclusions. It’s possible that I might leave my house from time to time to go to an exercise class, but that would require more motivation than I’ve worked up to in one day of mini-biking. I’ll have to get back to you on that.
Meanwhile, I’ll just show you my cranes for the day.
#62
#60-#61
My photo prompt today was “on the page.” The book shown here is Pride and Prejudice. The cranes are folded from a Pride and Prejudice calendar. I bought the calendar for the purpose of using it as origami paper, but I had a hard time peeling off the pages today. The calendar has the text of the entire book in it, and I felt like I was violating a sacred manuscript.
