This is a picture of my "new" chair. I saw it on the side of the road and it didn't dawn on me until I passed it that hey, I need an office chair. Since I was listening to a good song on the radio and didn't specifically have to be back home (but did have a few things I needed to do before I returned to the ice rink to pick up my son from work), I had time, I told myself. Plus, it will fit in the car I am driving! (It is my husband's SUV -- my car has been in one shop or the other for the past week: first to get a ding fixed that happened when someone at my son's college backed into my car when my son was using it because his car was in the shop and second to get the driver's seat back on track. It had become derailed when I backed it up over a baseball. Body shop and mechanic respectively.)
I drove around the block and pulled over near the chair. I picked it up, carried it over to level ground, and sat in it. I felt around under the seat to find the little lever that changes the seat height and raised it all the way up and swung my feet just as someone drove by. A quick flash of embarrassment made me feel self-conscious momentarily, until I realized that the benefit of getting a new office chair without spending money outweighed what anyone thought of me (or what I imagined they thought of me...who knows -- maybe they thought was, "What a clever, frugal woman, and not too proud to accept someone else's castoffs as her own treasure.") I wanted to make sure it worked before I brought it home, unlike the microwave, but that's a story for another time.
Just a week and a half ago, I got rid of my old office chair along with my regular weekly trash pick up. It was only $7 to haul it away. It was a great chair. It used to heat up and vibrate (cheap version of a massage chair), until the dog chewed through the electronics. Then it became just another office chair. Then it wore out.
I have been using a dining chair at my desk for several weeks, a couple of months, even. My back hurts ALL the time, no matter how many yoga stretches I do and I don't know -- is it because I am stressed out with my new (old) role at work (it's what I used to do before I got laid off and came back as a contractor) or literally the fact that it is a dining room chair and yeah, maybe good to sit in for an hour while you're having a meal, but all day...maybe not so good.
I am not sure how long that chair has been broken and sitting in the "front room," which has been kind of a catch-all for all things crap that Mom needs to deal with, and where I worked for several years, starting with the time that we had three houseguests staying in the family room where I worked at one of the built-in desks. But, now that I am Webexing multiple times a day, I need a room with a door. I moved my party up to my oldest son's room since he's at college. I am not 100% sure what I will do when he's home for winter break. I could work in the basement where there's another built-in desk, but the scenery in that area is not something I'd like to show on Webex: workbench, punching bag, unfinished room.
So now, once I get the side-of-the-road chair cleaned up, it will be as good as new -- without spending any money, because a) I am on a spending diet and b) who has any extra money during the holidays anyway?
No comments:
Post a Comment