You know what charm is: a way of getting the answer 'yes' without having asked any clear question.

Bigmouth strikes again. Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary, Brighton. May 2012.

Theme Thursday already?

Every now and again I think that it becomes clear that it is time for A NEW BEGINNING.

‘A NEW BEGINNING?’ you ask. ‘A NEW BEGINNING!’ I say.

For me, this A NEW BEGINNING is at the same time breathtakingly simple yet utterly revolutionary.

As of yesterday I have reconfigured my workstation to one in which standing has become the default option. That is, my computer set up has the monitor at standing eye level and the keyboard at around elbow height. I’ve got the desk configured in such a way that I have the opportunity to sit down if so desired. The fact that I am also working on a laptop makes it relatively easy to do computer work seated too.

My typical workday starts at 8 am, after a walk to the bus stop, a bus into the city and then a twenty-minute walk into the office. I normally try to leave by 4:15 pm, but occasionally that time is pushed out. A fair whack of that time sees me bolted to a computer or telephone, with intermittent meetings out and about (I’m usually able to walk to most of these). Most of the meetings that I attend (some interminably long) see me sitting down.

The point is: having a standing desk won't mean standing for 8 hours a day straight.

So why A NEW BEGINNING?

I have a number of reasons. When I am sitting at my desk, even with a fancy-pants ergonomic chair, I have a tendency to slump, with my back curved and shoulders forward, which closes my chest and makes my breathing more shallow. When standing my shoulders go back, which straightens the spine and opens up my chest. The hope is that it will help with my posture.

Secondly, we burn fewer calories when we’re sitting. In fact, extended sitting sessions change our body’s metabolism.

This, and a host of other studies seem to confirm an increasing evidence base to suggest that there’s a “physiology of inactivity”.

Thus, a more sedentary set up seems to drive the fact that sitting workers crash reasonably hard around mid-afternoon. For me, 2:30 pm sees me most days nearly drifting off to sleep. When I’m standing, I find that I am more alert and attentive all through the day (even if you’re more tired by day’s end).

The key message is not that ‘standing all day’ should be the norm or that ‘sitting is the enemy’. It is more about stressing that sitting all day is not good for you and that creating work environments where standing is the default option (rather than sitting).

I’m very early on in the journey, but am already finding it working.

It really does feel like A NEW BEGINNING.

Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it...

I still have the robot on the job. Here you can see the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery . And here is a poem: Soliloquy for One Dead Bruce Dawe Ah, no, Joe, you never knew the whole of it, the whistling which is only the wind in the chimney's smoking belly, the footsteps on the muddy path that are always somebody else's. I think of your limbs down there, softly becoming mineral, the life of grasses, and the old love of you thrusts the tears up into my eyes, with the family aware and looking everywhere else. Sometimes when summer is over the land, when the heat quickens the deaf timbers, and birds are thick in the plumbs again, my heart sickens, Joe, calling for the water of your voice and the gone agony of your nearness. I try hard to forget, saying: If God wills, it must be so, because of His goodness, because- but the grasshopper memory leaps in the long thicket, knowing no ease. Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it... I like Bruce Dawe. He just my be my favourite Austral...

There was nothing left. No reason, no conscience, no understanding; even the most rudimentary sense of life or death, good or evil, right or wrong.

Here is a self portrait. I’m calling it Portrait of a lady in a dirty window . Shocking, isn’t it? However, it is apt! Samhain , Nos Galan Gaeaf , Hop-tu-Naa , All Saints , All Hallows , Hallowmas , Hallowe'en or HALLOWEEN . It’s Theme Thursday and we’re talking about the festivals traditionally held at the end of the harvest season. Huh? No wonder Australians have trouble with the concept of HALLOWEEN. For the record, in my thirty-two L O N G years on the planet, I can’t say I’ve ever seen ghosts ‘n goblins, trick ‘n treaters or Michael Myers stalking Tasmania’s streets at the end of October. [That said, I did once see a woman as pale as a ghost turning tricks that looked like Michael Myers in late November one time.] Despite the best efforts of Hollywood, sitcoms, and innumerable companies; it seems Australians are impervious to the [ahem] charms of a corporatized variant of a celebration of the end of the "lighter half" of the year and beginning of the "darke...

In dreams begin responsibilities.

A life at sea, that's for me, only I just don't have the BREAD. That's right, Theme Thursday yet again and I post a photo of a yacht dicking about in Bass Strait just off Wynyard. The problem is, I am yet again stuck at work, slogging away, because I knead need the dough . My understanding is that it is the dough that makes the BREAD. And it is the BREAD that buys the yacht. On my salary though, I will be lucky to have enough dough or BREAD for a half dozen dinner rolls. Happy Theme Thursday people, sorry for the rush.

This will hurt me...

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