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Friday, January 25, 2013

Where are you reading this? Your hotel bedroom or home kitchen chair - is it supporting you?


High chairs - I'm playing musical chairs seeking back-supporting, comfortable chairs.

I am looking for not just a high back chair but a vertical back for sitting at a laptop at a dining table. As Alexander technique books show, if you sit with your back reclining even slightly this puts pressure on the neck. Your neck is at a V when your back is leaning back but the head is leaning forwards. This happens when you look at something, whether eating, reading or at a computer or Skyping to family. 
If you know anybody who sells an upright chair, one which is really upright like the solid wood carver chair in stately homes and restaurants, in grand old-fashioned hotels, I'd like to know.  I already have lots of dining chairs which recline slightly. 
I have stayed in numerous properties. Where was the best chair?
In 1980 for my wedding anniversary we went on a tour to Scotland and stayed mostly at cheap bed and breakfast hotels whilst splurging or gourmet dinners. We visited Inverlochy Castle hotel and restaurant. My visualising brain tells me that this was where I first saw ideal upright dining chair. 
However, my date-checking brain tells me that the perfect chair was probably found in 1984. That year I had a car accident causing multiple injuries including a broken collar bone and broken ribs and a broken or cracked shoulder blade. It's more likely that in another restaurant that year I saw a solid wood chair at a grand hotel and asked for a different, upholstered chair. While waiting for it to be fetched, I reluctantly sat down on the wooden chair which had an upright back. To my amazement the high back upright chair, although it was solid wood, was more comfortable than the upholstered chair with the slight recline A reclining chair gave no support when you tried to sit upright or incline your head forwards to read a menu.
On social occasions, such as at book groups, there's often one person who asks for 'an upright chair'. I add my request. But the upright chair often does not have an upright back. It's fine for staring at the ceiling. Not for looking at a book cover.
When visiting friends or sitting in hotel rooms when travelling for business or pleasure I'm often sitting at a worktop checking my emails. I sit in the chairs provided. 
At home I've inherited various chairs which I am loathe to change. But I have chances to change chairs or replace them as three members of my family work in different areas of the same city or on different continents. I own, home swap for holidays, rent from others or rent out property belonging to myself or others. 
I am also a keen ebay buyer and any of you who use ebay will know that once you have done a search for something such as high back chairs if you save your search every few hours for the rest of your life you are sent possible matches. If you don't save a search but buy something, you are sent possible matches. So I am inundated with anything high anything with a back, and every kind of chair.
You might think that a high back dining chair or straight back chair which is easier to produce would be the norm. But no. It's a speciality item and assuming you are in pain and will pay any amount to relieve your pain the manufacturers want you to spend thousands of pounds on one chair. As for people furnishing care homes, they too are assumed to be spendthrifts, not misers. Despite the fact that in my experience most accountants count the pennies - and don't let the pounds look after themselves.
Do you know of a straight back chair. Please tell me. Thanks for feedback or just reading this. I want to spread the word to consumers and retailers and wholesalers and manufacturers. Maybe this could be my campaign. I would initially buy one, chairs to try it out. If suitable, I would then buy two, four, or more for my next property refurbishment. I could even go into business and get on television. Must take a break - to relieve the stress on my wrists and back. 

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