The Must-Do Stretch For All Computer Users [Try it now!]

Downward Facing Dog - with the advanced tongue option.

Sit at a computer long enough (and you know you do), eventually your shoulders start to tighten up to your ears, your spine rounds out as you slump, your quads and hamstrings tighten up from being in the sitting position so long and - worst of all for me - you get that weird pinchy sensation between your shoulder blades. It probably doesn't help that I sit on a 20$ desk "chair" from IKEA.

So every half hour or so, lest I permanently become hunchbacked, I do my favorite stretch: Down Dog! This yoga pose (often the only yoga pose non-yoga people know because it lends itself so well to double entendres) really stretches everything from your shoulders to your chest to your calves and hamstrings. Plus it totally fixes that pinchy shoulder issue. It's just so soothing! I love it. I love it so much I have done it in a church parking lot. And a grocery store aisle (leaning on my cart). And in the hospital. I even taught a class of preschoolers how to do it (when I may or may not have been supposed to be showing them a flannel board story that I totally didn't prepare). I'm working up to someplace really socially unacceptable: fine French restaurant? Parent-teacher conference? Mid-town bus? I'll let you know.

How about the dog park?

My other favorite stretch - that I apparently adore so much I get all gussied up to do it* - is what we used to call the Chinese splits. Back in my un-P.C. days. These days they're the People's Republic of China With Bonus Oppressed Peoples of Tibet and Huiger splits.


*This pic was actually part of a Girls of Fitness Blogging calendar soon to be released. Although sadly this pic didn't make the cut so I had to post it here - didn't want to waste all that red lipstick!

What is your favorite stretch? Have you ever busted it out someplace public (besides the gym)? Anybody really get off your chair and do Down Dog??