How I Chill

Most of my time is spent sitting or laying around in my apartment. Because it's not very large and the furniture provide obstacles, I have difficulties using my crutches here. So this is how I usually get around:

My desk chair and its five wonderful wheels. I turn the chair around, look over my shoulder, and propel myself backwards. Using the amazing desk chair I can sit and cook in the kitchen, get to the front door, open windows, and reach the television and my laptop without having to get up. The cable guard on the floor cuts off my bedroom and bathroom from the realm of the chair, so I still have to crutch to get to those. A perk of this furniture layout is that it's easy to transfer to the couch or prop my feet up while still in the chair.

Another useful trick is when I'm sitting around and realize that something that I want is a few feet out of reach. I have provided a scenario in the following photos, using my ice pack as the thing I want (which I really did want). Those chips and salsa are for snacking after I finish this blog.

First, I locate the desired object- my ice pack.

I use the armpit part of the crutch to scoot the object to the edge of the table and push it to the floor. Objects to avoid are the bowl of salsa, chips, and my stack of GRE study cards (the white things).

Once the ice pack is on the floor I can just scoot it to me, where my gimp foot is waiting for refreshing coolness.

And that is how to be as extremely lazy as possible.

The homemade crutch bag

Making the crutch bags

Things needed:

Fabric scissors

Needle/thread or sewing machine (I don’t own a sewing machine, sadly)

Fabric, preferably a thicker one like flannel or fleece ($4)

Sew-on velcro strips, 3 ft x ¾ in ($2)

Measuring tape or ruler

I also had a cheese quesadilla while I made this but that’s not mandatory.

To make:

I got a pretty dark purple fleece that matches a lot of my wardrobe, and black Velcro for the straps. The gap between my crutches’ two poles is 4 inches, and the space from the handle to where the poles join is about eleven inches, but my bag will only go to about nine inches. So I’ll cut a 5 x 20 piece of fabric (lengthwise so that the bottom of the bag doesn’t have stitching holding it together). For a smaller front pocket I cut a five by six square.

I flipped the fabric so it is inside out, sewed it up, sewed the bottom of the small pocket, and then muscle-sewed the Velcro on- four pieces paired off for the straps, and a small square inside the top pocket so that one closes. Later I added a velcro strap around the bag near the bottom to keep it from flapping around while I'm in movement.

And then I still had a ton of fabric so I made the armpit- bits up there by measuring the length and how far over it I wanted the fabric to go, sewing it up and putting it on. And then I made a second of those too. But I haven't technically finished it so there's no photo.