The Pursuit of Laziness

Posted byRandall 376 Comments on The Pursuit of Laziness

Since I was a kid, I’ve been looking for the perfect way to read in bed. The ideal position would involve no sustained muscle effort, so I could just let my eyes drift shut as I read, without the book falling shut or my hand slipping or anything.  One way is to sit up against something and hold the book on your lap, but that’s not great for falling asleep.  So I usually end up reading on my side.

The problem is, you have to hold the book to see both pages, and in either case, you’re using some muscles to hold it where it is.

This has worked for most of my life, but it’s still not that ultimate relaxation.

However, I recently got a Kindle.  I was intending to use it mainly as a mobile web browser, but I’ve surprised myself by using it to read an awful lot.  And, with apologies to all the bibliophiles out there, I find the ergonomics better than a paperback.  When snacking and reading, I can lay it flat on a table without the use of a book weight to hold it opened, and when lying in bed, I don’t have to keep moving it to read.

But it’s not perfect.  There’s no way to hold it with a finger on the ‘next page’ buttons that doesn’t require a few muscles to hold it upright:

Either I work to hold my hand off the bed, or I awkwardly curl my fingers around it.  Either way, it tips over if I relax my arm, even if it’s leaning against a pillow, and I’m startled awake by this:

I started to wonder if I could do even better.  I got out of bed one night, went to the closet, and got a steel coat hanger and some pliers.  After a few minutes of twisting, I created this:

First of all, it holds the Kindle upright …

And second, it lets me lie there motionless, and turn the pages with just a tiny twitch of my thumb:

Finally, after decades of reading in bed, I have reached that stage of perfect relaxation.

376 replies on “The Pursuit of Laziness”

  5. I’m still bibliophiling old-school… but I must admit that this combination of a Kindle plus holder looks pretty tempting.

    However, I think a wired version could be made for them good ol’ books. I’ll try doing it after getting some sleep.

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  7. Hrm. I just arrange my blankets to hold it at the right angle. May try a coathanger approach next time. Previous page navigation seems to require moving the kindle though?

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  9. Hrmm, one of the things I really like about reading in bed is the ability to just fall asleep and forget the book till the morning. Books are soft so it doesn’t matter if you roll onto it in your sleep or if it falls off the bed, but generally they just drift to the bottom of the bed somehow ;).

    With this solution, if you drop off while you’re reading, the risk of injury is greatly increased, I can just imagine rolling onto the point of that, with the blue-tack offering little or no protection 😛

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  13. I’ve been an e-reader for the last decade or so (since higher-res, paper-white screens came out on Sony Clies) and I also find dead-tree books just sooo inconvenient now!

    You can only carry two or three, and that’s in a backpack, not a pocket. You need a light on, and a fairly bright one, in the right position at that! A PDA has a backlit screen (one black mark for the Kindle)
    The only paper book with a built-in dictionary is a dictionary, and it’s not much of a read, generally… The PDA looks up a word in a choice of dictionaries with just a touch of the screen. Plus I can check facts in wikipedia or a Bible concordance or the complete works of Shakespeare, etc., all on the device. If I have wi-fi handy, all of the Googleverse is available without getting out of bed/comfy chair.

    And it’s small enough to hold at any angle without fatigue and the ‘next page’ button is right under my thumb in the most comfortable positions.

    For pure text, there’s no reason why an ebook should be the same size as a paper book. The same compromise of number of words before a relatively inconvenient page turn vs physical convenience just doesn’t apply.

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  14. Talk about same box.

    My thought was to modify one of those articulated dentist lamp arms, to hold a book suspended over me as I lay back. Never managed to get hold of one tho.

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  17. I have always found reading in bed annoying, but better than sitting up.I lie on my side and hold the book in the lower hand with the fingers wrapped up over the top edge (as in, the side of the book that is up). If reading the higher page I can rest my wrist on the bed, but need to hold it up to read the lower page. If my hand gets sore I can roll over. I frequently fall asleep reading (by accident) so it must be reasonably comfortable as far as these things go…

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  18. where the heck do you buy your hangers…the Military Industrial Mega store? That has to be the thickest gauge hanger I’ve ever seen.

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  19. There just isn’t any limit on your awesomess is there?
    And no, there isn’t any sarcasm in the previous line. I’ve suffered the same problem for years, only to find that I only need a kindle, a coat hanger and your brilliance to fix it 🙂

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  20. Hmm, about halfway through that post, I was thinking either voice commands or remote control (wired or wireless switch held in one hand with forward/back page buttons). A coat hanger is definitely lower-tech.

    Personally, I’m one of those seemingly rare people who is comfortable sprawled out flat on my belly, for either sleeping or reading. For reading, I prop my chin up on a pillow, and my arms naturally end up in the perfect position to hold down opposite sides of a paperback in front of my face.
    This doesn’t work if you’re holed up in bed because of sinus issues, though, as breathing through your mouth is pretty impossible if your head’s weight is all on your chin and you’re doing this in an effort to be lazy.

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  21. Was mulling over the same problem yesterday, albeit with an iPod Touch focus. If only there was a computer that could read my mind then there would be no need for physical movement at all…

    Awesome idea, thanks.:)

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  24. This is actually the first thing I thought of when I saw what the kindle looked like. “There’s got to be some way to finally read while falling asleep with this thing!”

    However: I get the feeling that you’d run the risk of never actually finding your place again when you woke up, having read several pages moving across the boundary of your continuing memory as you fall asleep. This could mean that the first couple pages you read after that will always feel like you should skip ahead… only to find that you missed something.

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  26. You know, I have been thinking about exactly this same problem, and now that I read this, I can’t stop trying to design a stand to print out on the reprap (:

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  27. Cool 🙂 I use a 3.5″ screen on a PDA for my reading purposes.. and the smaller size makes it easy to use sleeping.

    I wish i could put all these silly little ideas I have on my blog.

    @the guy who suggested voice activated page turning: That wont work.. you want to drift away into sleep, and shouting at the device will bring you back to wake-up land. Also you need to deal with the frustration of wrongly identified voice commands.

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  28. You just sold me on the Kindle good sir. I have the exact same problem when I read books in bed.

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  30. Is the The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy?

    I hope you Remember that Towel Day is Next Month!!

    25 of May If my Memory is correct (I highly Doubt this)

    42.

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  31. As Luke said earlier, my favorite position with the dead tree variation of the e-book, is lying on the side with the left side of the book flat on the bed (or right side if I’m reading Hebrew atm), holding the book open with a thumb or something, and reading that page (as is shown on the very first picture).

    The problem is that to keep this position, I need to turn around after every page, or hold the book in the most uncomfortable-wrist-bending second position (as shown in pic. 2).

    So, I thought of an idea, if ever I had a book I wanted to publish:
    First step, write two books.
    Second step, print one of the books only on even numbered pages.
    Third step, print the second book only on the odd numbered pages – but upside down (crucial!).
    Fourth step, relax in bed reading only in the comfortable position.

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  33. It takes a twisted mind.

    Once I finally get my iPhone and the Kindle app, I’m gonna have to find an appropriate solution for it.

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  34. Anil – I wasn’t thinking anything fancy, just if the reader heard a sleepy grunt of the tone of “I wish someone would get up and turn the page for me,” it would move one page forward. In my ideal reading environment, it’s nearly silent, and I assume there could be some thumb-pressable button combination that one could hit very easily while keeping a hold on the device while rolling over/shifting/anything else that it might mistake for voice. Whatever combination it is would tell the Kindle not to listen to whatever sounds may come in until you release the buttons.

    This is, however, a situation of dynamo-heated-bike-handlebars versus gloves, and I will admit that the gloves win.

    Also, well-spotted Jacob. [smallcaps]I FEEL THAT MORE OF US SHOULD HAVE NOTICED.[/smallcaps]

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  35. Oh, and if there is ANYTHING worth reading in bed, time and time again, is def. the Discworld series. Thief of Time, if I’m not mistaken?

    “THERE IS NO JUSTICE, JUST ME.”

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  36. The most compelling argument for the Kindle yet! If I had an extra $300, I would say that you’d sold me on it, but unfortunately that can’t be literal right now… you’ve sold me on the idea of it, anyway.

    I usually put a couple pillows under my head to get my eyes at a good reading angle, then just hold the book open on my chest. The problem is, of course, that I am abruptly shocked awake when the book slips from my hands, falls forward, and hits my face. (This actually was a real problem when I was reading a big hardback leatherbound Complete Jane Austen, which fell and jabbed me in the face with a pointy corner. Hardcover books in bed can be dangerous!)

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  38. maybe you should concentrate more on writing your shitty webcomic instead of designing a holder for your god damned kindle.

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  39. Being someone who enjoys sleeping on their stomach, my ideal solution would be to have a massage bed with a hole that you can poke your face through, with the book on the floor and your arms dangling over the side. I haven’t actually tried this out though – the effort:laziness ratio is too high (short term effort outweighs long term laziness).

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  41. An ingenious piece of engineering sir. *tips brain warmer.

    However, one does ponder the restriction of access to other buttons/functions. What you should have done is make sure your partner was properly trained. Through as simple series of coughs, grunts and mono-syllabic commands all of your Kindling needs could be taken care of. Unless of course your body is between your partner and the Kindle. In that case you’re screwed.

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  42. I _love_ the Sony Reader for this too. My bed is against the wall, and the reader is attached to a leather cover which opens up like a book. I can lean the reader against the wall and the leather cover keeps it from slipping against the bedcovers. The page turn switches are both easily usable in this position.

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  43. I love the picture with the paperback – that’s exactly what I’ve always done and it leads to me rolling over in bed way too many time.

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  45. Mostly my attention span is too broken by the Internet for me to read books in bed anymore. But when I do, the main lying-on-side problem is the arm of my glasses pressing into my face and causing the nose bridge to pinch. Can’t go to sleep with contact lenses in. It’s a cross we very nearsighted must bear. Come up with a solution to *that* and you’ll be 100% my hero.

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  49. I can’t believe the amount of effort you’re willing to do in the persue of laziness.

    Now, without the “next page button” thingie in the way, that could most certainly be used to hold many-a-paperback book open, I’m sure.

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  50. Awesome. If you ever need do this kind of thing in a really small scale orthodontic wire is a great choice.

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