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There was a day, thousands of years ago, long since lost to antiquity, that I think I went a full day without using a keyboard, mouse, or game controller. It might've been a Thursday. If such a day existed, it wasn't enough to stave off the onset of wrist pain that will no doubt evolve into full-blown carpal tunnel one day. Fortunately, this gooseneck mount helps me delay the inevitable.
I first took a look at the Saiji gooseneck mount at a time when I was suffering from a repetitive stress injury (RSI). It's not quite carpal tunnel, but after several months of working long weeks during my freelancer era, the muscles and tendons in my wrists were reaching a critical breaking point. Put simply, they were sick of my “paying for food” nonsense. This mount has been a godsend.
For too many weeks, my wrists were not only sore all day but were particularly susceptible to subtle jobs most of us usually don't notice. Holding a Switch a couple of inches off my lap felt like straining to carry 50 pounds of food in two dozen grocery bags at once. A keyboard without a wrist rest may as well have a wrist rest made entirely of 2-inch metal spikes.
Some things, I couldn't give up. Like, you know, working. While I cut back on my gaming quite a bit, I wanted to play occasionally to stave off the mental health spiral that comes from working 24/7. Since I could detach the Joy-Con controllers from my Nintendo Switch, I could technically play with my arms at my side while lying on the couch or the bed, perhaps even while wrapped in heating pads or propped up by pillows.
The only problem was the Switch itself. Whether on the couch or in bed, I found it difficult to position my arms to lie flat without putting extra strain on my neck or back. And I wasn't about to start trading one body part for another. Enter the gooseneck mount. I stumbled onto this little guy and decided to give it a shot holding my Switch while I lay down.
Photograph: Amazon
Saiji Gooseneck Phone Holder$18 $14 at Amazon$27 at Walmart
I have to admit, at first, I felt like a baby. I mean, here I am lying in bed with Breath of the Wild hanging over my head like it's a nursery mobile. But it worked. I could position my arms however I needed to reduce the stress I put on them without twisting the rest of my body into knots.
Over time, I realized the mount wasn't just useful for my hyper-specific wrist-pain use case. If I wanted to watch something while in bed, I could prop up my laptop, maybe set it on its side so I'm not straining my neck. Or I could just watch on my phone and use the gooseneck mount to put my phone in the best position for me. For the first time, I was adapting my phone screen to my posture, rather than adapting to it.
Eventually, I discovered the most endearing use case: cuddling. One of the loveliest feelings in the world is cuddling up with a partner while you watch your favorite show together. While couches are a pretty comfy way to do this, beds often aren't. Spooning while you both try to watch a propped-up laptop or tablet in bed usually leaves one person feeling uncomfortable.
So, my partners and I often use the gooseneck mount. Instead of struggling to adapt our posture to the screen, we get comfy however we'd like—little spoon, big spoon—and then move the phone into our view. The clamp at the base of the mount easily grips onto our headboard, so it can hang over or beside us wherever we end up.
It's not perfect. If you plan to do any activities that might involve your head spending a lot of time in the space around your headboard, you might want to take the mount off before you bump into it. But as we get older and the ravages of time develop yet more cruel ways to torment our cartilage and tendons, I'm pretty happy having one mount that doesn't demand sacrificing my posture just to watch the latest episode of Our Flag Means Death.
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