> And what if it was 100F, or 32F, or raining, or I didn't want to go for a walk, or I needed to get some large items like sugar or rice or a gallon of milk or a lot of beer for a party?
As a New Yorker, you just described daily life here? It’s really not a big deal — things are so close you can take multiple trips if you need to. Get some canvas bags. Plus since everything is so close you end up just doing smaller trips every day or so. If the shop is longer than 10-15 minutes and I’ve got more than, say, 40 pounds of groceries I might get a car back home, but that’s a rare trip. And honestly I’ll probably just walk it back anyway.
Maybe we just have a higher tolerance for pain here — I’ve certainly had people visit who think of themselves as fit and they get gassed out by regular New York walking life.
> I’ve certainly had people visit who think of themselves as fit and they get gassed out by regular New York walking life
It's interesting how things become normal once you do it every day. I used to live in a fifth floor apartment without lift. Quite a few stairs to climb. Three things come to my mind.
a) You very quickly learn not to forget anything when leaving the house.
b) There is some perverse sense of satisfaction in having guests over and walking up the stairs together; and purposefully keeping a calm breath whilst the guests are wheezing and complaining.
c) Some tradesman was working on one of the floors. I will never forget the sight of him carrying something heavy up those stairs whilst practically breathing through the cigarette in the corner of his mouth.
For very legitimate reasons life like this is not for everybody. But I would say for able-bodied healthy people it would be good to have a bit of regular forced exercise like that.
> I will never forget the sight of him carrying something heavy up those stairs...
Oh man, absolutely. I still have a vivid memory of moving out of a 5 floor walk-up with a narrow stairwell and as I was walking back into the building out comes the guy bear hugging my Fender Rhodes electric piano. It's gotta be around 150 pounds and very bulky. He was walking like it was nothing.
As a New Yorker, you just described daily life here? It’s really not a big deal — things are so close you can take multiple trips if you need to. Get some canvas bags. Plus since everything is so close you end up just doing smaller trips every day or so. If the shop is longer than 10-15 minutes and I’ve got more than, say, 40 pounds of groceries I might get a car back home, but that’s a rare trip. And honestly I’ll probably just walk it back anyway.
Maybe we just have a higher tolerance for pain here — I’ve certainly had people visit who think of themselves as fit and they get gassed out by regular New York walking life.