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Sumo Omni Chair – Test Drive!

The Omni is, essentially, a giant bean-bag. Meausuring up at around five-foot-long and a couple of feet wide it’s got almost bed-sized proportions. Unlike regular bean-bags, the Omni is covered with a rather tough semi-shiny fabric; so no polystyrene explosions!

Of course, all this is moot if it’s not comfortable and with office-space at a premium we had to decide if the chair was worth it’s square-footage. An easy task, you might think, except for two things. Firstly, I had to wait my turn, as everyone else wanted a go, and secondly (the reason everyone wanted a go) there must be a hundred different ways to sit on it!

My waiting time was filled with the entertainment of discovery as I watched the fully-clothed and solo-version of the Karma Sutra. Positions such as the ‘armchair’, ‘the poof’ and ‘the bed’ were demonstrated as well as the ‘overshoot the target and get stuck upside down’, which I wouldn’t recommend. Then we had ‘the camel’ and ‘the flop’.

After having suffered the most rigorous testing at the hands (or otherwise) of several over-enthusiastic members of The Mag team and a visitor, it was finally my turn. Yes, it was comfortable in all the positions that had been demonstrated, although careful planning was required to ensure standing back up didn’t look too embarassing!

The overhead of the Omni is that it does take up a bit of space, but if you pick the right colour and scrunch it into a corner you can get around that problem. The other consideration is that you shouldn’t let your gran sit in it as she”d never get upright again (we worked this out without a demonstration) and if you have a small pet, it will probably take some time to get used to the noise.

As for the future of this chair; it’s going to live next to the CD player for more traditional record-review purposes!

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