The wrong plank

I spent a month getting my token spend right to the penny. Couldn't tell you the last time I stood up before noon. I was pricing my attention and skipping the maintenance on the body that makes it. The most expensive hardware in the building, depreciating in a chair. Embarrassing math.

My tokens cost about a thousand times the model's. Every judgment call, every review that needs a human, every "this is wrong but I can't say why yet" comes out of this body. Sleep, blood flow, all the boring stuff that keeps a brain working. I priced what came out, I skipped what kept it running. Nobody treats a server this badly.

The chair used to have a case. When I stepped away, the work stepped away with me. So I stayed. Now the agents keep builds running, branches landing, and the review queue filling while I'm gone. I was going to wait anyway. I spend that time moving, and the sharp version of me clears the queue faster than the chair-shaped one ever did.

So I move. Most of my day happens at a walking desk. The rest fits into gaps the work already has: a chore, a set on the equipment, a walk when a hard problem needs the part of my brain that only talks while I'm moving. The fortieth rep doesn't arrive as fresh as the first. (My review essay brags that the fortieth agent pass does. The difference is that the rep is supposed to hurt.)

My setup is optional. Any office day has waits: a build, a review, a coworker who owes an answer, an agent still churning. There's room for a lap around the floor, squats by the desk, a brain-training app instead of the feed, a quick walk. Doom-scrolling through the wait doesn't make it rest. The wait passes either way. There's maintenance time sitting right there.

I keep writing about human attention being scarce and spending it where it pays. The bug only a human can catch still needs a rested human paying attention, and rest happens off the clock. Moving, sleeping, putting the phone in the other room. This is the maintenance that produces the attention I'm counting on. It's embarrassingly simple for something I've put such a high price on.

The agents need me sharp when a decision matters. The chair can wait.