Enlarge Image Thanko

How is your posture right now? You're probably sitting at a desktop or a laptop or leaning over a table with your smartphone cupped in your palm. Your spine might be hunched over, your head at an odd angle. If only you had a third arm to rest your chin on while you use the other two. If only. Oh wait, here you go: Japanese retailer Thanko has you covered with a chin-rest arm.

The Google-translated name of the product is Agonose Arm. It's an arm with a tilting flat hand on one end. The bottom side clamps to your desk. The adjustable wrist lets you change the angle of the hand, moving it around to support your cheek or your chin without tying up the use of your real arms. The arm extends to vary the height.

The translation of the product description is a muddled gem: "The hunched body, keep the spine and pin by supporting the jaw comfortably correction item." Makes sense.

The hand and arm parts are made with some sort of slightly squishy material to provide a level of comfort. The gadget can also double as an awkward pillow for taking naps at your desk.

The product page details all sorts of ways to use it, including positioning the hand against your chest to keep you from leaning forward or attaching it to your chair arm for leaning back and snagging a rest. It's only a matter of time before someone brings this onto an airplane.

Perhaps the biggest downside to the chin-rest arm is that it looks like a robot is constantly slapping you if you have it positioned next to your cheek. Then again, you might see this as a bonus feature.

Thanko is a store known for oddball gadgets like USB-powered heated slippers and fuzzy cat-ear headphones. If you want to become known as "that person with the weird third arm," then you're out of luck at the moment. The arm, which runs 4,980 yen (about $40, £27, AU$55) is currently sold out. If you want to order it when it comes back into stock, you'll need to use a shipping service for delivery to the US, UK or Australia. Which might totally be worth the effort.

Thanko

(Via RocketNews24)