Teppy, from my yoga teacher friend:

Here is my advice.

First, practice the stretches in the picures, but instead of trying to clasp your hands, hold onto a yoga strap and separate your hands about 6 inches or so. This will give you a bit more room to stretch as you build flexibility in your shoulders.

Also, the two standard stretches that runners, yogis, etc, use are helpful.

this one

And this one

When you are doing the stretches, practice deep even breathing in and out through your nose. Each inhale and exhale should last at least four counts. When you hold the stretches, do so for about 10 full breaths.

In a couple of weeks, you should find increased flexibility in your shoulders.

If you have a couple of seconds during your work day, try stretching then to avoid letting tons of tension build up around the top of the spine and in your shoulders. If you can't get away from your desk...do a few shoulder rolls forward and back and that should help a bit.

Steph, here's stretch that can help open that up. Check the stretches on this page--you don't want to focus on just one set of muscles.

ita, that's exactly what I was looking for. Thanks! I've marked your post for future stretching.

I try to do it when I have people over so we can all hang in the kitchen and take turns.

Teppy, from my yoga teacher friend:

Oh, lisah, thanks! I didn't expect a yogi-produced response so quickly! I'll try using a yoga strap when I do that stretch, and try holding the stretch longer.

I have the world's most jacked-up-but-still-flexible-and-working shoulders. One of the krav instructor perqs is tailoring your warmup so it includes your PT exercises. Not sure if the sudden increase in shoulder shrugs and rolls was noted by the students.

Googling jar jar amphibian produces 267,000 matches. jar jar reptile produces 347,000.

Google and the internets have spoken!

Although it'd be fun to start an internet campaign of "Jar Jar is an amphibian, dammit!" to try raise the amphibian numbers above the reptile numbers. Fun, that is, if I had nothing whatever to do with my time....

I didn't expect a yogi-produced response so quickly!

Well, we are Constant Communicators and she's got all the info in her head! She's really a great teacher.

I'll try using a yoga strap when I do that stretch, and try holding the stretch longer.

I think it was using the yoga strap for a while that really helped me out. My problem was that I could get my arms over but hands would fly apart. But now I can hold the stretch pretty well and my hands are getting nearer and nearer to the ground.

I was mostly amused by the Dragon*Con costumes. A lot of them did seem to be excuses to wear as little as possible without getting arrested ... with mixed results (the guys wearing "300" imitations really shouldn't have - really). There was a costume at the end of that series of photos that was all blue-green and peacock feathers that I thought was very attractive.

Teppy, that one exercise you linked to (facing into a corner) is one my PT recommended for when I'd been hunched over a keyboard for too long. It's really good for those days when my back is hurting right between the shoulder blades.

Note to self: go back to these stretchy posts when not consumed by stupid work.