Gunnar MLG Legend Chrome glasses; photo © Gunnar Optiks, LLC.

The odds are that, if you don’t already have one, you could use a set of Gunnar Optiks glasses right now. If, like most geeks, you spend some significant portion of your day in front of a computer monitor — whether for work or for play — you’ve been straining your eyes. Ever get a headache from an intense session of programming, writing, or videogaming? Gunnar’s i-AMP lenses may be the answer.

I’ve been wearing eyeglasses every day of my life for more than twenty years, and an uncounted but surely huge amount of that time has been spent in front of a computer. My non-blogger career is as a software engineer, so there literally is no way I can do my job without my eyes on the screen. I am a hard-core skeptic, and I’d tried out so-called “computer” glasses before, so I figured the Gunnar Optiks glasses wouldn’t have much of an effect on me. I was very pleasantly surprised, then, when the set they sent me worked like a charm.

Since work is where I spend the most time staring at a screen, I took my pair of prescription Gunnar glasses with me there. The first and second days I didn’t really notice much of a difference, but mid-afternoon on the third day I suddenly realized that the usual tension in my temples wasn’t there! Even better than that, the background headache I usually get from overhead fluorescent lights hadn’t arrived.

Matt Blum, wearing his Gunnars; photo by Jen Blum.

I don’t want to sound like a commercial, but I really can’t find anything negative to say about these glasses. They’re no more expensive than comparable traditional eyeglasses are, they come in lots of stylish designs, and, most importantly, they deliver on their promise. And they keep innovating, too: Gunnar just announced yesterday at CES that they will be selling 3D glasses starting in Q2 of this year, with prescription ones coming in Q3. I might just get myself a pair of those, because there are so many 3D movies coming out these days, and it’s really annoying trying to put 3D glasses on when you’re already wearing the glasses you need to be able to see anything at all.

And now for the giveaway: Leave a comment on this post giving a ballpark figure of the average amount of time you spend in front of a monitor each day to be entered to win a set of Gunnar Optiks MLG Legend Chrome glasses (pictured at the top of this post). These are not prescription lenses, so are suitable for folks with normal vision or who wear contact lenses, and sell for $99. To be entered, you must leave a comment by 5:00pm EST this Sunday, January 10, 2010.

I’m wearing my Gunnars (Groove style) as I write this, because there’s just no reason not to when I’m in front of a monitor. If you spend a lot of time looking at a screen, the money spent on a set for yourself will be well worth it.