Low Horse

I've talked a bit about how I switched my office job's old desk with a standing desk. I had hoped that this stool would allow me to rest my feet on the lower rung when I wasn't sitting on it but there wasn't enough room for my knees to fit underneath the seat. I remembered seeing a project via Make a while back for some low saw horses and I decided to just make one as a foot rail. This was my first attempt at doing joinery with hand tools only. I learned a lot and the project turned out just fine. Here's the tutorial from Make if you're interested: http://makeprojects.com/Project/Low-Horses/813/1

As with any project, careful measuring in the beginning will save you heartache in end. I had just sharpened my chisels so this was a great project to try them out on.

Here are the feet before I carved them. I just used some simple pine 2x4s I had lying around.

Here is the glue-up of the foot and the rail.

 One of my joints fit perfectly. The other? Not so much but it still held together after the glue-up.

 

If this was something that I was going to use in my shop, I would have taken the time to really smooth those rounded edges but since this is something that I'm using in my cubicle to put my feet on, I took some liberties.

Here's my set-up. My keyboard and mouse are on a (very fancy) pull-out tray and now I can rest my feet on my standing rail all I want.

Stool For Standing Desk

A few weeks ago, I switched over to a standing desk at work. I've been actively working on correcting my posture for years now and feel that this is a step in the right direction. Plus, my butt cheeks have left permanent indentations in my office chair and that's just wrong. I've changed my schedule at work so that I'm down to only four days a week so the timing seemed right.

     But just as sitting for nine hours a day can't be good for me, neither can standing, so I picked this up at a thrift store over the weekend. When I'm not sitting in it, it's under my desk so I can use the ring around the bottom as a foot rest. 

     The new set-up really blew my co-workers minds. One woman seemed almost upset at the idea. It's weird when people react so strongly to something that does not affect them at all. I've joked about putting up a sign that says, "Ask me about my standing desk" because nearly everyone wants to talk about it when they first see it. So, be prepared for that if you want to make the change.

     My feet have been fine. The only thing that's caused me some discomfort is the back of my calves where they hit the backs of my knees. Who knew that little muscle did so much for standing?