Standing Desk Experiment – Day Two
I’ve been wanting to try a standing desk for a while now. There’s a good bit of research out there on the health risks of sitting. Our culture is growing increasingly sedentary, and I’m one of those people who works a desk job and then goes home to my other computer desk or to the couch. A blog post this week by Lifehacker’s Gina Trapani spurred me to improvise a standing desk using things I found around the office. The height difference between a sitting desk and a standing desk is really just the length from your knee to your hip, which in my case was about 14 inches.
I’m halfway through day two, and I can already tell a big difference. I’m finding myself constantly shifting my weight from one leg to the other. It may not burn many calories, but over the course of 40 hours a week and 2,000 a year, it adds up. I tilted my keyboard platform forward like I’m standing at a lectern, which I’ve found is much more comfortable for typing. As far as adjusting to working while standing, I’ve always been a pacer, so I really don’t mind ditching my chair.
Here are some pictures of my new setup:
The top of the monitor is right at eye level, and the keyboard and mouse are at a height where my elbows can just hang naturally.
I found the keyboard platform in a storage closet. The two towers are actually Sharper Image personal heater/air conditioners that we bought back when the office was having AC problems, but they haven’t been used in a while. Gaining some extra shelf space for books was a nice bonus.
The mouse platform is an old file bin that I turned on its end, and I used a binder clip to attach it to the platform for added stability. My phone fit perfectly underneath.
Here’s the view from the side. The monitor is sitting on a file container with a couple of reams of paper on top. The keyboard platform had a 1″ backstop on it already, which worked perfectly to give it a slight tilt forward.
Check out that Lifehacker post for images of other standing desk setups.
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