Dave Child; I Made A Thing

Wooden Blocks

Tue, 28 Dec 2021 00:00:00 +0000

When we were much, much younger, my brother and I were lucky enough that our parents inherited a playset of large wooden blocks. These were about 50mm tall and 60mm wide, and of various lengths. If a single block was 50mm × 60mm × 60mm, and that was one "unit", the blocks were 1×1, 1×2, 1×4, and 2×2.

He and I are both now parents ourselves and our kids are of the age where they love toys like that, so I set about making a set for his kids as a Christmas present. I'll be making a set for my own kids once we have the space for them.

They took a couple of months of weekends, provided the excuse to pick up a few new tools, created an unholy amount of dust and woodchips, and were a lot of fun to make. His kids seem to like them as well.

The blocks themselves were pretty simple, just involved a metric ton of sanding. They're 50mm tall, 67mm wide, and 67mm or multiples thereof in length. I made 1×1, 1×2, 1×4 blocks, just like the original set. I didn't bother with the 2×2 blocks, we didn't get much use out of those as kids. I also added a few 1×3 blocks, and eight half-height (25mm tall) 1×6 blocks, which should be good for spanning gaps.

The box was more complicated. It needed to be large enough to accommodate the blocks, and they're heavy - they weigh just over 32kg by themselves. There needed to be enough clearance to extricate the blocks. The original set was also almost impossible for a child to move, and I wanted this to be more mobile. In the end I went for a relatively simple lidless box on castors.

The sides were joined with finger joints cut on the table saw. That was pretty painful; two of the joints went together easily, but on the other two I'd somehow made a few cuts slightly too wide (I think the finger joint jig I made for this project is a bit too loose and wobbly) on one side, so the fingers aligned at one end but overlapped at the other. It took some manual chisel work to get it to fit, and then some very thin strips inserted into the gaps to make it look better.

The base was a huge chunk, almost too large for the table saw, but it worked out eventually. I opted to glue it and put through screws from below, into the sides, as I thought that would be the most secure way to keep the whole thing together.

For a finish, I applied three coats of Danish oil. It might need another, the wood was soaking it up. Finally, I added some medium castors, wrapped it in Christmassy wrapping paper, and sent it onwards to its new home.

---section:sidebar---

Details


Materials	Utile
Joinery	Finger joints, biscuits on edge joints, base attached with screws and glue
Finish	Danish Oil (Colron, Natural)
Time	30 Hours
To Do	Locking Castor

---section:gallery---

Hanging Christmas Tree - Version 2

Sun, 21 Nov 2021 00:00:00 +0000

So, we've established already that Christmas trees are out to get us and must be stopped, so my quest for the perfect alternative continues. Here's version one, just in case you need a reminder:

{{ renderImage('/images/christmas-tree.jpg', '/images/christmas-tree.jpg', 821, 1095, 'Hanging Christmas Tree', 'The original, version 1 of the hanging tree.') }}

And here is version 2, the upgrade:

{{ renderImage('/images/christmas-tree-2.jpg', '/images/christmas-tree-2.jpg', 821, 1095, 'Hanging Christmas Tree 2', 'The next generation, Christmas Tree 2, Electric Boogaloo.') }}

This tree features a few upgrade and improvements over the original ...

Diagonal, continuous chains: The original has chains in sections, each hanging vertically. This meant that any imperfections in the alignment of holes or screws were multiplied down the tree, making it very hard to get any shelf, especially the bottom one, level in any direction. It also meant all the weight of the lower shelves was on the top shelf, which wasn't ideal. This new tree doesn't break the chains for each shelf, instead the chains are continuous from top to bottom. So, each shelf is supported directly by the chain, rather than the shelf above. This also looks a little more Christmas-tree-esque. The downside is that you lose a small area of shelf on each side as it's hard to fit a standing decoration under the chains, but I think it's a worthwhile trade-off.

Bamboo chain capture: The original tree uses screws to capture chain links from the side, making it very slow to remove any one shelf, or dismantle the whole thing. I also wasn't a huge fan of how the brass screws looked. This tree uses lengths of bamboo going all the way through the tree. This also helps with stability, as well as making it much quicker and easier to set up and tear down.

Mitred edges: The original tree has rounded edges, and this one goes for a more refined angled look, which I much prefer.

---section:sidebar---

Details


Materials	Oak
Joinery	Chains, captured with bamboo
Finish	Danish Oil (Colron, Natural)
Time	6 Hours
To Do	Underlighting, system to allow adjustment of shelves so they can all lie flat on the wall, door-hanging version?, experiment with alternative chain
Prequel	Hanging Christmas Tree

---section:gallery---

---section:private---

Private info

Materials and costs ...

Chains: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B01LX5PQIJ/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1 £4.25, need 2 (each is split into two to make four chains) This might be better: https://amazon.co.uk/Strong-Galvanized-Galvanised-Welded-Length/dp/B094TBHMCW

Wood: Oak: ~£200 from https://www.woodshopdirect.co.uk/planed-all-round/european-oak-timber/ ~£120 (of which only need one third the quantity, so per-tree price is ~£40) https://www.hardwoodjoblots.co.uk/?product=white-oak-1x4-par-to-4-square-edges-20x90mm

Walnut:
    ~£155 (of which only need two fifths the quantity, so per-tree price is ~£60) https://www.hardwoodjoblots.co.uk/?product=walnut-timber-american-black-walnut-par-pse-hardwood

Bamboo: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07G8MT1C9/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 £7.99, gives 60 sticks which produces 180 usable pieces, with 16 needed per tree for a per-tree cost of £0.80.

Shelves Lengths: 180mm, 300mm, 420mm, 540mm, 660mm, 780mm, 900mm. 3780mm in total. Width: 90mm. Height: 25mm.

The hooks from mum's kitchen are from the "MasterClass Deluxe Ceiling Mounted Wooden Pot Rack", and are called "hanging links". These are similar, about £1 each with delivery: https://www.hahn-kitchenware.com/products/kitchen-ceiling-racks/hahn-premium-hanging-links-pk-of-8/

Finish: Danish oil: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Furniture-Clinic-Danish-Oil-Wood/dp/B00CECZ0OS (need to measure how much it takes)

Shower Piece

Tue, 24 Aug 2021 01:00:00 +0100

Our shower was fitted before we moved in to our current home, and so we have no idea who made it or if replacement parts are available. Unfortunately, that means that when a piece breaks, there's not a lot we can do about it.

That is, until I got myself a 3D printer.

The two sides of the shower are - or were - connected by a plastic piece. It's curved, with a ridge on the top and a couple of protruding ends to slot into the shower sides. It was one of those that broke.

You can see the original in the photo below, with its arm missing.

Of course, once you have a 3D printer, a problem like this just becomes a matter of designing and printing the replacement piece yourself, so that's what I did.

I used tinkercad (and the design is public, on the off chance someone else needs this one day), and it's perfect for jobs like this for a CAD beginner like me, where the part is not terribly complicated.

The print went smoothly, however my first attempt used the water-washable resin from Elegoo, and that might be a bit too brittle. The piece fit the shower just fine, but snapped in the same way as the original three weeks later.

The second attempt, pictured above, used the Elegoo ABS-like resin, which is supposed to be more flexible and therefore less brittle. That was far more successful, and has been in place for four months now, with no signs of fatigue or stress.

---section:sidebar---

Details


Materials	Elegoo ABS-Like Grey Resin
Finish	None, so far.
Time	2 Hours
To Do	Maybe a steam-friendly or water-friendly finish?

Carrot Cake

Sat, 06 Mar 2021 00:00:00 +0000

This is an amazing carrot cake, courtesy of Sweetest Menu.

---section:ingredients---

[ { "item": "plain flour", "amount": "315", "unit": "g" }, { "item": "brown sugar", "amount": "190", "unit": "g" }, { "item": "caster sugar", "amount": "100", "unit": "g" }, { "item": "baking powder", "amount": "1", "unit": "tsp" }, { "item": "baking soda", "amount": "0.5", "unit": "tsp" }, { "item": "ground cinnamon", "amount": "1.5", "unit": "tsp" }, { "item": "ground nutmeg", "amount": "0.25", "unit": "tsp" }, { "item": "vegetable oil", "amount": "240", "unit": "ml" }, { "item": "vanilla extract", "amount": "1", "unit": "tsp" }, { "item": "large eggs", "amount": "3", "unit": "" }, { "item": "milk", "amount": "180", "unit": "ml" }, { "item": "carrot", "amount": "200", "unit": "g", "note": "roughly grated, skin on" }, { "item": "walnuts or pecans", "amount": "110", "unit": "g", "note": "roughly chopped, for batter" }, { "item": "cream cheese", "amount": "500", "unit": "g" }, { "item": "icing sugar", "amount": "310", "unit": "g" }, { "item": "maple syrup", "amount": "2", "unit": "tbsp" }, { "item": "walnuts or pecans", "amount": "55", "unit": "g", "note": "roughly chopped, for topping" } ]

---section:method---

Preheat the oven to 180 C (350 F) standard / 160 C (320 F) fan-forced.
Grease and line two 8-inch round cake pans with parchment or baking paper.
In a large mixing bowl, add flour, sugars, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and nutmeg.
In a separate bowl, add oil, vanilla, eggs and milk and whisk gently, just to break up the egg yolks.
Add carrot and nuts to dry ingredients, along with the wet ingredients, and mix gently until combined.
Pour into prepared cake tins. Bake for approximately 30-35 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean.
Gently remove cakes from cake pans and leave on a wire rack to cool completely.
To make the frosting, add the cream cheese and sugar to a mixing bowl and beat with an electric mixer on medium speed until combined and smooth.
Add maple syrup and beat again.
Spread one third of the frosting onto one of the cake layers. Add the other cake on top. Add remaining frosting on top.
Sprinkle over chopped nuts. Cut and serve.

Pyramidal Hanging Christmas Tree

Tue, 20 Oct 2020 01:00:00 +0100

So, we've established already that Christmas trees are evil and insane, but the office still needs something Christmassy to cheer the place up. This year, that became more pressing as we had round two of the Added Bytes Awful Bauble competition.

The office has some features that made it a challenge. I couldn't build a hanging Christmas tree like the one at home, because the walls at the office are sloped, and we can't install a bracket even if they weren't.

However, the office does have some lovely huge beams running across the ceiling, with ample space to loop something over and aroun. A hanging tree is certainly an option ...

So I set to work building the next generation of hanging tree. Picard to 2019's Kirk. As it was hanging from a rafter, I decided to make this one more 3D, in the shape of a pyramid.

Once again, beer with Steve provided the answer to one outstanding question - could we do something better than the screws? Steve suggested small bamboo sticks might work. And he was right.

This was in many ways a far more challenging build. Cutting 60° angles on a mitre saw is not easy when it only cuts up to 30°. Cutting that accurately is even harder. Then drilling a hole at an angle without a drill press, harder again. I'm buying a drill press. And a table saw.

Unfortunately, I didn't think in advance to size the layers so they could nest conveniently for storage.

The bamboo (I used these 6mm rods) made it much easier to set up, and looks far nicer. One trick, if you're looking to do the same, is to use an imperial quarter-inch drill bit. That's 6.3mm, leaving enough room for the bamboo to move without getting stuck, but not so much that the bamboo slips out of the channel.

This was a great, fun little project. The triangle shape gave a lovely depth to the whole thing. And having it hanging in the room over the meeting table was a nice way to bring in some festive cheer without damaging the building or leaving tree bits everywhere.

---section:sidebar---

Details


Materials	Oak
Joinery	Chains, captured with bamboo
Finish	Danish Oil (Colron, Natural)
Time	4 Hours
To Do	Make the layers fit into each other for better storage, more layers, explore mounting on pole of some sort, de-sharpen edges, more sides?
Prequel	Hanging Christmas Tree

---section:gallery---

[ { "image": "https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/RGsjsF8-yLGcNVCqFBOIqOsjh9F7nKcjx3e4xutPIKLoqClF02OK9iP_e6Q1PArZABr9mr1EayENPhjFomkPzWA1e9TGXhh6Q607gqGmPUziBVCj_Iu9fg0v5VyFCiNtn11JpFchVfk=w1920-h1080", "thumb": "https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/RGsjsF8-yLGcNVCqFBOIqOsjh9F7nKcjx3e4xutPIKLoqClF02OK9iP_e6Q1PArZABr9mr1EayENPhjFomkPzWA1e9TGXhh6Q607gqGmPUziBVCj_Iu9fg0v5VyFCiNtn11JpFchVfk=w400-h400", "title": "" }, { "image": "https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/aa6tJdk0yQmqU9ZNaCsUyCNkKSCVmhn855fFnoO_MiKxd3ltoF5TRQg-NPINehcM6h_lhQMzt986yO6ekaQNAa81lbvgLnBtzFu0nfXm8LHHOYfdUugYwumhreRtXkk760Yf0fHwzKk=w1920-h1080", "thumb": "https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/aa6tJdk0yQmqU9ZNaCsUyCNkKSCVmhn855fFnoO_MiKxd3ltoF5TRQg-NPINehcM6h_lhQMzt986yO6ekaQNAa81lbvgLnBtzFu0nfXm8LHHOYfdUugYwumhreRtXkk760Yf0fHwzKk=w400-h400", "title": "" } ]

Weggli

Sun, 04 Oct 2020 01:00:00 +0100

Whenever I've been on holiday to Switzerland or France, there have always been, alongside the croissants and pains au chocolate, these lovely little buns. They're a little sweet, and thoroughly delicious. And thanks to the Little Zurich Kitchen, I've finally been able to make my own. It turns out they're called "weggli", and this is the Little Zurich Kitchen recipe with a few little tweaks that I made for my own kitchen/oven/environment.

Eat these for breakfast with butter or jam. Or however you like. You're a grown-up, you can handle your own bread decisions.

---section:ingredients---

[ { "item": "plain flour", "amount": "500", "unit": "g" }, { "item": "milk", "amount": "300", "unit": "ml", "note": "lukewarm" }, { "item": "instant yeast", "amount": "14", "unit": "g", "note": "2 sachets, or 30g fresh yeast" }, { "item": "unsalted butter, soft", "amount": "55", "unit": "g" }, { "item": "salt", "amount": "12", "unit": "g" }, { "item": "golden caster sugar", "amount": "10", "unit": "g" }, { "item": "egg", "note": "do not add the egg to the dough, it’s for later", "amount": "1", "unit": "" } ]

---section:method---

Put all dry ingredients into a bowl and mix well so the yeast is not directly next to the salt.
Add the soft butter in small pieces. Add milk.
Mix everything into a soft dough. Knead the dough for 10 minutes in a kitchen machine or 15 minutes by hand. The dough is kneaded enough when it passes the ‘window test’: if you stretch the dough it doesn’t break until you can look through like a window (see photo).
Form a ball, but it back into the bowl and cover the bowl with a lid or tea towel. Let it rest until it’s doubled in size. This will take around 40-60 minutes or more if it’s cold in your kitchen, or less if it’s very warm.
Then take the dough out of the bowl, press the air out and cut it into 12 equal pieces. You can either weigh each piece (75g) or just shape the dough into a roll and cut it into 12 equally large pieces.
Shape every piece into a ball. Place the balls on a baking tray covered in greased baking parchment. Cover the tray with a tea towel or put it into a plastic bag if you happen to have such a big bag. Let the buns prove for another 30 minutes. Then press a small stick into each bun. You can press it down quite hard until the baking parchment shimmers through the dough.
Preheat the oven to 220 degrees C (430 degrees F), fan 200C / 390F.
Crack the egg, add a pinch of salt and a pinch of sugar and whisk the mixture. Brush the buns with the egg wash.
Bake the buns for 12-15 minutes until they look golden brown. These buns are best eaten on the same day or next.

---section:gallery---

[ { "image": "/images/weggli0.jpg", "thumb": "/images/weggli0.jpg", "title": "Dough rising." }, { "image": "/images/weggli1.jpg", "thumb": "/images/weggli1.jpg", "title": "Heheh, they look like butts." }, { "image": "/images/weggli2.jpg", "thumb": "/images/weggli2.jpg", "title": "Needs more crevice." }, { "image": "/images/weggli.jpg", "thumb": "/images/weggli.jpg", "title": "Yum." } ]

Hanging Christmas Tree

Thu, 19 Dec 2019 00:00:00 +0000

We have - or we had - a ritual in our house. You may have a similar one in your house.

Every year, near the start of December, we pile into the car and go to a garden centre. A place where life is celebrated, where you can buy any one of thousands of beautiful, and/or productive plants to bring colour or flavour to your world.

We go to this place dedicated to nature, and we head into the back. We ignore every one of the living plants along the way. And we head into what can only be described as a plant morgue.

In this plant morgue, a host of once-beautiful trees are arranged by height and species. We inspect them, looking for the one which looks like it had the most promising life ahead of it before it was killed. And we buy it, wrap it in a net, stick it in the car and take it home.

Once we get home, we take the tree out, stick it into a special holder that has no other purpose in our lives, drape it in sparkly things, and grin maniacially as over the next months the evidence it was once a living thing drains away, its branches wilt and its leaves fall to the carpet. Once we've had enough of it, we dump it in a pile of other rotting trees and spend the next eleven months hoovering up leaves.

There are several problems with this ritual.

First, and most obviously, it is insane. If aliens landed on the Earth mid-December and you were the one tasked with explaining to them why everyone was chopping down trees to put in their house to rot, you'd not get very far before you asked them if maybe they'd consider visiting a different planet, as large parts of this one were clearly barmy.

Second, it's deeply impractical. Christmas trees take up a large amount of space, drop leaves all over the place, require you to buy and store specialist equipment, and none of that for any more than fleeting entertainment.

Third, these things are actually dangerous, causing hundreds of house fires every year. While they're not starting fires, dry Christmas trees are incredibly flammable.

Fourth, and most significantly, Christmas trees are hugely damaging to the environment. Trees which are not disposed of carefully produce greenhouse gases as they decompose. They are often transported large distances, which carries a carbon cost. They're linked to the use of hundreds of thousands of tonnes of pesticides. Farms that grow these trees displace other similar, but less Christmassy, conifers, which are facing extinction.

If those aliens were second-guessing their decision to visit at the start of this list, they'd be back in their craft careening away from the Earth and promising each other a staycation next year; anything but a return to this mad planet.

All of these thoughts had been rattling around my brain for years. But still, I went and dutifully bought my dead tree every year and built my little sparkly mausoleum.

A New Hope

I'd been trying to think of something else we could do as a family instead. But I had such warm and happy memories of Christmases from my childhood, complete with a real tree, that I couldn't see any decent alternative. Plastic trees are fine, but I've not yet seen one that didn't look tacky. Renting one was an option, but every time I tried I found I was far too late and all that was left was tiny trees. I wanted my kids to feel the magic of Christmas, to participate in some of the same traditions that we had as kids. I didn't want them to feel envious of their classmates who had Christmas trees, or put them in a position where they were class killjoys lecturing people on the evils of Big Christmas Tree.

In 2019, however, I had an epiphany. I had thought of building something a few times, but never managed to come up with a design I liked. I thought a series of increasingly large shelves, connected to each other with chain and mounted to something on the wall, might look like a Christmas tree, and might solve most of the other issues I had. Plus, as a bonus, the kids would have something unique and positive they could tell their friends about.

So here's what we ended up with:

As you may have spotted, there were some issues with the first year's tree.

My friend Steve was the genius who came up with the idea of using screws, inserted from the side of the shelves, to "capture", the chains between shelves. The chains pass into holes at each end, which go most of the way through the shelf. Then from the side, the screw is inserted, which passes through the end loop of the chain and through to the other side of the hole.

All the chains are vertical, and at the top the chains converge to a mounting bracket on the wall. The rest of the year, the top screw that holds the bracket in place is a picture hook.

We added the usual decorations, and some fake greenery to give it a more Christmassy feel. We even found some Christmas tree fragrance sticks, which we secrete on the tree to produce that lovely new tree smell.

The photo above is from the first year, when the tree was a bit rushed. No finish is applied, some of the shelves are wonky, and there's a twist to the whole structure.

But in year two (2020), the tree had a round of fixes applied:

Finish was applied, screws were moved, boards were turned, and we added a new Lego shelf (the third one down) which the kids got to set up a little Lego Christmas scene on. Can't do that on a traditional Christmas tree! Although, their scene appears to involve the Death Star paying a visit to the nativity, so maybe that's not such a bad thing.

This new tree has some distinct advantages, which we've enjoyed so far:

It stores easily, doesn't take up much space.
After the environmental costs of production, it doesn't add any new costs every year.
After the financial costs of production, it doesn't add any new costs every year (after three years, material costs are covered).
It's far less flammable.
It takes up no space at all, more room for presents!
It is genuinely, 100%, non-drop.
The shelves offer the option to hang baubles underneath, but also to place non-hanging decorations on top.
It's a celebration of wood, not decaying as time goes on.
The kids love it (so far).

I'm expecting that as the kids get older, we'll eventually get some pushback from them, and demands to go get a "real tree", but so far they've loved that we have something all of our own, and that they got to help create.

Edit: In 2020, I made a variation on this theme - a more 3D version. You can see more about that project in Pyramidal Hanging Christmas Tree.

Edit: In 2021 the lego shelf was replaced. I liked the idea, but the rubber lego mat we were using was a pain. It may return in future! 2021's tree:

Edit: In 2021, I made a second tree for my mum, with some improvements. You can see more about that project in Hanging Christmas Tree - Version 2.

---section:sidebar---

Details


Materials	Oak
Joinery	Chains, captured with screws
Finish	Danish Oil (Colron, Natural)
Time	12 Hours
To Do	Fix wobbliness, find better system than screws, underlighting
Sequel	Hanging Christmas Tree - Version 2, Pyramidal Hanging Christmas Tree

---section:gallery---

{
  "image": "https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/sV8Br1j81zqXmgivqs1-svIqq7h6k5sPX5VYWQxjJDWELHSgqDLwzXyS0AnEMV-3TsaQqg_EP7PdCVyU_yhNMipES0MZcczCL9eJ5AomIlrc2eCzZuTLKvH0a4XCyQr_hbAsor7FP5c=w1920-h1080",
  "thumb": "https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/sV8Br1j81zqXmgivqs1-svIqq7h6k5sPX5VYWQxjJDWELHSgqDLwzXyS0AnEMV-3TsaQqg_EP7PdCVyU_yhNMipES0MZcczCL9eJ5AomIlrc2eCzZuTLKvH0a4XCyQr_hbAsor7FP5c=w400-h400",
  "title": "Close-up of the screws and chains."
}

]

Standing Desk

Thu, 31 May 2012 01:00:00 +0100

Why a Standing Desk?

By now almost everybody with internet access must have heard of standing desks - taller-than-usual desks that you work at while standing up. They have been hailed as a route to better health and posture, and plenty of people claim higher productivity since switching to a standing setup.

The only way they could make it sound better is if every standing desk came with an infinite supply of sandwiches and beer.

It's not a new fad either - Ernest Hemingway, Benjamin Disraeli, Winston Churchill, Charles Dickens and Virginia Woolf all worked standing up.

Other more recent converts include Mitch Wagner, Gina Trapani, Dan Benjamin and Buck Woody, who all have their own stories of their transition and their own advice to offer.

So What's it Like?

My first standing desk was a precarious arrangement - a coffee table perched on my regular old desk:

It was an interesting experiment, and a good cheap way to find out what all the fuss was about.

The first few days were hard going. I wasn't used to standing up for long periods, and my legs got tired fast. The first day I managed an hour. The second, two hours. Within a week I could do a day, with a break for lunch.

After a few weeks, I had developed some new habits. I was much more alert while working long periods, no longer suffering from tiredness after six or seven hours of work. I found myself wandering away from the screen to think about problems I was working on. I'd even started splitting my work into sections better - a couple of email sprints a day, for which I sometimes took the laptop somewhere more interesting. Even, occasionally, outside.

I discovered the urge while working to hop from foot to foot every dozen minutes or so. I quickly added a box under the desk to act as a footrest. I also bought a (unfortunately rather crappy) bar stool for the rare times when I wanted to switch to sitting. I didn't use it.

(I also started dancing while working. Only when nobody can see me, of course.)

Unfortunately, while the standing-coffee-perch-desk was good, it had its fair share of problems. It was a little too high, for one thing. Only by a couple of inches, but that was enough for my arms to rub on the edge of the desk, which became uncomfortable. It wasn't quite safe enough to be a long term solution either. So I decided I needed a replacement.

What Next?

There are plenty of off-the-shelf options. Dedicated standing desks, DJ tables, and even the self-assembly option with parts from Ikea or similar companies. There's a great roundup of the best standing desks currently available over at The Wire Cutter. All very tempting!

In the end, though, there's nothing quite like the feeling of satisfaction you get from designing and building something yourself. It's a lot like web development, except there are fewer bugs and you can feel the end product.

As a quick aside, a recent thread on reddit's woodworking community seems to indicate that perhaps an enthusiasm for woodwork is fairly common among developers. Is that true?

The Solution: Make My Own

I knew the rough shape I wanted. I hadn't built anything in years, so I wanted to keep it simple. I also wanted to keep the cost down. So, off to the local wood recycling place I went, and picked up plenty of 2x4 and 1.5x3.5 lengths of used pine. I also splashed out on a couple of decent, non-recycled pieces of pine for the top and shelf.

Three weeks later (a few hours a weekend), it was all ready to use. It wasn't all smooth sailing, but it was a lot of fun.

My Standing Desk

There are many like it, but this one is mine. Complete with my vertical mouse, another ergonomic improvement I can't recommend highly enough. My cork board may need some adjustment ...

The final desk has a couple of minor problems so far. First, it's creaky (varnish on varnish doesn't sound nice). It also suffers slightly from racking, though not enough at the moment that I'm losing sleep over it. A couple of strong wires crossed at the back should keep it together at least long enough for me to decide I want to build a better one!

Other than that, so far it's been great. A pleasure to work at, even after a day sitting and working at the office. So far, I've been more productive (though that might just be new toy syndrome), and I find it much more comfortable than my old sitting/slouching/napping setup. Now all that remains is to sort out that infinite supply of sandwiches and beer!

---section:sidebar---

Details


Materials	Pine
Joinery	Half laps, mortise and tenon
Finish	Wood dye - antique oak - and basic gloss varnish
Time	20 Hours
To Do	Version 2 needs standalone side pods

---section:gallery---

[ {

  "image": "https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/vyGY9oROEr7Vkl_q6HdbGI7sPP_8JZHvC4yX1ZRfkYz5hoXvDaixTPdR4VW_nTodk7b0_Mz4awqPU9VfQ0jF2EyakwJcRHul7KpmnvrVrxumJLeEThINxb1r1DIvCwuzpIg4jbTHRSI=w1920-h1080",
  "thumb": "https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/vyGY9oROEr7Vkl_q6HdbGI7sPP_8JZHvC4yX1ZRfkYz5hoXvDaixTPdR4VW_nTodk7b0_Mz4awqPU9VfQ0jF2EyakwJcRHul7KpmnvrVrxumJLeEThINxb1r1DIvCwuzpIg4jbTHRSI=w400-h400",
  "title": "I went for wood from a recycling center. No sense wasting good quality stuff on my first project in years - I want to be able to try things without worrying about cost etc. The wood we picked up (thanks, mum, for the help) was several 2 by 4s, and some sheets of pine (not recycled, but that's the bit I'll actually use). The 2 by 4s had lots of nails in, but I thought that would be fine - a little effort and a little filler would be all that was needed."

Mathaversaries

Sun, 23 Aug 2009 01:00:00 +0100

On Thursday, 15th January 2009, I went to the pub. Fear not, the story, for once, does not end there.

I was out with my wife, Lindsay, and a couple of friends. They asked us how long we'd been married. "Six hundred years", I replied, in the time-honoured tradition of husbands through the ages. And then, after a couple of minutes, I updated my guess ... "you know, I think it might just be one thousand days today".

Unfortunately, this conversation happened at the wrong end of several pints of lovely local ale, so working out what should have been something relatively simple turned into a small project. And after a few more ales, and some arguments about leap years, we settled on a number. It was 999 days.

Later, at home, mischief presented itself. Lindsay went to bed, and I got to work making a "Happy 1,000 Days Married" card. It was crude, but the point was not the make the world's greatest card. At the time, this was about points.

You see, it was inevitable that one day I'd forget a birthday or anniversary. Apparently everyone does. But I knew Lindsay wasn't going to have prepared anything for tomorrow's one, because she only found out about it two hours before. This was my chance to get ahead.

So, the next morning, with a great big shit-eating grin that husbands only wear on very special occasions, I presented my card to Lindsay. 1-0.

Later, at my desk, it occurred to me that these sorts of events must pass by every so often, and usually without fanfare. I started checking into what occasions I'd missed. It turns out I'd be 10,000 days old a couple of years before. 15,000,000 minutes old has passed by without mention. I was approaching my first Curium 243 half-life. This cannot stand! I can't let these things pass by, they matter every bit as much as annual birthdays and anniversaries.

So, off I went writing a little bit of software to solve this problems. It started as a post on my website, and a short 923 days later graduated to its own domain.

Mathaversaries will take any date you give it, and tell you what interesting time intervals are approaching or recently passed by. If you give it an email address, it'll email you when one of these things happens.

Later, I added a little bit more code, this time to message celebrities on Twitter and tell them when their interesting date intervals came up. To my great pleasure, several of those celebrities noticed these occasions, including Neil Gaiman, Simon Singh, Richard Herring, Robert Llewellyn, Nick Frost, and Andy Zaltzmann.

I'm a huge fan of those people, and many of the others who noticed this little bot doing its little bot thing. But as a huge Terry Pratchett fan (seriously, I'm on the cover of one of his books), I was chuffed to bits when this tweet caught Pterry's attention for a moment and earned a little retweet.

At this point, you'd be forgiven for thinking I'd spend a lot of time lording it over Lindsay and being a very smug little boy. You'd not be wrong, I did ... for a time, at least. Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of irony. Although I had built a website to tell me about weird time intervals since important dates, and I'd built in the ability to notify myself when these dates happened, I had forgotten to add our wedding date to my notifications list. So, on the morning of Thursday 13th October 2011, when Lindsay walked into the room with her own shit-eating grin, holding a suspiciously homemade looking card, I realised very very quickly that I was in for a nice big portion of humble pie, and my points lead, so carefully guarded for 1,000 days, had gone. 1-1.

Edit: Three thousand, four thousand and five thousands days have all now passed, and we both remembered. Lindsay has alerts set up from my own site. However, I think the six thousand day email may just get lost along the way ...

Colour Sudoku

Mon, 20 Mar 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I've launched a fun side project - Colour Sudoku (ed: now closed), a new type of sudoku puzzle where you have to place the numbers 1-9 in every row, column and blocks of a single colour (so 1-9 in the yellow boxes, 1-9 in the blue boxes, etc). Here's an example:

					4	3		5
				4		9
		2	5
			6				9	7
						6
2								4
5	9	3	1		2

	6		7				1

For a while, the code for this generated a new puzzle every day on coloursudoku.com, but eventually I mothballed the site. If you'd like more of these, please let me know and I'll see what I can do about adding the generator here.