If you work inside an office, you may unknowingly be in for health difficulties. According to a recent story by NPR, individuals who spend too much time sitting during the week face a much greater potential for heart related illnesses than do individuals who are more physically active. The NPR story quoted a researcher from South Carolina University who discovered that men that sat more than 23 hours per week were 64 percent more likely to die from heart disease than were those who sat fewer than 11 hours in an average week.
The Good News
Want to prevent potentially terminal heart issues? Why not make your own standing desk? A standing desk is just what it sounds like, a desk at which you stand instead of sit. If you are using a standing desk as your main desk, you will end up eliminating a great deal of those idle hours of sitting. And the best news? You may build your own standing desk with little effort and few bucks. The editors at Website Lifehacker provided an easy recipe for building a simple, effective standing desk. Here's the short version of it.
The Easy Way
If you only want a simple desk, Lifehacker suggests making a standing desk that utilizes Ikea's Utby legs. Though this desk is going to be smaller, it will be possible to fit your laptop, monitor and keyboard easily enough on it. You ought to have space, too, for a lamp and storage. To create this desk, purchase a Vika Amon Top, Utby under frame, Ekby Jarpen shelf and one set of Capita legs. You will find all these parts at Ikea for the total of about $140. Best of all? Based on the Lifehacker story, you can put this desk together with just a screwdriver.
A Bit More Complicated
You don't need to be satisfied with a homemade standing desk having a narrow top. You can easily step up to one using a wider top. And you can get it done while still confining your desk-part shopping to your nearest Ikea. First, as Lifehacker recommends, find two packages of Capita brackets, one Lack shelf, one Vika Amon tabletop and five Vika Byske legs at your Ikea. Then grab your power drill and get busy. Lifehacker ranks this desk as a "medium" one to build, so it ought not to be overly tricky to set up.