Cat on Chair

In our house everything constantly moves. I have a weird genetic condition causing a largely invisible disability and getting comfortable is vital and not easily achieved. We’ve moved my rusty dust-ridden old recliner up and down the stairs, trying to find it a good spot and last night it came downstairs again to become gaming chair attempt number 4.

Whilst Chris was taking a break, our disabled cat valorously risked life and limb to find this comfy spot; which complicated matters just a little. Looks like it won’t be my gaming chair after all.

Ikea Hacking: The Desk

The desk is done for now.

I used Ikea furniture and shelving which came to a total of around £80:

• 2 Antonius wall rails
• 9 Antonius bracket pairs
• 3 Antonius white shelves 37cm
• 1 Antonius white shelf 28cm
• 5 Ekby Viktor black shelves
• 1 Slightly damaged Ikea kitchen unit
• 1 Solveig Panel Curtain
• Non-Ikea: Some  velcro, cable tidies, screws and assorted bits

The cables haven’t been tidied away yet, but leaving that for last as I’m still moving pieces to get it just right. On the right side is Chris’ standing desk, put together for about £50, mirroring mine minus the desktop and cable nest. Either desk can hook up to the TV to provide additional screen real estate. It’s not traditional, but I’m loving it.

 

Help my 360 isn’t working!

And that’s before installing the new Dashboard. It was working fine yesterday, turned it on this morning and blue screen. (It is rather unfortunate that my TV has a bright blue screen whenever nothing is displayed on that channel). We’ve tried all the usual quick fixes: checked connections, checked cables and then started swapping – two TV’s and 2 Xbox’s (one from the Iron Age, but still in working order) allows for quite a few options and we’re in luck, my Xbox works just fine on the dining room TV. It does leave me with the enigma of why my Xbox 360 is not working. The TV works, the 360 works, the cable works, yet the 360 connected to this TV doesn’t work. Puzzling.

EDIT: We’ve managed to get it working by unplugging the Venom Twin Charging Cradle. I’ve had the cradle for as long as I’ve had my Xbox and the last few months its a been a bit dodgy; first it would only accept one controller (the second red light would just flash and second controller wouldn’t charge), then the back charging port failed completely and then the front started working sporadically, so something’s up there. I have no idea how this links in to my issue, but since we’ve unplugged it’ 360, HDMI cable and TV are working in perfect harmony.

Aside: Dining Room is still a work in progress having lived here less than a month with no furniture that fits in it. Pictured above, complete with no curtains/blind for that window just yet. The idea is to replace the white Ikea Antonius storage units with a standing desk in a dark stained wood (unit height needed 106 cm which is turning out to be very difficult to source) as the new dining room table (an early Christmas present) is Cherry wood.

A work in progress

Short one today. I slipped on some yogurt spilled by baby in the kitchen whilst holding said baby and dislocated my knee with the little one landing right on top of it. Not my finest moment, but baby’s fine and kneecaps go back where they are suppose to be. The desk is coming along, added more shelves and brackets, tidied up the wiring and its now looking like this…

Ikea Trip Number Two

For more stuff. The thing about having a kid and a disability is that your time is rarely your own. I’d write about gaming rather than assembling a gaming desk, if only I had time for both. I’m still playing Uncharted 3 and PvZ on my phone, nothing to talk about there unless someone can tell me how to get the slot machine achievement without replaying the mini-game a hundred times. My instant messaging looks something like this:

“Got it yet?”
“No. You?”
“No. I read online that it can take up to a hundred replays.”
“Seriously? I’m not playing it a hundred times O.o”
One day later….
“Got it yet?”
“No. Still trying. You?”

I still don’t think of gaming on my phone as gaming. I have lower standards when it comes to iOS games; they’re cheap and I don’t overthink giving it a go. I’ll try anything that has a pause button with integrated auto-save.

The desk is coming along nicely. I haven’t actually gotten to work on the desk and the only thing I bought was a new spotlight (black to replace whitish plastic) and the brackets we forgot to buy last time. I have assembled a lovely unit for Hawkgirl’s toys that’s right next to me with some play area on the top, so she can play her drum whilst Mommy’s on the computer. Will see how that works out for us.

Computer (Gaming) Desk Chairs

I’ve been console gaming for the last year or two for two reasons. The first is plug and play, I don’t use a mouse and keyboard very well and I haven’t found a decent universal replacement and so I’m left hacking my way into accessibility for each game, which is time consuming when with a console, I can sit down, pick up a controller and play. The second is space constraints. I have been living in a tiny 2-bedroom with a husband, baby and at times 2-3 carers around and there simply wasn’t anywhere I could set up my kit. Having moved house, I’d really like to get back into PC gaming a bit more; I do enjoy the customizability that it offers and sometimes it is fun modding and hacking and making things work in ways they weren’t intended to. The place to start has been my desk, for the first time in my adult life, I can put shelves up on walls. Fantastic. Whilst Chris is busy converting a Billy bookcase into a server cabinet, I realised that I hadn’t given any thought to a chair. It’s a standing desk, mostly for him as we tend to hot desk a lot but also for me as with back troubles, standing is sometimes the optimum position and a standing desk also puts everything well away from tiny probing fingers.

Back to the chair. I need:

• Bar stool height to accompany standing desk (or need to revamp desk so that keyboard and mouse is removable and screen adjustable)
• Good back and ideally some neck support
• Baby friendly
• Easy to sit down and get up from

This set of requirements is going to make it impossible to find the solution, so it’s all about compromise. I’m still looking, hoping for inspiration to hit, but I’m just not sure if it will. Using a desk for writing, serving the web, playing music, streaming video’s and such is easy, there’s plenty of time for breaks, I only use it for at most half an hour at a time before changing to a different activity and an ordinary bar stool or standing lends itself just fine to short bursts of usage. Gaming is very different, particularly if I’m playing with other people. Sessions go into hours and if you’re lucky you get a 5 minute break every hour when you carefully select who you play with. Five minutes an hour is very generous, the average in my experience is 15 minutes every couple of hours, if that. The point, my chair is going to have to be super comfortable to allow for this type of investment. The Rio has caught my eye, but just not sure, still thinking about it…

Desk Hacking: Shelves are up

Shelves are up, TV is up and fireplace have been removed. And nothing has come down either.

Computer Desk Hacking: Part 3

The first part of the wall shelves going up.

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Ikea Southampton: Desk hacking part 2

I’ve only ever been to Southampton’s train station via train. Salisbury to Southampton is a very pretty, wide road and Ikea is easy to locate coming into the city. We used to live 5 minutes from Ikea in Bristol and stopped in often for breakfast and a browse, but this was our first visit with a mini-monster in tow. I was a rather different experience.

I had a neat shopping list on my phone with all the product numbers of the shelves that will be required for my wall mounted and ten minutes into walking around the show room and I changed my mind. We picked an entire different system and what convinced me was looking around the store and noticing that it was the display system Ikea uses in-store.

It lead to a few detours, an impromptu baby lunch in a warehouse isle and unfortunately, checking out over lunch which meant an hour of queing with a very grumpy baby. It was worth it, just for the shelves, where else can I spend £3 on a shelf? They are white rather than black, so will be trying mixing and match black and white as the side-shelves in the correct length only came in black. Have the equipment, hopefully either husband or fairies can get it up on the wall for me…

 

Ikea Hacking

I’m trying to put down roots for the first time in my life and by that I mean for the first time I’m living somewhere that I plan to be living, given the choice, for more than 2-3 years. This is residence number 11 in thirteen years and I’m sick of moving house.

Deciding what to do with said house when you’re starting with a clean slate as none of your furniture fits and everything is in dire need of updating, is more difficult than I thought. Standard furniture is pricey and doesn’t often work well for us. I need things customized, Hawkgirl who also have EDS needs her one set of customizations at 12 months that as we’ve learned, continually changes as she matures, Chris wants his standing desk and a million docks and charging stations and Jade, our cat with Cerebellar Hypoplasia, the cat version of Cerebral Palsy,  needs ramps and customization to her furniture.

My favourite solution, Ikea hacking. I found this lovely iMac Desk, the babyproofed PC tower and a good selection of office and living room inspiration. Sidetracking a bit I’ve also found a fantastic cat walk and an inspirational Besta Litter Box Cabinet. I haven’t been able to find something to copy, but I guess that’s the beauty of hacking, thepoint is to customize it yourself to suit your needs and lifestyle. Getting our priorities straight, the first thing on the list is of course, a gaming centre. Off to Ikea tomorrow, watch this space…