I haven't been writing too much lately as I've been busy on a number of personal projects. One of those projects has been redoing my office at home. My previous office space was put together haphazardly a few years ago as a response to the pandemic and finding I needed my own space for both work and play. Fast forward a few years and I now find I want the office space to be better designed, more functional, and include better furniture.
I used to have a huge corner desk that unfortunately partially covered my window space. The darker room was rather depressing and needed more light. I decided it was time to remove the corner desk and replace it with a FlexiSpot standing desk (affiliate link) that I recently purchased. I was a little concerned about getting this desk sent through the mail and assembling it myself, but I had no issues. I found I only actually stand at the standing desk for about 20% of my time. However this seems to be the right enough time for me to ease the shoulder muscles from the strain caused by sitting in one place too long.
While the changes to the office were happening, a secondary project for me was to move out a lot of "stuff" my family had piled in the basement corner. Kids toys, media storage cabinets, exercise equipment, and lately camping gear. I spent some days off work changing all that. We now have an open space downstairs that we'll eventually put plants to make it a little sanctuary for my wife and me. I also decided to move all my vinyl records, CDs, and even cassette tapes into my home office.
With our living room and family room often used to watch movies and television shows, for years I've wanted to have another area to listen to my music. The problem is I have a small office and I could never figure out how I would fit all the physical media into the room along with the necessary stereo equipment including speakers. Until now...
I recently acquired a Technics Ottava All-In-One (affiliate link) due for a later review that is surprisingly good and solved my room space problem. While I do have a good pair of speakers (affiliate links) on my desk that I actively listen to, the Ottava sitting behind me on the other side of the room has renewed my appreciation for having background music. There are moments when the music is so good, I pause in what I'm doing and find I'm listening with a smile. Those moments are worth the price admission.
So that's the review of my home office in 2024. For the future, I'm playing with the idea of replacing the carpet with a wood floor as well as putting a coat of lighter paint on the walls. Until then though, I'm satisfied with the recent changes I made to my now dual purpose home office and music room.