Wednesday (29 May) - Hammer and Nails Stuff

Wednesday (29 May) - Hammer and Nails Stuff

When we upgraded our family room with a flat screen TV (and all of the associated extras that come with that) we had to do a lot of moving, relocating, and/or getting rid of stuff. Then, after we finished the new enclosed patio (which we call the "catio") there was more moving around to do.

All of that went well and we've reached the point where we are satisfied with how things are arranged. However, getting to that point meant making some other areas of the house worse. Specifically, I'm talking about our home offices, where I do almost all of my writing and where my better half handles most of the home paperwork, bills, and many other activities. Our offices are our personal sanctuarys. They are both in something of a mess, due to the migration of "stuff" into our offices related to the other changes.

We finally reached a point where neither one of us could stand the clutter anymore. We've begun a major reorganization of our two office rooms.

In my office I have a free standing shelving system that covers one entire wall from floor to ceiling. The brand is IVAR, and it's sold almost exclusively by Ikea. I like it because it can be constructed easily and in very versatile ways. It's also pretty cheap, using straight grained, unpainted pine and simple hardware. In a nutshell, the plan is to move the IVAR bookshelf from my room into Judi's room, where a lot of reorganizing has already been done. The IVAR shelving will open up a lot of floor space and give the room a more organized look.

For my room I looked at a lot of possible options, but in the end I decided to stay with my favorite shelving company, IVAR. They had expanded their system since I bought the first one and I liked the new dimensions available to me. The rack of IVAR shelves holding all of my electronic equipment (other than the monitors) is six feet high, nineteen inches long, and twelve inches wide. I am going to replace that with a similar rack that is designed a bit differently and is sixteen inches wide versus twelve inches. That doesn't sound like much, but it gives me a lot more flexibility in arranging and organizing the equipment. Most important, it will give me easier access to the computers when I need to make changes.

Since the new rack is going into the same space as the old rack, the biggest challenge is unplugging/disconnecting all of the miles of cables and cords and then reconnecting everything correctly. The actual moving is pretty simple, and I've already assembled the new rack (that took about fifteen minutes, it's really easy). Well, on second thought, the actual move of the shelving is a little bit more complicated, since I have to partially disassemble the old shelving before I can switch out the racks.

Once the new rack is in place, everything is reconnected, and all the blinking lights are working properly I can start moving the old shelving into the other room. I'm expecting that to go pretty smoothly. I may need to do a little saw work to fit the top tier of the shelving into place properly (something I had meant to do when I first bought it, but never got around to). I can get away with a little "good enough for me" work, but I want to get it right for Judi.

I'll have the house to myself during the day on Friday. I want to have everything in place and back to normal by dinner time.

That won't be quite the end, though. Once I can see how much space I reclaimed in my office, I will be building up my IVAR system to hold my favorite books. Real books, not the Kindle kind. Don't get me wrong, I love my Kindle and prefer to read books on it. Yes, even over real paper books. The convenience is just too overwhelming, from being able to carry around as many books as I want to being able to read them on whatever device I'm currently using, from PC to laptop to smart phone. Anyway, don't let me digress. I've always wanted to have a library room. We have a walk in closet that is filled by at least half with boxes of books. When I'm finished my office will double as my library as well. A lot of books will exit that walk-in closet (which is in Judi's office, by the way) and that closet will become our office supplies room, which right now we have scattered all over the place.

So, that's the method to this new madness. If you don't hear from me for awhile it's because somewhere in those miles of cord and cabling I've gooned something up.