Day 482...
Tuesday once more and the first working day of my week but it was actually spent working from home.
I had an online 'Teams' meeting to attend and so it was easier to join in the fun from home. The meeting brings together leaders and managers of early years settings across Derbyshire and aims to bring everyone up to date with current developments within the early years sector.
One of the benefits of lockdown has actually been having these meetings online. Not only can they be attended from the comfort of my own home, with decent coffee on hand, but there is no getting there and back, no car parking to pay for, no small talk to endure and we have actually had more meetings than we would have had ordinarily. Most years we would have 2 or 3 meetings but by utilising the tech we have been able to have shorter meetings, more often, as and when the need arose, which means we, as managers, get updates that are much more relevant and timely.
Either side of the meeting I had emails to catch up on, a couple of spreadsheets to update and staff appraisals to write and then email out to my team. When lunch rolled around I popped out to see my dad as he had requested some fish and chips from his local chip shop for lunch which I dutifully fetched for him.
Back home and I had a quick catch-up with Simon as although we had both been at home we had both been working and really not had chance to see each other. Simon has a deadline coming up at the end of the week so suffice to say it's 'all hands on deck' to make sure they can meet it.
Not long after lunch I finally managed to get through to my dad's doctor's surgery and have managed to get him an appointment to see a nurse tomorrow, which is much better than the appointment he'd been able to get for late next week.
Then because I know I've a busy few days ahead I decided to spend the afternoon getting some more work done even though technically I don't work Tuesday afternoons. But it made sense to get some notes typed up, 'to do' lists updated, online files organised, emails kept on top of, a banner ordered, my working folder sorted and a newsletter started!
And while all of the above was happening we had day two of our new windows being installed. There is still more to be installed tomorrow but all the straight forward windows have been done and that just leaves some french doors to be installed. But everything is looking good even if there seems to be dust everywhere...I can see a big clean through happening later this week!
As I came to finish writing today's post I saw on Twitter that our government have passed a bill, with only 90 minutes debating, that says all social and health care workers in care homes must be vaccinated. Err whatever happened to freedom of choice, what about those who cannot have the vaccine for medical reasons or on religious grounds. What ever happened to the free and democratic society I thought we lived in...it is beginning to feel more and more authoritarian as time goes on and I fear it won't be long before this sort of mandate is rolled out across more and more areas of our lives. I have nothing against vaccinations and I have had my two shots but I think everyone should have the freedom to choose. I think the young and the healthy should be able to make informed decisions about whether a vaccine that is still effectively in clinical trials is right for them at this moment in time without feeling that they are missing out on work and life opportunities. Where is all this taking us?
I will see you all tomorrow.
xx