Evening all. Glad to hear everyone is safe and well for the most part, and I've really enjoyed reading where everyone is these days.

I currently find myself as a Development Manager and Head of Solution Architecture at a Newcastle-based gambling platform company with over 40 poor sods relying on me to keep them busy and look after their welfare. We've unexpectedly won a bid to take over the 4th largest lottery in the world, which goes live in August. So things are a bit... hectic. Before this I've been pretty lucky to be honest while working as a Developer and then as an Architect which allowed me to see some bits of the world I'd never have expected to see.

I still haven't got a fucking clue how to get a printer to work mind.

I lecture med students relentlessly, think long and hard about things, and occasionally talk about these things to people.

Are you still living in Reichenburg? 

Apparently yes. As is one of my colleagues, thanks to some of our students.

Wow cracking thread - a few names in here I often wonder about. Lovely to see Xen still alive. Oddly enough Facebook seems to be coming full circle with more and more people dropping off - I wonder if we'll see some return to traditional forums.

I actually logged in because I think none other than the Luke Redpath liked post I made on Facebook

Like all of us, at some point I became massively fucking old and I'm now in my sixth year as a freelance contractor focusing on Citrix, with the usual dabbling of Microsoft and virtual stuff.

How are you sports/gambling people doing now we have SPORT back in our lives?

just insanely busy and stressed. Hate it.

How many of the 20 PL grounds are you involved with?

Mrs WmA bought me a Switch for my 64th so I've been playing insane amounts of Mario Odyssey. Does that count? Also there's snooker on the telly again.

Depends on what level you mean, but we work with all of them to at least some degree. Directly as in our company spends time inside them on the reg, I'd say about 7, maybe another 3 that we're quite close with. Plus Wembley.

LOL the cricket and rugby will start soon too, aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

Animal Crossing seems to be the in thing now.

I guess everyone wants everything NOW. More games in a shorter space of time?
3 months of not working then back into the deep end.

Working from home is getting to me again, but both do and don't want to return to the office.
Do because I need the interaction.
Don't because there's still a pandemic.

Our CEO was bold enough to say a while ago that he doesn't see a full office return across the group until there's a vaccine. Still expecting there to be some push in the coming month or so though.

Venue teams want everything earlier than normal. Commercial teams want to brief it in later than normal. The rock and the hard place have me in the middle. Some of them are just arseholes with no consideration of what they're asking I think emails at 5pm saying "here is a brief, can we see it today please" and things like that. Or asking for LED systems to be on and running at 6am the next morning (again at about 5pm for the request) and then chasing it for an answer within minutes. Cunts!

Can you maybe visit the office once or twice? I have found that a bit of interaction goes a long way - and also reinforces the realisation of how much affected we've been under the isolation.

We aren't renewing our London office lease when it comes up in September. I think at some point we'll get another one, smaller and nicer, but we'll never go back to having everyone in every day.
 

I feel exactly the same way. 

While working from home is convenient, and I'm actually more productive (cos of less distractions), I'm missing people and though we have meetings over Teams every day, you don't get the same experience as being in a room with other people. It's difficult to gauge reactions, whether people are actually listening etc... 

I didn't think I ever would, but I'm missing the commute into work. A 10 minute walk to the station, 20min journey and another 15min walk to get to the office offers a bit of mental space, some thinking and contemplation time, while also being able to zone out and just listen to some music. 

Sounds like you CEO is cut from the same mould as ours. He's said that though the offices are open, only come back when you're ready to, we're still formulating a plan on seating and the number of people that can be safely accommodated on each floor. 

I've got asthma, so am trying to leave this as long as possible to mitigate any chance of infection, but also don't want to become a hermit. It's scary though how quickly I've got used to hardly moving all day. I've got my work stuff set up on a desk in the room I use as a drawing room and it's entirely possible I could stay in here all day. :C

That sounds utterly shit. I can only hope they are being pressured from above on their sides, but it is often the case they just have no consideration for the people down the chain.

I think returning for a couple of days a week might be a good balance, but currently I've said if it is encouraged or does happen then I'd want to move back to our old office in a different part of the building so there's at least some isolation/separation across teams/site.

I kind of miss it, though more from being tired of only seeing my little suburban neighborhood and missing the bustle of down town. OTOH I have a splendid balcony to relax on, which I do quite often throughout the day -- that's something I don't have at the office, and will sorely miss once it all starts back up.

I was definitely having that issue of my home office being my "workshop" or whatever I'd want to call it, so my work day became my hobbies and I'd be in the same room for most of the day.

Can't remember if I mentioned on here, but at the end of April I changed my isolation location to my (relatively new) girlfriend's house. Made a "bubble" before it was allowed I guess. She's furloughed and was living alone, I was WFH and living alone. My mental health was definitely suffering being on my own with effectively no human contact at all. There's a chance she may return to work next month after today's announcements (at a guess) so I'll move back home at that point then return to the seeing each other like we had before that.

She's had the threat of redundancy which obviously isn't good at all. I think the first couple of months have been as okay as they can be for her as we knew it wouldn't be over quickly so she concentrated on hobbies and enjoying the sun, but with the potential redundancy and the lack of clarity on her place reopening (she works at a National Trust site which is on the last phase for reopening) it's made the recent couple of weeks more difficult.

We have a daily video call for the office staff/management team. Then after that my team have have a smaller video call. Definitely getting similar feelings as you from some colleagues, one said basically the same with regards to just being able to get in his car and drive to work, misses that. Also the days when WFH can extend more than they should.

Still don't envy anyone doing this with young kids.

(hug)

Aye, I've got two kids running around the house. 

I'm pretty sure they're mine. :|

Getting them to do any school work is tricky, when I'm at home with them. I can't really get away from my desk for any length of time during the working day, a lot of what I do relies on being on the phone. 

It has been easier over the past few weeks, Clare's a teacher and has only been in 2 days a week, so they've been able to catch up with work when she's been at home, but she's back to work full time now. I really don't want to send the kids to school (even though we've both got key worker status), for their sake and mine. So we're going to give them work to do during the day, but once they finish it, they kinda have to slob around until we both finish work. 

We've technically stopped the whole bubble thing over here - our Level 1 precautions mean life is back to normal but the borders are closed to non-residents/citizens, and anyone who does fly in is isolated in a hotel for 2 weeks. There's been a big shouting match recently because it turns out people were allowed to leave the isolation early (on compassionate grounds, mainly, but sometimes just for the hell of it, it seems), and a lot of those people weren't tested before or even during their government-mandated hotel stay. They've put the army in charge of it now, and things seem to be running much more to plan.

Since there's no official requirement for social distancing any more, work is also back to normal. We've been getting very mixed messages from our management - "You all did really well during lockdown and have proved that we can work remotely and still bring in new business" and "Everyone is encouraged to be back in the office, because face to face interaction is very important" and "Keep using our fantastic video conferencing technology to talk to your colleagues and customers, because we've proved we don't have to be in the same room to be effective and productive".

Personally, I enjoyed working from home and not having to go and deal with people all the time, but at the same time I kind of missed the personal contact a little bit. I'm hoping that when management finally get round to making a formal decision on the company's new position on remote working, that I'll be able to spend half the week at home, and the other half of the week in the office reminding myself how much I despise my colleagues and how happy I am at home.

Mind you, I'd also like it to go back to how quiet it was during lockdown. Especially given how close I live to a motorway at the moment.

I've said this a few times over the years and I don't think people believe me, but WFH isn't all that for all people.

I did a year of primary WFH back in 2016 and really didn't get on with it. I did it again last year, but with a proper office (Proper desk, multi monitors etc) and it was better but by the end I realised that I'm just more suited to being with people. Ironically, I was actually looking forward to getting a new contract which would likely be office based - then COVID happened.

The option of WFH is great, not driving 90 minutes or something is great but I need the balance. You can do lots of things to improve WFH and for some/many people it might be enough.