Last week saw me visit the office for only the second time since March 20. I’d had one visit for a simple reboot- just a few minutes- but this was approaching a day onsite, to assemble 2 servers, rack one, and configure iLO, so the rest of the work could be done remotely.

This made for a problem, because racking a DL380 isn’t a one person job (while you can easily lift one, positioning it on the rails is fiddly), but with all the Health and Safety obligations covered, a colleague and I attended, and got the job done.

We saw a few colleagues: while most of my job can be done from the nerve-centre that is my dining table, not everyone’s is like that. Grounds and buildings need looking after. Post needs dealing with, and some admin tasks rely on files or equipment that are onsite, so working patterns have varied according to role.

That’s quite interesting as several of our prominent politicians and one notably fuckwitted “celebrity” over-privileged “property developer” have been saying it is “time to get back to work”, seemingly forgetting that while there are people furloughed at home, some people never stopped going to work, thousands of us worked from home, and many people have combined work at home with attending a workplace, and this sort of shit isn’t helpful. The working world should, and has to change, and not just because of Covid. The whole idea of people travelling in order to use a PC and a phone is mental, really, and claiming that people will only work if actually present in an office is a pretty poor management attitude.

I certainly hadn’t missed the commute: the journey there for a 10am start was easy and quick, but coming back, despite the fact that Oldbury Viaduct is finished now, still involved a delay, and having got used to not sitting in traffic, it’s not something I’d be looking to return to.