1 September, 2021

The country is back in a Covid-19 lock down so we’ve had a couple of weeks at home. My silver lining is that I’m being paid this time around. I ran out of creative enthusiasm after about a week and have been idling ever since working on small projects, providing students with feedback when they ask, and generally trying not to create too much make-work to make myself feel useful. Technically the courses I run operate quite well remotely and the keen students are well into it. Working in front of a computer full time again is really not doing it for me any more so at least I now know my interest in working in I.T. again is at full ebb.

A lot of small experiments and little projects to get some instant wins are the focus at the moment. Exploring short project ideas that introduce skills and tools quickly in moderately interesting contexts is allowing me to provide a wider range of students with learning opportunities. These small projects are also helping me stay sane as the larger more ambitious projects tend to take more brain power … something I seem to be in short supply of at the moment.

A couple of new opportunities have appeared on my radar this year. New directions and possible new work environments as I try to pull my working life back to something more local and more related to my interests. I have not enjoyed the year back in secondary teaching as I had hoped and in general the heavy administration load is taking away the excitement I usually find in the classroom. While that is a bit sad I guess things are always changing and as my interests and skills have changed it might be time for more reflection and a bit of a reset.

One of our little guinea pigs died last week. Jojo, the more active one seemed to just run out of steam. The other one seems to be quite happy on his own but I keep forgetting how much pets become part of our lives.