As instructed by the November Newsletter, I made contact with Tony B this evening. I decided to telephone him rather than email as it's the next best thing to seeing him face to face.
Having fulfilled my obligation, I thought I should check in here too. This whole malarkey has not really bothered me too much in that I am quite happy in my own perimeter with the few times daily dog walk and odd foray out to pick up groceries when needed although I imagine like many of us, the longer it goes on then the more we may miss the social aspect.
Nothing to report on the modelling front I'm afraid due in large part to work and also the lack of any decent length of time to get stuck into anything when I'm not at work. What time I could have had is broken up into bite sized pieces - wife, daughter or dog seen to be constantly craving my attention or needing help with one silly thing after another. Those of you with families who understand your need to be left in peace for a decent length of time to crack on with some meaningful plasticness are indeed fortunate.
I had set up a folding table in the front room which is nice and light so I could do a bit of modelling of an evening and be in the same room as DCOS but as I had such a rare chance to do this I've been told I need to move back to my bench in the so called hobbies room at the back of the house which is in constant shadow and not somewhere I enjoy being so much, particularly as my old hi-fi broke and I had no radio for company. Anyhow, I have moved the one from my home office down there now and will have a good sort out tomorrow (I am on leave this week but, surprise surprise have had no time to myself so far!) which will hopefully motivate me to finish off that Lavochkin diorama! Then chat with Tony certainly helped I think as even though I prefer my own company most of the time, I do look forward to our monthly meetings - especially when we get the chance of a good bit of social time.
I am enjoying the new look IPMS magazine with the section devoted to a model gallery and I do that continues. I get the local weekly Gazette from my local paper shop and I've now ordered Fine Scale Model(l)er and Airfix Model World magazines too as it gives me the opportunity to get out of the house and walk along the sea front to as often as possible to see if there is a new edition out yet.
As far as work goes, I have been WFH since 16 March (and if you have also been doing this, don't forget to put in you claim for Tax Relief on this if you are eligible) and all of us in the Hub have been putting an immense amount of hours in supporting the students. The academic year never really came to an end this time around and overlapped with the current year due to the extra time they had been given to make their coursework submissions.
The new year started in September with quite a lot of the new students coming to Campus and I was asked if I would man the Hub stand at the two week Welcome Fest for two days each week. That sort of thing, as you probably know, is right up my street and I was the first choice anyway so it's as well I said yes and after 8 months of WFH the welcome change of scenery was much needed. We are split into 3 small teams now and so do one week on Campus and two weeks at home. I was in the third team but being in the first two weeks as well meant I have been the only member of the Hub to see all the crew, something I'm very grateful.
I hope this maybe starts a little thread off about how YOU are all doing and what you've been up to besides modelling...
