14th April 2024 to 19th April 2024 - Returning to Work

 Good morning folks,

It has been a week since my last update, for which I wholeheartedly apologise. After my 2-week break from work I returned and suddenly realised I needed to make some adjustments to my life in order to fit in doing these daily updates.

I have spent the week doing that, and going forward from now I shall endeavour to post daily updates. For now though, in order to make sure the days are all accounted for, let me give you a breakdown of everything that has happened over the last few days.

Sunday 14th April 2024

I registered my Nintendo Switch and downloaded Pokemon Home. This is in preparation of beginning to play the new Pokemon games so that, I can finally, begin to catch them all. I got a free Pikachu to get me started too!

In the afternoon I travelled to Darlington to referee a cup semi final between Darlington Spraire Ladies and Durham City Ladies. It was a brilliant game, and although the scoreline of 6-1 doesn’t suggest it, it was a very end-to-end game. Darlington just took their chances, and I, as the referee, tried my best to keep the game flowing.

And on the way back home I stopped in at my mum’s once again to collect more belongings. Yet more DVDs, games and books have made their way to my home to be sorted. I then spend the rest of the day with the family watching some shows on Netflix - Ultimate Beastmaster, Physical 100, and After Life.

Monday 15th April 2024

Today I returned to work for the final term of the school academic year. I work as a school IT Technician and Digital Support for the Tees Valley Teaching School Hub (basically, if there is a problem and I can use my expertise in software and technology to fix it or build a solution, I do exactly that!).

I had 39 emails to respond to, which involved logging into various computer systems to check that information was accurate and then do some work around that, which took a couple of hours to sort out. I had a finance spreadsheet to set up to allow the Hub to work out various budgets for work going forward, setting it up in such a way it could display data from schools, areas, and school trusts. I then had another spreadsheet, which I had created last year, which calculated the costs for running the school nursery. It was using last years figures, and I needed to adjust some of the macros I had used to make the spreadsheet function like a piece of software, so I updated the figures and tweaked the spreadsheet a little.

All in all it was a very data driven day, and I spent far too much time in front of a computer. I broke up the day by making sure I took every opportunity to stand and stretch, otherwise my body became stiff and creaky.

After the working day I drove home and made tea, which was a lovely sausage roll, chips and vegetables, an ideal meal for when you are just getting in from work and getting back into a routine. I then spent the evening submitting my application for referee promotion, going up from Level 5 to Level 4, which involved doing an online test, making sure my record of games was up to date, and ensuring I had met all of the criteria, which I had. It is now a waiting game of a couple of months to see if my application is successful.

Tuesday 16th April 2024

Further adding to my daily work routine, I cycled to work today. I usually cycle to work unless I have some equipment to take in or I need to travel to another school.

Upon getting to work I had a laptop that needed setting up so that a member of staff could access our school wifi, emails, cloud and printer, so I spent an hour getting that sorted out.

I had another computer that needed adding to the school domain after it had been downgraded from Windows 11 and Windows 10 (our Trust wants all our computers to be Windows 10 as they have policies in place for it and want consistency). There were a few technician issues in getting this particular PC downgraded. The Windows 10 image I had been supplied by the Trust didn’t initially have the Network Controller installed, so I had to download it manually and have it patched in, be we got around that and continued on. I also need to download the RAID service in the PC’s BIOS settings, otherwise I couldn’t access the SSD’s to install the OS, but again, this was ultimately sorted out.

I then returned back to my Teaching School Hub duties and carried on with more spreadsheet and admin work, dealing with queries we received via email, and just generally keeping everything ticking along as it should be.

I cycled back home and made a rather spectacular Fish and Chips meal, adding Black Pepper to the Fillets to really give it a kick. It went down well in the house, so I think we will have that again. The day ended with me finishing off watching Season 1 of Physical 100 on Netflix, which was just incredible. So many strong bodies, it has giving me the motivation to want to get in shape!

Wednesday 17th April 2024

It was time to put the Wheelie Bin out at last! Our decluttering during the 2-week holiday from work meant our bins had been fairly full for far too long, and I took great pleasure in putting the bin out, knowing that when I returned from work it would be empty and all the rubbish would finally be gone.

The phone lines at work were down when I arrived. A BT engineer had to come in as they had detected the issue. After a couple of hours working with the engineer, who had to check the line coming in and go up the wooden pole outside the school, it turned out the wire had been crushed by another company installing some new equipment on the pole. He had to replace our telephone wire coming into the building. What a nightmare! But I am happy to report that, by 2pm, our line was back up and running.

I had more spreadsheet work to do involving finance, so got on with that. I’m fairly confident the spreadsheet is perfect now, and all of my formulas, which annoyingly I had to create manually as the cell ranges were all different, is going to work well.

Our Year 3 class was using the school iPads, only to realise the version of iMove they wanted to use wasn’t working. The teacher was showing the kids how to edit movies using a stop-motion animation they had used previously, but iMovie kept prompting them to sign in. I had to contact our Trust, who manage the iPad apps, and ask them to download the correct iMove app. Turns out we had accidentally been using the personal version, which now requires you to sign in to use, so we swapped it for the educational version, which worked perfectly.

Overall it was a rather busy day involving both physical and mental work. I was happy to head home at the end of the day, and made a rather epic Stir Fry for everyone. I also needed to pick Fearne up from her dance lesson, and we spent the evening playing silly card games and watching nonsensical TV.

Thursday 18th April 2024

With my Hub Finance spreadsheet now completed, it immediately needed to be adjusted as we had some new trainee teachers registering with us for the new school term. I had to add them to our computer systems, and then add them to the finance spreadsheet.

6 people needed adding, which involved adjusting around 18 formulas, which had suddenly all become one cell out of range. I tweaked them, which became quite relaxing as I could just focus on doing that one job, and watched with great delight as the spreadsheet I had spent a good few hours setting up over the last few days worked brilliantly. I metaphorically gave myself a pat on the shoulder. I love a functioning spreadsheet!

The rest of my day was spent setting up laptops for lessons, and helping staff out with general IT issues they were having. Nothing special to report, just me helping people use computers efficiently.

In the evening I had a football match to referee in Durham between Durham City Ladies, the same team from the weekend, and Wear United Woman. The rain stopped as I arrived for the game and it ended up being a lovely game. I got home and had a bath, put Fearne to bed, and my own head hit the pillow just after midnight. I was exhausted!

Friday 19th April 2024

Still aching after my match last night I cycled into work. It actually proved to be just what I needed, the movement of the legs while pedalling actually eased the pain.

I got to work just as assembly was starting, and spent a lovely half an hour listening to ways in which the kids at school had ‘been in the presence of Jesus’, as we celebrated all of the kindness each other had shown to one another during the week. It was lovely to listen to.

Yet more admin work ensued as people contacted the Hub either via the phones or email, all needing either general advice or guidance. I also had the chance to add another downgraded PC to the Trust domain, and overall it was just a standardly busy day at work helping people out and looking after various pieces of software and technology.

In the evening my Freemason’s buddies were meeting up for an Indian meal at a look restaurant, so with the blessing of Juli and Fearne, I headed off to meet them. I had a Lamb Rogan curry, which was just right for me. Not spicy, but it was lovely.

I got home just before 11pm, put Fearne to bed (she had fell asleep on the couch) and headed to bed too. I was still full from food so couldn’t sleep, so I watched an Episode of Mr Robot, S1 E7, before finally calling it a night.

You are now all officially up to date!