May be around less than I planned......

[kenny mac]

What a guy you are Nigel, I'm amazed by the good will of some people in this horrible war.
There are some horrible people out there feeding on this but people like you restore my faith in humanity.
Stay safe.

[chapperz66]

Nice one Nigel. I hope you are able to do your thing remotely.

My wife is heavily involved in organising this in our town.  Apparently as a local government manager she is a silver commander in emergency planning.  Sounds a bit like something from Blake's 7, but in reality it is a big thing at the moment.  Because of my health she is having to try and do it from home.

[alfstone]

Nice one Nigel. I hope you are able to do your thing remotely.

Yes, I agree 100%, this is extremely important. Try do do your job remotely, try not to meet people (no meetings etc.), and only is absolutely necessary, NEVER without plastic gloves, surgical mask and plastic cover for glasses.

Alfredo

[TPB]

Helping others that is part of being a community stay safe brother
Tim

[Ferryman]

Hi all, just checking in quick to say thanks for the kind words. I'm totally safe, everything I am doing is back office admin and just time-consuming. Things should settle down over the next week as we get the systems up and running. I never thought that a career spent working with boring accounting and business systems would actually be of value in a crisis situation! Spreadsheet skills are also of some use it tuns out. Who knew?

However, I am more in awe of all the volunteers that will actually be packing and delivering all the food boxes. They are far more at risk than me.

I should be back to reasonably regular participation in a week or so, stay safe everyone.

[cuthbert]

I've been a bit subdued the past few weeks seeing some of the less pleasant behaviors on display, either directly or in the news. It is stories like yours that renew my faith in humanity. Bless you for the help you're giving to others .

[Ferryman]

And I'm back in the room. After several days of non-stop spreadsheet writing and systems testing, we have everything in place so I should have some spare time now, unless I get pulled into anything else. So there will be some comments and maybe even some music from me.....

I've been a bit subdued the past few weeks seeing some of the less pleasant behaviors on display, either directly or in the news. It is stories like yours that renew my faith in humanity. Bless you for the help you're giving to others .

This volunteer group is amazing, and really restores you faith in humanity. Just one story - a someone rang the helpline concerned about their neighbour. The volunteer group tried to contact them and could not, tried social services and the police but they wouldn't help as the person was not registered as vulnerable, so one of the volunteers went back to the house and was finally able to raise the person. They were elderly, had basically been in bed and had not eaten for three days. They now have a dedicated volunteer supporting them who cooks meals for them and takes them round to them.

Although there are some unpleasant people out there, it's good to know the pleasant ones way outnumber them.

And for the IT people out there, it's the Cloud to the rescue. All of this is enabled through a cloud-based workgroup app (Slack), a digital commerce platform (Shopify) and good old Google Sheets, Forms and Docs.

[Greeny]

It's great to hear positive stories like this (not someone being sick & unattended obviously, but the response to deal with it...).

Thankyou Nigel.

I'm not the biggest optimist in the world  but I do believe this dark episode will have a positive and lasting impact on communities and human relationships. It will make it more like Songcrafters 

We use Slack for all our work comms & use shared Google docs - everything is in the cloud and accessible from anywhere, which means our adjustment to remote working has been easy. Physically at least. Mentally is another matter. But it's a great tool - with a horrible name!

[cuthbert]

This volunteer group is amazing, and really restores you faith in humanity. Just one story - a someone rang the helpline concerned about their neighbour. The volunteer group tried to contact them and could not, tried social services and the police but they wouldn't help as the person was not registered as vulnerable, so one of the volunteers went back to the house and was finally able to raise the person. They were elderly, had basically been in bed and had not eaten for three days. They now have a dedicated volunteer supporting them who cooks meals for them and takes them round to them.

Although there are some unpleasant people out there, it's good to know the pleasant ones way outnumber them.

That is truly wonderful to hear, Nigel - your volunteer group is making a positive difference for those who are suffering. If we can all pull together, we can get through this with much better outcomes.