One third, two-thirds

The world is perceptively changing, now that we have been through the pandemic and are starting to emerge from it. I've heard from more than one source that a third of the people who have been forced to work from home are deciding to keep things that way and have no intention of going back. Our friend John in Arizona is one of these. Three of Chris' close colleagues have stopped going to work altogether, having handed in their notice. 

I'm hopeful that the roads will be less busy than they used to be during commuting hours.

My husband and my daughter in their respective jobs can't wait to be back on the work premises, because the home environment is so tiring / distracting, but I imagine that when they return they'll find it disturbingly different from what it used to be at the start of 2020. With a third of their colleagues missing from their desks, the offices will seem emptier, or may be filled with monitors showing the faces (or just the names) of those working from home. Chris never did like video conferences; he thinks they don't work. Our son George doesn't like working online either. He's at a virtual international conference this week with meetings to attend at 7 a.m., mid-day and in the middle of the night, in his time zone. That's tough. My friend Elva, also coordinating people right round the world and right round the clock these days, seems to have got used to it. She snatches moments of sleep when she can.

The experience of having to communicate online has affected clubs and volunteer organisations as well. Our CFUW-Ottawa Club is choosing to continue to use video technology for many of its meetings next season; our use of social media and (heaven help us) email has greatly increased too. Being the new "VP Communications" means I'm responsible for most of the Club's announcements and news updates from now on, so last week I spent time getting used to the log-on process and other protocol for our various communications tools: three Facebook pages, the Twitter feed, the admin pages of the Club's website (using Wild Apricot templates), with a different password and user name for each. I have been asked to learn about the use of hashtags and hyperlinked logos. We're also wondering about the potential of a LinkedIn account and I may experiment with a new blog or two.

This week I have spent far too many hours on these things. My German-speaking friends have their own Facebook page, as does the Environment Action group; being in charge of both groups, I feel obliged to keep up with those posts as well. Sometimes there are gratifying rewards, as last night, when Heidi, who used to be in our conversation group in when she lived in Ottawa 14 or so years ago, sent me a message out of the blue saying "I found you on Facebook..." I invited her to join our online Konversationsgruppe, and she responded: Gerne kannst Du mich in Eure Facebook-Gruppe aufnehmen. 

This morning our daughter was a panelist and EURAMET delegate at a conference on Metrology for a Globalised, Digital and Green Society. I didn't log on to hear her speak because that would have been at 5a.m. where I live. Apparently her message (as she joined in from her NPL office) was this:

We need an observation-based feedback loop as we respond to the challenges of climate change and that feedback loop relies on the quality of the observations. And we need to get that message to elected and unelected “policy makers” everywhere.