I woke up in London to heavy rain and sleet yesterday morning. It was, in a word, grim. And over the morning, it only seemed to get worse. At one point, it even started snowing!
I made it into my office, cursing myself on the DLR for not wearing more layers. I cranked up my office heating – which I can thankfully control – and set to work. After a couple of meetings, I realised there was no reason to stay in the office and decided to work from my home office for the rest of the day.
Cue traipsing through more sleet and biting wind to get back to the station and then home. The journey is only about thirty minutes, door to door, but it felt a lot longer.
And then, just after I had some late lunch, the sun re-appeared. I peered out of my study window and saw blue skies and blazing sun. It was incredible. So after dispatching a couple of important emails, I grabbed a few more layers, my hat and gloves and AirPods, and headed out for a walk.
I had an hour before my next online meeting, so I power-walked by the river to Wapping and back. This helped me get to my 10,000 steps goal and simultaneously exposed me to some mood-boosting sunshine.
My last call of the day ended at 6pm, and by then it was dark again. I was so glad I popped out to take advantage of the break in the weather. Another advantage to running your own business is that you can prioritise sunshine over a busy in-box!
Since I started working from home last month I too have came to realise the value of getting up and getting out when the rain clears. The only difference is my walking route is rural Kilkenny laneways, not London streets! I’m interested; if you are meeting clients online, is there a common meeting app of choice you can use? Or does it change from client to client? I’ve been in same company for 15 years and so we have a universal app in-house. How does videoconferencing work in the Big Bad World?
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Online meetings can take place via many apps…unfortunately! Preferred (and permitted!) apps differ, so I end up using a combination of Skype, Zoom and google hangouts. Zoom is by far the best. Skype, in my experience, the worst. I’m working on moving all existing clients to zoom but corporate IT policies differ widely, so it’s an ongoing battle…
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I actually have another related question for you, which I’ll DM you in Twitter for?
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