It could be the route cause of my fatigue though!
The one arm hangs didn’t go well. I need unwieldy amounts of assistance if I use a counterbalance. Need to rethink this: scales or perhaps a larger edge as tt is doing? Work continues... classic email from the VC this week: three paragraphs on what a wonderful job we were doing in troubled times blah blah blah, fourth paragraph telling us our pay rise will be frozen this year. It’s the little things you remember. This is probably a sign of things to come: most UK Universities will be bracing themselves for redundancies in the next 3-4 months. We have few overseas students and the “optics” of cutting a health professions course wouldn’t be good so I imagine we’re safer than most.
Quote from: duncan on April 27, 2020, 10:05:44 pmThe one arm hangs didn’t go well. I need unwieldy amounts of assistance if I use a counterbalance. Need to rethink this: scales or perhaps a larger edge as tt is doing? Work continues... classic email from the VC this week: three paragraphs on what a wonderful job we were doing in troubled times blah blah blah, fourth paragraph telling us our pay rise will be frozen this year. It’s the little things you remember. This is probably a sign of things to come: most UK Universities will be bracing themselves for redundancies in the next 3-4 months. We have few overseas students and the “optics” of cutting a health professions course wouldn’t be good so I imagine we’re safer than most. Stick with it Duncan (on both issues...) for the 1 arm hangs - I deliberately used the larger hold to get my shoulder and arm used to the position. I'm due another set today and may start later this week moving to a smaller hold and seeing how shit I actually am! Though - I loved being able to keep an arm bent but one of the moments I enjoyed alot was (with assist) after a couple of weeks being able to gently twist around with bent arm etc.. a completely new body movement that felt rather like learning to walk etc.. Body - turn around so I can see the timer - and it did!! Anyway - I've had pulley systems before etc.. and always found the pull/pushing down with one arm really weird. The foot loop assistance was much easier for me to use (for me with therabands - though could be with a pulley). I 'calibrated' my therabands using a digital equiv of a spring balance (handheld - used for airport baggage weight) lying on the floor pulling the loop down :D The downside of therabands is that they work for 1 arm hangs (like I'm doing) but for one arm pullup training the assist suddenly drops off as you get towards 90 degrees!!Work wise - I'm kind of in denial. I'm effectively working 1.5 days a week at the moment and its total firefighting with editing roles, student supervision and the dregs of teaching (oh - and the marking I'm ignoring for now). Fuck knows what will happen in Sept - its clear from our missives on high no-one really knows. We too have very few OS students so those losses will be minimal - but we already had bad admissions figures domestically and I can't see these getting better. I also fail to see how we can have new students arriving in September. Social distancing in lecture theatres, for teaching, labs etc.. is hard - but workable. However - getting 10k students all together in one place from all over the country would seem to be epidemiologically dumb. Freshers flu etc... but with CV19 attached... Unless something changes dramatically in the next 4.5 months - its going to be virtual semester 1. I'm mercifully being seconded into a research role for 2-3 years - but that counts for nothing if the whole instutution goes to the wall - which is certainly a possibility. We already had a £20m deficit and were just starting the compulsory redundancy rounds after two voluntary.
Thanks TT. I’m sticking with one arm hangs. I’m fine pulling down with the other arm but manoeuvring the 30kg counterbalance I need for a 20mm edge felt like a risk to floorboards and toes. I’ll try a bigger hold and perhaps the bathroom scales.
Quote from: tomtom on April 28, 2020, 11:45:45 amQuote from: duncan on April 27, 2020, 10:05:44 pmThe one arm hangs didn’t go well. I need unwieldy amounts of assistance if I use a counterbalance. Need to rethink this: scales or perhaps a larger edge as tt is doing? Work continues... classic email from the VC this week: three paragraphs on what a wonderful job we were doing in troubled times blah blah blah, fourth paragraph telling us our pay rise will be frozen this year. It’s the little things you remember. This is probably a sign of things to come: most UK Universities will be bracing themselves for redundancies in the next 3-4 months. We have few overseas students and the “optics” of cutting a health professions course wouldn’t be good so I imagine we’re safer than most. Stick with it Duncan (on both issues...) for the 1 arm hangs - I deliberately used the larger hold to get my shoulder and arm used to the position. I'm due another set today and may start later this week moving to a smaller hold and seeing how shit I actually am! Though - I loved being able to keep an arm bent but one of the moments I enjoyed alot was (with assist) after a couple of weeks being able to gently twist around with bent arm etc.. a completely new body movement that felt rather like learning to walk etc.. Body - turn around so I can see the timer - and it did!! Anyway - I've had pulley systems before etc.. and always found the pull/pushing down with one arm really weird. The foot loop assistance was much easier for me to use (for me with therabands - though could be with a pulley). I 'calibrated' my therabands using a digital equiv of a spring balance (handheld - used for airport baggage weight) lying on the floor pulling the loop down :D The downside of therabands is that they work for 1 arm hangs (like I'm doing) but for one arm pullup training the assist suddenly drops off as you get towards 90 degrees!!Work wise - I'm kind of in denial. I'm effectively working 1.5 days a week at the moment and its total firefighting with editing roles, student supervision and the dregs of teaching (oh - and the marking I'm ignoring for now). Fuck knows what will happen in Sept - its clear from our missives on high no-one really knows. We too have very few OS students so those losses will be minimal - but we already had bad admissions figures domestically and I can't see these getting better. I also fail to see how we can have new students arriving in September. Social distancing in lecture theatres, for teaching, labs etc.. is hard - but workable. However - getting 10k students all together in one place from all over the country would seem to be epidemiologically dumb. Freshers flu etc... but with CV19 attached... Unless something changes dramatically in the next 4.5 months - its going to be virtual semester 1. I'm mercifully being seconded into a research role for 2-3 years - but that counts for nothing if the whole instutution goes to the wall - which is certainly a possibility. We already had a £20m deficit and were just starting the compulsory redundancy rounds after two voluntary.Thanks TT. I’m sticking with one arm hangs. I’m fine pulling down with the other arm but manoeuvring the 30kg counterbalance I need for a 20mm edge felt like a risk to floorboards and toes. I’ll try a bigger hold and perhaps the bathroom scales. I'm thankful my job in some form seems relatively secure in the short term and this crisis will probably increase interest in health-related degrees in the medium term. Our leadership also appears to be in denial about what will happen in September: we’re being asked to simultaneously plan timetables as if 100 new students will be doing lectures and practicals (ha!) whilst also preparing for everything to go online. The latter seem more likely though If I was 18 I’d be thinking 20/21 would be an excellent time to do a gap year somewhere safer than London (China perhaps?). I wouldn’t be thinking of paying £9000 for an online course, the relative failure of MOOCs proved you couldn’t even give them away. The UK university strategy of the last 20 years - mortgaging themselves for £billions to enhance the ‘student experience’ with luxury real estate whilst casualising the teachers - suggests the leadership don’t believe this either. Someone, somewhere, must be planning what we to do if 50% don't turn up but it's probably seen as too shocking to share with the troops. It feels like the UK University bubble economy is about to burst and if I was exposed, a student landlord for example, I might be examining my portfolio.
I also feel a bit sorry for kids in their final year at a school. When I picked my kids up from school on the day lockdown started the P7s were having a half hearted attempt at a celebration of what was probably their last day of primary school. No last term with their mates, no leaving concert, no prom, no residential trip to the Cairgorms.
I fully expect graduate recruitment will be largely non existent this summer
Quote from: tomtom on April 30, 2020, 01:10:58 pmI fully expect graduate recruitment will be largely non existent this summer We aren't doing a graduate / placement scheme this year, but that is more current state of the industry driven than anything else.