Weeknote 15: Pyramid training (Week 16, 2018)

Posted on By Mark Wilson
This content is 7 years old. I don't routinely update old blog posts as they are only intended to represent a view at a particular point in time. Please be warned that the information here may be out of date.

This week has been pyramid-shaped:

  • Monday: start work on Customer A’s End User Computing Strategy.
  • Tuesday: work on Customer B’s Surface/Windows 10 rollout (I’ve stopped pretending that it’s anything to do with a “Modern Workplace” because it’s completely technology-focused). Then, up to Stafford ready for Wednesday’s team meeting and an opportunity for dinner at The Market Vaults (great “dirty burger” and real ale).
  • Wednesday: Team Meeting – opportunity to catch up with my fellow Architects (we’re generally working on different projects so always good to get together). Second trip to the Market Vaults in as many days…
  • Thursday: Back with customer B, then over to the Microsoft Cloud User Group meeting in Birmingham.
  • Friday: trying to write customer A’s strategy but in reality dealing with customer B’s “issues” (and politics). Then, spend the evening at the local “urgent care centre” after my youngest son bangs and cuts his head on a wall whilst playing Xbox (3-4 hour wait means “urgent” is a relative term in an under-funded NHS)… anyway, playing on the Xbox is clearly a dangerous activity!

In other news, I finally managed to get my turbo trainer back to Wiggle using the Asda To You service. It’s a simple but smart solution and a great example of diversification where otherwise near-empty supermarket trucks take parcels from stores to the central distribution hub. Advantages include local drop-off for customers, extra revenue for the supermarket and empty truck space gets used (with the consequential effect of fewer trucks on the road). And they’ll take parcels up to 25kg.

I need to wait for Wiggle and Tacx to work out what’s wrong with my trainer and repair or replace now (so no Zwifting) but at least the sun is shining so I can ride my bike outside…

Talking of sunshine, I wish this was one of my pictures but one local photographer/drone pilot grabbed a shot of Olney in this week’s sunshine:

The rest of the weekend will include a road bike ride, then another attempt at the towpath MTB training with my eldest son (last time we attempted that ride a big puncture ended play), checking out a car boot sale as a potential opportunity to sell some of the contents of our loft – and taking my Mum for afternoon tea as a belated 70th birthday present.

I’ll wrap up this week’s post with another Instagram shot… these road markings amused me as I navigated Birmingham’s one-way system on Thursday evening…