

But, being in a job where I’m often in bunker mode – and having practised social distancing since my first school disco – I’ve got a couple of suggestions for university staff struggling to adjust to it. Is that someone we saw sneeze and miss their elbow? Is that nipping in my chest the virus, last night’s jalfrezi or just DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness, since you ask) after yesterday’s push-ups? But now our camera system is like a wall of postcards – nothing moving except the gulls and our own imaginations. I was watching students adjust earbuds, zooming in on would-be intruders. Before all the shops put “sorry, we’re closed” signs in their windows, campus CCTV was its usual mosaic of activity. What should they do? I read them the recommendation from the NHS Covid-19 page, then told them to watch the internet clip in which Alan Partridge demonstrates a contactless way of using a train toilet.Ī week down the line, and the jokes are harder to find. I read him the prepared statement that we’ve got taped to our monitor, then told him what I’d do if it was my kid getting panicked.Īnother call came from two of our student nurses, who are on placement in a ward with two suspected coronavirus cases. Someone who did phone us lately was a dad in Croatia, anxious that his son would jeopardise his degree if he went home before an official lockdown was announced. Just pick up the phone – we will even waive the standard engagement fee of a packet of biscuits for when you want an ear to bend. If any of them are reading this, you’re welcome to chat to us. Behind closed doors in halls are the international students who couldn’t get a flight home. Of course, security aren’t the only people still on campus. It’s so quiet that, last week, I wore a Soviet GP-5 gas mask while covering reception, but only managed to terrify two emergency engineers.

And we are left having to devise a new routine for ourselves as guards.īut now I’d quite welcome that level of excitement. To paraphrase Shackleton, “our lives are now dependent on the play of grim elementary forces”. We got one last email from on high – a request to stop issuing practice room keys to music students so we could limit cross-contamination via the mixing console – and then it was just us.Ī few days later, the prime minister closed all the pubs. Then a box of hand sanitiser was delivered to our counter, so precious that it felt like I was accepting a dowry. In security, our first taste of the pandemic was when we received a job lot of disposable gloves and binbags.

#Kids gas mask seesaw serial numbers
Covid-19 was striking and no one was reassured by the signs in toilets claiming that “the government and NHS are well prepared to deal with this virus” – these will be a collector’s item soon, like those £5 notes selling for thousands of pounds on eBay because their serial numbers begin “AK47”. A hurried email sent from a lecturer’s Samsung asking us to unlock their office and check that they’ve definitely logged off.
#Kids gas mask seesaw series
It’s a series of events that us campus guards can normally set their watches to.
