Week 23: 30 August — 5 September 2020
Sunday 30 August
Veggie breakfast in a box inside the Pear Orchard and after that a relaxing day, so not much to report today!
Monday 31 August
After a 19km cycle, we tackled some gardening jobs, which was mega hard work, but very satisfying to get these outstanding jobs done. Clair nearly chopped down a tree. 😂
Also started a new regime, tracking my daily calorie intake in order to shift some lockdown weight gain. Clair discovered through her personal trainer a brilliant app, called Nutracheck. This is the first time in my life that I will be able to accurately check calories in and an appropriate level in order to allow weight loss. Looking forward to knowing what will happen in a month’s time. Yes it does cost (£29.99 for a year) and it’s a U.K. app only no cups, ounces or any USA terms.
Tuesday 1 September
Oh dear LinkedIn is becoming a spam fest. First I had the rogue recruitment consultant (male) pitching me and now a marketing professional (female) pitching me.
(😖)
First she sent me this very nice invitation. She must know the workings of LinkedIn well because I have replaced my ‘connect’ button with a ‘follow’ button only. This means she has to click on the ‘more’ button and also know how to send a personalised invitation. Here’s the invitation:
Hey there Michael! I’m impressed with your background and it looks like we have some shared contacts and professional interests. I’d be honored if you would connect with me.
This was about a week ago. I agonised over whether to connect with her or not, you just never know these days. I’ve even written this at the bottom of my profile summary, but I bet she didn’t read it.
Note: Since the advent of Covid19 I have definitely changed my willingness to accept total strangers into my network. I have indeed become more suspicious of people’s motives for connecting. It’s going to be a tough few years for everyone, so taking advantage of people’s networks or prospecting and pitching to them in the way that some folks are doing is a real shame.
And then the pitch came, literally within seconds of me accepting the connection request.
Michael — Thanks so much for the connection! I’m not sure if you looked at my profile, but I distribute a self-contained, screening COVID-19 Booth that can be used for multiple scenarios. Some applications are:
- COVID19 testing in urban areas
- Replacement of drive-through COVID19 testing, as proven to be faster with a new patient ever 5–7 minutes
- Pop-up Flu Jab admin and ability to create an outdoor area to reduce risks for elderly population
- A few can be joined together, to create a walk-through screening area into events, stadiums, attractions, etc.
It’s on wheels, doesn’t require PPE and completely protects healthcare workers, giving them peace of mind. There are already 100+ deployed in the field. Doctors have said it speeds up the testing processes. I don’t know if you are the correct person to reach out to?
You can see product videos and case studies at…
So I’m not naming and shaming the individual or company this time, unlike my previous action on the recruitment consultant, but maybe sharing the invitation and the response will mean you are forewarned about how desperate people are because of the blasted pandemic.
After I received this I responded with…
Unbelievable (name). You didn’t struck me as someone who would do this. Wish you success.
And the response back was…
Thank you Michael. I’m try my best. My parents are stuck in Texas self isolating since March. I’m very worried about the situation so my brother and I got together to see if we could do something that would increase testing. This is what we came up with.
Seriously? That’s the best excuse?
Wednesday 2 September
My mother-in-law’s roof being repaired today, great news!!
Another awesome video by Donald Trump!
[embed]https://youtu.be/D1iwuYdGEGA[/embed]
More campaigning by The Lincoln Project.
[embed]https://youtu.be/83YL2jg-PPQ[/embed]
Thursday 3 September
Everyone’s trying to survive on this planet Covid for as long as they can, but what if there’s a better time no longer here? I wonder about this often!
When it comes to business this article talk about start-ups needing to collaborate, but why?
[embed]https://apple.news/AYqafTHYoTs6FX0YZmUTP3Q[/embed]
Oh dear the cracks are already forming for Boris. How long he will stay as PM in the U.K. is anyone’s guess, but the slippery road to the end has started already.
[embed]https://twitter.com/JohnJCrace/status/1301186514852999170?s=20[/embed]
20-minute Covid19 tests? Now this would be groundbreaking but which country would be first? Definitely not the U.K.
[embed]https://apple.news/AYqafTHYoTs6FX0YZmUTP3Q[/embed]
Matt Hancock has definitely become public enemy number 1. He’s just the worst of British in my view, coming from a Dutchman who has lived in the UK for over 43 years!
[embed]https://twitter.com/Mistywoman1/status/1301410867263803393?s=20[/embed]
[embed]https://twitter.com/fionas64/status/1301422482877042688?s=20[/embed]
[embed]https://twitter.com/richard_figg/status/1301457999530274817?s=20[/embed]
[embed]https://twitter.com/BrexitBuster/status/1301460428938190849?s=20[/embed]
Trump is the worst President in history and now he slams war heroes too? That man just has to go!
[embed]https://twitter.com/TheAtlantic/status/1301642301656137730?s=20[/embed]
[embed]https://apple.news/AYqafTHYoTs6FX0YZmUTP3Q[/embed]
Friday 4 September
Dettol takes over the London Underground and getting some free Twitter coverage to boot!
https://twitter.com/helloalegria/status/1301290315593191426?s=20
The full image is below with different text this time!
So someone commented on one of my Quora posts from a few years back, which was a brilliant story!
https://www.quora.com/Can-we-know-who-unfollwed-me-on-LinkedIn/answer/Michael-de-Groot
Oh wow. Dear Sir Ken Robinson. In this video published in May 2020 he compares the industrialisation of agriculture to the industrialisation in education. What a great comparison indeed.
[embed]https://youtu.be/QU4Q17t4muY[/embed]
Saturday 5 September
Carrying bricks to the recycling centre. After some kitchen improvements earlier this year, it meant we had a lot of very very heavy brick outside on our patio. I loaded them in the wheel barrow, lifted them in the back of my car, drove them to the recycling centre and lifted them one by one into the recycling bin for rubble. I did this twice in order to manage all the bricks!
Michael out for this week!