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On study days
February 2nd, 2010
Today I was on a full-day study day for work. Other than saying that it was better than I was expecting I’m not going to talk about the contents of the day, for I have more weighty (literally) matters to discuss.
I was amused that, just like when I was a health visitor in London, colleagues’ estimation of study days always seem to revolve round food. When I mentioned to one of my colleagues yesterday that I was going on this study day today, she asked where it was, and when I told her her first reply was “oh I’ve been on a study day there, they’ve got a great cafe!” (which I am delighted to report is true. They also served biscuits and pastries mid-morning and mid-afternoon which was a definite bonus). I remember in the past when we were asked to attend some boring meeting or other, the first question was almost never “how will this improve my practice/the service/etc” but instead almost always “will there be biscuits?”
It’s like I’ve been saying to my new colleagues. Health visiting is health visiting, wherever in the country you happen to do it 
[In academia it was generally the 2nd topic of discussion. They did usually manage to say "interesting lecture" or somesuch before commenting on the standard of catering].
test Filed under food, nursing | Tags: study day | Comments (2)2 Responses to “On study days”
so true! We have a meeting of some bigwigs coming up from Hobart next week .. the first thing that popped into my head after the appointment popped into my inbox is … I wonder who’s catering? And I hope it isn’t who we had last time ’cause they bit the big one!
I loved this post so much! It seems silly but I think this is actually our more sensible animal side reasserting itself. I’ve often been asked how I’m enjoying a training course or a job and even before I think “am I making a difference” I think about the environment – the people, the heating, the biscuits. I used to feel strange and childish for thinking this way but I suspect I was just struggling to take things like that for granted – we *should* enjoy the bizarre levels of comfort we have, it would be pretty insulting to the cold and the hungry if we didn’t!