Fun with new offices

[selenay]

The snagging issues started to appear with the new offices today. The biggest, from a health and safety point of view, is probably also the daftest.

The architect who redesigned our office area is obviously a fan of natural light. He had all those nasty florescent overhead lights taken out and the empty ports neatly covered over. We have lovely big windows that are wonderful on a sunny day. What did the architect forget?

Replacement lights.

Yes, if the sun goes behind clouds or, god forbit, it gets dark outside as it is wont to do in the evenings, we have no lighting. Ah. Facilities sees our problem, apparently. They’re going to see whether they can rustle up a couple of stand-alone lamps. Not a terribly practical solution due to the layout of the office (my desk, for example, will still be quite dark), but it’s a step there. We’re hoping they sort it out before winter because we won’t have many hours of usable sunlight...

Of course, we did work out that we'd be forced to work very short hours in the winter if it isn't sorted out :-)

My beautiful new car is still nameless. I was leaning towards Dixie or Sarah-Jane, but my sister is Not Impressed by those suggestions (capitalisation important). So, no name. But she is a joy to drive :-)

My, I can get dull and aimless when I'm knackered.

Comments

[paranoidangel]

If that was me and my sister, being Not Impressed would automatically make one of those names the actual one. You could always call it SJ for short (J for second letters is really handy, cf CJ) and no-one would have to know what it was short for. Or indeed, if it was short for anything.

[riverfox.livejournal.com]

But she is a joy to drive :-)

*snickers* You could name her Joy. :-p

[gmul.livejournal.com]

Replacement lights
What is it with architects? purple_peril has just moved in to a new office and it's vey clear whoever designed it or the building as a whole wasn't going to have to work there either. We have an architects practise as a client although I don't know any of their buildings to be able to judge if they suffer the same problem!

The opposite problem here ...

[the-magician.livejournal.com]

... in that we've got lots of big windows allowing in far too much daylight (anyone who sits near a window gets an LCD monitor to help them actually see anything on their screen!) and we've got ugly dangling flourescent lighting ... some people have asked about being able to switch off the lights above their desk and were told that facility management takes their tasks very seriously. That there's a legal minimum lux that needs to be present on a desk, and that if the lights above are off, then when the sun goes in, winter arrives, evening draws on etc. that the lighting may be below the minimum level for someone on that strip of (switched off) lighting. So we're stuck with the lights on.

Still, it's a gorgeous day out there!

[selenay]

*g* SJ does have a certain amount of appeal, but I suspect mainly because you mentioned CJ in the same sentence! :-))

[selenay]

*snort*

[selenay]

I think architects have been over-influenced by the Blue Sky thinking concepts - big on ideas, not so hot on practicalities. These places are never designed by the people who have to work in them. They'd definitely be more sensible, with better facilities and more logic to the design if they were!

I turns out that we have no microwave anywhere in the building :-( Our 'kitchen' is just a room with vending machines. Not even a sink. Bleh.

Re: The opposite problem here ...

[selenay]

I hadn't realised how annoying the opposite problem could be! Obviously none of these facilities guys think through what it will be like for people working in these offices :-( Otherwise everything would be much more sensible.

You'd think having the correct lighting levels available, and it be your choice as to what you use, would satisfy health and safety, wouldn't you?

But I got to spend plenty of time looking out of the window at the gorgeous day :-)