| Give a man a computer – a month at Toybox |
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Someone said this week: “If you give a man a meal it will feed him for a day, if you teach him to fish he can feed himself forever. But if you give a man a computer…. you won’t see him for several weeks….” I’m going to ‘blog’ about my month from mid May to mid June 2011.
Where do I start? Let’s kick off with some background. I am married to Beverley and we have two adult children, Rebecca and Andrew. Rebecca started working in London this week, for the MP Lyn Featherstone who is undersecretary of state for Inclusion. Andy (jr), lives and works in Nottingham for Experian, specialising in data analysis.
We have lived in Milton Keynes for almost 15 years and have been part of SCF all this time. Bev is an English and humanities teacher but has wider responsibilities in her role at Stantonbury Campus. My working days are at Toybox, a charity dedicated to helping street living and street working children in Latin America, I have been the Chief Executive Officer there for almost seven years. I am hoping to dip in and out whenever I get round to writing something or have something to say that may be mildly interesting. Not much has come to mind so far! (Note: posts are in reverse chronological order with the most recent near he top).
Wednesday 16th June. Day one of my sabbatical – I spent it finishing off work projects, emails and calls. Just about done, what next? Monday 14th June Where did the week go? It has been the normal round of life and nothing of much interest to write into the blog as I round off my SCF ‘blogging’. Today is due to be my last day in the office before heading out on a sabbatical until August. After seven years with Toybox as CEO I am taking a break this summer for a mixture of reflection / retreat; relaxation and research. So I won’t be in the office but will be working for much of the time particularly on the research side and looking at forward strategic plans. I have never taken a break from work and as I sit writing this it seems a but of a luxury with lots of white space in the diary. Go to church and then a great lunch with friends. It is raining this afternoon, I was about to water the plants in the garden, some of which are looking decidedly limp and sad. I was given a couple of bird feeders for Christmas; one is on a tree outside our kitchen window. I don’t know much about bird varieties in the UK but did look up some in a “Birds of the British Isles” booklet I got with the newspaper this spring. I can’t find the grey one with four legs and long bushy tail anywhere in the book but it seems to enjoy the food! What a lovely morning! I go out on a bike ride first thing with Bev, Karen and Neil and home mid morning leaving for the church presentation at noon. The presentation goes OK and is followed by a time of questions, none of which I had been really expecting. We feel a bit deflated at the end of the meeting but it is so hard to tell and ultimately we have a longstanding and positive relationship with the church so hope this has at the very least enhanced the relationship. We will see. Nobody is speaking to me today because I have ignored their emails! I seem to have a string of phone calls and a bunch of things folks want me to comment on, in the afternoon we have a Skype meeting with Andrew in Costa Rica. Thursday 2nd June London today with a sequence of meetings, including the Consortium for Street Children and then after lunch a gathering of INGO (International Non Government Organisation) leaders arranged by Micah Challenge international. Joel Edwards now leads this advocacy agency that seeks to bring together Christian INGOs in the UK to provide a collective voice on issues of poverty and in particular focusing on the Millennium Development Goals. Joel was formally the Director of the Evangelical Alliance an is an inspiring speaker, starting the gathering by looking at the Christian response to poverty. Wednesday 1st June I got a book the other day called Brilliant Email and (like almost every book I read) I have got about half way through. After one and a half working days out of the office I have more than 100 emails to handle. Am I alone in wondering if a really do need all this communication or dialogue? I determine to be ruthless with the delete button; unsubscribe to anything that is not vital; speak to people rather than email and only respond if I really have to do so. The book advises me to ask "what would happen if I do nothing with this email?" Let me try that for starters. Jess is in the office today on crutches and is managing to get around ok but very tired by mid afternoon. Tuesday 31st May Home at last and an evening to catch up, it is a long drive from Newcastle in the back of a minibus with bikes and riders. I’m looking forward to sleeping in my own bed tonight. I avoid checking work email this evening but back into it in the morning, and a chance to review the C2C adventure with the team. Jess is out of hospital and heading home to MK. Monday 23 May Toybox Board meeting this afternoon, always a demanding day but we have a great group of trustees. There is just time for me to meet folks from my team first thing, take a couple of ‘phone calls and check email. Alastair, chair of the Board, arrives at 10.30 and we run through the papers, contentious points and the ‘numbers’. Lunch with the team and trustees is followed by the Board meeting proper that finished a bit after 6.00pm and then I head home on the bike. It's raining. Why not write some more of the SCF blog – why not? Sunday 22 May Church in the morning, around the house in the afternoon and leading worship for the evening service (not sure it completely worked but there you go – tried something new) before getting home and catching up on work emails ready for Monday. Seems a short weekend! Saturday 21 May I am speaking at a men’s breakfast in Reading this morning so it is an early start. M1.M24 M4 getting there before 8.00am and only just in time to set up as folks are arriving. The projector does not want to connect to my laptop but in the end I do manage to get it working and am able to play a clip from the Toybox DVD and the PowerPoint. I am last to get breakfast, still the beacon is nice and almost worth the drive. Many of the 65 or so men are finishing before I start eating. Presentation seems to work fine and a good time of questions. The brief I work to is part Toybox work and part life story and part “how my faith impacts the work I do”. Pack up and head home getting back for lunch. In the afternoon we - Bev and I - go for a 30 mile cycle ride stopping for a pint in a village pub. I really need to unwind if I can and getting out on the bike is great therapy for me An office day, lots of email, [comment – do I really need all these emails? What did I do before email?] Some reporting to do with folks from my team to meet and work on projects. I am speaking tomorrow morning at a men’s breakfast in Reading so some time spent preparing for that. That reminds me – it will be an early start. We have a trustee meeting on Monday so I needed to look over that agenda and make sure we are all ready. I tried to get hold of our international director by Skype in Costa Rica this afternoon – they are six hours behind us – but the line kept dropping out. Normally it is fine – technology!
My job with Toybox takes me out of the office now and then, sometimes over to Central and South America. But today started in the Toybox UK office at Bletchley, I cycled to work and like to get in for 8.00 am or before – it tends to be quiet. Off to London by train mid morning to attend a meeting with a range of representatives from other international development agencies. I am on the steering committee for a Latin America liaison group. Addressing the meeting today was Baroness Hooper who has a particular interest in Latin America issues in the House of Lords – all sounds very grand but it is very much day to day with some policy discussions and focus on issues. Fair traded, organic Nicaraguan coffee in the break, counter balanced with McVities chocolate biscuits, all soon gone. |
This month's blogger is Andrew Stockbridge, who is the chief executive officer of a charity called 
set up outside at 6.00am it had seemed a short night. But breakfast with coffee and – yes – bacon and egg, starts the bank holiday Monday as we hit the road at 9.30am climbing the never ending hill on to the moors before the steady descent into Sunderland. Another great day tinged with sadness as we reach the sea in Sunderland without Jess. Our ride is 136 miles with just over 9,100 feet of climb over the three days. The Newcastle YMCA has seen better days – "Not dissimilar to some of the riders," I hear you say – but the food is good as is the company and England win the first cricket test match of the season, we enjoy the highlights! Why do we do these fundraising rides? – for the children 
Breakfast is special on these events, with the riders mostly opting for the "full English" option. But for how much longer I wonder! I learn that China is the world's fasting growing economy but this is perhaps not entirely good news for pigs. China already consumes 46% of the world's pork (a good pub quiz question that) and we may soon be priced out of the market and all the pigs stir-fried. So, after enjoying what may 
prove to be one of my last bacon and egg breakfasts, we head east out onto the wet roads of Penrith with the backbone of England in the distance, menacingly shrouded in cloud. What a day's cycling! Leaving the Lakes behind we climb the relentless 1,900ft to 
We set out from waterfront at Whitehaven just before 8.45am. Eight riders and two support team to carry the kit. Meandering through the Lake District lanes reaching the top of