[BENT_8]

The end goal is the same for everyone, to live with it, but until we have the majority of people vaccinated we are not in a position to live with it yet and this is the mistake NSW has made, the people are not ready for their strategy to work.

From a personal perspective, lockdown could not have come at a better time, after last years extended restrictions on school sports etc. It affected my industry in an interesting way. For months schools were prevented from conducting sports carnivals and excursions and so our buses sat idle.
Once things kicked off again we were inundated with work as much of those events contribute to curriculum assessments so they can't just abandon them.
We were fair dinkum flatout, infact I earnt more over the 20/21 financial year than I did in any of the previous years since entering the industry.

Fast forward to Feb 2021 and it was like schools were so scared of another lockdown mid year that they tried to squeeze as much in as possible early, this has meant another 6 months of head down **** up getting them back and forth.

As some may know, I lost my best mate of 30+ years in mid May and despite taking a week off to grieve, with funeral arrangements and cleaning up his unit i didnt really get around to grieving as I needed to.
3 weeks ago I arranged a weekend away to Barmera for all his friends and family that we camped with regularly, about 20 of us. It was good to get away but again I found myself so busy accommodating everyone's needs that I again failed to find time for my needs and came home feeling exhausted.

When school holiday OSHC finished work slows down for a few days as school proper gets underway again so I had no work until the following Wednesday, I took this opportunity to secure a cabin in Barmera and disappeared for 3 nights for some me time, I grabbed a 6 pack of scotch and sat on the banks of Lake Bonney and just howled as I let it all out.

I returned to Adelaide last Tuesday just in time for lockdown and whilst I felt much better in myself and ready to tackle the rest of the school year, there were so many things around home that I'd neglected that another week off has been a blessing as I've been able to complete or progress heaps of projects.
To me, so long as its short and sharp, having a lockdown is like hitting the reset button, things look much brighter on the other side.