With just over a month of confinement behind us and the uncertainty of when it will end, we thought we’d ask the EcoEvo community at Trinity College how they were coping. From the relief provided by our trusty companions to the energising outdoors, find out what measures academics have taken to remain sane, even when the world has seemingly gone insane. You might even find some inspiration for yourself!
Lucy Harding – PhD student in the Zoology Department
Extreme rockpooling! I’ve been using my ‘one outing for exercise’ to go rockpooling at my local beach. Lots of anemones, sea snails, limpets, crabs and yesterday, two flounder fish!
Jacinta Kong – Postdoc in the Zoology Department
I’m enjoying watching baby snow leopards on the Melbourne Zoo live cam. They’re very cute and aren’t always on screen but with a bit of luck it’s really exciting to catch them live. Tip: the live stream records a couple of hours of footage so you can scroll back in time and try to find them if they aren’t there. There are other animals on cam too and in other zoos.
Andrew Mooney – PhD student in the Zoology Department
Physical isolation doesn’t have to leave a bad taste in your mouth, especially if you have a killer recipe. Having some free time means I’ve done more baking in the last three weeks than in the last year combined. Warning: should be enjoyed in moderation as part of a healthy and balanced diet.
Floriane O’Keeffe – PhD student in the Zoology Department
Although I don’t have a garden, I’m lucky enough to live right next to a park, so I’ve been making an effort to go outside once a day on my state-mandated exercise. A stroll around the park is a respite from our current reality: the cherry blossoms are in full bloom, and it’s also a good opportunity to hone my photography skills on the parks’ unsuspecting residents.
Fionn O Marcaigh – PhD student in the Zoology Department
Since I can’t get out to look at birds, I repurposed my scope to watch the moon instead. Easier to find, and it doesn’t fly away.
Jane Stout – Professor in the Botany Department
When it’s sunny, doing FIT counts of flower-visitors in the garden for the All-Ireland Pollinator Plan: https://pollinators.ie/record-pollinators/fit-count/
But mostly just lots of gardening, decorating, baking…
Haley Dolton – PhD student in the Zoology Department
All things arty! Starting a ‘quarantine art series’ and stitching things into my guitar strap that represent all my nearest and dearest!
Katrin Schertenleib – PhD student in the Zoology Department
I love my 2km-from-home range for going on walks!
Obviously, low tide helps 😉
Now I just need to come up with an idea of what to do with all those shells that I can’t stop myself from collecting on the way.
Yvonne Buckley – Professor in the Zoology Department
Taking the dog for walks – she’s never been more regularly walked! I’m also holding a weekly “Virtual Nature” Zoom classroom each week for nine children in my extended family from 4 to 12 years old. So far we’ve covered “Pollinators”, “Tiny flowers” and “Birds we like”, next week we’re doing “Our favourite episodes from Planet Earth II”. It’s been fun adapting my teaching skills to a very different kind of classroom and I’m enjoying our collaborative approach to curriculum building 🙂
Yvonne did not include a photo of said dog, but we thought the world deserved it so here she is, in all her glory, visiting the office a few weeks before the lockdown.
Paula Tierney – PhD student in the Zoology Department
We fostered a dog! My sister had already applied to the DSPCA at Christmas and, with the shelter closing due to covid-19, they were in need of foster homes. Rafa the jack russell has been with us for a month now and he’s a great boy for cuddles and 2km radius walks. Most of the DSPCA’s animals are currently in foster homes, but you could always offer to help a neighbour walk their dog – Dogs Trust has good guidelines on staying safe and socially distanced while walking someone else’s dog.
Marine Valmier – PhD student in the Botany Department
To stay sane, healthy and motivated, I included a 30 minute workout and a 10 minute meditation in my morning routine. The videos Trinity Sport is sharing online are a great start (and the hip hop tutorials are great fun), but now I pick my favorite exercises and I do it to my own motivational playlist! For meditation, I recommend the “Balance” app, which is offering a free 1 year subscription at the moment. It is designed to adapt to every level, needs and preferences. Then, to stay focused, I use the “Plantie” app for the Pomodoro technique, which rewards me by making fruits grow after each 25 minute session. If you’re ready to invest, the “Forest” app plants real trees in exchange for your time away from your phone! Also, I started making origami… with varying degrees of success 🙂
Elena Zioga – PhD student in the Botany Department
I have decided to start learning how to play the didgeridoo!
It is something that I have always wanted and now I can make it happen…or at least try 🙂
Also, I planted some pollinator friendly seeds in the backyard and now I am really looking forward to seeing them grow!
Keep calm and be(e) positive.
Irene Bottero – PhD student in the Botany Department
I am trying to hone my italian culinary skills preparing pizzas (no..no pineapple on it) and lasagne! Also, my flatmates and I have decided to challenge ourselves with a 1000 pieces puzzle. What does the figure represent? Well… kittens, flowers and pollinators of course !
Jenny Bortoluzzi – PhD student in the Zoology Department
From enjoying a good book in the sunshine to daily yoga sessions, I have been tried to take a few steps to make sure my mental health doesn’t suffer during this period. Living alone, I’ve found regular video calls with friends and family have been essential to this, as well as hourly visits by my landlords’ dog. I’ve also picked up a few hobbies again, two of my favourites: photography and knitting! The garden is home to so much wonderful wildlife I normally don’t pay attention to, including a couple of sassy starlings that I have fallen in love with.
As for knitting, well, by the time we actually come out of confinement, maybe it’ll be time to wrap up warm again so I may as well prepare…
Bonus round – the weird and wonderful measures our researchers have had to take to WFH
Fionn O Marcaigh – PhD student in the Zoology Department
Is your desk too low for making video calls? Just prop your laptop on top of a decade or two’s worth of lab notebooks. It’ll bring your camera closer to your eye level, and since it’s not quite flat you’ll be filming yourself at a cool Dutch angle. You can also commandeer the TV to be your second screen. There’s nothing good on, anyway.
Maude Baudraz – PhD student in the Zoology Department
Being stuck in front of the computer for so much time in the day was a big one for me. All work activities, including meetings, went digital, and even most private life, with things such as “meeting up with friends” and even sports events happening online now. One easy solution; books, books, books and a good old printer. My reading load definitely went up with this lockdown, one plus point for my PhD, I guess! PS: the pair of weights behind the printer, gives you an idea of how improvised the workstation is 😉
Katrin Schertenleib – PhD student in the Zoology Department
We’re living in a pretty small space that only has one emergency desk. But now we’re two people who need to WFH. Our first idea of extending some shelfs didn’t work out, the computer screen didn’t fit in. So we had to get more creative…
There couldn’t be a better desk than our sofa!
(Luckily, we have alternative options for sitting 😉 )
Paula Tierney – PhD student in the Zoology Department
To add to the list of desk kludges/MacGyver-ing, I improvised a stand up desk with an upturned Ikea bin. I had been struggling a lot with being productive while working from home and a stand up desk weirdly seemed to help? Monkey brain says standing up = action time.
Sam Ross – PhD student in the Zoology Department
I’m spending the lockdown on the island of Okinawa, where I’m visiting a collaborator’s lab. I’m lucky to be staying with a friend who owns a hammock. So on the sunnier days my workstation sways gently in the breeze. There are certainly worse places to be ‘stuck’!
So there you have it! Our colleagues just trying to make the best out of the situation! What are you doing to Stay Sane in the Insanity?