idling

In order to be able to avoid having to stop to collect personal belongings our office fire alarum has an intermittent stage (when more important people on other floors are allowed to leave without plebs crowding them on the stairs) when staff should ready themselves whilst remaining calm prior to leaving when the tone becomes continuous. We sometimes never even got to leave the building after canteen toast-singe alerts as we used to sit in the opposite side from the source of many such false alarums but were eventually compelled out for some fresh air today despite a strange silent moment's gap between the intermittent and continuous tones.

I'd initially gone to the wrong muster point (not that it would be possible to not notice everyone moving further away if the order was given to proceed to bomb-threat positions) but had been wandering off for a walk to make use of the time when TFP alerted me to this opportunity. The office recently successfully tested an automated SMS notification-cascade-alert thing (in place of each layer ringing all their underlings manually) in case the building ever falls over and we have to assume emergency working procedures but it occurred to me that it could be used equally well for letting everyone know when the same building is safe to return to after a toast-singe-threat or fire drill. That was everyone could go for a healthy wander on the nearby streets without blocking them by standing on the pavements immediately outside the building.