» Letters they'll never read

Dear Maggie
I ain't gonna work on your farm no more

Sincerely,

Bob
(Mon 8th Mar 2010, 18:30, More)

» Babysitters

My Nan used to babysit for Michael Parkinson
....so that's three degrees of separation from most of the people of the late twentieth century it was ever worthwhile to meet. This would have been sometime in the 1940s I think, well before he was wearing brown suits on prime-time TV

As for me, my own recollections of babysitters are varied - one was a son of my Mum's friend who ran a video shop, so at age six or seven I got to see various Schwarzenegger titles (Red Heat and Commando being among those I remember) as well as a ton of other 1980s action flicks - the occasional sex scene was always fast-forwarded, but not the explosions and war. Later on, there was one fabulously attractive 17-year old who used to tell us about her newly-discovered love of nightclubbing and engage in the odd pillow fight. Once I hit the age of about 13 or 14, however, we were pretty much left to babysit for ourselves (including for a whole week whilst my Mum spent the £600-odd she'd recently won on the bingo on a holiday in Tenerife with her boyf).

Now I'm a teacher, which is, more or less, only a pedestal or two above babysitting, except if I were to spend my classes screening the latest gory action movies I wouldn't expect to be in a job for long, even if the kids might enjoy that more than learning English
(Fri 29th Oct 2010, 1:14, More)

» Stuff I've found

Trolley Boy
I used to be the trolley boy, way back when I was a sixth former, for Moronsons... hated the job most of the time, having to work outdoors in the worst of winter, but, because of "Sir" Ken Moronson's tightness, and the fact that he would rather charge his own customers for the privilege of using one of his beloved trolleys rather than use it for free and then chuck it in the nearest river - as he surely knew they all would, tight prick - I was able to turn up for work every Saturday morning and know that by lunchtime I'd have made enough £1 coins to buy my subsidised pie and chip in the staff canteen, and by the end of the day I'd have the money to cover at least one pint in the pub (to compensate for finishing work at 9pm on a Saturday). Excellent. Plus, among the many 'bonus' finds in my time there, were:

- a full crate of John Smiths Bitter discovered in a trolley well after store closing time

- £30 left in the ATM (plus a great many fivers and tenners stuck in the bushes surrounding the car park)

- A brilliant black and decker full beam torch which I had for years until accidentally leaving in a hostel somewhere in South Africa

- and many more goodies, including full bags of shopping, christmas lights sets, books, more alcohol, etc etc etc...
(Sun 9th Nov 2008, 1:37, More)

» I Quit!

Just quit. I mean it
I jacked in a dreary, dreadful call centre job (which I was over-qualified for anyway) after getting turned down for a promotion- which the company instead preferred to give to others who had been there for less time than I had- some of whom I had actually helped train to do the job in the first place!

Upon being sent the email that told me I hadn't got the role, I immediately decided to hand in my notice, I didn't even care if I didn't have another job to go to. By the time my notice was up I still didn't have another job, so I spent a month living on my savings before eventually landing another job which paid £2k a year more than I would have earned had I got the promotion I went for in the first place, and ia a much less miserable and hostile environment.

So all I can say is- is you've got a job you hate, then don't wait for things to turn themselves around, don't meekly send off aplications in the vain hope you'll get an interview. Quitting a crap job is the best kick-up-the-backside you'll ever get, you'll be more determined to do better and job interviewers, believe it or not, will actually be impressed that you've got the balls to make your own decisions rather than spend your life muttering about your crap job but doing nothing about it.

Wow, there's a book there. I could make millions.
(Sat 24th May 2008, 18:34, More)

» Cheap Tat

Crap coat
Was bought for me

About the time when I was 16 (a long time ago) and it was coming up to Christmas, my Dad asked me what I'd like to receive. I really needed a warm jacket as the flimsy thing I already had (another cheap piece of tat bought by my Mum- my parents were already long divorced by this time) didn't really protect me from either the rain or the cold. So I asked for a winter jacket, knowing that my Dad was making a decent living and his new missis was worth loadsamoney.

So it somes to Christmas morning and I of course know what I've got. I get to open my present in front of my Dad's side of the family and his missis' weird kids, thinking it's going to be an ultra-warm Timberland or Henri Lloyd (this is before those brands became wholly appropriated by chavscum). It turns out to be a crappy probably-less-than-£10 job from Tradex, which my Dad was at the time recommending to all his friends (all of whom have since vanished) as a revelation (they'd recently opened one of their sheds nearby). I had to feign gratitude and go "wow, thanks" as I realise what a load of crap I've got, and then watch as they open the presents I've worked so hard to earn for them (okay most of those were cheap but I was only in the sixth form and had only recently started my first ever paying job other than the paper round).

The coat started to rip at the shoulders after a week, weighed a ton due to probably being lined with the innards of mattresses from some landfill site, and when it rained bled dye onto whatever else you had on. I ended up using it in my job pushing trolleys round Moronsons car park after my company-branded and equally tat works jacket got stolen. In one rain shower (which I endured whilst wearing the bloody thing and pushing those godforsaken trolleys) the coat soaked up so much water that it took about five days to dry out on the radiator (though it was my Dad's radiator so probably wasn't turned up to its maximum. Was warmer than my Mum's house though where we used to wake up with ice on the windows INSIDE the house- this was the 1990s). Eventually the weather warmed up and I didn't need it any more.

Come the next winter, it was still hanging around, but rather than wear it again I threw it on the November 5th bonfire and bought my own. My Dad usually buys me alcohol at Christmas now, 'cos he thinks I'm an alcoholic. He's probably tight. I mean right.
(Sun 6th Jan 2008, 23:37, More)