| 2009 |
Measuring people’s height and weight |
| Where…………………… |
Aberdeenshire |
| What was it like? |
I worked for a couple of weeks for a social research company and one of the projects I worked on involved visiting people in their homes and weighing them and then measuring their height. I was amazed that people actually let me in their homes, and had to learn not to raise an eyebrow when I read out their weight. |
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| 1998 |
Space Kitchens telesales |
| Where |
Dundee |
| What was it like? |
Miserable. Interrupting people in the evenings, while they’re trying to have their tea and watch Corrie, is a real test of how hard your neck is. Teaches good lessons in sales and closing the deal, but if you don’t believe in your product, and I never ever saw a Space Kitchen, then it’s difficult to really get behind the pitch. |
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| 1996 |
GJs Bartender |
| Where |
Dundee |
| What was it like? |
What makes a bar is its people, and GJs regulars were a motley bunch of kind-hearted nutcases. They were Dundee FC supporters – I remember a Wild West-style scrap between visiting team supporters consisting of young lads and the GJs regulars, consisting of pensioners and the disabled. I got caught in the cross fire and had shards of glass in my ears. That’s true. It was wild. Bless ‘em. |
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| 1996 |
BT Directory Enquiries |
| Where |
Dundee |
| What was it like? |
Like a sweat shop. I take my hat off to anyone who manages to adapt to this sort of work. It would hasve to be a change at the genetic level for me. They’re totally target-driven, which makes for an increasingly high pressure work environment. If you logged off for a few minutes to go for a pee, they were round at your station checking up. Probably the toughest gig in terms of endurance. |
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| 8 months – 1995 |
Turnkey at Tayside Police HQ |
| Where |
Dundee |
| What was it like |
I had to search prisoners when they came into custody, then look after them during their stay in the cells underneath police HQ, which involved waking them to make sure they were alive, giving them blankets, making tea, giving them breakfast (a polony roll) which we collected from the Salvation Army. I still can’t believe I ever did that job. I enjoyed it. |
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| Summer 1988 |
Translator for French pile driving contractors |
| Where |
Southampton, Hampshire |
| What was it like |
These guys were putting in the foundations for a hotel being build down near the docks. They were nuts: working 12 hours, 8am to 8pm, taking two hours for lunch, relaxing in a converted ship container that travelled the world with them, getting pissed on red wine at lunch, scrambling about underneath the pile driving rig’s feet as it crawled like a crab from pile to pile round the site. How no-one was ever killed I don’t know. |
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| Spring 1988 |
Make-up packer in a Max Factor warehouse |
| Where |
Poole, Dorset |
| What was it like? |
About 12 of us, including a very comical and always-stoned Scouser, travelled from Southampton to Poole in a minibus each day. For 5 days I worked on a conveyor belt taking boxes of lipsticks, mascara, eyeliner, all that stuff, and packed it into boxes ready to be loaded and transported. That was the summer of the pop group Bros, and a couple of young lads who were fans used to do dance routines and sing “I Owe You Nothing” while they should have been working. |
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| 6 months – 1988 |
Nightclub doorman |
| Where |
Escape Club, Southampton |
| What was it like? |
I went for a part-time job as a barman, and the owner pulled me aside and said had I ever had any fights. I got the gig. £30 for a week night. I was loaded. I learned all the dodgy tricks of the unlicensed door trade. Erm, some incredible antics. Then the toughest guy I’ve ever met in my life – he was from NZ – came to the door causing bovver and I didn’t let him in. It was frightening because he was sober. I handed in my notice the next day. |
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| Spring 1985 |
Roofing and paving labourer |
| Where |
All over Angus |
| What was it like? |
Erm, this was a strange one. I drove round Brechin and Angus with a bloke who paid me cash in hand for lifting slabs, shoveling sand and holding his ladder. In the end I was suspicious he just wanted to watch me lift stuff and climb the ladder. I later heard a friend of a friend had chased the same bloke through a field threatening to kill him, for some reason or another. |
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| 6 hot months 1984 |
Jute mill labourer |
| Where |
Craigo, north Angus |
| What was it like? |
It was like the Dark Ages. It had a fearsome reputation as a tough place to work, but I really enjoyed it. A lot of the men there were simply working to pay off fines from the courts – aye, for beating folk up and stuff like that. I worked an ancient machine which carded huge rolls of raw jute. We kept soft metal-bladed knives in our back pockets to cut the jute when it jammed and before friction set it alight. There were many fires. One in which I could have been killed. |
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| Spring 1984 |
Cherry picking |
| Where |
Ardeche, France |
| What was it like? |
|
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| 6 summer wks 1981-7 |
Canning factory labourer |
| Where |
Brechin, Angus |
| What was it like? |
First job in which I worked 12 hours a day, 6 days a week. Had to wait another 20 years when I became a BBC radio producer to do that again. I’m sure I got paid more in the factory! I worked in the syrup room, where I made up the juice for the raspberries or whatever fruit we were putting in tins. Those were the days. I remember the summers being so hot, I used to wear a string vest out in the town on Saturday afternoons. It’s true. |
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| Summer 1981 |
Selling soft fruit from a stall |
| Where |
Milkbar, nr Brechin, Angus |
| What was it like? |
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| 1976-1982 |
Newspaper round |
| Where |
Brechin, Angus |
| What was it like? |
|
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| Every October, 1973-80 |
Picking tatties |
| Where |
Fields all over north Angus |
| What was it like? |
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