Your First Job

[Mr Romanov Saviour of HMFC]

Did the same for 1 week and jacked it. Split the route with Malky then we realised we'd be panning our ***** in for about ?6 a week. Slave labour is what it is.

 

First real job was apprentice sparky with Maxwell Electrical. Really enjoyed my time there sadly they went out of business a couple of years ago

 

The graft you are expected to put in for pennies is ******* ridiculous.

 

It's a full scale military operation to get every leaflet in the papers. My heart goes out to anyone doing it now!

[Hansel]

Worked in the co-op in Gracemount. Depressing place to be. The security guard made the mistake of actually doing his job properly, so he was jumped and given a kick-in by the local neds more than once.

 

One time he had pressed the remote control to bring the shutter down at closing time, and a group of radges grabbed him locking all of us inside and him outside. All you could hear was the noise of the shutters as he was battered against it time and time again.

 

I'm sure there was a manual override, but errrrr, no one knew where it was.......

 

I didn't stay there long and quit after I was jumped and had my jacked chored. Wasn't worth it.

[moogsy]

 

 

mid to late 80's after it first opened

 

Some "interesting" nights working there....

 

Slightly before my time! Was never a fan of the place, got even worse when it changed to Gary's Kitchen (worst name for a Chinese ever?)

 

I'd like you too elaborate on the 'interesting' nights

[Guest GhostHunter]

Slightly before my time! Was never a fan of the place, got even worse when it changed to Gary's Kitchen (worst name for a Chinese ever?)

 

I'd like you too elaborate on the 'interesting' nights

 

Being threatened by the local McAlpine Drinks Lorry Mafia

 

Numerous ahem, "altercations" with the local DMains "yoofs"

 

Witnessing a murder outside the Norhet

 

Stalking Chatting up the next door neighbour who was 32

 

Delivering take aways to the high rises in Muirhouse and having a fully naked woman answering the door to me (she was in her 60's)

 

A lot plenty too many and a fair few

[Juan Rom?n Riquelme]

Worked in the co-op in Gracemount. Depressing place to be. The security guard made the mistake of actually doing his job properly, so he was jumped and given a kick-in by the local neds more than once.

 

One time he had pressed the remote control to bring the shutter down at closing time, and a group of radges grabbed him locking all of us inside and him outside. All you could hear was the noise of the shutters as he was battered against it time and time again.

 

I'm sure there was a manual override, but errrrr, no one knew where it was.......

 

I didn't stay there long and quit after I was jumped and had my jacked chored. Wasn't worth it.

 

Was the co-op I worked in too. I might have seen old security tapes of that. There was one my boss showed me from the Danderhall shop where a bunch of junkies ram raided the booze section with a trolley and then started banjoing the security guard. Absolutely mental stuff. Luckily mine was in a less bampot infested territory.

[graygo]

Was the co-op I worked in too. I might have seen old security tapes of that. There was one my boss showed me from the Danderhall shop where a bunch of junkies ram raided the booze section with a trolley and then started banjoing the security guard. Absolutely mental stuff. Luckily mine was in a less bampot infested territory.

 

Was a sleepy wee village when I was a lad.

[moogsy]

 

 

Being threatened by the local McAlpine Drinks Lorry Mafia

 

Numerous ahem, "altercations" with the local DMains "yoofs"

 

Witnessing a murder outside the Norhet

 

Stalking Chatting up the next door neighbour who was 32

 

Delivering take aways to the high rises in Muirhouse and having a fully naked woman answering the door to me (she was in her 60's)

 

A lot plenty too many and a fair few

 

Some of that is mental. Character building I suppose!

 

I've heard numerous stories from tradesmen at the council of birds answering the door naked.....unfortunately for them (and yourself it would seem) the people involved have been, without exception, old and/or ugly

[Craig Gordons Gloves]

i had a number of jobs through school - started off with a paper round (26-30 papers a day) but it was all the big houses in West Linton so took half an hour - i was paid a whopping 3.60 a week for 6 days work. Then on a Sunday i would work for the local gun club pulling the traps for their clay pigeon shoots. August - December, i would work on the local country estates grouse and pheasant beating for a tenner a day (plus 2 cans of lager and a brace of birds). The paper round saw me from 11 - 14, then i was "promoted" to work in the shop sorting out all the rounds. The number of times i missed the school bus was unreal. I also worked at the local garage for a pound an hour pumping petrol. Paper round tips were about 100 quid at christmas so me and 2 friends would get the bus into Edinburgh on Christmas eve, and get pished before shopping for christmas presents....

 

Eventually "lost" my job at the paper shop for getting caught red handed sticking 10 B+H in my pocket. Worked in a slaughterhouse for a summer aged 16 and got paid 200 quid cash a week - for 12 hour days loading lamb carcasses onto the freezer lorries, when i would finish at 5pm i'd race home, shower and go to work in a local hotel as a waiter from 6-11. This was back in 92 and i was making about 260 a week during the school holidays. Blew it all on hash, clothes and strongbow. But by god, it was fun!!

[Hansel]

 

 

Was the co-op I worked in too. I might have seen old security tapes of that. There was one my boss showed me from the Danderhall shop where a bunch of junkies ram raided the booze section with a trolley and then started banjoing the security guard. Absolutely mental stuff. Luckily mine was in a less bampot infested territory.

Nutters.

I always remember the Shan music that was played in a loop. The songs were instrumental covers of classics and they slowly started to do my head in each day.

 

Was it David who was your manager? I worked there around 98-99 when I was 16.

 

[Juan Rom?n Riquelme]

Nutters.

I always remember the Shan music that was played in a loop. The songs were instrumental covers of classics and they slowly started to do my head in each day.

 

Was it David who was your manager? I worked there around 98-99 when I was 16.

 

I did have a manager called David. Dunno if it'd be who you're thinking of though. He'd be about the same age as you I think and was my boss in the last 4/5 years.

[Hansel]

 

 

I did have a manager called David. Dunno if it'd be who you're thinking of though. He'd be about the same age as you I think and was my boss in the last 4/5 years.

Must be a different guy then. The guy was in his 50s and was a grumpy bugger.

[Helzibob]

When I was pretty young, primary school age, I delivered eggs. I had to say "eggs on legs" when the customer answered the door. Then when I was about 12 I cleaned the show houses in a new housing estate every week and my first proper job was as a YTS at Lunn Poly travel agents and I got ?40 a week. I seemed to have more money to spend back then though.

[BoJack Horseman]

The graft you are expected to put in for pennies is ******* ridiculous.

 

It's a full scale military operation to get every leaflet in the papers. My heart goes out to anyone doing it now!

 

Probably the Polish kids.

[CostaJambo]

Being threatened by the local McAlpine Drinks Lorry Mafia

 

Numerous ahem, "altercations" with the local DMains "yoofs"

 

Witnessing a murder outside the Norhet

 

Stalking Chatting up the next door neighbour who was 32

 

Delivering take aways to the high rises in Muirhouse and having a fully naked woman answering the door to me (she was in her 60's)

 

A lot plenty too many and a fair few

 

Was the chinese previously a bakers? Think I know the bursd you mean. Think one of my pals may have skelped her mate who lived in The Green. Was it a sort of cottage the house next to it?

 

Started doing 3 paper rounds on a Sunday morning for RS McColls for about a fiver in 1979/80 which as decent cash. Then tattie boy in the Corbie, then the deli counter in Lows until I left school just as we moved out of D Mains in 1985. First proper job was a trainee quantity surveyor for the grand sum of 2500 quid a year. Felt hard done by until I started day release and one of the boys was on 1980 a year!

[Guest GhostHunter]

Was the chinese previously a bakers? Think I know the bursd you mean. Think one of my pals may have skelped her mate who lived in The Green. Was it a sort of cottage the house next to it?

 

Started doing 3 paper rounds on a Sunday morning for RS McColls for about a fiver in 1979/80 which as decent cash. Then tattie boy in the Corbie, then the deli counter in Lows until I left school just as we moved out of D Mains in 1985. First proper job was a trainee quantity surveyor for the grand sum of 2500 quid a year. Felt hard done by until I started day release and one of the boys was on 1980 a year!

 

Yep - think her name was Julie..top bursd.

 

Plus her car reg was ORG 343Y so I had her pegged as fair game

[Konrad von Carstein]

Apprentice at Ferranti in 1981 along with half the population of Edinburgh for the princely sum of ?26

 

Me too, Mechnical Craft? Trying to remember the names of some of the instructors and gone blank....

[Dr. Sheldon Cooper]

I'm another one who had a paper round for a few years. I just did Evening News' though, every day after school and a Saturday morning. Got paid a tenner a week! Took me about 45 minutes to do my round and it finished in my street which was nice.

 

Currently in my first 'proper' job though. Had a few interviews for Tesco and Sainsbury's but never got past that stage. My course at Uni provides a placement in 3rd year so I'm currently 7 months into mine working as a Finance Intern at a Microelectronics company in Edinburgh. The folk in my team are a good laugh and I got on well with them, makes such a difference not being overdrawn every month after wasting my student loan on nights out and football!

[rudi must stay]

Worked at my tennis club as a barman, for a few years actually, my family are well liked there and that helped me get the job

[Doctor FinnBarr]

Apprentice spray-painter in a Bathgate bodyshop in 1977. ?17 per week but I only paid 99p NI from that, no tax

 

[Boaby Ewing]

Herald & Post and I absolutely hated it. Was about 1000 papers and then leaflets to put in the papers for 20 quid a week or something.

 

Ended up getting grassed up by some auld bint for dumping the papers.

 

Good character building though.

 

This, without the grassing up/dumping (well, not more than a couple of times).

 

I used to fold out a massive dust sheet in my folk's living room and stuff and fold the papers before heading out. Used to run half the route just to get it over with.

 

Gid workout though.

[Currahee!]

I done the papers from 85 to 1990. Not 1 day of high school passed without me having done the papers that morning.

 

Then straight into an apprenticeship with British Gas in August 1990. I still do the same job.

[Jambos_1874]

I had a paper round for a few years and started off on ?13/week. Slave labour!

[shaun.lawson]

Office junior for the most boring firm of chartered accountants on the planet.

 

I was 18 - no-one else in the office was younger than 42. Every single bloody day, two of them would sit there asking each other what they were cooking their other half for their tea: EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. My job, meanwhile, was to compile hideously tedious VAT return spreadsheets, answer the phones... and make the tea. Every 40 ******* minutes.

 

Not only that, but they all wanted different tea, in their own special mug. So every 40 ******* minutes, up I'd get to wash their mugs, put the kettle on, and remember to put Earl Grey in one, Darjeeling in another, Assam in another; milk in one, no milk in another; two sugars in one, no sugars in another; sweetener in another. Then I'd carry them all, one in each hand: they had to be full, but if I spilt the tiniest drop, woe betide me.

 

I did strike up a friendship with one of them: the secretary, who was also treated like a general dogsbody, over-worked beyond belief, and hated them all with a passion. So every Friday lunchtime, with everyone else out of the office, we'd sit bitching and plotting their destruction. I enjoyed that.

 

I only lasted three and a half months there - and felt so, so good as soon as I'd quit. But without question, they were the longest three and a half months of my life. Comes the revolution...

 

Bunch of absolute arseholes.

[leginten]

First part-time job was working behind the counter in a Crawford's delicatessen (Crawford's briefly got ideas above their station in the 1970s) in Rose Street. It was in the same block as Bruce's record store, so the guys who worked there used to come along at lunchtime to order their deli sandwiches. I got into the habit of providing them with possibly more fillings than their payment deserved, and they got into the habit of knocking something off the price of the vinyl I rushed into their shop to buy every pay-day.

 

It was a nice arrangement while it lasted.

[Bonnie Prince Charlie]

When I was 16 I stacked the shelfs at Coopers Finefare supermarket in Musselburgh, 5 nights per week after school. I do remember that the night manager used to give us a list of what he wanted put in his car boot, wander if he ever got caught. I find it very strange now when I see adults doing the same job nowadays, maybe it's not allowed now? I gave up that job after a few months as I got a Saturday job in the old PTs on North Bridge; did that for several months before I got another Saturday job in the old Burton's menswear in St James centre. it was all pretty good money for a schoolboy and a good introduction to the workplace.

[Chris Benoit]

I done the papers from 85 to 1990. Not 1 day of high school passed without me having done the papers that morning.

 

Then straight into an apprenticeship with British Gas in August 1990. I still do the same job.

 

 

That's a ******* long apprenticeship

[Craigieboy]

I worked in a cafe when I was 15.

 

Bread Street.

 

7am - 6pm on a Saturday.

 

?16 in hand though.

 

The stuff we done to people's food who we didn't like btw.

 

I had the rancid end of my smelly ****** around the rim of quite a few coffee cups.

[Buffalo Bill]

Part-time - delivering incontinence pads to the elderly and infirm.

 

 

Full-time - gloop scooper, Jet Wash drain.

[Konrad von Carstein]

I worked in a cafe when I was 15.

 

Bread Street.

 

7am - 6pm on a Saturday.

 

?16 in hand though.

 

The stuff we done to people's food who we didn't like btw.

 

I had the rancid end of my smelly ****** around the rim of quite a few coffee cups.

Espresso?

[Der Kaiser]

Stock Replenishment Officer at McKays in Penicuik followed by Cinema Operative at UCI.

 

Was at UCI four years, first two years job was awesome. Didn't even feel like a job, loads of staff and we just mucked about, eating sweets, popcorn and ice cream, watching movies, sneaking through to Megabowl on breaks for a few sly pints, making up our own weird games ....I was particularly good at the "Seat every customer in a different accent" game. It was a hard graft sometimes when the huge blockbusters were out and concession stand shifts sometimes finished at about 3am at the weekend cleaning everything but loads of good work colleagues. Generally if you finsihed at 10pm on a Friday or Saturday it was off into town for a huge p1ss up.

 

Last two years....loads of cutbacks.....job was sheeeite.

[Craigieboy]

 

 

Full-time - gloop scooper, Jet Wash drain.

 

I saw this in action folks.

 

On my breaks. (Between lessons and getting an easy steal from the Esso)

 

[Guest]

Contortionist

 

But I struggled to make ends meet

[Locky]

Worked as a kitchen porter in an Italian restaurant at 13.

 

Saved up for my first season at 14.

 

Proud of myself.

[Marvin]

Worked for 4 hours on a Sunday in Freshways on St Johns Road in Corstorphine . It was that shit, I got paid more money from my paper run. Shortly after I ended up in Safeway on the Glasgow Road roundabout.

[Tams bird]

Office junior in Alexanders the Ford garage in Dundas Street.. 1975..

[scott_jambo]

Office junior for the most boring firm of chartered accountants on the planet.

 

I was 18 - no-one else in the office was younger than 42. Every single bloody day, two of them would sit there asking each other what they were cooking their other half for their tea: EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. My job, meanwhile, was to compile hideously tedious VAT return spreadsheets, answer the phones... and make the tea. Every 40 ******* minutes.

 

Not only that, but they all wanted different tea, in their own special mug. So every 40 ******* minutes, up I'd get to wash their mugs, put the kettle on, and remember to put Earl Grey in one, Darjeeling in another, Assam in another; milk in one, no milk in another; two sugars in one, no sugars in another; sweetener in another. Then I'd carry them all, one in each hand: they had to be full, but if I spilt the tiniest drop, woe betide me.

 

I did strike up a friendship with one of them: the secretary, who was also treated like a general dogsbody, over-worked beyond belief, and hated them all with a passion. So every Friday lunchtime, with everyone else out of the office, we'd sit bitching and plotting their destruction. I enjoyed that.

 

I only lasted three and a half months there - and felt so, so good as soon as I'd quit. But without question, they were the longest three and a half months of my life. Comes the revolution...

 

Bunch of absolute arseholes.

 

First job at 18.

[Floyd]

Had loads of jobs from the age of 12 onwards, paper rounds, cream delivery, milk rounds, car washing but the first actual job at 14 was working on a Chippy Van, 4 shifts a week 5-11 on a Wednesday, Thursday, Friday & 6-11 on a Sunday.

 

Free food, anything that I wanted that was left at the end of the night and most importantly cash!!!

 

?12 a shift when I first started, but went up to ?15+ if we were busy. Only downside was we went round the mean streets of Castlemilk first before venturing into Fernhill & Cathkin.

 

Felt more like danger money as the years went on, but it was a good laugh and was certainly character building.

 

The van only ran during the spring/summer months back then, but the boy that ran it had another business selling & delivering gas bottles so I got a gig doing deliveries during the winter, that was a tough shift but it built me up and was character building.

 

Money was pish compared to the chippy but the tips more than made up for it and it was better than having no part time job during the winter.

 

I remeber leaving school and starting my skill seekers job, and being raging that I was getting ?58.99 per week for 5 days graft when I made more on the chippy.

 

Ended up keeping a couple of shifts on the chippy until I was 17/18 for the extra cash and then did the occasional shift till I moved away when I was 20.

 

Good time with even better stories.

[Creepy Lurker]

I was a waiter in the Scottish National Trust cafe. Got sacked on my first day, though, probably because I was ******* useless. Was giving people soup with knives and forks and shit, also laughed at the manager when he spilt a bottle of milk.

[graygo]

Me too, Mechnical Craft? Trying to remember the names of some of the instructors and gone blank....

 

Mechanical Technician.

 

Instructors I can mind were Farquharson, Graham, Kilanowski, Greig and who could forget Norrie in the stores? There was also wee John who was like a Janny and collected the pools money.

[dav1e]

 

First job I had was carrying coal from the coal shed in my grandads garden to the cupboard upstairs in his flat. Used to pay me 5p for each metal 'oor wullie' pail I filled. Always earned enough to get to the Hearts game on a Saturday .

I think my grandad was trying to teach me the value of hard work,unfortunately it worked, he put me off it for life!

Left school at 16 to work in the Post Office . 1st monthly wage was ?117 which wasn't bad at the time. Youth Opportunity Scheme paid about ?18 a week while an apprentice would earn ?20- ?25 .

[davemclaren]

Part time - walking greyhounds around powderhall dog track in a white coat and bowler hat.

 

Full time - apprentice post office telephone engineer shoving cabling rods under roads. Lasted 6 weeks.

[BigC]

We used to go round the neighbours houses charging ?1 to wash a car.

 

First job was delivering the herald and post,

 

Second job was delivering prescriptions for an hour on my bike after school for ?3 per hour.

 

First real job was working in the local chippy. Ended up doing it for 3 years before getting my arse in gear and going back to college. Earned ?2.85 to ?4.00 doing that.

 

After that I started life guarding and climbed the career ladder in health and fitness.

[Ribble]

First job at 15 was as the saturday assistant in Lloyds the Chemist, was there for nearly 2 years and it was decent enough apart from the punters coming in for daily scripts and the abysmal wages, think I started on ?2.06 per hour and was on nearly ?2.30 by the time I left!

 

First full time job was as an admin assistant at The Law Society on ?5250 a year!

 

Yesterday I had my last day with the NHS after almost 12 years!