National Insurance

"And what exactly do you see yourself doing here at the museum?" Maureen asks with a snear.

"Erm, well since I am to be working at the Information desk and shop, relating to the customers and satisfying their needs will be the most important part of the job, be it informing them of an exhibition they may be interested in, or selling them a particular item in the museum shop," I reply perfectly naturally and unrehearsed.

"Ohh, satisfy my needs, Torquer," Julia smiles.

"Yes, well. What are your ambitions in life, your career path?" Maureen questions again.

"I am currently interested in engineering. My parents and step parents are all architects, but I see myself doing something a little bigger than house extensions and park pavilions, big stuff like bridges: civil engineering."

"I also prefer big stuff as well," Julia lingers for a moment.

"And what about your experience in the retail sector, tell us about that," Maureen ploughs on.

"I took my work experience in a cafe bar, serving drinks and clearing tables. I even did a few of my own drinks, like banana and coffee milkshakes, which the manager was pleased about."

"Mmm, bananas please me too," Julia's glance almost boils my cup of water.

"Right then, I think we have everything we want now," snaps Maureen.

"I want more..." Julia mumbles as she leaves the room.

"So, I think that finishes everything," says Maureen, heading for the door, "I've got to dash off to another meeting now. Julia will see you out."


"Er Torquer, can you bring your National Insurance card [bloody welfare state draining my wages], Passport [not a single stamp because the French and Italian immigration bastards can't be bothered to budge a finger] and Certificate of Qualifications please. I need to... to photocopy them," Julia's angelic voice calls from the stationary cupboard...

Nottingham Part 2: Even GP Taylor can't stop famine

After having become accustomed to having clothes washed so soft they felt like angel wings and silk and stuff, I now had to prepare to face a lots of old people in a charity shop surrounded by lots of old books and other-such junk based items. However, the Oxfam shop on Bridgeford Road Nottingham was nothing like what I expected.

"A keen eye for a priceless bargain, Torquer?" Well no, in fact. I was to be volunteering at this shop for the best part of two days, simply to add an extra row to the 'volunteer work' table of my CV. Ah, it was nothing, no need for any heartfelt applause readers.


I was to be assisting my perfectly able-bodied and communicative grandmother in this extortionate second-hand book and trinket shop. So, as I stepped through this ordinary looking shop frontage, it became clear that this was no traditional charity shop, full of other people's crap for 25p a time. Instead, there was a float to initialize, till to power up, lights to turn on (really!?) and an excruciatingly complicated banking system of record books, money bags, multi-columned paper and number writing.

For some reason, due to my obviously thieving nature, I was not allowed anywhere near the till, unless to wipe it with a dishcloth as grimy as Robin's hair after playing tennis with him. My generous pleas of "Let me help you with that dear Grandmother" where overruled by shouts of "Get in the back and sort them expired road atlases into equal piles!"

After being forced to purchase an over-date Fair-trade smoothie for one pound bleedin' thirty-nine, I was given the task of filling a box with books that had been out on display for more than 6 weeks. I duly took all the books marked 'Wk 4' (for it was now week 10 of their pointlessly complicated stock control system) and placed them gently into the dusty fruit box I had been thrown by an old man with a yellow shirt who smelled of cement and urinal cakes.


My Grandma then charged into the back of the shop when I told her that I had finished, scooped up the box, opened the fire exit door to the alley behind the shop and lobbed the crate into the dumpster.

Horrified, I stood and gawped as some books that I was going to buy at the end of the day where now mixed in with the remains of Monday night's kitchen waste from the trendy wine bar next door! Sigh, I could have fished them out nice and clean: if only it was still a Natwest.


The second day started even earlier than the first and we were the only people in the shop again. Thus I began the pointless task of selecting which books to dumpsterate, and which to keep, making sure that my personal pile was safely stowed away from slippery-fingered volunteers, behind I large mound of unsold GP Taylor novels.

After a frankly boring and fruitless day on the my mother's Penguin classics book collection expansion front, I followed my Grandmother home on the bus to the rare occasion when my Grandfather prepare the dinner. Sainsbury's really do make half-decent ready meals.

I have since established that Oxfam (and like probably many other 'charity shops' nowadays) is certainly not one of those small charity shops with a low turnover, shelves of battered old books and deserving local cause. It is instead a national organisation that just so happens to accept donations of strictly 'saleable' items, just so happens to be run mostly by volunteers (they were recruiting two paid full time staff for other branches in Nottingham) and just so happens to give some of its profits to famine stricken countries in sub-Saharan Africa. The rest it spends of wages, shop fittings and various sheets of coloured paper to remind people to turn things of when they leave and notices explaining that it is against conduct to attempt improvisation.

Furthermore, they insist on sticking f***ing sticky labels on everything! Any book that has a paper cover in any Oxfam shop across the country has now been completely ruined. I tried to remove some from my purchases and even a generous lashing of WD-40 failed to budge it or the slimy residue they leave behind. Strewth!! Dammit!!

American Pie 2

As I marched tenaciously into Baronjon menswear outlet with my obedient and credit-card bearing mother at heel, a well trained store assistant greeted me on the door mat. Being used to this sort of attention and respect, I merely offered him a nod before progressing to the elevator toward the rear of the store.

Actually, all of this is total bull shit. I was in desperate need of a suit for the end of year prom. This was the last shop in town and my mother was irate, threatening to make me pay for it unless I found something I liked soon. The chinese equivalent of our former ICT teacher frowned at me as I tread mud and rainwater all over his newly installed door mat and looked me up and down in disgust.

I had first groaned at the thought of dressing up in suits and tuxedos (not at the same time of course) just to spend three hours 'mingling' silently with my friends (and enemies), to whom I am already adequately acquainted. The letter from school stated:

"Your son/daughter has expressed an interest in attending the Year 11 Leaver Prom. [various padding] Students will be transported via luxury coach to the presently undecided venue."

Translated as:

"The ugly, dishonest and assertive little shit you call your son/daughter wants you to give us £36 for a ticket, plus £50 for a suit and £5 for drinks on the night. Your child will be bundled into the back of the cheapest, slowest and smelliest twenty year-old double decker bus we can boost. As for the venue, we have no idea where it will be, possibly the school canteen."

After handing over £49 for the first suit I tried on, and swaggering out of the door with a very expensive bag to say the least, my mother and I paid another visit to the 'Tardis Cafe'. Fortunately, I had emptied my bladder twice in the fifteen minutes before leaving home that morning.

The evening itself started adequately. We were all searched - or rather, felt up by some perverted security guard. Security guard? Oh yes. The school decided to pay another company to organise the entire thing, probably costing everyone an extra £5 just to pay for the buffet and champagne at the shareholders AGM.

My prom date this was not. This was not me. Thank God for Google Images Search.

The original letter from school stated that we would enter the venue on a red carpet. Ha! This was the most pathetic, threadbare, maroon 3 metres of Carpet Right off cut that I have ever seen.

Professional photographers were supposed to be at the event to take individual and group photos. What I saw was some fat woman in blue jeans taking group snaps with some crappy little HP compact camera. Apologies, but after having recently purchased an Canon D-SLR (oh yeah!), I am afraid I am above novice photography. The fat woman actually had a key ring machine that put the photos into some low-grade, clear plastic key ring. I refrained from wasting my money on this, although my friends decided that £2 was good value from some badly framed, awfully lit and microscopic 3cm x 2cm image embedded in scratched plastic. Phew!

The evening was rounded off with a slideshow of photos of everyone from Year 7 and the current Year 11 side by side to see the comparisons. Chortle! You should have seen Jingo five years ago. I've hardly changed a bit though. Others were almost unrecognisable, but some people had an empty box with 'Insert Clipart Here' written in it!

So we all squelched off through the mud at midnight and went home as sober virgins. Hardly American Pie.