Thursday, March 13, 2008

WORK




**I am very very angry with Katharine Whitehorn.**

Katharine (Old Kaz to her friends) was 80 last month. By the time I'm as old as her, many of you will be as old as me (Young Kaz to my friends).

She had a column in The Observer for 36 years which was tolerably amusing but you'd never LOL.
So, don't read this interview or you'll get angry as well.

Some advice from Ms Whitehorn:
1: To the young.

"Find out what you like doing best and get someone to pay you for doing it".
Yes - good advice for someone like Katharine who was born with talent, came from a well connected family and went to Roedean and Cambridge.

Not so useful if you like playing computer games, texting your mates, listening to gangsta rap and watching Neighbours?

2: To the old:

"The important thing is to keep working".

And what is Katharine's current job? She’s the agony aunt for Saga magazine.

Nice Work if you can get it.

So - she doesn't have to set the alarm for 6.30 each morning and queue for the bus in the wind and rain for the privilege of scrubbing floors, clearing tables or "inspecting small steel balls at Fischer Bearings Ltd, Wolverhampton, c.1959".




WORK is a four letter word with a million different meanings.


(young) KAZ

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34 Comments:

Blogger Rog said...

Young Kaz = Inspirational as the song thrush.

Old Kaz = Irritating as the other sort.

2:07 pm  
Blogger stitchwort said...

And I thought she was dead.

2:38 pm  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ooo, ANGRY Kaz! Excellent.

And quite right too, what a lot of rot. Great work if you can find it but most can't.

4:15 pm  
Blogger Geoff said...

I know two women who are still working full-time at 70. One needs the money. The other has more money than she needs.

Guess which one is of most use in the workplace.

4:17 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Murph:
Gee thanks (blushes and adopts coquettish expression)
Thrush? We'll have to send her some of that Canesten stuff that's advertised on the telly.

Stitch:
'Fraid not.
Perhaps we could get her and Brucie together.

NiC:
Yeah - I enjoyed getting ANGRY again.
I think I'll do it tomorrow as well.

Geoff:
Hard up or not - I guarantee that by the age of 70 I'll be no bloody use to anyone - and that's a promise!
.

4:43 pm  
Blogger The Mistress said...

I like watching Corrie.

Can I get a job there as a writer?

First thing I'd do is kill off Gail Platt.

5:04 pm  
Blogger CyberPete said...

I like my job but if someone would pay me to sleep all day I'd take that job in an instant

5:42 pm  
Blogger Romeo Morningwood said...

I've often wondered how difficult it must be for a lab tech to remain civil after collecting post operative samples at the Vasectomy Clinic?

How do you remain pleasant in front of those grinning fools as they march up to you with their chest all puffed out and slam their little sample on the counter.

I suppose that you'd have to come up with some one liners like;
"Wow you are fast! Your wife's one lucky gal."

OK OK it was me...so?!

7:48 pm  
Blogger garfer said...

Work is best confined to short bursts of frenetic activity.

This is why I mug people and run away very fast.

It keeps me in beer, tabs, and weed.

8:30 pm  
Blogger Betty said...

My auntie used to work at Fisher Bearings to support her drunken layabout husband! I wonder if she's in the picture?

I'm going to get one of those jobs handing out baskets to people in ASDA when I get to my seventies. There's nothing like the dignity that having a job brings you, is there?

9:10 pm  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Oh, sure! Rub it in why don'tcha.

12:44 am  
Blogger Tom said...

Old Kaz as her head firmly stuck inside her Harrods Bag... unlike you young Kaz.. our nice Kaz, the girl with a test tube of the 'elixir of life'.. better known as a Yates Blob.. give um hell this weekend Kaz..
Tom

7:02 am  
Blogger KAZ said...

mj:
NO WAY! I want that job.
'Killing off's too good for her' - Her role should be rewritten to take her out of that posh surgery and put her in an overall and skullcap stuffing the giblets up chickens

Pete:
But what would you do all night?

Donn:
So???
Some say sarcasm is the lowest form of wit - but I'm sure your wife really is a lucky girl ....no really.

Garfer:
I always admire your philosophical insights on life.
I presume your day job keeps the Daimler in petrol.

Betty:
That's amazing. What struck me was how smart those women looked with their high heels and shoulder pads. Perhaps they'd just got dolled up for the photo opportunity.

Come to think of it - is being the 'Saga Agony Aunt' very dignified?

Rimshot:
So sorry.
Do you fancy inspecting steel balls in Wolverhampton?

8:58 am  
Blogger KAZ said...

Wom:
You must be psychic - or did I once mention my lifelong love of Yates's Wine Lodge?
And you're quite right - I owe it all to Yates's - they used to have a motto about 'Drink being a better servant than a master'.
Think I still manage to stick to that.

9:25 am  
Blogger Tom said...

Ha! I guessed.. I did many moons ago spend to much time in the old Yates on Back Piccadilly.. At that time I was not the nice person I am today... ha! I still buy a bottle, in fact I have some left and might treet my self to a blob later...Enjoy whats left of Friday.
Catch up again soon
Tom

10:22 am  
Blogger Dave said...

If I were offered the opportunity to take early retirement (say, for the sake of argument, on health grounds) I'd do my best not to feel a useless drain on society.

1:55 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Wom /Tom:
Yates at Blackpool was the scene of much of my misspent youth.
I think it's still there but it's a pale imitation of its former self.... a bit like me perhaps.

Dave:
I know you'd try your best Dave - but sometimes the guilt might be too much to bear - I speak from experience.

4:52 pm  
Blogger CyberPete said...

Hopefully I'd do a different job

or at least have my legs pointing at jesus

11:14 pm  
Blogger liits said...

The Observer = The Guardian [on Sunday]. Our local rag, the Camden New Journal had a columnist called Rose Hacker, the Uk's oldest columnist. Boy did she write some crap! You would think that after all that time she'd have learned a thing or two, but, no. She was still the same deluded left wing fool that she'd always been.

2:50 am  
Blogger tony said...

Yea, although i DO read rags such as The Observer etc.i sometimes wonder what Planet these Media/New Labour Types live on..at least Tories are fairly honest about dishonesty........

12:10 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Pete:
Jesus???
Is there a picture on your bedroom wall?

lilts:
One 'old' columnist that I really like is Nancy Banks Smith who does the telly in the Guardian.
She's over 90 and very funny.

Tony:
'Tories are fairly honest about dishonesty........' .....Hmmm - well - I'll have to think about that one.
On second thoughts I won't - I don't like thinking about Tories.

2:04 pm  
Blogger The Poet Laura-eate said...

Last kick of a dying horse Kaz - you should chill! And actually I have a quirky affection for people from an age where things were so black & white, moral compasses were so certain, hypocrisy was a way of life, but hey, at least we all had decent neighbours & could leave our front doors open! Like 'em or hate 'em, the world will be a poorer place without them, if only as a contrast/living history reminder.

2:34 pm  
Blogger Glenda Young said...

OJ and Kaz, I'm gonna fight you both for that job! Now! Outside! Come on! Let's be having yer!

6:55 pm  
Blogger Roses said...

I'm just in from work, my feet throbbing and unwilling to take me to the fridge where I've got a bottle of naughtiness stashed, reading this.

Well, I like blogging, drinking and make-up, but it's not looking likely that I'll make any money from any of these activities. Especially after the crap Saturday I've just had at work.

Grumble, grumble, grumble.

7:58 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Laura:
Sadly I think too many younger people also have this idea that you can glide into a cushy, well paid job regardless of your postcode, contacts or family background.

But hey - OK - I'll just chill now ...until the next time.

Nora:
Name your weapons wench.
I think it's just between thee and me unless MJ turns up at the last minute ..*ding* - seconds out!

Roses:
Getting paid a handsome salary for blogging about drink and make up whilst drinking and looking wonderful would be just perfect.

8:30 pm  
Blogger CyberPete said...

Oh it was his arms he had spread wide

my mistake

10:01 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Well it's Easter next week so you can do some intensive Jesus studying.

10:05 am  
Blogger The Mistress said...

Bitchfight to see who becomes the next Corrie writer!

8:34 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Vodka bottles at the ready - Last one standing's the winner.
Cheers!!!

10:32 pm  
Blogger The Mistress said...

It'll be a Jamesons bottle for me tonight.

I might as well say I'm out now as the drink inevitably leaves me horizontally-inclined.

2:19 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

I don't think they do Irish vodka -so I'll have my annual pint of Guiness, fall over and leave it all to Nora.

3:07 pm  
Blogger Zig said...

I would comment but I have to go to work.

7:59 am  
Blogger KAZ said...

Katharine would be proud of you.

8:41 am  
Anonymous Brian said...

Michigan Labor Market Information, Mi Fast Facts, Talent Bank Profiles. The following documents provide summary occupational and educational characteristics of Talent Bank job applicants for Michigan and the state's 25 Michigan Works! The U.S. Department of Labor Home Page. The U.S. Department of Labor is charged with preparing the American workforce for new and better jobs. DOL is responsible for the administration and enforcement of.

2:28 pm  

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