Jobsworse.


Spare a thought for the producer who dreamt of working on a multi-platinum album, yet records the page-turning sound for an e-paper instead.

Surely no-one sets out to be responsible for that, yet someone has to do it. It’s like the people who photograph food for menus or zoom in on the winning lottery numbers when they come out of Guinevere; they provide a service of reasonable value that isn't something to aspire to. It must be hard to work on something so utterly mundane.

My ex-flatmate had a couple of jobs when we lived together that served a financial purpose, but were amusing in their dullness; something we both used to joke about. The Top Three were:

3) Packing mushrooms (he's allergic to them).
2) Stacking toilets.
1) Ironing snooker tables.

The top job was by definition the best. It was a door-to-door service, which meant driving from pool hall to pool hall, asking if they needed anything doing. I hope it wasn't commission-only as he can’t have had much uptake - and if he did, it's a thankless task: God knows how you get them on an ironing board anyway.

One thing I will say about the person who recorded the rustling for my local paper: they applied attention to detail to their work, as every few pages sound different, though it’s possible noticing this makes me the worse-off.

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