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I practically get sick with anxiety when I think about what those people who have to drive a vehicle in the midst of the peleton during any of the big cycling races.
Watching some of the team car drivers and the media motorcycles having to navigate the road without hitting, or getting in the way of, the riders - swarming all over the place as they are... without running into one of the other vehicles.... without running over those crazy spectators who run into road....
I'm not sure my brain would be able to work fast enough to respond to all the various stimuli being thrown at me without screwing up somewhere over the course of, say, the four hours on the road. I can imagine going down in history as the driver who panicked when a rider signalled for help with a mechanical, ran over a spectator, and caused a pile-up of epic proportions involving riders, cars, motorcycles, and bike parts.
I'd take that, over some of the stuff police investigators have to do, every day of the week.
I thought this was going to be about the Conservative leadership election.
One of my regular visits when working for Welsh Water was a Knackers yard. One Summer the plant broke down so the carcasses built up and started to rot more than they were usually rotting. The guys dealing with those carcasses were doing the worst job I've seen. The sight of entrails everywhere was not good and the smell something else.
Nuclear waste clean up?
A guy at our cycle club drives the car just in front of the lead riders for most of the top UK road races. So he "should" be ahead of all the chaos in the peloton
Given the attitude of some drivers towards cyclists in this country, he has a rich vein of anecdotes, many involving gobshites happy to argue the toss and act like dicks with the civilian escort group, but who subsequently get their comeuppance when the blue light reinforcements arrive (one of which I saw when the ToB came through our village in 2012)
Indian sewer cleaner is a pretty shite job.
Teacher
Picking lobsters out of Jayne Mansfield's bum.
Picking lobsters out of Jayne Mansfield’s bum.
I thought it was crabs...
I practically get sick with anxiety when I think about what those people who have to drive a vehicle in the midst of the peleton during any of the big cycling races.
I do it pretty regularly. The big races actually tend to be easier. If you've got police outriders, a Section 16A rolling road closure (and/or a council enforced fill closure in towns) it's reasonably easy, you can use the whole road and speed limits can be umm "flexible". In the car there's at least 2 radios, you need your eyes on the mirrors at all times while taking in all the radio chatter, visual instructions from police motos and an eye on what spectators are doing. I was working on Tour de Yorkshire and the crowds on the climbs made it difficult getting the car up some of them, was having to flick the mirrors in at times! All that while working out the time gaps you've got on the riders.
It's kinda fun though, you get to see some good racing. Most of the drivers at that level are commissaires and/or former riders etc who know the score with it - how riders are likely to behave at any given point, the line choices they'll make and then be able to judge the car in and around all that.
Teacher
Not this week
Cornish tin miner.
Navigator in a rally car.
Trumps spray tan applicator
Navigator in a rally car.
I did that just once, quite enjoyed it, a lot less stressful than drivng.
Unblocking sewers should be a horrible job but the fellas I've known who do it seem to be unusually cheerful and positive individuals.
When they got the stuff out of the sewers that was blocking it my job was to take is as evidence, chakaping. When the abattoirs workers took the bucket sieves out and flushed everything down the drains I used to get hearts, lungs etc..
I used to be a dag treader.
I thought it was crabs…
No it is lobsters. "Up went the lobsters, boing..."
Navigator in a rally car.
I spent quite a few years navigating at club level. Brilliant when it's going well. Absolute pain when you end up in yet another ditch.
Fatage's solicitor. You are getting very rich being paid money from, in all likelihood, Bannon/Putin and doing so makes sure that a truly awful person can carry on doing precisely that
If you ever think your job is pointless, just remember there is a bloke in Germany who puts indicators on BMW cars.......
When i was out in Kandahar there were a team of Indian guys who's job was to skim the "crust" off the top of the sewage settlement pond using long shovels then put it into sacks to dry in the sun. This is in 45 degree heat as well - no PPE apart from gloves and a handkerchief tied over the nose. They did nine month rotations with five weeks leave ( it think - it might have been less leave).
Those all sound terrible.
My worst 2 were:
Picking Zucchini in Queensland, 10 hours a day, 6 days a week in hot and humid or hot and wet weather chasing a tractor up and down a field bent over double picking these horrible, often rotten things from their spiky bushes. I managed two weeks.
Debt collecting in 2008/9 after years of selling finance to local businesses, people who sometimes lived close to you it all went wrong, not only were we expected to knock doors to chase payments from people who’d stopped answering the phone and letters, we did so representing the very bank who’d largely caused the mess in the first place. I didn’t mind repo’ing cars from failed companies before the liquidators got hold of them, it was impersonal and sometimes fun, but chasing family men and women who worked from their homes was horrible, in the end I just reported ‘no answer’ and sat in a cafe for 20 mins. Thankfully whichever high up idiot who came up with the idea was put back in his box after a few weeks and it ended.
At a quick glance a lot of abattoir jobs would seem to be up there (from visiting a couple the bloke who had to stir the big vat of tripe seemed to be a candidate). Also sewer cleaning stuff.
But...
If you work in a big abattoir or clean sewers from Thames Water you're working from a big company in a regulated industry. You'll have training, PPE, probably union representation and be paid a fair amount.
So for me the worst jobs are the guys cleaning cars for £2 an hour and sleeping in the portakabn. Or picking fruit an veg and getting your wages taken off you as rent for a bunk in a cow shed.