40 years on.......

I think divorce followed by second home ownership has a big impact on the housing shortage .

 

Hope it will be at least a trio if @redgaz can see where he’s walking

 

I once earned £2.11 an hour as a security guard at various hospitals and empty office blocks.

This was in 1990.

 

£ 14.50 a week ...HGV truck apprentice mechanic first wage . I wasn't gleefully skipping home on Friday 6 o clock .
1974 Sept . It got better as you became more skilled .

 

When I was ill the rest of the guys on the ward were all ex diesel fitters on buses and trucks…..each had asbestosis.

I remember one saying whenever there was a brake job you’d grab an airline and blow the drum clean, filling the whole garage with the brake lining dust.


Seems a hard profession to have survived .

 

You ever just thought that it’s you that dosnt understand things? Not everyone do.
You ever been diagnosed with anything? ‘On the spectrum’ etc? Honest question as many people go under the radar. Don’t be embarrassed, it happens.
Have a think about that.

 

I was on the yts. £26.25 a week, on Saturday mornings to earn more, I did pressure washing under a concrete ramp, cleaning the chassis of lorries and busses. Got an extra £20.00 for it. But motor mechanics back then was a dangerous job.
Not just with the cuts and bruises and dropping jacks on your feet (), but the use of chemicals, greases, oil. All cancer giving, sprays in the the air, to breathe in, as you say, brake dust and other things. I know mechanics now that have been doing it all their lives. The more sensible ones don’t have breathing problems, but two are dead, we think, because of the trade. I gave it up after the yts, as I went into forklift driving for someone else.
I’m still here, but it gave me the knowledge.

 

Have you?

“If that’s my question, your isn’t the answer. You are in about those that don’t”

Does your quote above make sense to you?

My job is spending hours reading and listening to information, the doing something with it. A lot of the time I have to understand it’s context or if it’s based on facts or assumption. Do I get things wrong, sometimes, not often though because I often work with people who are simply more clever than I am..

If I don’t understand something, I flag it just as I have done with you.

So, hourly, daily, weekly I’m very exposed to my, and other people’s thoughts and conclusions and getting things correct or incorrect. I work as a contractor…I get things wrong I get sacked.

Tell me, are you?

 

Yes, I am. Daily, I am thinking for other people, if that’s what you mean. currently I am helping my 3 boys, two who are now adults, simply starting off in their lives. Helping them write out and wording things for them. One is a self employed brick layer now, who has been put in charge of seeking labourers for his gang, so I am wording and writing out ads for him, sorting out his receipts and passing on my own accountancy knowledge, in my dimly lit make shift office I built myself for these sort of things.Probably harder for me, as the only pay I get for it is the satisfaction that they do well, but I still have to concentrate on my own business, organising work, servicing my own equipment, planning future work, etc. and listening to customers, etc.
It’s no wonder that I don’t have time for my VW…

 

So when you write something and the customer doesn’t understand it you then ask them if they are on the spectrum, as opposed to revisit yor own words?

 

I don’t write things for them. I get off my arse and go and see them face to face. It’s the best communication possible. It also makes it more personal and you can ‘weigh each other up’, so to speak.

 

[

is this you pricing up a gardening job
https://www.instagram.com/reel/C3-BNssi97O/?igsh=b284amxjbXQwMGJ0

 

That’s a brilliant approach for you, and plainly it works if you have a one to one relationship with the customer, and the customer never sues, wants to recover costs or exercise penalty clauses within the contract.

My professional life is more the latter.

Much though this discourse is an enjoyable distraction, I’ll summarise where we are.

You said ‘why are all people on boats Young men’
I’ve answered that and you’ve ignored me.
You’ve said why don’t they stay in France, where it’s safe.
I’ve told you the question should be how many stay in France.
I’ve answered that and you’ve ignored me.
You’ve replied with a message I can’t understand.
I’ve told you that several times and you’ve ignored me.
You’ve asked me if I am on the spectrum.
I’ve told you it’s doubtful, but it’s certainly not why I can understand your point.
And you’ve ignored me.

So I get the merry dance of various conversation arcs. I suspect it’s merely a typo, but hey ho.

I’ve tried to treat you with respect whilst having my own ability to learn questioned.

You could easily verify any of the points I’ve made, instead, like many with your mindset it’s easier to question the messenger.

I look forward to many more of your novel thoughts where you simply ignore anyone that questions them.

Here’s a cheeky thought, has it ever occurred to you that most of your customers might like stuff written down when dealing with a local man who on here says he has a reputation locally?

See, it’s not hard to offend someone is it, which I’m unsure you do unknowingly on here a fair amount of the time.

 

Baz said, Why don’t they stay in France where it’s safe. Read it again. I’m just repeating a question. My client would rather meet me, as most of them are old and don’t talk to many other people. We enjoy ‘banter’, professionally or not. This is the problem with writing stuff to each other, you see? You are proving your own point

 

And offending people? That’s down to the person who is offended. Some people get offended if you look at them funny.

 

You must get that? Better to go and see some one face to face, ain’t it? ‘See’ what they are saying, by their expressions and mannerisms?

 

Chill soggzy
Don’t keep rattling that cage

 

Asbestos in brake linings were banned i think in 1974 or 73 along with everything else i think .
That said vehicles older coming in would have it in them but brakes on a wagon would only last a year so in theory you would see the last of them .
Haulage company's one man operators could well have had old stock to last them a couple of years or more so you had to be aware .
On my City and Guilds coarse it was very much paramount that you should be aware of asbo linings and blowing them off .

The garage i worked at was a British Leyland Giltspur group set up, a big place with first rate facility's and were very strict on the safety aspects .
We once had an old mechanic start old school style who kept blowing the shoes down inside the garage ...we al went outside until it cleared , he had no idea of the possible dangers and was eventually sacked as he kept doing it .