Dying
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oh i missed the first job bit.
From as early as i can remember i worked in dad's factory for pocket money at best. Was still doing that over uni summers until i was 20 i reckon
Pamphlets was my first. I got fired from that for missing too many deliveries. I had the New World coupons in a retiree area, so those biddies used to ring up if they didn't get them. What really offended me is i never even dumped, i legit did that job so fuck knows why they weren't getting them. 500-odd pamphlets a week.
Mobil forecourt which was pretty sweet.
Best one was cleaning a bakery. Worked around sport, full-time available over holidays if i wanted. Basic baking duties sometimes. Food at the end of every day. Mint
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I remember when Dad retired and was only play golf (Retired around 55) and going to the beach house, he wanted to show me that you had to work for money and that any job is a good job.
So when I was about 14 or 15 he took me to a night job packing boxes in a warehouse (books I think) and it was only supposed to be for 2 hours per night. After the first night we never went back and he basically said find something you like and do it.
It must have been the most torturous 2 hours he had ever worked. Big ups to him for trying to teach me a valuable lesson.
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First job: family farm - shearing shed to be precise. Didn't get paid for that really, tho dad did take us to a nearby farm for my first tax paying job when I was 14. Hot. Owner was a dickhead and didn't treat his sleep for lice, so the wool was total crap to work with.
Fuck all that. It's why I bludge in an office for a living. Every time I get frustrated with the political corporate shit, I look at the brickies building houses in searing heat, and think about the farm.
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@NTA yeah, fuck working outside in this country, it's ridiculous
Qld Govt looking to bring in legislation (driven by unions) that will force tradesmen to stop work if the temp hits 28, or the humidity 75%. So for 9 months of the year in Cairns then
It was 28 degrees as i drove to work at 7.40 this morning.
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@mariner4life said in Aging:
@NTA yeah, fuck working outside in this country, it's ridiculous
Qld Govt looking to bring in legislation (driven by unions) that will force tradesmen to stop work if the temp hits 28, or the humidity 75%. So for 9 months of the year in Cairns then
It was 28 degrees as i drove to work at 7.40 this morning.
28 seems low, but presumably there is a temperature above which it's dangerous to work outside, even if that's 40.
Or in the spirit of the thread, they should man up or find a softer job.
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On hot weather working, one of my worst jobs ever was picking strawberries in summer in Hawkes Bay. Start work stupidly early in the morning (was not a morning person back then) then try and pick as much before 8am so you could cruise a bit to 10-12 and then go home.
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On hot weather working, one of my worst jobs ever was picking strawberries in summer in Hawkes Bay. Start work stupidly early in the morning (was not a morning person back then) then try and pick as much before 8am so you could cruise a bit to 10-12 and then go home.
Similar job out our way was cotton "chipping" i.e. chipping or pulling burrs and weeds out of cotton crop rows in order to prevent contamination of the final product.
I never did it (mornings? ugh), but mates would in school holidays: Get up before dawn, go up and down the rows for hours at a time in increasing heat. Few breaks and make sure you're in long sleeves and a decent hat. Pay was OK, from memory.
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@mariner4life said in Aging:
Qld Govt looking to bring in legislation (driven by unions) that will force tradesmen to stop work if the temp hits 28, or the humidity 75%. So for 9 months of the year in Cairns then
Lazy fluffybunnies. And I genuinely mean that for any person who encourages such a position.
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1st job for me was doing the payroll in the hotel my old man managed (at 11).
First paid job - woolies Got sacked for sweeping up to slowly so started my own cleaning company at 17 while at uni.
Only get up in the middle of the night for a piss if I've been on the piss.
Never too tired. It might not work next time!!! That hasn't been a problem but there's always a first so hell no.
Don't really listen to music full stop. I want to engage my brain with stuff other than work so listen to a lot of podcasts on subjects outside my comfort zone - sciences, philosophy, history mainly.
Never, ever, ever get grumpy
Still got a thick mop of hair on my head but its grey now (that started in my early 20's) but its growing in my ears now too and I seem to be developing long grey nasal hairs which look like bogeys if I don't catch them.
Have thus far managed to avoid the hairy back though.
Someone mentioned endurance vs strength. I walk 70 - 100 kms every week - mainly after work (podcasts). I was OK with fit young things leaving me for dead but increasingly it's Mums with buggies. Effectively anyone without a zimmer frame burns me off on the hills which fucks me off - or would if I was the type to get grumpy
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@mariner4life said in Aging:
One thing that I find makes me grumpier is the avalanche of stupid songs. Dance Monkey - WTF? Anything with autotune. Practically everything on high rotate on commercial radio - I know I'm hardly their target demographic but use some imagination you lazy pricks.
there are a couple of songs playing on the radio now that i quite like...
seriously outweighed by the mountains of utter shit though
Can't listen to the radio any more. Loud dickheads and ads. Or politicians. Its a lose-lose.
Agreed, the one exception being R&N Fridays on 2Day FM and other affiliated stations. Love being taken back to my "clubbing" days with all the older R&N and Hip Hop (which is not really my cup of tea but the memories).
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Every time I get frustrated with the political corporate shit, I look at the brickies building houses in searing heat, and think about the farm.
I always think of the poor roofers, laying white colourbond roofs in 30+ temps, no thanks. Or mechanics in overalls inside a hot unconditioned workshop.
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@NTA said in Aging:
Every time I get frustrated with the political corporate shit, I look at the brickies building houses in searing heat, and think about the farm.I always think of the poor roofers, laying white colourbond roofs in 30+ temps, no thanks. Or mechanics in overalls inside a hot unconditioned workshop.
I did roofing (roofing labouring really) as a summer job a couple of year at uni. Now that is some bollocks work I never want to do again.
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Every time I get frustrated with the political corporate shit, I look at the brickies building houses in searing heat, and think about the farm.
I always think of the poor roofers, laying white colourbond roofs in 30+ temps, no thanks. Or mechanics in overalls inside a hot unconditioned workshop.
a couple of my best mates are roofers. It's insane the conditions they work in. Likewise the mates who paint them. Or the guy who spends most of his time installing solar panels. Roofs in 35+ is fucking ridiculous.
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Back on Aging: someone mentined having to get up to pee in the middle of the night. I now try to avoid any form of caffeine after 3PM and even stop water and other fluids after dinner. But at 4AM I'm still getting a kick from the bladder?
Think I need to exercise more. In my 30s when I got fit, I don't remember having any issues sleeping through the night.
Guys. Prostate check. Get it done. No joke, just get it done.
Completely agree @JC
As my Uncle passed away from it, my Father has it (along with dementia) and is being treated and managed but at age 77 he is more likely to die from other age related illnesses (especially the dementia) rather than the prostate cancer getting him and finally, my brother at 44 was diagnosed,
He had the new robot aided surgery and the after hasn't been fun for him and his wife.
Only just now, 3 years later can he get an erection with just the phizer rizer (blue pill). Previously, he had to take the blue pill plus inject some other drug directly into the old fella. Can you imagine just how much guts that takes, inject directly into the penis!!!
Needless to say, there sex life wasn't great the past three years but is improving now.
Aging certainly sucks. At age 52, like others have said, often having to rise in the middle of the morning to pee, then it's shite to get back to sleep.
Recovery from a decent session is now measured in weeks rather than hours (20's) and days (40's).
Funnily, like a previous poster wrote, my knees which gave me heaps of troubles throughout my late 30's and 40's are now fine but my wife, who is 9 years younger is often complaining of her knees bothering her.
Currently suffering from the rather unpleasant effects of an auto-immune disease, mesenteric panniculitis, which I've likely had for many years but is expressing itself much worse these days due to the body not being able to cope as well when you age.
Supermarkets, interesting topic. I've lived in Sydney (North Sydney these days to be precise) for 25 odd years and my observations as to the quality of produce is that it varies wildly. Depending on where you live and whether said supermarket has any local competition, you can get utterly shite but expensive produce or you can live in an area where the three big names, Coles, Woolies and Aldi are all in competition and prices will be down and quality up.
Funnily, I've also found some of the more affluent areas have some of the worst quality produce.
One thing I've always noted on my trips to NZ is that the shopping seems cheaper, certainly the alcohol is(!!!), the quality generally better but the range more limited.
Especially if you are shopping for in season produce, NZ rocks, Aus not so much. For example (or as per @NTA's latin lesson e.g.) we rarely buy apples from the supermarkets. They will be floury. soft and lacking in any flavour. Often, the are cold storage from the previous years.
However, it should be noted that some new apple varieties to hit the Aussie shelves such as the Jazz apple are actually seasonal from the supermarkets.
I can also say we hardly ever buy a orange for similar reasons, dry and often awful tasting.
Now to booze, as alluded to earlier, I'm like a kid in a candy store when walking into any NZ supermarket. All those awesome craft beers at prices which we pay for dross here! And yes, I am a real craft beer piston wristed gibbon, sans beard and beer gut.
The killer is, I was in Taupo last year for my cousins wedding, went to the supermarket to buy some beers and found that James Squires beers, brewed just across the bridge in Camperdown, are cheaper by half in NZ than in Sydney... now that right there was a WTF moment!
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@mariner4life said in Aging:
Every time I get frustrated with the political corporate shit, I look at the brickies building houses in searing heat, and think about the farm.
I always think of the poor roofers, laying white colourbond roofs in 30+ temps, no thanks. Or mechanics in overalls inside a hot unconditioned workshop.
a couple of my best mates are roofers. It's insane the conditions they work in. Likewise the mates who paint them. Or the guy who spends most of his time installing solar panels. Roofs in 35+ is fucking ridiculous.
Or the guys putting in the roof insulation, I did that once, fuck that.
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the quality generally better but the range more limited.
I actually find the opposite of this although it's generally in specific stuff like chocolate biscuits - no Australia, twenty different types of Tim Tams is not a good range of chocolate biscuits. Although in the last couple of years the 'home brand' biscuits of Coles seem to be mimicking NZ types (e.g toffee pops, mallow puffs etc). Coffee (plunger/beans) is the other big one, there's always a big range in NZ supermarkets but Coles and Woolies have a small range. I actually buy mine from Aldi because I like their 'organic' home brand ... although I hate shopping there as I have to a. line up and b. talk to an actual human to buy it.
Strawberries and chicken are easily the cheapest things comparatively over here - strawberries are the closest to fruit I eat and you can pick up punnets cheap as fudge.
Beer is weirdly expensive here.
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One of my first jobs was grinding out the inside of fibreglass boats to remove the "dags" from the chopped strand matt guns. Middle of summer inside a hull, outside in the sun, wearing overalls taped around the cuffs to stop the itchy shit getting inside. Huge safety gloves that didn't prevent shards getting into hands. Dust prevention masks that were just there to prevent you breathing, not stop inhaling the dust. Fucking nightmare - for minimum wage.
Reminds me of this:
"I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulphuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad and our mother would kill us and dance about on our graves singing Hallelujah"
And you try and tell the young people of today that ... they won't believe you
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@mariner4life said in Aging:
Every time I get frustrated with the political corporate shit, I look at the brickies building houses in searing heat, and think about the farm.
I always think of the poor roofers, laying white colourbond roofs in 30+ temps, no thanks. Or mechanics in overalls inside a hot unconditioned workshop.
a couple of my best mates are roofers. It's insane the conditions they work in. Likewise the mates who paint them. Or the guy who spends most of his time installing solar panels. Roofs in 35+ is fucking ridiculous.
Or the guys putting in the roof insulation, I did that once, fuck that.
My worst roofing job ever was one where the original guys had the wrong washers, so I had to remove the nail/screw (Can't remember), replace the washer and drill it back in (because they were too cheap to pay for new ones so we couldn't put the washers on beforehand). It was at the port in Napier ... I've never seen so many used condoms in my life. I think because the sewage pipes were nearby and the seagulls would pick them up and dump them there.
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the quality generally better but the range more limited.
I actually find the opposite of this although it's generally in specific stuff like chocolate biscuits - no Australia, twenty different types of Tim Tams is not a good range of chocolate biscuits. Although in the last couple of years the 'home brand' biscuits of Coles seem to be mimicking NZ types (e.g toffee pops, mallow puffs etc). Coffee (plunger/beans) is the other big one, there's always a big range in NZ supermarkets but Coles and Woolies have a small range. I actually buy mine from Aldi because I like their 'organic' home brand ... although I hate shopping there as I have to a. line up and b. talk to an actual human to buy it.
Strawberries and chicken are easily the cheapest things comparatively over here - strawberries are the closest to fruit I eat and you can pick up punnets cheap as fudge.
Beer is weirdly expensive here.
Agreed in that respect @Nepia . I was focusing more on produce, fruits and veggies in particular.
Some goods in NZ have a much better range than Aus, and vice versa. I guess it's what you focus on.
The one thing I definitely think is a whole lot better in NZ is the alcohol. Prices much much better than Aus due to better tax rules.
What shits me about being a craft beer piston wristed gibbon is that I'm getting used to paying between $16-18 for a single can of a good , strong craft beer. The other day I popped into a good brew pub and asked for a beer I saw they had on Untapped but didn't realise it was by can only and not on tap. The single can was get this... $34!
Sure it was some rare and amazing American 10% Double New England IPA but I just about spat out "what the fuck" when the barman told me. I then ordered a schooner of their own IPA (mind you that was $16 a schooner), drank that and walk out. Probably won't bother to go back.
