My early years were lived at a pace I still find hard to comprehend even now. My first car at 10 years old (Zephyr 6 MK III) was the start, I then started buying bangers and doing them up and selling them to neighbours and friends, then along came school. I hated school, the violence was unbelievable, if there was not rival school wars with bottle fights, there were ‘ban the cane’ strikes by teachers and of course the pupils, and with teachers being stabbed it was not a great place to be. Oh yes it happened in the London comprehensive’s and it is not something new, just suppressed for many years from the media. I left school with barely enough qualification’s to breath let alone get an apprenticeship as a mechanic and worked for a packing company in London. Six months later and finally got a job as an apprentice mechanic (thanks for taking pity B & M Auto’s) on cars and commercials. Three years on and another bit of paper I was offered a job with a small engineering company making discreet components for the MOD, as is normal MOD practice you never got to fabricate the complete part, so never did see the completed article but suffice to say it helped things go bang. That was great working with lathes/mills and so forth to exacting tolerances no CAD though just a very steady hand and a good eye.
The company moved out of the area and I drifted into a labouring job, it was local and it got into kitchen fitting, house/flat conversions/plumbing/electrics. This was good whilst it lasted but I wanted more money, I ended up driving a mini cab for a few years, your own hours and you controlled your wages, I then opened a couple of cab offices in Essex with a couple of other guys, during this time I became diabetic and found the weird hours and business stress made blood sugar control very difficult, in fact no, it made it damn impossible! Over time the businesses were sold and I went self employed as a mechanic. I had also developed a hankering for computers and started building and selling them as a sideline to the mechanic business. I had no computing qualifications but boy can I read! I decided to go to college, typical I could not sit an exam that was at the level I had achieved, this resulted in starting at the bottom, (big head bit coming up), less than a year later and having passed every exam they threw at me they offered me a job!!
Of course there was a caveat, I registered as a teaching assistant and they funded my teaching certification including various assessors modules, so I could teach and also set exams to suit the various curriculum changes as and when they happened. Passing that three years later this secured my permanent post as IT Lecturer and course tutor. I attended various courses to extend my computing knowledge including HTML, easy VB, and on to ‘C+’, this was padded out by Worcester College who tidied up my MS ‘Office’ and OS (WIN 2000 server) knowledge.
The college continued to fund my PDP or ‘personal development path’ through to University to study for my degree in computer science, during this time the Labour party were calling for all teachers to be qualified and not all Uni teachers were, so I was called upon on occasion to step in which was a great buzz as the ‘teachers’ were being taught by TEACHERS. Throughout these blurring years I continued to build custom cars, race engines, drag racing with the RWYB, Le Mans with the Jag club and underground street racing, i.e. the early ‘fast and the furious days’ but were more discreet and better organised, less laptops and more feeler gauges on Weber carburetor ‘O’ rings! I was also fixing family and friends cars when one day my heart decided I should just have a rest. Everything ground to a halt, after a spell in hospital I reduced my work hours and dropped out of University. As time passed and my health returned to an acceptable level, I had a stress test done which allowed me to apply for a HGV licence, this I did, the teaching career binned I plodded around for a few years driving whatever paid enough money. It would be a flat bed skateboard delivering pipework one week, the ‘Hovis’ long box bread lorries the following and yes, I did collect my fair share of street furniture driving those! Perhaps the best four year was threading 32 ton 8 leggers in reverse up peoples driveways with the materials for their extension AFTER they have signed the disclaimer about underground services damage. “Sorry guv you were warned” as you pulled off the pavement, their house lights go out, and slabs started lifting up as the water pressure was released from the broken pipes! The driving was great, you turned off the engine and you were finished, the teaching meant taking home work, reading the various nanny state directive’s about how the ‘praise sandwich’ should be delivered to a slipping student rather than tell him or her straight they was going to fail if they did not stop f*cking about, and who did not want to be there anyway. It never stopped, there was always some course to attend, even during holidays, I was simply not built for that any more, finally sold up everything and moved to Spain.
Now registered as self employed ‘multiservicios’ and as a fully legal business I fix cars and do property maintenance. I work when I want and for how long I want but, I have to keep the workaholic in me under rein, my body soon pushes back if I try to overdo it, I am in effect semi retired now and love it! The 80 is the hobby, a bit of scuba, and snooker or card nights with friends.
If your eyes have not glazed over by now, then thanks for reading.
Regards
Dave