MercianMarcus wrote:Plumbers. If there is one out there that can do even a half descent job, ...
'.. from a high horse ..?'
In the '70s I had been the first Officer in a new Air Cadet unit, started in a relatively (for this area) rough area on the initiative of a former RAF SNCO.
Quite a few years ago we had called a plumber. When he came to the door he immediately recognised me, knowing the surname, and said "Oh, Sir, I've been meaning to apologise to you ever since I left the Cadets without saying goodbye". I then remembered him. He had been a very promising Cadet, one of the first of the new Unit to do a Summer Camp, and down for a gliding course and an Easter overseas Camp. Then one day in the spring term his father had brought in his uniform and said he would not be coming back. I was very worried that we had done something wrong; his friends could only tell me that he had also left school.
It turned out that on his 16th birthday his father had said "right, son, you're a man now. You don't need to go to school any more or take any exams, I've apprenticed you to a mate who's a plumber." "but Dad, what about Cadets, my Camp, my gliding .. ?" "Schoolboy stuff, son, you're not going back, you'll be working too long hours and no holidays".
He had really wanted to go into the RAF, preferably as NCO aircrew, and was working hard towards enough CSEs (as they then were), which at his then school would have been an achievement. I pointed out to him that as a plumber he was probably earning more, 20+ years later, than he would have been as a SNCO .
Oh, and he did a good job for a fair price ..
(mere guide at) Jet Age Museum, Gloucestershire Airport
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