The benefits of having a boy...........

Seafarer1966 · 8 May 2018

DIYedboy said:
Sadly young blokes don't realise a boy cannot be lippy to an old lag, I started off as an apprentice car mechanic, if anyone lipped an old timer he would lift the poor fella above his head, throw him against a wall n then the human projectile would drop into the tyre bath.................happy days!!!
If you think that during the Vietnam war the average age of the American conscripts was 19 (the poor little sods) imagine our lot getting shipped out to war!!

Coincidentally on the subject of kids being sent to war I was reading about Eisenhower's decision to use raw recruits straight from basic training for the American landings at Omaha beach on D-Day. He insisted that no battle veterans be used, only young lads with no fighting experience.

He knew that if he used experienced troops they wouldn't have got off the boats because they would have known what was waiting for them on that beach.

Seafarer1966 · 8 May 2018

My mother was a clerk in the printing trade for 40 years. The printing apprentices used to dread the day they became qualified men as the old lags used to strip them and paint printing ink over their privates. It was called being 'blackballed' and was something of a tradition. The ink wouldn't wash off. You had to wait for it to wear off. The old lags had it done to them when they were apprentices now it was the young lads turn.

FiremanT · 4 Jun 2018

Seafarer1966 said:
As an apprentice surveyor in the coal industry many years ago I had my share of ribbing. My owd grandad had given me some invaluable advice..."never refuse to do something you're asked to do....just don't do it well....and don't react in any way".

Whenever I was told to make tea I'd use lukewarm water from the tap, pre-used tea bags out of the kitchen bin, and if it was for one of the pit deputies (Seamus you bar steward...probably dead now as he was a bottle of scotch a day alchie even back then) I'd collect whatever creepy crawlies I could from the store room and put those in the teapot as well.

The site manager once told me to wash his car. I made sure it was covered in streaks when I'd finished. He never asked me again and used to make the other apprentice do it.

When I left for pastures new I superglued a couple of the locks on certain persons lockers (those that had given me the most hassle). They had to use a pry bar to get into them. I rode off on my Honda C90 into the sunset p155ing myself laughing.

And they say youngsters today are useless waste of spaces.

FiremanT · 4 Jun 2018

Seafarer1966 said:
Next day, dying of curiosity, I got to the canteen. There was most of the workforce, with the victim (the other apprentice) tied face down to a table with his trousers and underpants round his ankles. We had a machine driver called Hoss, due to the impressive size of his appendage, it was as thick as a milk bottle and wasn't even standing to attention. Hoss had his weapon out and was prodding the lads head with it, telling him that the site blokes were all somewhat annoyed with him, and Hoss was going to mount him and give him a good seeing to and that when he'd finished the lad would have to sit down to wee like a woman. The apprentice was squealing like a pig by this time and crying. The blokes were all cheering and egging Hoss on (he didn't carry out the threat). Eventually they untied the lad who went home in a state of distress. He came back a week later than handed his notice in. The police would have arrested folk these days for less.

Different times, different world.

Thank Christ for that.

The sad thing is that you seem to think the old ways were good.

Diver Fred · 4 Jun 2018

Seafarer1966 said:
>> snip<<The printing apprentices used to dread the day they became qualified men as the old lags used to ....>>Snip<<

I had something similar 'try' to happen to me when I left my first employer... Grabbed from behind by one bloke, he though that by having my arms pinned I couldn't fight back... Little did he know that I had been training for self defense for a couple of years, so I slipped down a little so I could get right hand onto his elbow and left hand onto his wrist, push his elbow away and pull down and twist left hand and his right arm went 'click' - he screamed... And let me go. Apparently he was off work for several weeks. As the union man saw what happened I couldn't be reprimanded as it was out of work hours and my last day.

Diver Fred · 4 Jun 2018

I've worked in both large and small companies. Large companies did (do?) try to give their apprentices a sample of every job for a few weeks, what I've found is they range from useless (not interested) to trying too hard.
In small companies I felt sorry that the apprentices didn't really get much chance to see a range of skills and disciplines but they did soon learn how to make tea and how to 'drive' a sweeping brush. The ones that progressed the most under me were the ones who didn't get offended when shown the kettle and mugs on the first day and brush on their second day.
The penultimate apprentice allocated to me really thought I was a 'bastard' cause I used to check his apprentice 'note' book regularly and make him write reports on what we did when off site when working on stuff outside of the discipline h'd been taken on for. 5 years later when I left the company he came and found me to thank me personally for what I'd made him do; all the out of work area stuff at that time was now useful to him in his new job in the company, he progressed very rapidly.

durhamplumber · 30 Jun 2018

Seafarer1966 said:
Coincidentally on the subject of kids being sent to war I was reading about Eisenhower's decision to use raw recruits straight from basic training for the American landings at Omaha beach on D-Day. He insisted that no battle veterans be used, only young lads with no fighting experience.

He knew that if he used experienced troops they wouldn't have got off the boats because they would have known what was waiting for them on that beach.

He was spot on in his thinking.

JohnD · 30 Jun 2018

another advantage being that very high casualty rates would only reduce the number of inexperienced rookies, while leaving better troops alive for future use.

This doesn't apply in most other jobs, and unless you have an ample supply of new conscripts, has bad results in keeping things running.

Seafarer1966 · 3 Aug 2018

FiremanT said:
And they say youngsters today are useless waste of spaces.

Fireman my owd. Get a felt a large indelible ink marker pen and in your bestest ever ever handwriting write 'TROLL' on your forehead in reverse so you can remind yourself when you're looking in the mirror.

FiremanT · 3 Aug 2018

Seafarer1966 said:
Fireman my owd. Get a felt a large indelible ink marker pen and in your bestest ever ever handwriting write 'TROLL' on your forehead in reverse so you can remind yourself when you're looking in the mirror.

Grow up man.I am not your site "boy".

Once a bully always a bully?

The benefits of having a boy...........

durhamplumber

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