Hello
Just introducing myself.
Can I just tell you how i got here? Thanks:)
Well, up to last year, November, I was in Spain. I had been there for 13 years. I was working as a guitarist/singer/entertainer.
I loved it. The money was good (1200 euros a week, yes…a week) the crack was good, and I was with a slim, shaggy blonde hair, suntanned, white teeth, wonderful woman.
Times were good
Then…the slim blonde turned into a effin nutter (Not a surprise really, She´d been doing it for a while) Split up.
Jobs started to be less and less, and it came to the point where I couldn´t pay my rent. This process took about ten years, totally because of the “Credit Crunch”
A happy smiley title for some thing that ruined millions of peoples lives.
I phoned my sister, in UK. I said I need to come back… She said…here´s your plane ticket (on the´net)
I came to London, to my sisters house. Now, it´s a nice big house, and she´s just had a huge loft conversion done. Yep, that´s me. Top floor, looks like I´m living in IKEA! But it does had its own bathroom/shower
So, here I am. London. Age 60. No skills. Ex military surveyor, ex Class 2 driver, ex Commercial Diver (plus explosives), ex Steel Erector/Rigger, but no certified skills.
What to do.
When I went to sign on (A nightmare, don´t get me started, no money for 14 weeks) I eventually wound up with a lovely work coach who thought it was her job to help me and NOT to just knock back every suggestion, or plea for help, that I made (Unlike my first work coach).
This woman actually offered me useful things!
So I did a NVQ in Health and Social Care
Applied for jobs, got interviews, no go because I have no character references.
Ok, bin that idea.
Back to see my work coach.
That very day they had some people in the Job Centre (Hackney) doing a presentation for HCT (Hackney Community Transport). These people give you everything you need up to, but not including, a PCV/HGV test. So basically a Medical and a CPC.
I went to see them in the floor below my signing floor.
No prresentation, just a kinda informal chat. I told the lovely woman there that I USED to have an HGV 2
She asked why I don´t have it anymore.
I said it had expired
She said they don´t expire, just get your medical and CPC, with us, and you get your licence back.
I said WHAAAAT?
Next week I start the CPC, get my medical, and start looking for jobs.
Good news eh?
Anyways, hello to all, and get ready for some totally newboy questions from me. I shall, of course, expect some totally idiotic replies