Your day jobs?

[Inky]

Dear friends,

I recently got a new job as a fieldworker in market research - it is a fun and active job which allows me to travel across the city and talk to many people. Sometimes, I can even write little bits of my stories during lulls in work.

Now, I'm interested to know: what are your day jobs, fellow writers? Unless you are surviving as a full-time writer (which I imagine is quite rare)?

Have a nice day, everyone
Inky

[Gyppo]

I have always had a 'proper' job as well as being a writer.  Although in my own mind most of them were part-time to keep the rent and food coming in.

Baker, postman, showman, working on the belt at Nintendo shoving games in boxes, and all sorts of short term things to earn a bob or two.  All these jobs also offered excellent 'people watching' opportunities, thus providing a wonderful pool of raw material to work with.  Something an 'Ivory Tower' writer wouldn't have ;-).

But I always found time to write, and you tend to become quite good at making the most of opportunities and time.  You learn to write to order, to turn on the creative juices almost as soon as you sit down to type.  In truth, often before, as you'll find yourself planning a scene or whatever on your way home from work.  You also sometimes find you've totally lost yourself in your writing and the night has passed and it's time to go and do your bread and butter job again.

Eventually this will take a toll on your health.  I got to my fifties before the cracks started to show, but I'm still paying for it now.

Now I'm retired and I'll admit that having a regular pension has taken some of the urgency from the need to earn extra.  My two girls are independent, and someone else is taking care of my ex-wife.

My day to day needs are modest, but my characters won't let me slack off too much ;-)

Gyppo

[Noizchild]

Writing.

[nosuchmember]

I never considered a job on whether or not it was a proper job: Cook, waitress, book keeper, midwife, home schooling parent, head-chainman(construction). rod-man (construction), and ,oh yeah, a bartender.

I am retired from construction layout business. Eight of my ten children are grown with children, and grandchildren of their own(I lost the other two to Heaven. One died in my hands, the other died on a highway. 

I have two talents (gifts), when my heart is moved, I draw and/or write .

I had two art showings in Bangladesh: 2014 and 2015.

My only job today: Is doing what needs to be done in the day.        jt

[Vienna]

To earn money, my day job is selling books, I work in a medical bookshop in Vienna. I also translate, proof-read, and give private classes.

[hillwalker3000]

Retired ex-FedEx manager. . . but I've since worked part time as a gardener, handyman, picture gallery assistant and petrol sales attendant. Oh, and I'll probably never give up my real job - I'm a writer.

H3K

[trainer]

I work as a freelance educational consultant. I also do some part-time tutoring. Some months, when consultancy doesn't bring in enough money, I actively look for more tutoring opportunities. I have resisted a stable, full-time job for a long while now. I don't like the rigidity of a full-time job: fixed leaves, fixed work hours, no freedom to plan my day.

The two most important aspects of my day are running and reading. Sometimes, I find the need to go for an afternoon run, and I plan my lunch accordingly. Or I blow all morning reading and writing, and work only at night. These are things I'd never be able to do without autonomy.

[landmersm]

Manager in a manufacturing environment.  Stimulating. (insert sarcasm font for proper effect.)

[thatollie]

I stand in the sun and say hello to people and then press some buttons.

There is no sun at the moment so I'm out of work.

[Il Penseroso]

I had muggle jobs as a merchant, cashier, baker, teacher, cleaner. Then fate came along and put me in a wheelchair, so now I'm between jobs as people euphemistically call it.

[Mark T]

Eish man, that's a harsh card from the hand of fate. African sorry from over here. You seem talented and resilient.

My day job (these days) is being a general contractor in a coastal tourist village. I've done all sorts of things. Before this I was a farm manager, living in a mountain range. 

 

[Il Penseroso]

Thanks Mark.

Talented? I hope. Resilient? Absolutely. I simply refuse to give up, so if life gives me lemons, I make a lemon meringue pie. It would be a waste of time to sit down in a corner and pity myself.

[Gyppo]

It would be a waste of time to sit down in a corner and pity myself.

Good man.

[Il Penseroso]

Good man.

Ta.