In the early eighties I spent a couple of years at college before landing a job as an office junior in a small but snobby security firm.
The majority of the staff were in their forties and thus horrified when confronted with a lovely new word processor. This was intended to ease the workload in the office, as was I, so, rather than pulling themselves out of their fossil cases, the twinset and pearls brigade decided to combine both youth and electronics. This meant, of course, that I was thrown in at the deep end.
I sat at a small desk with this alien being and an instruction manual and began to decipher its meanings. I soon became an authority as no-one else wanted to bother with it, and so when an upgrade was necessary I was the one who made the necessary recommendations.
And thus my career path was formed. I took several clerical jobs over the next few years, but every one I had seemed to collide with computers. You must understand that this was when 'Windows' was just an infant in Britain, and not the petulant post-pubescent and disgustingly smug teenager with attitude it has since become.
Having made it my business to learn as much as I could about the vast array of systems I worked on (mostly from the manuals and accompanied by a colourful variety of swear words when I frequently got it wrong), I decided to hone my craft into being. I then quit whatever dull job it was I was doing, called myself, rather grandly, an Applications Specialist, and made myself available to several agencies in the district for a fee of around seven pounds per hour, which was quite a lot in those days. And I did very well for myself, thank-you-very-much. |
