Monday, January 13, 2020
Welcome to another edition of RV Travel’s Daily Tips newsletter. Here you’ll find helpful RV-related and living tips from the pros, travel advice, a handy website of the day, tips on our favorite RVing-related products and, of course, a good laugh. Thanks for joining us. We appreciate you. Please tell your friends about us.
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Today’s thought
“Whenever I feel the need to exercise, I lie down until it goes away.” ―
Need an excuse to celebrate? Today is National Clean-Off-Your-Desk Day! Good luck!
Did you see the news? Click here to read the latest issue of the Sunday News for RVers.
Tip of the Day
Warning to would-be full-timers about warranties
If you are buying a new RV to go full-timing it’s critical you examine the warranty from the factory before you make the purchase. A lot of those warranties forbid full-timing and actually wipe out or severely reduce the warranty to a couple of months if you do.
So be careful! And if the dealer says not to worry because the warranty will cover you in spite of what it says, then do not buy the RV until the dealer writes that down on the sales contract, so that the dealer is making that guarantee in writing to you. Otherwise, you could find yourself with a bad RV and money out of your own pocket to fix it. Life is too short to put up with a bad RV. —Ron Burge (RV Lemon lawyer)
Do you have a tip? Submit it here.
RV Electricity – This week’s J.A.M. (Just Ask Mike) Session:
Higher ground (for your pedestal). A reader is dismayed that in order to get a surge protector into place at the low-to-the-ground pedestal in an RV campground, he had to dig down about a foot at the base of the pedestal. Mike explains why these pedestals are still found in campgrounds, and an easy, and safe, workaround if you have to hook up to one.
• Sign up for Mike’s monthly RV Electricity Newsletter.
• While you’re at it, be sure to join his popular Facebook group, RV Electricity.
• Read more of Mike’s articles here.
Oh, my! Motorhome towing a trailer and a boat – 122 feet altogether!
(In case you missed this a few weeks ago.) How would you like to drive down the highway in a motorhome, towing both a long trailer and a boat behind you — 122 feet long altogether? Well, that’s exactly what this man is doing. Watch the short video!
Reader poll
What did we learn about you from our reader polls last week? Find out here.
Save money with these reusable silicone bags
Never waste money on plastic bags again! This 4-pack of reusable silicone food bags have an airtight seal and are leak-proof, keeping food fresh for longer. Easily freeze the bags, and even run them through the dishwasher once you’re done using them. This plastic bag alternative won’t harm the environment, and instead provides a solution that you can wash, rinse and reuse to your heart’s content! Learn more or order.
Helpful resources
• NATIONAL TRAFFIC AND ROAD CLOSURE INFORMATION.
• ROAD AND TRAFFIC CONDITIONS ACROSS THE NATION.
• WEATHER ALERTS FROM THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE.
• CURRENT WILDFIRE REPORT.
• LATEST RV RECALLS.
Quick Tip
Clean black marks off your rig
Black marks on your rig? Give it a shot of WD-40, rub it with a rag, and many of those black marks will vanish. Wear gloves when using WD-40.
And, in case you missed this a few months ago, here are some surprising uses for WD-40. Do you have any uses that aren’t listed in the article or in the previous comments from readers? If so, please add your helpful tip(s) below the article.
Best-selling printed directory of free and inexpensive campgrounds. Click.
Space heater uses less than two amps! RVtravel.com has one, loves it! More.
Random RV Thought
Whenever you can, get off the Interstates and drive the back roads. You’ll battle fewer big rig trucks and get up close and personal with scenery and the local population. Pause often along the main streets of small towns, have lunch, or maybe just a milkshake. Drop by the general store and buy the local paper. It’s 10 times more fun taking a back road than speeding along a boring Interstate.
Website of the day
Camping and RV parks in Illinois
“Take the scenic route and visit some of the best spots for camping in Illinois. Lake-side to forest fringe, we break down the RV parks and campgrounds available in Illinois.” From the Illinois Office of Tourism.
Keep road flares in the RV for emergency
You should always have road flares in your RV in case of an emergency. This pack of three bright, waterproof, and shatterproof LED disks are perfect to keep tucked away. These bright lights can be seen from a mile away and can be used for traffic control, as a warning light, as a rescue beacon and they can also be used for recreational activities such as camping and hiking. Learn more or order here.
Popular articles you may have missed at RVtravel.com
• RVers: To arm or not to arm.
• Is your RV 10 years old or older? Any problems being denied a site?
• How has your RV performed based on your expectations when you bought it? (Whew! 75 comments!)
• Can we use bottled water for the RV toilet in winter?
#883F
Trivia
At former President Ronald Regan’s inauguration in 1981, he insisted that a food from each state be served. For Massachusetts, that was Legal Seafoods’ clam chowder. That chowder has been served at every presidential inauguration since.
Heading to an RV show soon? You should be! Even if you’re not buying, the new RVs are fun to look at. See all the upcoming shows on this page and find one in your area.
Leave here with a laugh
Three good ol’ boys are on Death Row. They discuss how to distract the firing squad so they can escape, and come up with a plan. When the first one’s in front of the firing squad he yells “Tornado!” and the firing squad drop their rifles, run for cover and he escapes. The second man comes in front of the firing squad and at the last moment he yells “Earthquake!” and the firing squad drop their rifles, run for cover and he escapes. The third man, who’s not the brightest candle on the cake, then comes in front of the firing squad and at the last moment yells “Fire!” —Thank you, George Bliss!
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Editor and Publisher: Chuck Woodbury. Managing editor: Emily Woodbury. Senior editor: Diane McGovern. Advertising director: Jessica Sarvis. Financial affairs director: Gail Meyring. IT wrangler: Kim Christiansen.
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I worked on a neighbor’s Dairy farm. Learned the importance of being on time; working late; and finishing the job; however crappy it might be. Also learned that was not what I wanted to do for a living; although I did raise a few Beef Cattle.
re: ” learned that was not what I wanted to do for a living; ”
That was a benefit of letting pre-high school kids work at real world jobs.
At 13 I worked as a trail guide at horse stable. Best job I ever loved! Got there at 7AM, left at 5 PM. I rounded up the horses, fed them, groomed them and saddled them. My pay was $.15 per person I took out on the trails. It wasn’t about the money it was about the love of the job and horses of course!
I was 14 and working in a Pontiac dealers used car lot for a whopping $1.60 an hour. My duties were to keep the cars clean and re-arrange them in the lot. And occasionally drive them to the dealer 2 miles away. Yep, no license. That’s how I learned to drive.
Things were more laid back then.
A friend of mine got stopped by the police at age 15 while delivering rafters 50 miles from the lumber yard. He lost the job but I don’t think much happened to anyone involved.
Farm laborer on neighboring farm-hay, tobacco, corn, etc.
Worked on a dairy farm last 2 years of high school. Summer time was milking cows and start time was 0300 every day. To this day I still wake up at 0200 to 0300 to start my day and I am in my 70’s.
I started training horses at a very young age and that is about all I wanted to do. I made a nice career of it until the age of seventy. I slowed down a bit but still at it.
Since my mother thought I should wait until age 12 to start babysitting, the jobs before that included selling greeting cards and wrapping paper door to door, delivering the Sunday paper and collecting for the daily on a rural paper route, and doing inventory including the math for the family business.
I worked at small town diner making pie.
Grew up working on family dairy farm.
I grew up on a farm in Idaho. Did all kinds of farm work growing up but my first pay check was driving truck for a neighbor at 13 hauling grain to the elevator and potatoes from field to storage.
I checked newspaper, but helped my dad on his milk route, mowed lawns with a push mower, weeded yards, worked on a seed farm, then was a gas station attendant, grease monkey and tow truck operator.
Grew up helping my mother who worked as a waitress. I would clean her tables so she could turn more tables. As a team we made more tips.
Dairy farm – pulled a lot of … (milked cows) and threw a lot of hay bales (before modern day round bales).
first job was at 13 was peddling a 3-wheeled ice cream cart around town. i cut grass and delivered newspapers as well. first ‘real’ job was flipping burgers at Burger King. during college i’ve worked at a small town radio station (WKAI in McComb IL), on a loading dock, in a steel mill. later as a prison guard (Stateville in Illinois), as communications officer for a juvenile corrections center, dispatcher at a local PD, and for nearly 30-years at a regional 9-1-1 call center starting as a dispatcher and rising to deputy director. now happily retired for 14+ years and looking forward to our 50th wedding anniversary in march.
On our work as a child – You should have provided a choice for “All of the above”
I Pruned Christmas Trees on a Tree Farm in Western New York. $5.00 a day, Plus Lunch, was what we were paid. Didn’t make a whole lot of money but had a blast!
I worked for a small property management company from age 13 doing repairs, painting, etc. learned a lot that was helpful in flipping houses latter in life
Worked in my dad’s gas station pumping gas and working in the back room doing service when they had service stations all at 1.00 and hour.
As a child, almost all of those for $$. Include washing cars, collecting soda bottles.
Growing up we were tobacco farmers so I started driving tractors and pulling tobacco plants at 4 yrs. As I grew up I went to work for other farmers working for them kinda like a hired gun. I made a lot of money in middle and high school.
And I thought I was young a 7 driving the tractor pulling a grain trailer back and forth between the field and storage bin.
Started out cutting grass and shoveling snow. Then graduated to working one summer at night bussing tables. Then at 15, worked at the Kansas City Zoo caring for ponies and an elephant (Starlight) giving rides to children. Also bailed hay on weekends.
My first job as a child was picking fruit and veggies.
Started babysitting at 13, became a golf caddy at 14+15, bought my own motor scooter the second year to ride to and from the golf course. At 16 went to work in a grocery store, so I learned early on to work for every thing I got.
Started working when I was 14 y.o. at a Mr. Steak restaurant as a dishwasher, then as a busboy and next a cook.
MY family owned a tourist court, The Giants Camp, in FL. I cleaned the cabins and the bathhouse.
Various jobs on local farms starting late grade school through junior high when I got a job sacking groceries and trimming produce.
Farm work: picking things out of fields: rocks, dropped ears of corn, weeds. Bailing hay, etc.
I got a job building pole barns the summer that I turned 15! Working on roofs made me decide I needed to go to college!
Mowing lawns, and newspaper routes had many more kids than jobs.
All prior to age 16: shoveled snow; mowed lawns; washed cars; breakfast cook @ pancake house; ticket taker @ movie theater.
I started working when I was 12 at my neighbor’s farm. This included all the things related to a dairy farm from feeding the cows, plowing, planting, and harvesting crops. It helped me develop a great work ethic
On your poll. I did all except the lemonade stand. I also was a pin setter in the bowling alley when I was 11 until 14.
Helped my Grandfather run a Cotton Gin when I was 13 for $5 a day. Then at age 16 I was a short order cook in a little diner making 50 cents a hour while in going to high school.
At 15, in 1957, started working at a Garden Nursery, for 50 cents/hr, weeding the rows of bushes, plants and small trees. Worked 44 hours a week in the summer. Was making 75 cents/hr the second summer. Best time was weeding the cultivated blueberry bushes, got to eat them, when ripe.
In today’s reader poll. you needed a column for ” I did all the above”
I started babysitting in the summers after turning 13. When I was around 15, I detasseled corn and walked beans for a few weeks in mid to late summer at local Iowa farms. These were hot and sweaty jobs but the money was good, and I got to be with my friends.
“Today is National Clean-Off-Your-Desk Day! Good luck!”
I was an Admin Manager when I retired from the Air Force in 1993. My main slogan was, “A Clean Desk Is A Sure Sign Of A Sick Mind”
I worked in a Hallmark card shop for $.75/hr. Mowed lawns in summer and shoveled snow in the winter. Moved up to the ‘customary’ gas station job that all the cool guys did. Ahem. Growing up in Chicago was fun – BACK THEN! 50’s.
Mowed grass at father’s buildings. Started working gas stations at 14. Moving furniture also at 15-20. Always had a side business throughout my working years.
When young I did ironing and clothing alterations (for neighbors and in college for others in the dorm). Alterations paid very well. I thank my mother for teaching me to sew.
Mowed lawns and tied wire on a Hay baler in the summertime when I was 12 and 13 years old, when I was 14 I worked in a meat processing plant. My job was to run a de-feathering machine in the Chicken section. Then in High school worked in a gas station. Didn’t get paid but, had free use of the tools and cheap gas. Also cleaned out farmers barns on weekends for $3 bucks a day. That money lasted me all week.
Bailed hay, pumped gas at a marina, did sorting at an electroplating co. and fed cows. Grew, weeded, harvested and sold sweet corn at the roadside.
Before I got a permit to work, i started my news paper routes at 10, then at 12 started my lawn mowing , had both until at 15 got my 1st job at the San Gabriel Valley Gun club.
From “Tip of the Day” article. About warranties forbidding full-timing and wiping out or reducing the warranty because you plan on being a full timer. That is absurd! I have never heard of such a thing. Manufactures afraid that there inferior piece of junk is going to fall apart quicker and be in need of warranty repair faster than if you just bought one and didn’t use it as often. PROBABLY. Then the other part about having the selling dealer write down in your sales contract that it is OK to be a full timer is a joke also. You are out RVing around miles and miles from your original dealership that you bought the RV from with the fulltime clause in your sales contract and you need warranty repair. You know whats going to happen? Your write in dealer guarantee on your sales contract is not going to be worth the piece of paper its written on!! ONLY IN AMERICA!!
I worked at a drug store stocking shelves
Working at gas station at 14, in the oil field as a roustabout at 15 through 17.
Thanks for the tip – another good use for WD-40 -removing black marks and other stains, BUT, WD also very effectively takes the wax off the paint to. Rewax, – your coach will love you for it, the paint will stay nice for years with annual maintenance and touch-ups like this as necessary.
Another slick tip: if the rig has gotten in the way of a tree dripping sap, the absolutely least expensive easy and fool proof method of removal without damaging paint rubber or any other surface is to use methyl alcohol – simple gas line antifreeze.
A little dap will do ya, for each spot. I keep a small bottle with me all the time. It’s important to get sap off particularly a painted surface asap, as some of them are quite acidic. Not as much a problem with modern base coat clear coat paint systems, but I have seen damage through that bullet like clear coat.
The alcohol also removes the wax, re- wax after using MA.
Worked at a medical facility treating people with severe arthritis. Every year a special bus arrived and the people were all former prisoners from German concentration camps. As a young person I got an education that made me aware of how important our democracy is! The stories that I was told have stayed with me and have always been a part of who I am.
Washed Cars, babysat for neighbors, dug footers for friend of family(got free cokes), went crabbing and sold the harvest( Maryland) newspaper route, busboy at a club and ran the buffer after school on the linoleum floors.
Started volunteering at the neighborhood library at age 12. At the end of the summer they surprised me with $5. I worked in the library (for $) until I graduated from high school. Also, babysitting at 25c/ hr.
Every summer we had to pick green beans, strawberries and blackberries to earn money for our school clothes. I hated picking beans, the vines were cold and wet. I was not a fast picker & didnt make much money. Sure wish kids today could have that same experience. I didnt have time to get into trouble.
WHY can’t kids today have that experience? No community gardens nearby? Organize one!
I started at 8 yrs mowing my grandfather large lawn. At 13 worked in my dad’s plumbing store. Answered calls, worked at counter, did odd jobs, emptied trucks, learned plumbing and sweat copper, and helped other plumbers clean drain lines. At 15/16 drove PU truck to supplier 35 miles away to get plumbing supplies from a wholesaler. At 17 worked in a bakery delivering bakery items to 3 grocery stores and to another sub bakery 12 miles away on Saturday. At 18 then set up snowmobiles and emptied gas from boats at a marine dealer. Then the Army, including Vietnam. Glad to finally be retired!
I worked at a chicken farm from age 13 to 15 and earned enough money to pay for my hockey equipment.
At 7 yrs. old I bought my own baby chicks (11 hens, 2 roosters), raised them up then sold their eggs to pay for their food, etc. I increased my flock, my egg route and did all the work myself looking after them. I was fortunate that the place we moved to had the buildings so I could do this. My Mother took all the eggs she wanted for free. When I was old enough I also babysat the neighbours kids. I wanted to be a veterinarian so I was saving money so I could go to the school. We moved when I was 14 and I had to sell all my chickens. Then I worked picking strawberries, raspberries and helping at a vets office. I also worked at a couple of canneries during the school breaks. I tried to install that work ethic in my children also.
At 10-13 Trapped muskrats in winters . Picked blueberries in summer for 11 cent a quart.
Yes I worked many jobs (babysitting, house cleaning, ironing, picking fruit etc) from 10 on. I was not made to work but I wanted my own money. Initially I kept my savings in a band aid box and then opened a savings account. At 15 I paid cash ($450) for my first car, a 1956 Ford.
I wish the survey asked how many did NOT work as a child.
I did all of those jobs and more, the best money making job I had was peddling drugs, I was a delivery boy for a local pharmacy and delivered all over town on my bicycle in all types of weather!
My father was an electrician and in the summer I helped him wire houses. When I was 14 I wired my first home by myself. It’s still standing
My mother and aunt owned a ceramic shop. I would work there after school, Saturdays, and during the summer. Paid for a trip with a school group to the Soviet Union!
I grew up on a farm, and during summers would work for neighbors (after our farmwork was done) bailing hay, driving tractors, etc.
Worked for the owner of an apricot orchard who sold dried apricots. Cut them in half, then laid them out on drying trays in drying shed.
Reader Poll: I was raised on a family dairy farm in New York. Did it all. Liked working with machinery over cattle.
In 1965 I rented a small Honda motorcycle and soon cracked the engine casing showing off doing a wheelie in front of a girl I liked (hit her parents fencepost). The rental was from a gas station and the owner made a deal with my parents for me to work the repair cost off at $1 an hour (my whole paycheck). That was my 1st “paying” job and other than school and a part time job while in aviation school I worked full time for the next 55 years. (not as a pilot unfortunately).
About the Random RV Thought and the “blue highways” … there was a book, written decades ago, by a man who decided to do exactly that, and get to know non-city Americans. Great book, read it in the 70s, and it set my heart on the RV path. The author, William Least-Heat Moon, did his trip in his car, but I want my house with me when I go.
Even if I have to overnight somewhere else … isn’t that what toads are for? Those side day trips?
https://www.amazon.com/Blue-Highways-Journey-into-America-ebook/dp/B006BAW16O/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Blue+Highways&qid=1578932956&s=books&sr=1-1
Oops! Just checked the pub date (which I shoulda done first), and it came out in 1982.
I think I still have it….. [sigh…..]
I was attending the University of Missouri – Columbia at the time William Least-Heat Moon left his teaching position at different small college in town. Loved the “Blue Highways” book and asked for his book “Here, There, Elsewhere” for Christmas when it came out in 2013. His writing helped me discover my own wanderlust which I pursued alone for a number of years in a Chevy Vega and later a Chevy Luv pickup with an over-the-cab type camper top. Now it’s a Gulf Stream class C accompanied by my wife and often the grandkids!
I chose other because I thought about it I realized I had quite a few jobs as a kid . Well the first job I had was really not a job but my friends and I would get together when we needed money and wanted something and we go out and collect bottles and you could take those bottles down to the local grocery store and turn them in for the deposit. My second job was a paperboy I delivered about 50 papers a day I don’t know if folks remember it but at least twice a year we had what we called inserts that went into the paper which were ads and it would double the size of the paper it was really hard to get all that on your bicycle. My next job was golf caddy and you could make pretty good money about $12 plus tip for 18 holes of golf carrying two bags. And the last job I had was working in a grocery store at 16 years old. it’s also where I got my dislike for labor unions because at 16 I was forced to join the union and pay union dues if I wanted to work.
Mowed lots of lawns including two churches and a small cemetery. At 16 started at the local grocery but I didn’t mind those union dues. It was minimum wage most of the time ($1.25/hr.) but in summer when we often worked near 40 hours we got $3.45/hr. which was way more than any other job kids my age could get in our small town.
Jobs
Cut lawn , shoveled snow, picked fruit, worked in a grocery store doing everything but butcher and cashier. Help my dad in our bar on weekends. Worked for general contractor moving wood from one house to another, sub for a paper route. (even when nightcrawler hunting at night to sell worms during the day)
At 14, I got my first job – a summer job at a local amusement park within walking distance of my house. I was paid 50cents an hour, and if I did a really good job, they told me they’d hire me the next summer for 65cents! THAT was motivation!
My job? Lifting little kids on and off the kiddie rides. They all went around a central hub, like the merry go-round. The boats were on water, the planes were up in the air, and the kiddie cars had wooden clowns with movable legs on “tricycles” pulling the little 2-seater car behind.
Yeah, when you’re 14, little kids are heavy. I never went back for the “pay raise” the next summer. Got a real job in a five-and-dime. ;D
You asked if you worked as a child…. you didn’t list the age limit, nor did you provide a “NO” selection. Do you consider working at home for an allowance…working?
I suggest that goes under the ‘other’ category, with the explanation as you stated it. it’s not critical. Just for fun.
At 10, I worked in a gas station, no pay tho. Just helped out. Before that, I mowed lawns. After ten, I had a paper route. And I delivered a neighborhood “Voice of the Council” flyer and got 5-10 cents for each one(sometimes, I delivered to over 100 neighbors. My pockets were loaded with coins. It was fun! Now, times have changed and I’m trying to come up with a mower that mows artificial turf 😁
At 11 I had been taking guitar lessons so I was asked to join a band sponsored by a local dance studio. We played about every weekend but total income for the year was $1.50. I must say it got better after that. By 14 I was teaching guitar at a local music store making $4.00/hr. In 1964 that was big money.
When I was a kid I worked in a private club on weddings and different parties in their ball rooms. I helped with the preparing of the food as well as setting the tables, decorating the rooms. and setting up the buffets. It was usually on Saturdays, but sometimes on Sunday afternoons. It was hard work but fun and provided me with my own cash. I also babysat a lot which I enjoyed doing.
Hmmm! “If a cluttered desk top is the sign of a cluttered mind – what is the sign of an empty desk top?”
Chuck, I think you hit a nerve with today’s question, Most of us old enough to be RV’ers grew up with the work ethic which the youth nowadays seem to lack, There are more comments than I have seen for any other question. I am 84 and began working at 10, walking dogs, delivering papers, soda jerk, laundromat assistant, stock boy etc. etc. It’s a shame that kids are held back from working nowadays. It builds character and instills a sense of responsibility and confidence.
Started out pulling weeds in neighbors garden. Then paper route and summer working in the muck toping onions and picking beans. At 16 got my license and a job delivering pizza, also pumping gas and changing oil. Everyone of these jobs gave me a little more insight about people and how to deal with them and the many problems that need to be solved. Great life with very few regrets.
I did all the above jobs except the Kool Aid stand. I also cleaned a butcher shop at night.
While in high school I worked as a soda jerk in a drugstore and in a Armenian rug store I helped with setting up displays of the most beautiful rugs I’ve ever seen…
I picked cotton for various farmers every autumn from about age 4 or 5 until I graduated from high school. During my teen years I cleaned house for a woman for a while, worked as a “soda jerk” at a couple of drug stores and worked on Saturdays and during Christmas holidays at a Wacker’s variety store.
Detassled corn and hoed beans for area farmers. I thought it was great as I got a great tan while making money! That was before anyone knew about skin damage from the sun!
At age 13-14 in 1950, I delivered orders for our local fruit & vegetable store in The Bronx. Tips varied from 10-50 cents per order. The larger tips usually involved climbing stairs in a 5 story apartment building.
Assuming “child” includes the teen years, I picked and thinned fruit in local orchards, serviced planes at the airport, sold Amway products, worked as a janitor ($1.50/hr. in 1964) and played sax in dance bands ($16 for a 3-hour gig).
As older RV’ers, we grew up in a time when kids routinely worked and learned responsibility. Both of us worked all the jobs above plus we worked in tobacco fields from 11 years old up. It was a way of life we grew up with and in today’s world, we both believe it is sorely missed.
Paper route–shoveled snow from sidewalks & driveways–Mom ran a restaurant & it was my job to peel 50 lbs. of taters EVERY DAY–caddied at local golf course–Grew up in Wyoming….
Paperboy , magazine seller , bowling alley pinsetter (sometimes a dangerous job) ,helper in a drive-in restaurant , drug store delivery boy
There should have been a option to click more than one job in the poll.
Agreed
I know I will not have a common answer here because we lived on a 13 ton ketch (kind of big sailboat) and I did what was available. If we were alongside (docked) at a yard, I would often help the working men. They like having someone to fetch tools or get into places that grown men have a hard time fitting into. I also worked many fishing boats or other. I often did not get paid in cash.
Needless to say, there were no lawns to mow or any of the other things, but that was OK because I liked being a waterman and made a living that way until I came ashore to have a family.
as a summer job I worked several years in a warehouse packaging and bottling chemicals, cutting and bending rebar for forms, mixed and poured cement for prefab products and general custodial work. because I worked for a relative there was no problem working with the chemicals. The rest of the year if something needed done I did it, mowing, cleaning out rain gutters, painting, digging ditches, finished concrete, hauled blocks, and swinging a hammer.
Stack hay on trailer and unload in barn, cut fire wood, milk cows
Worked on dads cattle farm from very young and at his fire sprinkler company from age 12. Was paid for my work. Learned how to manage money. So now I don’t owe for anything. Thanks dad for teaching me.
I started working at 14 as an A&W curb waitress (50 cents an hour plus tips). A couple months later I was promoted to curb manager (65 cents an hour plus tips). I also babysat and then at 16 I got a job as a cashier at a grocery store. My starting pay was $1.675 an hour. The Federal minimum wage was a whopping $1.60 in 1970.
Lied about my age and worked on a drilling rig in South Arkansas.
Pulled thistles and dandelions for my parents. Think we got a penny a piece but they were not counted unless the whole root was pulled. Some babysitting, then the hard work of cleaning cabins especially hard when the visitors were long term where cleaning of ovens and refrigerators was needed along with the bed making, bathroom and floor cleaning. Then after proving to be a good worker the hotel/cabin owners had me operate the office while they were gone renting rooms were I had to determine how much to charge by what I thought they would be willing to pay. As others have mentioned, when we grew up we were taught to work and knew the value of money. If we wanted extras we made our own money to buy them and didn’t rely on handouts.
We lived in town but I grew up in farm country so I had all the work I could stand! My first paid jobs started around age 10 when I picked strawberries by the flat – hated all the thorns so didn’t last long and moved on to picking zucchini and then onions (Walls Walls sweets!). At age 14 I started bucking bales and rogueing rye in wheat fields with high school friends. It was guys in one crew and girls we knew in a second crew. The farmer would drop us off at different areas and we would walk across the field and pull any rye we saw sticking out above the wheat. We boys heard the girls decided to go topless to get tanned and they all got painful sunburns which was both scandalous and titillating (no pun intended) and soon forgotten as par for the course in farm country. Walking the wheat led to hoeing weeds and moving sprinkler pipes in asparagus fields then driving wheat truck and working in canneries for pea and corn harvests and finally running grain elevators which got me through college and out of farm country. I spent my work life mainly in the Seattle software world and now retirement. It has been a good ride and now it’s onto the RV road life. Yeehaw!
The absolute best Black Streak Remover and Awning Cleaner I have found to date is Kor-Kay’s. It is not widely available but it sure should be! I’ve always found it at Trailerama RV Supply on Rt 206 North in Cranberry Lake , NJ. Haven’t found it anywhere else accept good ol’ Amazon. I’m surprised every Marine and RV Supply store doesn’t carry it. It’s that good. It’s head and shoulders above the two most widely sold brands, which show me nothin’. (Yeah. You know who they are!).
I cleaned a barber shop every Sunday. Dusted countertop, cabinet, etc. swept the floors, scrubbed, mopped and waxed the floors. Cleaned the bathroom and storeroom. I was on the 6th grade. I don’t remember what I got paid but I remember being happy with the money. The shop was less than a short block were I went to school. After school I’d run there and the barber paid me. I then ran back to school to take the bus home. No, I never missed the bus.
Worked for my grandfather in his country general store in Maine.
Worked delivering newspapers, at concession stand at swim pool and a vendor walking the stands at high school football games, went on to be a short order cook till I graduated.
I taught skiing!
Mowed lawns, picked cherries, picked apples, picked pears, changed water lines in orchards, and at age 16 employee building pickup canopies after school and full time on summer breaks.
Working 12 and under? All of the above, plus snowblowing/shoveling, small engine repair (mostly carbs), selling candy and novelties at school out of my wide briefcase, bike repair, installing extension phones and speaker wiring, rewiring lamps, dog care, and a few others I must be forgetting now.
I funded my lawnmower and snowblower purchases (cheap, because defunct and I fixed).
Worked for Sears and Roebuck in Philadelphia in the catalog department in the 1960’s. Those were the days when Sears was king.
Grew up on a farm so there was always work to do and I loved it. When I grew up and left home I really missed working with my dad. He taught me so much. Would not have changed a thing. Growing up on a farm was the best.
Farm and ranch. Always something!
Wrote a news column about my little community for the local small-town newspaper. Everybody loved reading about themselves and their activities. It paid 10 cents per inch.
I bailed hay for local farmers.
I baby sat and mowed lawns, the latter for an apartment complex and was paid weekly. Also paid taxes.
Trimmed trees…had a blast and got to climb hundreds of trees and ride around town in the back of a truck.
Painted homes (interior), Chopped wood, Dug ditches
Re: today’s poll I had several different jobs, I had the obligatory paper route, I worked in a neighborhood grocery store, and I had a job doing housekeeping for a small medical group (3 doctors). I dusted, mopped and buffed floors, and emptied trash cans…..
Regarding the electrical article…is this theatrical cord the same as 550 parachute cord?
Not exactly. Parachute cord (Paracord) is nylon and stretchy, while theatrical cord (tie line) is cotton and stable dimensionally. So if you don’t want something to sag – use cotton tie line, but if you need shock resistance – use nylon paracord. I’m sure either type would work well to lash a surge protector to a pedestal to keep it off the ground.
I grew up on a farm. Started driving tractor at about age 8. Lots of other work until I graduated high school and went off to university. From then on it was easy.
I helped my dad in his apiary and ran a honey stand on the side of the road.
I worked on a farm made 2 dollars a day when i was 14 rode my bicycle to work
My “other” job was picking blueberries when I was 11 yo. Got 10 cents a pint and typically could make $5 a day. Year 1969
Another job I had at age 15 was washing military aircraft for a Defense Dept. contractor.
Used to wash C141’s. Really dirty job but the pay was good, $1.75 hr. I was “technically ” illegal since I wasn’t 16, but my sister was dating the guy who hired everybody. lol
Babysat for $.50/hr (meant doing chores, too!), picked up the apples and prunes in our yard @$.01 each before we could go swimming in our 3′ doughboy pool, worked for my father’s hardwood floor laying business during school breaks setting nails and puttying the holes!, scorekeeper for adult recreation leagues @ $1.16/hr, collecting bottles for deposit money, lemonade stands, mostly volunteered during the summers of high school as a jr. recreation leader & later hired before their usual age ‘cuz I had the experience!