The current job involves cleaning a bar and making it ready for opening. It being a Victorian-era pub, there are several acres of brass, and copper pipes everywhere. It takes a half hour to polish. Worst are the beer pump handles (fiddly, and usually encrusted in stale ale) and the bar rail (covered in dried dirt, usually requires attention from a wet cloth before it will be ready for brasso-ing).

The brasso-ing is definitely not a therapeutic exercise; it is usually a frantic race against the clock. Kind members of the public add to the handicaps by telephoning to ask, "Are you open yet?" (They have lived in the town for several years, walked past the place every day, and yet haven't bothered to look at the opening times for themselves. These are the same customers who can stand at a busy bar for several minutes shouting for service; and only when a barman serves them, start thinking about what they actually want to drink, and start asking their equally vapid friends what they in turn want.)

As a former member of the Armed Forces, I am well aware that a "dirty soldier" is not someone with dirt-encrusted boots, grimy equipment and general air of uncleanliness; it is a junior soldier with a speck of dust on an otherwise impeccable uniform. The former is usually a Senior NCO with no apparent duties other than to shout "**** Off !" at all ranks who disturb his reading of a tabloid newspaper in whatever store or office he has buried himself.

My solution to keeping the pub clean - don't open it.

OK, rant over. Had a bad Christmas; turned down for a proper job, had my car written off, and the TV went "Pfoo!" last week. The last is no great loss, except that I am left with several dozen video tapes that aren't much use until it is replaced.

At least Santa didn't leave me any lumps of coal.