My first official job was when I was eight. I went with my little red wagon and hauled people's groceries from the Dominion store at the corner of Laurendeau and de Biencourt every Saturday for about three years. Usually got a dime if it was within a five block radius of the store.

However, sometimes I'd go with my grandfather to the Drake Tavern and earn a dime to watch for various people's wives. If I saw them coming I'd give the man the high sign and he'd take off to the bathroom until the coast was clear. But I was six then and grampy would slip me a glass of draft, some pickled onion, pickled egg and pickled tongue. That's when I learned that passing gas could get ya noticed by the clientelle, and since that was good for business I--well, I'm sure no one is interested in that so I'll move on.

Two morning paper routes of approximately 55 papers each at different times, one when I was about 10 and 11, and another when I was 12-14 or so. Made about $4.50 a week. I got to keep $.50 as allowance/spending money for the week and my ma held on to the rest and some of it went to food or rent. After 4 years I was able to go to a summer gymnastic camp on a part scholarship. In those days ya got a penny a paper from the newspaper company and reliable delivery got ya good tips. The best tipper on the first route was a couple who always gave me a quarter. That was big bucks back then. Wednesday or Thursday papers were a sob to haul because they were about 2 1/2 times the weight of the regular papers due to advertising supplements.

Snow shoveling was lucrative also. I did that from the time I was about seven. I got a talking to from my gran for accepting money from the lady downstairs--I had to return the nickle. Hers was supposed to be done gratis and it was from then on. She was a very nice lady who'd come to Montreal from Russia (I think) and she would make me a cup of tea and give me a few cookies. That was cool because I usually had to warm up after doing about a half dozen places on the street (meaning the block I lived on). The market crashed when I was about 9 or so. I would still do that lady's walkway and I did until she passed away when I was about 13 or so.

I always watched out for cleaning jobs or painting work. A downstairs neighbour paid me $.50 an hour to paint the shed and stairs out back on the building we moved to a block away. Big job and I needed help with the scaffolding.

Much of my spare time was taken with baseball and football. After I discovered guitar and actually had my Stella, which I painted with white enamel paint so it would look cool, I became a lazy layabout except for the paper route because music meant more to me than money, and I spent my first year learning chords and songs to sing. I was 13.

That's about it.