Back end of a pantomime cow
'He's behind you!' Ever wanted to be an actor but been too darn ugly to cut the mustard in the lead role? Now you can do it as the back end of a pantomime cow.
Nobody will actually see you as you'll be constantly bent double, gripping the belt loops of the actor in the front end. No beans for him this week as you'll be just inches from an explosive encounter. You'll have to trust the head end, too. One false step and you can literally go up in smoke as the theatre lights and pyrotechnics are a bit primitive.
You'd better put on a good show though, or the audience is likely to pelt you with apples if they're not entertained. 'Oh, no, I'm not.' 'Oh, yes, you are!'
Child toymaker
Like all children, rich kids love their toys. Unfortunately, this means that poor children, with their tiny hands, have to work in sweat shops to make them.
The intricate work involved in creating dolls is carried out by impoverished kids as young as five or six. Crammed into workhouses, they prepare the decorative toys for hours on end in terrible conditions. One of the worst tasks is inserting hairs one by one into the heads of dolls modelled after posh Victorian kids. The horsehair that is used carries various diseases such as tuberculosis.
Thousands of children are worked and abused in this way for years, with no chances of escape or of bettering themselves. A sorry reminder that suffering continues even through the 'season of goodwill'.
Gozzard (gooseherd)
Fancy a Christmas walk? Then get your boots on – we're walking across country with a massive gaggle of geese. The best way to get these narky and aggressive critters to market and the table is to make the plump gits walk.
The equivalent of a bad mood covered in feathers, each goose needs to be caught first and have its feet tarred and sanded. This provides them with the equivalent of a pair of little booties for the trek. Then you have to herd them at a snail's pace along the highways and byways all the way to London.
If you lose a bird, you'll have to pay for it, so keep an eye on them. Although some people keep them as guard geese, these nightclub bouncers of the poultry world will need your protection from foxes at night, so make sure you sleep with one eye open.
Turkey farmer's wife
Are you used to pulling birds? Are you married to a turkey farmer? Then this job could be for you. Probably the very worst, it involves you gutting and preparing hundreds and hundreds of birds in only a week or so.
Conditions need to be cold so that the freshly killed birds don't go 'off'. The freezing temperature also helps keep the guts in a relatively solid condition. A frenzy of plucking creates a cloud of feathers and dust and results in sore hands and a bald bird. A swift chop of the head and then it's two fingers down the throat to pull out the crop. Then you get personal with the corpse by shoving a hand up its bottom and try to pull out all its insides in one fell swoop. Charming …
