I've had a coupleI've had a couple of jobs in the last few years that made me wonder if I was just really desperate for money or drunk when I applied for them. My third job was working in a factory making mosquito incense sticks. These stupid things are really popular in Australia and work quite well repelling mosquitoes, but I'll never go near them again!

I started off making them using a machine, and I must have not been very good at it, because after a couple of days, they placed me at a long table, where I had to clean up the drips and imperfections out of them once they had dried, by hand. The main ingredients they used in the sticks were sandalwood and citronella, and not only did I get a headache everyday by inhaling the potent oil all day long, I also got little tiny splinters in my fingers that I couldn't get out.

After two weeks of that, I had enough and asked if I could do something else, where I was transferred yet again to another long table. This one had a large bin on the left hand side of the table, and countless boxes of, well, incense boxes that I had to fold for the sticks to be packaged in them. After that, I had to pack ten incense sticks in each box, wrap them in plastic and place them in the plastic shrink machine, then pack them in another box ready for distribution.

I think I lasted about two months in that job, which I think was pretty good, considering how primitive the factory was. I actually thought most of the packaging was done by machines, so I guess I had a big shock in my doughy little moment.

The second worst job I had was the pits. At the time, I was working night fill for a fuel station on the weekends and I was paying high rent for a lovely cockroach infested little asbestos dump in a high market area. Taking a second job seemed like an appealing idea at the time. It was for a cleaning company, where you go around and clean four properties a day in a team of three.

I though yep, easy money, so I applied for the job. It was only half way through my first day that I realized these four little houses a day where sprawling mansions. With countless bathrooms, bedrooms, toilets, etc. I made a vow after this job that I will never own a spa bath again unless I lived in a sprawling mansion and had cleaners to do it for me. My back is still sore after cleaning all those spas and that is four years later.

Not only was the work back breaking, but the leader' of my team' was a grumpy old bugger (pardon the pun) who picked out every little mistake' I had made. Three days after I got the job, I got sick with a cold and called in to tell the boss I wouldn't be in. That was when surprise number two surfaced! If you didn't give the boss forty eight hours notice that you were not going to be in for work, you would get eighty dollars deducted from your pay.

Unreal, isn't it? How are you meant to know that you're going to be sick in the next forty eight hours? Did I look psychic to her? After that, everything just went down hill for me. I was coming to work late, so oops! Another eighty dollars deducted from my pay. I worked for that company for four weeks and never got a cent! Eventually, I realized I was being the fool and told them not so politely where they could put their job.

Learn more about this author, Belinda Brown.
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