Viv Albertine: What is the worst job you have done?

Originally asked

The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A

The Guardian's long-running Q&A repeatedly asks this standing question, with minor tense variation.

You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.

Recorded Viv Albertine said elsewhere, not written here

In my first job in film, a giant bloke dressed like a sumo wrestler asked me to get his G-string out of his arse. He said he couldn’t reach it.

The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 10 October 2020 source ↗

Others on this question

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Jimmy Akingbola British-Nigerian TV, theatre and film actor

Working in a warehouse, packing frozen meat. It was a nightmare: I hate the cold and it was very tough.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 15 August 2020 source ↗

Guz Khan

Leafleting for a window company when I was 12. I remember putting them through letterboxes thinking: I’m going to sell drugs, because this is rubbish.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 13 December 2025 source ↗

Siri Hustvedt American novelist, essayist, poet

I was a floor model briefly at Bloomingdale’s in New York in 1979. I hated it. When no one was watching, I would lock myself in the toilet and read.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 19 August 2017 source ↗

Malcolm Gladwell Staff writer at The New Yorker; author of The Tipping Point and Outliers

I was a reporter for many years at the Washington Post. Although I loved every minute, I don’t think I was a very good reporter.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 17 April 2021 source ↗

More from Viv Albertine

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Question What has been your biggest disappointment? Failure & regret

Romantic love – what a con. (I do still believe in it.)

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 10 October 2020 source ↗

Question Who most deserves an apology from you, and why? Failure & regret

I wish I’d told my mother that, in all the years I knew her, she was never once boring. We weren’t demonstrative, so that would have meant that I loved her.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 10 October 2020 source ↗

Question What did you want to be when you were growing up? Identity & self

I had no female role models growing up. I lived an incredibly sheltered life: there was no TV at home and we had no visitors. It wasn’t until rock and pop came into my life that I concocted myself as a role model.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 10 October 2020 source ↗