Tim Rice: What is the worst job you have done?

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 Tim Rice said elsewhere, not written here

I worked in a petrol station on the A1 one summer. I enjoyed it except when I was on latrine duty.

The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 11 March 2017 source ↗

Others on this question

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Justin Hawkins

Cockroach stamper at a dried-flower factory.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 1 March 2025 source ↗

Jenna Coleman English actress

After Emmerdale, babysitting. I freaked out – I couldn’t believe people put me in charge of their children.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 16 February 2019 source ↗

Juliet Stevenson

I worked in a supermarket on the Kings Road when I was 17, standing by the beers, wines and spirits to make sure people didn’t shoplift. They were such horrible employers that I didn’t care whether people shoplifted or not.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 2 May 2026 source ↗

Neil Gaiman Author of fiction, comics and screenplays

The only job I quit was, aged about 23, subediting a “men’s” magazine. My job was typing out readers’ pornographic fantasies. I started wishing people would reproduce by splitting down the middle.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 21 October 2023 source ↗