Jobsworth

Ok. Enough depressing talk. It's busy at work this week but my interest in Tarquin Double-Barrelled's GCSE Latin and Flavia I-Live-In-Chelsea-And-I-Can Afford-To-Be-Lazy's AS level Art, has gone from limited to pretty much zero. I'm eager to sort as much out as I can before I leave though as I do feel guilty for abandoning my boss.

As much as I long to leave it, the job has given me a fascinating insight in to British education, class, ethnicity and myself.

Among other things, I have learnt that:

• There are more multi-millionaires living in London than I realised
• Many of the wealthiest aren't English
• People are prepared to pay almost anything to get their kids through school
• GCSEs and A2s are getting easier
• There are students out there qualifying as lawyers who still need help writing their coursework and revising for exams
• There are a lot of bored, rich, pushy, competitive mothers out there. Most have a nanny, cleaner, cook, dog walker and au pair. Thank God my mother wasn't one of them
• Money doesn't make you a good payer
• Money doesn't make you pleasant
• Many students think it's OK to pay someone to sit their on-line exams
• You can't believe everyone who says their child is 'gifted', 'above average', 'scholarship material' - that would be most of them
• A mother who tells you you are their 'rock' one day is just as likely to shout down the phone at you the next, should a tuition session go wrong.
• You can have an Oxbridge degree yet still have no common sense and employ the worst grammar, even in a CV
• Stress is relative. I am glad I'll never have to concur with people who tell me things like: 'you'll never believe the grief I'm going through finding a good chauffer' or 'I'm in agony trying decide what shade of cream to paint the third bathroom in my new Kensington mansion'.

As for myself I have learnt that:

• I enjoy managing people
• I am a good negotiator (or bullshitter if needs be)
• I am patient
• I never want to work in education again
• I need to be doing something far more creative
• I want to work to live
• I am glad I'm not at school now
• To never underestimate the power of upper class 'chit-chat'
• Working alone makes me depressed, morbid and neurotic