DAYS ON AND OFF

One of the attractions of tourist guiding was the thought of not having the monotonous commute to the office very day - particularly at the moment with the tubes being stopped by strikes and repair work. You imagine you will be able to enjoy weekends and days off inthe week and long periods with little work - just enough to give you the feeling of being a real profesional without the grind.
In practice, of course, you have the commuter's regular outgoings without his/her regular incomings and this leads to a state of a paranoia which means that you take whatever goes to allow against the times when the phone stops ringing. When people's savings go south (as they have done recently) they cut back on many things - charities, gym clubs and holidays being the main victims. A lot of guides are suffering and I feel guilty at having trained tour directors at a time when virtually non-one is taking on new people.
As I work for a major comapny and an agency, I can balance my availability and, while I usually take Sundays off if I am not on tour these days, I rarely turn anything else down. Recently I had a sixteen day tour followed by two eight dayers back to back with a day off in between. I must have filled in the day off on my internet availability for the agency and, sure enough, on the way back from Stonehenge on the last day of the sixteen day tour I received a phone call saying that I was needed for a cruise job with a five o'clock start the following day - and I took the job, of course. It is partly not wanting to disappoint people, but also the insecurity of the long distance freelancer that means you work 33 days without a break - and then get a cold which knocks you out for the first days of your break and is still bunging me up.
No sympathy, though. I made the choice and, seeing those commuters yesterday, I am not sorry.