To make extra money, and get some things cheaper, for many years my Dad ran a "Kays Club Catalogue." I think we all have fun memories of this one. Basically as a "Kays Agent" you got sent a catalogue and some carbon copy order books. You got your friends to order stuff from it. It was delivered to your door, you gave it to your friends and you collected the money. They only had to pay so much a week instead of up front. You got a percentage of the collected money and a discount on stuff you ordered yourself from the catalogue. Easy, right?
My Dad kept all this stuff in his "Kays Box", a box which his work used to make for portable windup gramaphones. So basically this was a cloth covered briefcase sized wooden case without the mechanism. Dad had a couple of these and one he used as his "briefcase" for the Kays stuff. It was years before I realised what these were, I thought all briefcases were built this way!
So every Saturday afternoon out would come Dad's Kays box and he'd start entering in this weeks new orders, payments he'd collected from people, etc. Now all you have to do is add it up, make sure it balances, calculate the total take your commission and post off the difference.
We'd still be there Saturday evening trying to get it all to add up!
Mum would have a go, my sisters would have a go, eventually as I got older, I'd have a go. "Ooops, whats the time? Where's me coupon?"
Everything stopped while we checked the pools coupon as the football results were read out at five o'clock on the TV sports roundup. "Crystal Palace 0, Cardiff United 0, Raith Rovers 2, Rotheram United 1." It would drone on for hours. Basically, you got 1, 1 1/2, 2 or 3 points depending on whether the game was a home win, away win, goaless draw or a draw. You choose a "perm," a permuation of 12 from 15, or as many perms as you wanted to pay for on your coupon which you gave to the pools agent who called round every week. If you scored 12 3 pointers you won the pools - instant millionaire. It was our state lottery. So, "Was that a 2 or a 1?" "Ssshhh, what did he say? Damn, I missed that one now. Why can't you kids be quiet?"
So now we are trying to add up the pools coupon. "Did we win?" Nope.
Finally, quick write it up and stick it in the envelope!
Who needs school when you've got this educational home environment? Addition, subtraction, percentages, permutations. Thanks Dad!