Fifty-two-year-old seeks employment due to the foot and mouth crisis and September 11. No, that’s not quite right. I didn’t get foot and mouth on September 11. I was a victim of market forces. The hotel and travel industry for which I made promotional videos was confused and so stopped promoting - anything.

Day one I needed to start earning. TEFL appealed. A five-week intensive course and I could be sitting helping a Spanish student learn the intricacies of English grammar over a glass of Rioja in a square in Barcelona. Research was needed. I invited myself to a school of English in north London. They handed me a questionnaire.

“What is wrong with the following statement?: ‘My father has just buyed a new car.’

I stared at this in horror. I knew damn well it should be “boughted” but how would I explain this linguistic nuance to a foreigner?

I wrote, “This is why I need training,” and left.

I calculated that the course would cost pound;700. I wouldn’t earn for five weeks and the books alone would cost next month’s mortgage. But as one door closed, another window opened.

Day TWO Double-glazing! I sit in front of a 24-year-old LSE graduate. He’s seen the light. His window of opportunity earned pound;7,000 in two months - as a holiday job with this firm. Now, after three years, he’s an area manager. Boughted a Porsche, buyed a Kensington flat and is owning a healthy bank account. It’s the 15- point sales pitch that must be carried out to the letter which I thought would be my downfall. Hard times may call for a hard sell but I’d like all that effort to have more personal satisfaction and permanence than a 25-year guarantee and a 50-year finance plan sold by me to a couple in Acacia Avenue.

“Nick! Supply teaching,” suggested my wife. “Resurrect your teaching qualifications.”

Thirty-one years ago I gained a teaching certificate. Actually, I’d forgotten all about it. My opportunities had led me away from that path and on to the highway of educational broadcasting and corporate productions. Nice money and an ego in ascendance. I still have the ego, and it’s an expensive thing to maintain. They should name some yuppie sports car “The ego”.

Where is my qualification? It’s got more dust on it than Miss Haversham’s wedding cake.

I ring the DFES.

“Name?”

“Graham Hughes.”

“College?”

“Central School of Speech amp; Drama.”

“Year?”

“Left in 1971.”

“Your preferred name is Nick, is that right?”

“Yessssssssssssss!”

I AM STILL BELONGED.

Now I can sell double-glazing to 12-year-olds.

Day THREE I visit a supply teaching agency. It’s in the same road that I used to walk up to broadcast my programmes on the BBC’s education service. Tony Blair’s “Education, education, education” is percolating through my mind as I ride up in the lift - surely I am a valued asset in Labour’s educational programme?

My bag is crammed with P45s, P60s, CVs, my qualified teacher status, passport, photographs (taken in a booth at a tube station - another pound;4 investment in this academic venture). Hello! pound;4! I’ve never thought of pound;4 before. Until now it was small change. I am in need of a job that pays money - and hopefully a few compliments.

I am interviewed by a chirpy lady who trained at a drama school, taught, and then joined the agency to help sell supply teachers to the world. She offers to sell me - she thinks I’m a saleable commodity. She is to become my agent, with advice on what style of flak jacket to wear when facing Year 8 somewhere south of the river “I at this time of day?”

Day FOUR Phone rings. Teaching agency. School in Islington requires three-day-a-week drama teacher. Am I available for interview? Is Aristophanes Greek?

I go. Meet head of drama. Great bloke, so he tells me. But his enthusiasm rubs off on me. Invites me to take a class next week. I genuinely want this job. I like this school. This is better then double glazing. I set off to prepare the first lesson I’ve given in 29 years.

Day FIVE Phone rings. Teaching agency. School in Southwark requires three-day-a-week drama teacher. Brief: turn up at 12.30pm. Get tour of school. Teach class of 28 for 50 minutes at 1.30pm. Get paid pound;60 and await result.

Fantastic. I can practise my rusty teaching skills in Southwark readying myself to shine in Islington.

Day SIX Arrive in Southwark. Met by shell-suited head of drama and a Mrs Thatcher lookalike. They have a problem that they hand to me. Due to a timetable mix-up, they ask me whether I would mind teaching a class immediately - but the pupils will have to break for lunch after 20 minutes and return 30 minutes later for the second half of the lesson.

I smile and say, “No problem.” Adaptability! That will get me Brownie points.

Shell suit disappears and Mrs Thatcher leads me to the classroom. Sitting in a circle are 20 young girls. Swathed in headscarves, they look like a young Taliban mothers’ meeting. I can’t get any eye contact, which makes me realise that nearly 30 years out of the classroom has left me somewhat culturally challenged by modern Britain.

To add to my confusion, Mrs Thatcher asks me to take the register. She hands me a photocopied list of children’s names. It looks like the worst hand of scrabble I’ve ever seen. Even if I could read the names through the blur of the photocopy, I still wouldn’t be able to pronounce them. The girls are going to have to sit through a register reading that has more dramatic pauses than a Harold Pinter play.

It’s at this moment that Ibegin to realise that selling double glazing is an easier option than selling myself as a supply teacher.