So you’ve just finished matric and are looking for a job.

The first thing you need to do is drop a few kilos. School-leavers are getting more corpulent by the year. Sure, some are pregnant, but the other ten per cent are just plain lard-asses.

There are many weight-loss tapes on the market, but I recommend the duct tape. Tear off a strip and put it over your mouth, you big fat pig.

Employers would rather hire thin people. It’s a fact. And if it’s not, it should be.

Thin people have more energy, take shorter lunch breaks and have fewer moral qualms about sleeping their way to the top. Bosses appreciate these qualities in a worker.

My advice is, don’t rush into a job. Take your time. Look around. Drink a lot, blow up ATMs, have lashings of casual sex. This brief period of unemployment could be the happiest time of your life.

Once you get a job, marriage won’t be far off. Everyone wants to be married to someone who has a job. The taxman will be first in line to savage your salary. Once he has eaten his fill, the banks and the insurance companies and the medical aid schemes will sink their claws into you. Then the scavengers at the municipality will have a go. Finally, your horrible children will suck up any crumbs that might still be lying around. That’s the next 45 years taken care of.

But at least you can look forward to retiring on a pension that will cover the rent on a bachelor flat for two years. And if you eat only once a week, you should be able to afford three days in Margate before you die. It will be the holiday of a lifetime. Literally.

If, however, you simply cannot wait to become an insignificant cog in this great wheel of misfortune, and you choose not to seek psychiatric help, then this is what you need to do.

Apply for every job you see advertised. It doesn’t matter if it’s a filing clerk at a panel-beaters or director-general in the department of education. You have just as much chance of getting one as the other.

Very few jobs in this world require skills that can’t be picked up off the internet in an afternoon. In the majority of cases, you really only need the ability to manufacture an impressive CV.

If you can write and you don’t have foetal alcohol syndrome, you stand a very good chance of getting a top job in the private sector.

When it comes to the civil service, however, brain damage can work in your favour. I don’t mean it helps to be retarded to work for the government. That would be rude.

I’m talking about their policy of hiring people with disabilities. But be careful. It’s a bit of a grey area.

For example, the SA Post Office will still invite you for an interview, but you might not get the job of postman if your CV says you have no legs. On the other hand, you could always say they grew back while you were having breakfast that morning. Post office staff have seen some amazing things – most of them inside parcels that never reached their destinations – and they will believe anything.

There is fierce competition for jobs, so be prepared.

Tuck your shirt in, make sure your nails are clean and carry a Z88 9mm pistol. It’s a very effective tool when it comes to convincing prospective employees that you’re the right man for the job. If you’re a woman, you might want to try the smaller, more feminine Glock 26.

But feel free to use something else. The Musler pump action riot gun is very effective in reducing the number of job applicants in any given situation. And it’s proudly South African, too.

If it’s queues you’re worried about, get there early and cordon off the area with razor wire. The one thing we learned from Marikana is that we no longer have to use our hands to set up the barricades. That’s right. Razor wire can be dispensed from an armoured vehicle. Pick one up on Gumtree. Make sure you’re on the inside when you seal off the premises.

A career in the air force has become a popular choice ever since Prince Harry single-handedly killed half the Taliban from inside his helicopter.

He compared being in charge of the Apache’s weapons systems to “playing Xbox”. You can have just as much fun in the SAAF. The only difference is that none of our choppers are airworthy. And we can’t afford Xboxes. You will, however, get authentic combat experience on your unit’s PlayStation 1.

The KwaZulu-Natal road traffic inspectorate would sooner kill you than hire you, so I’d suggest you stay away from them.

If you lack the courage of your convictions, you could always get a job at First National Bank.

Here’s the catch, 22 or otherwise. The problem you jobseekers have – apart from being too thick to go to university – is that you don’t have any experience.

Smoking weed and losing your virginity in grade eight doesn’t count as experience. Well, it does in my book. But I’m not currently hiring.

You might have to take a poorly paid job.

In my opinion, all jobs are poorly paid. None of them are worth a damn. Jobs are evil. They take away your freedom and destroy your health. They turn you into something you never wanted to be and they fill you with self-loathing.

I know what I’m talking about. I have been there. My eyesight is ruined and my ass is sore.

If you’re offered an unpaid job-shadowing opportunity, don’t turn it down. Take notes. Make maps. Forge keys. Learn the security codes.

When you are thanked for your free labour and told there are no vacancies, return late one night and put all that knowledge to good use.

Ngikufisela inhlanhla!