Hogfather - millions

'There's something wrong and he won't tell me?' said Susan. That made her even more angry. 'But Albert is in on it too,' she added.

She thought: thousands, millions of years in the same job. Not a nice one. It isn't always cheerful old men passing away at a great age. Sooner or later, it was bound to get anyone down. Someone had to do something. It was like that time when Twyla's grandmother had started telling everyone that she was the Empress of Krull and had stopped wearing clothes. And Susan was bright enough to know that the phrase 'Someone ought to do something' was not, by itself, a helpful one. People who used it never added the rider 'and that someone is me'.

But someone ought to do something, and right now the whole pool of someones consisted of her, and no one else. Twyla's grandmother had ended up in a nursing home overlooking the sea at Quirm. That sort of option probably didn't apply here. Besides, he'd be unpopular with the other residents.

***

Hogfather - p93