Has anyone noticed how many of the people responding to this thread have been either writers or editors?
I like my job just fine. I’m a writer. My day job is as senior writer/editor for a trade association that serves the sales & marketing arm of the radio industry. Yawn, right? Nope… I find it really interesting. My main job here at the RAB is to write and produce a daily newsletter with a circulation of between 5,000 and 10,000 people, some of whom have actually taken the unprecedented step of telling me they like reading it. :eek: I also do a lot of other writing and editing projects around here; there’s more than enough variety to keep me interested, and I’m happy here. Why? because my boss, and the more senior people above her, make a point of periodically telling me how thrilled they are with the job I’m doing. I just eat that $#!t up.
I also write on my own time - screenplays, essays, short stories, cookbooks…I’m even working on a novel.
NOW THEN. All you editors… would you like to see some of my writing? hopeful grin Eve has seen some and can tell you if it’s worth looking at. Give a guy a hand. quietly slipping a fifty to Eve
I like my job a lot. I’m doing psychological research, so it does involve a lot of writing, as well as statistical analysis, which, against all odds, I find fascinating.
It also has good benefits, congenial co-workers, is very close to home, and is situated on a beautiful promontory overlooking the Pacific.
The only complaint I have is that I’m at the mercy of government grants.
I think there is a theme emerging here. The people that are in a creative position, (editing, video, TV, writing and so on) are the happiest.
You may have read, in previous posts, that I’m a radio announcer. I GET to go to work each day. I’m the luckiest son of a bitch on the planet. The money sucks. I’m 36 years old and make under 50k a year…with a wife and 3 kids, its a little tight at times…but so what, I love what I do.
There are drawbacks…I get up at 3:30am…but I’m off at noon. I have to read EVERYTHING that comes within 20 feet of me, but reading is fun. I have to put up with people that call the station and complain about my jokes.( I read recently that Viagra will help cut flowers to last longer,so my bit was, if you overcook your spaghetti, drop a couple of them in the pot and presto…firmed right up!) Several older listeners called and complained. Just put them on the air…lots of fun
I almost went that direction. I have a BA in psych and I used to do a lot of research assistant internships in school. If I didn’t have music in my life, I’d probably be doing psych research now.
Like most people I don’t wake up yelling yipppeee to go to work. My job itself is not bad at all. It’s very goverment controled so we all have to work to certain standards. But as much as the company can be, they treat us really good. I have 4 weeks paid vacation, 12 holidays, 2 personal days, and sick days, which includes family sickness not just me. We get 4 hours every month to attend school functions with our kids. They have a luncheon for everyone once a quarter.
We have a 401k plan, you can buy stock, which the company will match 50 cents to the dollar if certain goals are met at year end (they usually are met).
Our time is calculated every two weeks, so we work our hours so that we have every other Friday off, splitting the workforce in half so that everything is always covered.
It has its pits. Security is tight, every morning you and all your possessions get x-rayed on the way in. You have special procedures you have to know. I guess the worst part to me are the Emergency Drills that we have to participate in every day. Yea, like if I’m off work I’m gonna drive right into the radioactive plume to come to work for an emergency.
I work at a nuclear power plant as a technical aide.
This is the only place I know that will pay me to do what I’d do in my spare time if I was working somewhere else. My job title is software engineer but what I get to do is to write code. I just love to do it. I like it so much that I put up with all the other stuff around here that I dislike. I have deliberately and carefully weighed the pros and cons of changing companies or changing professions but I keep coming back to the fact that I’m paid (and paid pretty well, IMHO) to do what I like to do.
As others have pointed out, creativity seems to be a common element in jobs people like. Some folks wouldn’t find what I do creative but that’s one of the things I like best about it.
OTOH, my dad is a truck driver. I couldn’t imagine a duller, more stultifying occupation but he loves it. He says there is nothing more relaxing to him than to hit the road. (There were six of us kids – maybe that had something to do with it.) So I think it’s kinda like what Curly said in “City Slickers” – find that one thing.
I like my job fine but would love it if I could do it part time and have the rest of the time free to be impulsive, selfish, and lazy. That’s my true soul. But I do institutional research–statistics, writing, data gathering, etc. for a university. I love my coworkers (except the one I have been fantasizing about strangling all week) and the benefits are pretty good for being in the non-profit sector. My office operates a lot like a family (including a few dysfunctions) and that’s a bonus. My coworkers brought me dinners for six night after my son was born, for example. Gotta like that level of caring about life outside the office.
Shut up! When I was in radio, reading the RAB and the other trades was part of my morning ritual. I’d hide them from the boss until I got through them, and then causually mention they had come in. Good stuff!
And Sax…oooh, I am jealous. Actually, my job has great benefits, 2 weeks paid vacation, 12 personal days, 12 sick days, state and federal holidays. We will probably get to flex from July 4th until Labor Day, I’ll probably work 10 hour days Tues-Fri to get Mondays off. But it’s SO monotonous. Eh. Come fall I’ll hopefully be in school full time, so it won’t matter.
I don’t actually, technically, have a job, as I’m only in my second year of college. I plan on being a grade school teacher, and I plan on getting a degree in English, poss. minors in french, philo or psyc. This is all stuff I either want to do or am interested in doing. However, the college I currently attend does not have a BA in elementary education . . . I have to get my masters in that. Damned annoying school, but at only like 5000 a year (or term, I forget which) it’s not bad. Plus the food is edible.
If you don’t like your job, the logical solution (which is probably the hardest one) is to go to night school or something and acquire the skills necessary to do what you want (and yes, lying on your back all day on the sofa can be a job . . . lil abner was a mattress tester, after all).
Dave, don’t make me come up-state to terminate you.
A lot of the jobs listed above sound really interesting. I think we should print it out and send it to high schools to remind kids that they should choose a job wisely. Money doesn’t equal happiness. For me, it’s the drinking on the job that does.
P.S. Thanks for lunch Uke!
BTW, Moe, dear, if you’re going to call yourself a “genious”, you should learn how to spell the damn word. It’s “genius”.
People think coding software is not creative??? Well, maybe they just don’t understand it well enough to know what an art properly written code can be (RSA Encryption in 4 lines of PERL. need I say more? )
Of course if all you do is just drag & drop VB modules…hehe but that’s not really writing code.
I work as an electronics technician at a bomb range 50 miles west of town. It’s out in the middle of nowhere. I was an Electronic Warfare Systems Technician (worked on stuff that jams radar) for 20 years in the USAF, and now I get to see the other side of the equation. I operate a system that tracks aircraft while a radar simulator shoots simulated threat signals at the plane. My system receives the reflected signals plus the jamming signals the plane transmits and evaluates how good the jamming is working.
I get to work with computers (a linux-based system – if anyone knows whether these things need defragging let me know – we’re all ignorant re: linux) and lots of other electronic gear. Sometimes we get to shoot little rockets at the planes, to simulate surface-to-air missiles. I get paid to play with fireworks! Cool!
The mesa we’re at is about 300-400 feet above the surrounding countryside and there’s no settlement of consequence within 10 miles (the nearest town, Melrose, NM, is 14 miles away). The bomb range is also a wildlife preserve, and there’s all kinds of animals all over the place. We see pronghorn antelope, rabbits, birds, bats, tarantulas, scorpions, and all sorts of wildlife. Last night driving home I saw a pronghorn antelope and, just a little while later had to slam on the brakes to avoid ruining a deer’s day.
The pay’s good for this area (~$30k a year) but I really need a more economical vehicle. On the plus side, I’m learning how to extract the maximum amount of gas mileage from a minivan.
I not only like my job, I am proud of what I do. There’s not too many folks who can say that and mean it.
Yeah, yeah, there’s the low pay and all the time I must spend away from my son, but there must be something to it since I’ve been doing it for 18 years.
trying to be charitable
Maybe he meant to call himself a “genial musician,” and got caught in a variant of the whole “vegetables are sensual, people are sensuous” debate.
