What Is/Was Your Occupation?

[Wellington]

I may have seen or made a thread like this before or it could have been on a pipe smoking forum, but I thought I'd make one. I love learning about the paths different people have taken in life. Many of you are retired, what was/were your occupations? Those currently working, what is your occupation?

I'll start, I'm a plumber, also have a handyman business, don't do much with it anymore. Also managed a food bank for a few years during my philanthropic years.

[Nymuso]

CRNA - Retired

(Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist)

[eyesore]

HVAC for 50 years . Going to retire in 2022...for sure!

[Mandobart]

This comes up a lot peripherally in other threads. You'll find there are a lot of techies here.

I trained as a nuclear field electronics technician in the USN, on submarines. I spent about 8-1/2 years as a submarine reactor operator and instrumentation/control tech.

It was stressful, not fun, tedious, demanding and I told myself to run far and fast from nuclear power and propulsion. I went to college and majored in mechanical engineering. But when I graduated there was nothing going on and no one was hiring mechanical engineers in the biomedical field (my goal/dream).

So I took a job as a consultant at a company subcontracting at a very large DOE former nuclear weapons site. Not fun, too much hustling to land the next contract, too much desk work.

I ended up at the local commercial nuclear power plant in the system/field engineering group. Did that for about 8 years, then got into plant operations and worked/studied/struggled for about 2 years and earned my senior reactor operator license from the NRC.

I worked as a control room supervisor, shift manager and trainer for over 13 years. Now I'm in the maintenance planning/execution group. I spend my days pouring over procedures, prints, manuals and federally regulated requirements to ensure we can safely, correctly and legally perform required maintenance.

It's been a very rewarding (financially and intellectually) 24 year plus career. I've worked hundreds of nightshifts, weekends, holidays, etc. But I'm set to retire in a little over a year.

[czgunner]

Auto tech for 11 years. Furloughed. Now I'm studying business via the V.A.

[brad4d8]

Retired. Was an ESL teacher and school librarian in what was called a Juvenile Training School, but was really a prison for serious juvenile offenders.

[BrunoBlack]

Carpenter + General Contractor (20 years)
University Professor + University Administrator (30 years)

[Craig Wilson]

As good a reason for a first post as any...

I'm a CPA and worked for 36 years as a financial analyst for a government agency. I retired 11 years ago.

Since retirement I took a 5 week live-in guitar building course, built and outfitted a shop and have been building on an amateur basis since. Mostly steel string acoustic, a classical, a 12 string and working on my first archtop now (build #009).

[Brucebubs]

Gravure printer - supervisor.

Part-time Budget car rental at Merimbula Airport, then part-time music store sales, then part-time video store.

[ssstewart]

was a pretty fart smeller back in the day, travelled everywhere, held senior level positions with Lucent Tech/Memorex/Cap Gemini ( six sigma prac and Lean), etc etc. also did a few stints of public speaking (Dale Carnegie) and other motivational speaking gigs. Feet have been firmly planted in canada my home for last 15 years running a Pub/restaurant and Catering Firm. when i first came back made a decision that home/family was more important than money even though i had many offers from headhunters, made the right choice for me, no hindsight regrets.

[buddyhu]

I retired 10 years ago from a very rewarding career as a psychologist…but it was a stressful path at times. Worked in several settings: medical hospital, private psychiatric hospital, big HMO, solo private practice.

[rdeane]

In my younger life, worked as a US Army civilian employee (local hire on an overseas assignment for my spouse), both as an administrative assistant and then later after much training, an intelligence order of battle analyst. Upon returning to the US, spent 25 years as Executive Assistant to CEOs and Vice Presidents in hospital administration. Retired in 2011.

[islandguitar]

Started my career as a YMCA staff member in youth and physical services.

But after three years, moved on to 47 year career in College admissions and college counseling with a Master's in this field. The final 13 years were spent in my own private consulting business working with students and families needing help with the admissions financial aid process. Retired from all this in 2019.

For the past 20 years I've also held seasonal part-time jobs as a Coast Guard licensed marine operator of small vessels delivering folks to and from their vessels here in our harbor.

Short story: Bachelor's degree in electrical engineering with a long career in telecommunications software.

Long story: paper route as a kid, odd job sort of thing for a family friend, worked in a grocery store, as a movie theatre usher, in a retail lighting store, went to school to train as an architectural draftsman, worked in the construction industry for 4 years (it sucked), went back to school again for an electrical engineering degree, now a long career in telecommunications software testing (doesn't suck, mostly...). I plan on retiring in 6-7 years.

[DanR]

I am a senior designer in the automotive industry, currently specializing in restraints (seat belts and airbags).