Topic: My occupations

[Raul CB750K1]

Five pages in just two days...

This confirms one of my theories about human nature: people LOVE to talk about themselves rather than the others.


I won't tell you what I do, but I will tell you what I will do: I'm taking a year off starting Oct. 1st. I've decided to take a break, spend more time with the kids and wife, finish my bike restorations, do more sport, and stare while life goes on. At 35, with just one year mortgage to go, this is the nearest I can be to feel like a rich man. There is a spanish proverb that says "The rich one is not the one with more wealth, but the one with less needs".


Stop talking about myself....


Raul

[GoatBaSS]

I love the wisdom of old proverbs. So very true. Enjoy the time...

[Bob Wessner]

This confirms one of my theories about human nature: people LOVE to talk about themselves rather than the others.

There are all sorts of pithy little sayings, like the one, "You might as well blow your own horn, because no one else is going to do it for you." 

[ElCheapo]

This confirms one of my theories about human nature: people LOVE to talk about themselves rather than the others.

There are all sorts of pithy little sayings, like the one, "You might as well blow your own horn, because no one else is going to do it for you." 

 

[firecracker]

There are all sorts of pithy little sayings, like the one, "You might as well blow your own horn, because no one else is going to do it for you."

How true!

My wife doesn't even want to TALK about blowing my horn...  wait, what were we talking about?

 

[cbjunkie]

raul - it also confirms the fact that Americans love to talk about their jobs...which is considered rude and boring in most of Europe.

[ElCheapo]

Anyone notice that people identify who they are with what they do?

Funny thing, ask some one who are they and they we promptly tell you what they do.

[cbjunkie]

in america...that's what i was referring to in the previous post - it isn't necessarily that way everywhere else...

if anyone is interested there is actually a good book written about this and other such phenonmena

[Raul CB750K1]

From my experience with americans, they like to talk about what they do because it could mean a job opportunity. We in Spain don't generally talk about work because self-employment is not common, therefore talking about the office is in general boring.


But it's true that we tend to overestimate the importance of our daily work, like if the world wouldn't turn without us. Another proverb says that "cemetaries are full of one-of-a-kind people"


Raul

[cbjunkie]

  if only that were true, raul...the real truth is Americans are perfectly willing to tell you about their boring office job - and there's not a goddam thing you can do to stop them.

[Matt Hubbell]

I find other folks jobs, so I don't have to work. hahaha

[ProTeal55]

Sorry I am so late for getting in this one..

My current job is in the sales Dept. of  large volume Freightliner / Sterling & Western Star dealership.
Been here for just under a year, and my time here is running thin (about to jump ship)
Good job , though just a rough business to be in , and I found out I am not a "outside sales" kinda guy. Doing donuts in a 58,000 lbs. GVW truck is fun dont get me wrong, just doesnt pay the bills...

Previous job was at a high-end V-twin shop doing promotions/ events / sales / etc..
That was the one where I got to meet more hot women than I could handle, but I did my best  

[tsflstb]

I pass gas...through a pipeline up to the east coast.

TONS of hot women in the natural gas industry.  I wish all these hoes would back up off me sometimes.

[cbjunkie]

LOL

where's the *fart* emoticon when you need it??

[jgary]

I sell things that nobody can see!  Market research for web sites.

J.

[sparty]

if only that were true, raul...the real truth is Americans are perfectly willing to tell you about their boring office job - and there's not a goddam thing you can do to stop them.

ain't that the truth! 

I am in covert ops, so I can't say a thing.  Forget you heard that.

Sparty

[Ernie]

im a carpenter,wifey says i have too much wood ,i keep telling her thats a good thing

[lewisj]

I'm a manager at a composites test lab.  Companies send us their newest material and I get to break it.  It's very cool seeing a 1" wide strip at material break at 40,000 lbs.

[ChrisR]

Hey Raul, well done on finishing with the mortgage at 35 - you must have worked hard to do that, so it seems like you deserve your year off. We were mortgage free when we lived in Sweden for a while but we're back in the UK now with house prices through the roof and the rest of my life in hoc to the bank. But I'm working on a cunning plan

[nickjtc]

But I'm working on a cunning plan

Would you care to share that plan, Baldrick?

[Raul CB750K1]

Hey Raul, well done on finishing with the mortgage at 35 - you must have worked hard to do that, so it seems like you deserve your year off. We were mortgage free when we lived in Sweden for a while but we're back in the UK now with house prices through the roof and the rest of my life in hoc to the bank. But I'm working on a cunning plan

We bought our appartment ten years ago, and the mortgage was for 15 years, which seems like eternity. After the first five years we started to be better off and, as we got some savings, used to pay the bank in order to reduce the deadline.

Sad thing is that house prices in Madrid has raised 300% in these ten years. 30 year, 40 year mortgages are common now. People will own their appartments almost when they retire! That's crazy, I always say that if I would have to start over again I would move to another city, or even to another country. Living in big cities have a lot of downsides, and I don't want to be an slave for the rest of my life.

My neighbour, who had a two-bedroom appartment, has bought a house that will be finished in two years. They had two kids so they need more space. The difference in price is more or less the same than my 3 bedroom appartment costed 10 years ago.


I would love to have a house with a private garage to tinker, but I'm not willing to spend another 15 years of my life paying for the commodity. I rather tinker in my community garage; it's not the same but enough for me.


Raul


P.S. For those of you not familiarized with the european living, the normal thing is to live in an "appartment", a flat in a 5 to 15 stories building, that normally have a community garage below ground. Those who are better off live in what you call "houses" and we call "chalet", a single house surrounded by a garden. Ironically, people living in houses would love not to, as lately they are suffering lots of violent assaults by gangs from eastern europe or south america, and living alone doesn't facilitate to get help. Many people start to understand now the american tradition of gun owning. It's sad that somebody work hard to have a dream house and cannot enjoy it. #$%*ty politicians and their overprotective laws...

[Raul CB750K1]

Don't you see how we love to talk about ourselves? 

[Duck]

Owned/ran a computer/network/unix consulting co. for 15 years. Bill collecting and other paperwork took all the fun out of it.
Been doing home renovation for the past few years while looking for a scientific/technial job in Honolulu.
Have learned MC mechanics too.
It's tough finding work when over 50 and with no recent history of working for anyone.
-Duck

Sounds pretty boring, eh? Try camping out in a clients building for a week until he finally realizes the cops are not gonna haul you off until he pays you ;-)

Prior jobs.
WSI/lifeguard, inner city Atlanta pools. Drunks, wife beatings, fights, gunshots avery weekend. Only death was a drug overdose.
Math Physics instructor at girls boarding school in Fiji. Tough job for a young man.
Precision navigation/geodetics, marine oil exploration, China and Pacific.
Instrumentation and telemetry technician(really did engineering but university work is 'different'')
Research Scientist.

Compared to prior jobs, the biz was dull but had kids, mortgage, and all that stuff.
Lots of volunteer work to keep things interesting.

-Duck

[Bob Wessner]

Hey Raul, well done on finishing with the mortgage at 35 - you must have worked hard to do that, so it seems like you deserve your year off. We were mortgage free when we lived in Sweden for a while but we're back in the UK now with house prices through the roof and the rest of my life in hoc to the bank. But I'm working on a cunning plan

We bought our appartment ten years ago, and the mortgage was for 15 years, which seems like eternity. After the first five years we started to be better off and, as we got some savings, used to pay the bank in order to reduce the deadline.

Sad thing is that house prices in Madrid has raised 300% in these ten years. 30 year, 40 year mortgages are common now. People will own their appartments almost when they retire! That's crazy, I always say that if I would have to start over again I would move to another city, or even to another country. Living in big cities have a lot of downsides, and I don't want to be an slave for the rest of my life.

My neighbour, who had a two-bedroom appartment, has bought a house that will be finished in two years. They had two kids so they need more space. The difference in price is more or less the same than my 3 bedroom appartment costed 10 years ago.


I would love to have a house with a private garage to tinker, but I'm not willing to spend another 15 years of my life paying for the commodity. I rather tinker in my community garage; it's not the same but enough for me.


Raul


P.S. For those of you not familiarized with the european living, the normal thing is to live in an "appartment", a flat in a 5 to 15 stories building, that normally have a community garage below ground. Those who are better off live in what you call "houses" and we call "chalet", a single house surrounded by a garden. Ironically, people living in houses would love not to, as lately they are suffering lots of violent assaults by gangs from eastern europe or south america, and living alone doesn't facilitate to get help. Many people start to understand now the american tradition of gun owning. It's sad that somebody work hard to have a dream house and cannot enjoy it. #$%*ty politicians and their overprotective laws...

Raul,

Quite the eye opening description!

[hootle]

Wow. Cool bunch of stories...keep 'em coming.

Me:

Grew up around a restoration shop (Dad's) for old Brit/German/Italian iron. Changed cities for college, found a fairly well-known (nationally, oddly enough) Alfa Romeo shop about a block from campus, and worked as a restoration tech on afternoons and weekends for three years or so, learning as I went. Eventually graduated with an English degree (Journalism minor) and didn't really know what I wanted to do with myself besides writing...and knew writing probably couldn't pay the bills. Given that, I kept on wrenching on Alfas.

Circumstances changed, and I switched shops, working for a little while as a Porsche/Vespa mechanic (local P-car independent shop was also the local Vespa dealer). Hated the Vespa side of things, and once it looked like it was going to be my only focus (no one else there would touch the things), I picked up and moved to Chicago to be with some friends. Without any real direction, ended up working as a BMW tech for a friend of mine who owned an independent shop there.

Oddly enough, that prompted a pretty heavy involvement in the national BMW car club (BMWCCA). Had done a bunch of newspaper/A&E/car club freelance writing through college as a lark, and after some time, I landed a regular gig with the CCA's national club magazine. Two years later, thanks to a near-endless amount of hard work, my nearly four-year-long job search paid off: I found the job I've got now. I'm assistant editor for a fairly well-known car magazine (no, not that one; the other one) in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

All things considered, even though the honeymoon's long over, I absolutely love it. I come to work every day, hang out with crazy, ridiculously intelligent people, and get to play with cars and travel for a living. It's the career I wanted when I was twelve but never thought that I'd get. I'm 25, thoroughly geeked on both my job and its subject matter, and I feel pretty damn lucky...