Random Thoughts - Part III The Search for Spark (No Politics)

[soundman98]

Originally Posted by Kaotic Lazagna

Unless you are extremely unhappy at your current job (like I was in my last job), I wouldn't really consider it too much. I hated my last job enough to take a 20k a year hit/cut and doubled my commute.

no, i'm definitely at that point. my current commute is 3 miles. this is literally 10x's the commute. side benefit, the vehicle actually gets up to operating temp...

[Sapphireho]

I graduated with a degree in accounting and started down the CPA route. Learned right away I didn't want that. Went the IT route.

If I had my life to do over I would not have done either.

If you are still young, no wife or kids, don't like what you are doing, I say change. Money is just money. No one ever said in their deathbed "I wish I had more money".

[soundman98]

Originally Posted by Sapphireho

I graduated with a degree in accounting and started down the CPA route. Learned right away I didn't want that. Went the IT route.

If I had my life to do over I would not have done either.

If you are still young, no wife or kids, don't like what you are doing, I say change. Money is just money. No one ever said in their deathbed "I wish I had more money".

they do when they see how much deathbed's cost!

[Sapphireho]

Originally Posted by soundman98

they do when they see how much deathbed's cost!

Your dead. Doesn't matter.

[Sapphireho]

So what happened to the cookie tin?

I so wanted to participate, and get a duplicate and send to someone I don't like with special cookies.

[Kaotic Lazagna]

Originally Posted by soundman98

no, i'm definitely at that point. my current commute is 3 miles. this is literally 10x's the commute. side benefit, the vehicle actually gets up to operating temp...

eeek, yeah, maybe consider it since you're at that point. My commute went from 30 miles to 60 miles each way

But I also got a much better health benefit/insurance. And I've since transferred locations and dropped my commute from 60 down to 5.

[spcmafia]

Originally Posted by Sapphireho

So what happened to the cookie tin?

I so wanted to participate, and get a duplicate and send to someone I don't like with special cookies.

Oh sht! I completely forgot lol. With Mrs Mafia visits to the E.R because of the gallbladder I completely got off track.

[Sapphireho]

Originally Posted by spcmafia

Oh sht! I completely forgot lol. With Mrs Mafia visits to the E.R because of the gallbladder I completely got off track.

Hope she's ok.

[spcmafia]

Originally Posted by Sapphireho

Hope she's ok.

Thank you. She just had her surgery last Wednesday and is recovering. Movement is limited but glad the whole thing is over.



I told her that her four incision scars look like she was hanging out downtown at the wrong place, at the wrong time.

[Sapphireho]

When I got back from the bay area there was a note that TSA opened and searched my bag. Maybe because I had a big bag of lavash, and a big loaf of Raymond's sourdough bread in my bag. I can see them looking at an xray... "What the hell is that?"

[cjd]

Originally Posted by soundman98

no, i'm definitely at that point. my current commute is 3 miles. this is literally 10x's the commute. side benefit, the vehicle actually gets up to operating temp...

I guess I'd add to my previous... Be deliberate in the change. Waiting years for a gradual catch-up and the rest of your description didn't sound like it was something you wished you were doing instead. Go back to school if you need to. Change is scary but probably good (don't look at me as an example... ha) as long as the benefits outweigh the negatives. Assume you never see those salary increases to catch up: would you still do it?

[NoHaveMSG]

Originally Posted by soundman98

in other shouting-into-the-void news, i interviewed at a different job last friday. just mulling things over.

things have been going ok lately, but i had started the looking process a few months ago when things were bad, finally got an interview. things tend to swing dramatically one way and then the other, so the next wave of 'bad' is coming...

it's a place that i'd be more of a mechanic role-- upfitting trucks for dump beds, service bodies, strobe lights. almost none of my professional electrical experience applies, but the last 15+ years of my hobby of modding vehicles does. mixed feelings as to 'what have i been doing with my life' so far in that respect. but then my electrical experience basically means nothing anywhere else for the most part because i don't have any PLC experience, despite 2 years at the security place teaching myself to strip apart dvr software and re-build it into workable install discs.

biggest thing is the pay, and all the tools i'd need-- i have the toolbox in the garage i can shift over to work duties, but still missing about half the tools i'd need to get started.

with the pay, it'd be about a $6/hr pay cut to start off, but they pay benefits with raises at the 3/6/9 month milestones the first year and then cost of living adjustments after that. so it'd be a rough first year, but then would put me within about $3/hr different by the end of the first year. second year, according to what they said, should put me close to $1/hr behind what i'm currently making.

i'm currently making more per hour, as well as about 5-10 hours overtime every week, but paying 10% of a pretty abysmal insurance plan--disadvantage of a tiny company.

i dunno... i'm just under the boss on the totem pole where i'm at, but being under this boss leaves me with very little confidence in myself, which is what started the process of seeing what else was out there a few months ago.

is this place better? maybe? always hard to tell in a 1-hr interview sometimes. but at least i'd be working in 1 place, and be indoors consistently, maybe even get home before 6-7:00 some nights, which would be cool to not spend 12-13 hours a day dedicated to work. it had that 'small company feel', but was a rather large company (husband/wife/barking-dog run the office, they sold to become a subsidiary of a major corp a few years ago, so less than 30 people, but then major corp paperwork stuff). so the internal politics somewhat worry me being similar to what i'm trying to escape. but then the husband at least had a little of a southern drawl, so he's not as much of a talker as my current boss...

I played that game 5-6 years ago and didn't go as expected. It's why I ended up back at my old job, would have been a lot better off had I never left.

Originally Posted by cjd

@soundman98 Unless it's work you'd love, doesn't sound like the right move to me.

^^This for sure.

[Capt Spaulding]

I’d suggest thinking about what’s really important to you. When I started college law school was the plan. A couple of years into my ug life I sat in on a couple of classes in the law school with an older buddy and decided that was NOT for me. One of the better decisions I made. Dropped out, went to work designing petro chemical plants. Made a lot of money over 8 years then the industry went tits up. Lost my job when I declined an opportunity to work on a binary nerve agent project. Went back to school, finished my BS, worked for a year in insurance (claims) then back to school for a PhD.

Got a university teaching job and it worked out. Never got back to my E&C industry salary (in adjusted dollars), but the career satisfaction balanced that out. And I never had to help make WMDs.

You’re bright. It will be OK.

[NoHaveMSG]

JFC MM93 just needs to retire already