Best job you ever had?

Gerhardt

Gerhardt

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Gerhardt
I worked at a grocery store when I was in high school and the owner let me close the store on the nights I worked. Which is pretty cool when you're in high school and the store sells beer.

I landed a pretty good job here right out of college. After working nights and weekends for so long it felt like I was getting paid to be on vacation to work only M-F 8-4:30. And it was more money than I expected. Over the years I've become pretty good at what I do so I have a lot of free time to hang around online, mostly here. No pressure. No stress. Treated like an adult (which can't be said about a lot of places) Take breaks and lunch when I want. If I want the day off I can take it off w/ no notice.

I used to think it was too good to be true, that it couldn't last. But I quit thinking about it too much 20 years ago.

The one thing I don't understand is all the other people around here who can't wait to retire.

What about the best job you ever had?

(I'm just waiting for Henning to pipe in about his tenure as a strip club bouncer)
 
The second coolest job I ever had was during the Summers while I was in college, spending active duty time running a land navigation course at an Army reserve base. It was completely kick back, I could pretty much do whatever I wanted whenever I wanted, and I really didn't have to answer to anyone on a daily basis.
 
The one I have now, helping other pilot owners to maintain their aircraft. I work as much as I want, meet great people, and get paid.

And,,,,, I am the boss :)
 
The one my last employer offered me out of a clear blue sky. Worked with him several years turning wrenches and driving rivets on airplanes and doing a lot of paperwork. He and I are best friends to this day. :yes::yes:
 
Owning my own business, a little picture framing shop. It was fun. Working with my hands, making things, getting atta boys from my customers.

It had it's down times of course, but overall, it was an enjoyable way to make a living. I did well at it, and am now retired. I still make oval and round frames for a few of the local picture framing shops. There is not much of a demand for them, so it is more like a hobby, screwing around in my little woodshop out in my garage now and then.

-John
 
Working for an independent system operator (electric grid). Responsibilities were significant and you actually saw the value and impact to society of your work on a day to day basis. The attitude was get the job done, we were encouraged to find better ways of doing the job, and the schedule was really flexible. When you went offsite to audit power plants you were always treated in an awesome manner and even senior people looked up to you, i was in my early to mid twenties. finally, I had time to fly pretty much any day. good times.
 
I have two:

1. Working at America Online was a blast. It was early in the days of the technical restructuring of call centers, so there wasn't a lot of oversight or control. We found a bunch of secret areas in the America Online software that non-employees couldn't access, and it was just a lot of fun....until I got fired for dealing with a pesky customer. lol.
2. Delivery driver for KFC. Decent money for an 18 year old, but the sheer amount of boobs, sex, and free alcohol that came with that job is something that most teenagers only dream of. I'm not sure why, but women will do almost anything for free chicken. Its even better when they do it and you still make them pay for it!
 
Worked for a farmer in Iowa when I was in college. 16+ hours in a tractor in the spring pulling a 35' field cultivator. In the fall, would spend time in the combine until the grain dryer got full, then switch over to one of the 4WD tractors pulling a 10 shank breaking plow until 2-3am. After ground was worked, would work like mad to get anhydrous put down before the ground froze.

About twice as many hours per week as I work now, but it was four times the enjoyment per hour, so it worked out.
 
Being a loadmaster in the airforce when I was a kid.
 
Loved playing in bars and teaching guitar when I was a teenager. Especially with "older women" in their 20s hitting on me.....
 
asgcpa said:
Loved playing in bars and teaching guitar when I was a teenager. Especially with "older women" in their 20s hitting on me.....
Click to expand...

Come to FLA plenty of older women to hit on you,if that's your thing.
 
SkyHog said:
I have two:


2. Delivery driver for KFC. Decent money for an 18 year old, but the sheer amount of boobs, sex, and free alcohol that came with that job is something that most teenagers only dream of. I'm not sure why, but women will do almost anything for free chicken. Its even better when they do it and you still make them pay for it!
Click to expand...

you chicken fiend you
 
Being a father. The avatar is my son's Halloween costume 2002.
 
I worked as a computer mechanic for Digital equipment Corporation from 1984-1988. When I got hired on, I knew absolutely nada about computers, but I could fix anything. So after 6 weeks of training, they offered me a slot as an onsite field engineer at Lockheed Georgia, because NOBODY wanted to work there. They were an extremely tough customer to please, and they seemed to spit out good people about every 6 months.
This was during the build of the C-5B. Ohh it was heaven. I got to see the making of Herculese airplanes and Galaxy's everyday. I got to work with customer/engineers who had come over from the Skunk Works and knew Kelly Johnson personally.
I survived the wrath of the customer so well, that they gave me a cake and small "going away party" when I left.
When I started, i had a great boss who rewarded me very well because I got his toughest customer to give very high survey marks, which in turn paid him very well. When he retired, they put in a newhire manager from Xerox, who tried to run our little merry band like the service group at a Chevy dealer. Blue team and Red team, etc. When He showed up onsite to "get to know the customers", he really ****ed them off right away, and then made sure to let me know it was my fault it was a bad meet up.
About that time the guys I worked for before, in the geophysical group offered me the stars and moon to return, and I did, for the next ten years.
 
My last assignment on active duty with the US Air Force was at the Air Force Weapons Labratory (now the Phillips Lab). SDI aka Star Wars was the new thing in town. I had just spent two years in intelligence and had been deployed with the USMC and US Army. It was great to be back into R&D. The head of my department told me my mission was the 'think of things and build them.' We had truck loads of cash. All of us were in our 20's and single. We had no set duty hours and our job was to figure out how to blow crap up with lasers from outer space! It was a great time!!!

In the small world arena I found out that a friend of the Fredericks worked at the lab at about the same time I did. He lives up by 6Y9 and new my old boss who had sadly passed away only a few years ago. Last time I was up there we got to tell each other old war stories and reminisce!
 
Afiter I retired I ran into the director of the Parks and Recs Department for the city. She offered me a job at the aquatic center supervising the lifeguards. I ended up getting my Red Cross lifeguard certification at the age of 60 and my Lifeguard Instructor certification at the age of 61. I was old enough to be a grandfather to the kids that worked for me, but I still got invited to all the parties, which I politely declined, considering that I would probably be the only one there old enough to drink if I did show up. Anyway, I did that for a couple of years and enjoyed it so much. I'm still facebook friends with a bunch of them, and even though I did not work there last summer, I kept getting e-mails and text messages asking me if they could get time off. I always told them it was OK with me.
 
Working by myself, no more employees.
 
Airline Pilot ! It gives me lot's of time off to fly little airplanes and I don't have to put up with any office politics or driving in traffic the same five days a week. Heck, I don't even know what my immediate supervisor even looks like - I've never met him.
 
The BEST job I ever had I started at when I was 17 and worked there on and off till I was 27.
It was a SMALL family owned "amusement park". It was western themed and they put on shows. "gunfights".
It was quite fun to tell people when they asked what you did "I am a professional gunfighter"!
I did it full time for 2 years, then after that, just on the weekends because it was FUN!
How many people get to live out their dream to be a cowboy? Carry a 45 on your hip and get beat up and shot 3 times a day?
It DID help on a resume when you put Professional Gunfighter, you almost ALWAYS at least get an interview. LOL
The family that owned it were GREAT people.
 
Coastal boat deliveries, good money, take a trip with one girl, get paid well, tuck and hide from bad weather.

Roving photographer at Six Flags was a very close second.
 
Best job: EF-111A Electronic Warfare Officer at RAF Upper Heyford for three years.

Second best job is the one I've had for the last 10 years. Employee #1 at a small software company in Austin. Ten years and we have no rules, not even an employee handbook. No face time rules, just work with your team to get the project done.

Inside, air conditioned, no heavy lifting!

Doing a job in which 35 is considered over the hill at age 62! I'm older than most of co-workers Mom's!
 
I was a bouncer at a bar on the barrier island in Florida. On the island were the well to do.

So...I stood at the door and ID'd anyone who look young. The music played with live bands or DJ's. Every now and again I caught an under age kid with a fake ID. I'd keep the ID and tell them to call the cops if they had a problem with that. (nobody ever did)

So, I was paid cash to stand at a door and ID rich kids trying to sneak in. The real perk was that any time I came in (including work nights) I drank free as well as whoever I brought with me. Thats right...me and 5 dudes roll in and we all drink free for the night. Of course I would throw a mad tip towards the bar but still...great perk.
 
Art VanDelay said:
Airline Pilot ! It gives me lot's of time off to fly little airplanes and I don't have to put up with any office politics or driving in traffic the same five days a week. Heck, I don't even know what my immediate supervisor even looks like - I've never met him.
Click to expand...

Yep. :thumbsup:
 
Most fun gig I ever had was being a grill guy at outback steakhouse in high school. Me and a few friends ran that kitchen. Late nights and stinky clothes but I loved when it would get so slammed and I would shift into this sort of auto pilot mode I felt like I could do 100 things at a time. I was good at that. Also the waitstaff would buy us under age guys beer after the shifts.

Currently I manage software engineers and a domestic container shipping company. Best I.T. job from an enjoying the business perspective. Sort of like playing battleship without the war part. I am in charge of vessels going to Honolulu, Kodiak, Dutch Harbor, San Juan, & Anchorage

Plus, I get to work from home (Manager working from home WTH?)


Edit: I will second "being a dad" (son 6, daughter turns 5 next week) couldn't begin to describe how much joy they bring me.
 
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"Best." How do you define that?

As an attorney representing almost exclusively small businesses in the construction arena, I love love love my clients, risk takers and good people, all. Always on the tip of the spear, always a good attitude and (in direct contravention of the image many in the press an politics try to portray) always trying to make it right for their employees. That's good. On the other hand, while most of the lawyers I deal with day-in, day-out are great, there is a small minority who, honestly speaking, are real jerks. They do not do their clients a service by so acting, but what're you gonna do?

Before that, I was in field service for the Bell & Howell Company of Chicago, Illinois, and I got to go around and fix stuff. It was heaven, perhaps because I was good at it, but it was fun to walk in and, in an hour or so, turn a crisis into a fix. Company treated us well and supported us well.

Later, they promoted me to a Product Support job in California, where I worked with an amazingly good bunch of folks, and we did good work. Sadly, the company paid well, had excellent labor-management relations, issued regular dividends to shareholders, had no debt, lots of cash and was publicly-traded, so it had to be broken-up.

So I went to law school.

Keith Lane said:
I worked as a computer mechanic for Digital equipment Corporation from 1984-1988. When I got hired on, I knew absolutely nada about computers, but I could fix anything. So after 6 weeks of training, they offered me a slot as an onsite field engineer at Lockheed Georgia, because NOBODY wanted to work there. They were an extremely tough customer to please, and they seemed to spit out good people about every 6 months.
This was during the build of the C-5B. Ohh it was heaven. I got to see the making of Herculese airplanes and Galaxy's everyday. I got to work with customer/engineers who had come over from the Skunk Works and knew Kelly Johnson personally.
I survived the wrath of the customer so well, that they gave me a cake and small "going away party" when I left.
When I started, i had a great boss who rewarded me very well because I got his toughest customer to give very high survey marks, which in turn paid him very well. When he retired, they put in a newhire manager from Xerox, who tried to run our little merry band like the service group at a Chevy dealer. Blue team and Red team, etc. When He showed up onsite to "get to know the customers", he really ****ed them off right away, and then made sure to let me know it was my fault it was a bad meet up.
About that time the guys I worked for before, in the geophysical group offered me the stars and moon to return, and I did, for the next ten years.
Click to expand...

Ah, yes, at B&H, we had systems with PDP11 boxen massaging and feeding data. I used to be very good at hex to decimal conversion for hand-loading bootstrap programs on the older ones...

Jeff Oslick said:
Best job? I own a toy store!

:D :yes:

www.EnchantedToyStore.com
Click to expand...

Excellent!

I did not much care for Southern California as a whole, but I still miss Fullerton, a fine place to live, in my humble opinion.
 
I've been blessed with some great opportunities in my single years that I couldn't't have done as easily once I got married. Was a commercial and research diver who worked from Antarctica to Alaska. Enough time at sea led to my captain's license and ended up at one time running the Hooter's Fishing Team while still in my twenties working on my Marine Biology degree. Went to oil spill response from there for a number of years and enjoyed the emergency response so much I finally ended up here running a FireBoat for one of the busiest fire depts. in the US, just a few miles south of Henning.
Changing careers drastically has been interesting and challenging every few years but has certainly prevented boredom and complacency. I've never been afraid of being on the wrong end of a shovel and getting as dirty as needed to get the job done so my work ethic has kept me employed through thick and thin.
If I had to pick the best job though it would be what I'm know doing at home: being a dad. My wife and I ended up adopting a pair of kids; 2 and 3 years old with only 4 days notice from first notice to in our home!!! We only had dawgs and cats before but certainly spun our lives out of control. This has been scarier than any fires that I've ever faced, more intimidating than any offshore weather, but yet strangely the most rewarding thing I've probably ever done. My daughter enjoys flying, my son lives and eats flying. They ask for airport picnics at the tiki bar and know they have to help pull the plane out of the hangar if they want to go bore holes in the sky.
I've truly been blessed with jobs over the years but by far the best one was one I never even saw coming. I was always one to take the road less traveled but now unexpectedly ended up squarely in a happy suburbia with a very longterm job!
 
2nd best Navy SEAL back in the 80's
Best currently engineer @ Pratt & Whitney still getting to blow things up.
 
So many jobs -- most had some very, very memorable moments. Going to Africa to cover famine in Sudan for a newspaper, documenting the death spiral of Eastern Airlines, watching up close and personal the media circus that was the aftermath of JFK Jr.'s crash, getting calls from manufs wanting me to fly their brand new (Pilatus, Victory jet, Eclipse, DA-42 etc).

But the best is the one I have now. I go from airport to airport, helping them solve their problems. From Alaska to Hawaii to Seattle to Fort Lauderdale to Houston to ... What's not to like?
 
Gwenivere Dentler.

Ah memories...
 
Best job: Flying a single seat jet seeing the world from a point of view no one else saw at that moment.
Worst job: Using that jet to kill people.
 
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