What Other Careers

I was a full time flight instructor and flying 1,000 hours per year while pretending to be a college student. On one day's notice, I dropped everything and moved to Alaska and began the life of a bush pilot and within one year had worked myself up to a leadership position in a business run by criminals. Despite living the exciting and dangerous life of a 22 year old bush pilot on the frozen tundra of Western Alaska and making $10,000 per month (in 1981!), I gave it all up for stupid reasons and instead of finishing my ATP and moving on to the airlines, I joined the Army to become a helicopter pilot...

Forty years later, I still work for the DoD/Army and I'm still a CFI. I never went back to Alaska, other than for a year for work and now I'm just waiting to retire, so I can instruct full time again. I don't regret all my bad decisions, but I made the best of the decisions I made.

Either way, I have some great stories...
 
I used to kill people for a living. That was my second paid job.

The first paid job was working for a two day a week circulation newspaper in the California desert that had their rag printed in LA, then we would spend the first half of the night tying the papers on the tying machine and loading them into cars and pickups, then the last part of the night delivering them.

My third paid job was working for a newspaper in their ad department. Meaning, the machines that unfolded and inserted ads into the newspapers. Wow, what could go wrong there. A lot. But at the end of the day, it seemed to work out.
 
Sac Arrow said:
I used to kill people for a living. That was my second paid job.

The first paid job was working for a two day a week circulation newspaper in the California desert that had their rag printed in LA, then we would spend the first half of the night tying the papers on the tying machine and loading them into cars and pickups, then the last part of the night delivering them.

My third paid job was working for a newspaper in their ad department. Meaning, the machines that unfolded and inserted ads into the newspapers. Wow, what could go wrong there. A lot. But at the end of the day, it seemed to work out.
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This reminds me of one those "poorly describe what you do" prompts.

I used to run the bananas on my screen into each other, now they want me to keep them apart.
 
I'll depart from tradition and omit the "gigolo" quip.

Had I not been an engineer (retired from Lockheed last year), I would have had a career in rock & roll. During college I worked as a sound tech mixing live bands. I'm a mediocre guitar player, but I'm good enough behind a mixing board to earn a living at it.

After college, during my first few years in aerospace, some friends and I had an audio business on the side. We had a mobile recording studio built into a Winnebago, and we also provided live audio for bands, did installation work in nightclubs and other places, and we rented out some equipment. I also knew some guys who were touring with major acts and they offered to bring me on.

But I figured out that I'd never make the same money in rock that I could in aerospace, so instead I spent 36 years developing WMDs for a better tomorrow. I had a great gig at Lockheed, but sadly without sex, drugs, and rock & roll......

But now that I'm retired I may take it up again!
 
I ended up in IT on the networking side for a financial company. I am 5-7 years until I can retire and do a second career type thing. I cannot teach, so no CFI for me. Maybe freight flying? Something where I am not on 24/7 call and have to carry a corporate cell phone always.

If I could go do it again, I would have moved right into getting my MBA after my Bachelors and moved on the management and business side of things. Always wanted to do international business and travel. Probably a crap job, but it always struck me as something different.
 
Software developer. I make computers do things and have for 44 years. Always something new to learn. Planning on retiring this year (maybe part time work to get past coming recession) and flying, visiting Ireland, visiting family (Wisconsin, Florida, California, etc.), flying more, seeing more of our country, fishing, meeting other pilots, volunteering at aviation activities (Oshkosh, flyins, etc.), flying, and whatever I can do to help others.
 
By training I'm an electrical engineer. I worked one year writing database code for a defense contract, five years doing high performance computing and networking research for the Army, spent three years as a University Administrator (By the banks of the old Raritan), ran a software company for 21 years until Textron bought it and fired just about everybody with a clue. Other paying jobs: TV survey auditer (my first "real" job), recording studio engineer, NASCAR official, Financial arbitrator, Uber driver, Professional Wine Judge, and Book Editor.

Now I'm mostly retired. I serve on several non-profit boards including being secretary of the American Wine Society, webmaster of the North Carolina Woodworkers Association, and treasurer of the Long Island Airport Homeowners Association.
 
mcdewey said:
Software developer. I make computers do things and have for 44 years. Always something new to learn. Planning on retiring this year (maybe part time work to get past coming recession) and flying, visiting Ireland, visiting family (Wisconsin, Florida, California, etc.), flying more, seeing more of our country, fishing, meeting other pilots, volunteering at aviation activities (Oshkosh, flyins, etc.), flying, and whatever I can do to help others.
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Oh, and continuing to get better at the Irish whistle with lessons and hopefully some playing at public venues. Learning how to work sound equipment would be great too. I love music; it's one of my life joys. (In addition to flying :D)
 
schmookeeg said:
This is worse than those people who talk in the third person.
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doc-holliday-tombstone.gif
 
Just taking early retirement after 25 years with NASA. It’s been a good run, but time to do some other things… hiking, travel, financially supporting my local A&P. I’d like to do some college teaching as an adjunct but can’t stand the thought of prostrating myself in front of some Dean, begging for the chance to get paid $2500 per semester.
 
AlleyCat67 said:
Just taking early retirement after 25 years with NASA. It’s been a good run, but time to do some other things… hiking, travel, financially supporting my local A&P. I’d like to do some college teaching as an adjunct but can’t stand the thought of prostrating myself in front of some Dean, begging for the chance to get paid $2500 per semester.
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Yeah, don't do it. There be dragons there.
 
flyingron said:
How about the first person, plural.

We are not amused.
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That seems like the language choice of most pilots, it would seem. Especially when talking to ATC. As though we don't want the boogie man on the other side of the radio to know we are up here alone.
 
RudyP said:
A lot of pilots do this on the radio even when solo. I think it comes back to flight training since we all learned to talk on the radio with a CFI next to us.
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I thought it was from listening to ATPs on the frequency being a bad example. Always use "we" and start every transmission with "And."
 
AlleyCat67 said:
I’d like to do some college teaching as an adjunct but can’t stand the thought of prostrating myself in front of some Dean, begging for the chance to get paid $2500 per semester.
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I was once offered that as a way to get a degree.
 
flyingron said:
I thought it was from listening to ATPs on the frequency being a bad example. Always use "we" and start every transmission with "And."
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I always thought “we” was “me and my airplane”.

if you’re gonna emulate ATPs, ya gotta use a gravelly voice that’s low and almost inaudible.
 
MauleSkinner said:
if you’re gonna emulate ATPs, ya gotta use a gravelly voice that’s low and almost inaudible.
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That's only if you're trying to fake it. The real guys in the day actually had voices that deep. Years ago my father was doing labor work respresenting Trans Caribbean Airlines pilots when they merged with American. The head of the MEC was a guy named Bernie Textor. The guy had the deepest voice my twelve year old mind had ever heard. When he'd call our house I didn't even have to ask, just told my father that Captain Textor was on the phone.
 
flyingron said:
That's only if you're trying to fake it. The real guys in the day actually had voices that deep. Years ago my father was doing labor work respresenting Trans Caribbean Airlines pilots when they merged with American. The head of the MEC was a guy named Bernie Textor. The guy had the deepest voice my twelve year old mind had ever heard. When he'd call our house I didn't even have to ask, just told my father that Captain Textor was on the phone.
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That’s what happens when you start chain smoking at age 6. ;)
 
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