Your Job When You Grow Up

When I was a kid growing up in a small town, and I imagined my future, I could think of maybe fifty types of careers. They were all the obvious ones: lawyer, doctor, veterinarian, banker, store clerk, mailman, cartoonist, etc.

I always wonder how different the world would be if kids knew there are a million jobs in the world to choose from, and not just fifty. Would kids start early to prepare for careers as videographers or dolphin trainers if they knew how cool those jobs were?

I was thinking of this recently while working with a Dilbert licensee. They make fluorescent light diffusers for your office ceiling, with images such as the sky with clouds, or Dilbert characters looking down at your cube. Very cool: www.skyscapes.biz

So I imagine 5-year old Timmy, when asked what he wants to do for a career, answering “When I grow up, I want to make fluorescent light diffusers with Dilbert characters. They are the perfect item for adding some visual relief to drab cubicle farms.”

Timmy would die a virgin.

If you get one of these Skyscapes, let me know how you use it in your office. Was it a reward for an employee of the month, a way to make the break room livelier, or an easier way to show people where the printer is. I’ll even post your picture in this blog as you pose beneath the Skyscape. And if you are getting paid while you do it, that’s another job you didn’t imagine when you were five.

Comments

[lilith]

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[groovy gary]

Check out a book called Gig. It's a collection of all sorts of people talking about their jobs, ala Studs Terkel, and I believe there are more than fifty in there. A good read just for fun, and maybe a good gift for your kid if you don't mind her or him reading about sex workers and drug dealers.

[Nirav]

50 careers??? damn, when i grew up in 80s and 90s in india there were just 2 professions (Engineer or Doctor, ... or may be throw in a lawyer)

When i was a kid i was good at art so architecture was an option, or a commercial artist in an advertising agency. (would have made my conservative parents crazy)

I did become an engineer, worked as an engineer and then went to business school to be a banker. still dont know what i really want to do.

Anyways the job that pays the bills

[Zzyzxmo]

A leech on the ass of society, but I didn't have the stomach for politics. Then settled for working in IT but that was still too close. Now I work for the government and trying to drain the swamps leeches thrive in.

[scott]

Wow!! hope you get some time to see someone tracking.

[Phelps]

My job didn't exist when I was a kid, or even a teenager. The technology that supports it was only in its most rudimentary forms when I was a teenager, and when I hit 19, I was already doing it.

(I'm in litigation support/trial presentation.)

[Mark Boltz]

Are you kidding? I'll go out and buy a few of those (maybe even some Dilbert ones) just because of this post. We're about to move into a new office space and I'd love to see the look on my co-workers faces when they go to the new location.

As for the job occupation concept, I learned myself that what you aspire to and what you end up doing can be so completely different, and changing as you learn that it's probably best that kids stick to fireman, airplane pilot, veterinarian, McDonald's cashier, or whatever. I went from construction worker (thanks, Tonka!) to airplane pilot (bad eyesight), veterinarian, film producer, diplomat, translator to finally doing IT, which is what I do and love to this day.

[John]

Well done to whomever came up with this and patented it. At fifty bucks a pop, it seems like a pretty brilliant idea.

[Mari]

Yeah. I also remember watching the Bill Moyer's PBS series with Joseph Cambell telling us to follow our bliss, and the rest will follow. If only we were not programed to do what others want for us and learn to follow our hearts, the world would be a happier place.

[Praveen]

I always wanted to be super rich just like bill gates(since i was 8) n then give all money in charity. Now i am 20,still trying to get that rich but, the wish to give it all away still remains.

[Ca]

My orthodontist has one of these above each chair - it's one of the greatest ideas ever, because it gives kids something to look at to distract them from the scary stuff going on in their mouth. My dentist just has posters on the ceiling, and they're less interesting and harder to focus on because they aren't lit up.

[sigal]

No one instructs you how to sort out which job will make you feel right. For help in this matter, and for fun, see:
http://www.trappedinspace.com/jobs

[tc]

Ever watch "Dirty Jobs" on Discovery? I'm pretty sure none of those jobs are advertised in Career Prep classes.

[Barry Seymour]

Product placement, much?

At least it's a cool product.

[black spot]

If I had known about computer and animation as a viable career when I was younger I would have jumped at it, but computers were not that exciting to a child in the sixties. Being good at art and maths everyone threw architecture at me, which made me shudder. Oh and then there was being a printer. When I was young I alternated between wanting to be a brain surgeon, engineer, vet and artist. Turned into an accountant, but haven’t given up my dreams just yet.

I really wanted to sing, but my voice can clear a room in three seconds flat.

[John Reedy]

I would like to be a chicken-dresser...it is a real specialized career, where you dress up chickens in tuxedos/etc. for photo shoots.

http://awritersblock.com

[Former 407 Addict]

I personally wanted to be a fighter pilot... which turned out to be a no-go because I was nearsighted and female (though the Canadian armed forces now accept women in that role, they still need the good eyes, darn it.)

On a slightly related note... did you notice that the How to Install instructions on Sky-Scapes site appear to be illustrated by an in-duh-vidual?

Step 1: Turn off fluorescent light.

All Illustrating Photos: Clearly show the light shining brightly on the installer.

[Fred]

When I was a kid, I always wanted to work in a job that uses those cool block things Spock and Capt. Kirk put into the computer. Many, many years later, that is just what I'm doing.

[ryan]

i wish i knew of all the different types of jobs out there from age thirteen and on. i probably wouldn't be in IT.

[mark]

Scott, we all know you are adept in the art of hypnosis and subliminal suggestion. Tying up the outrageously obvious advert in the form a blog post was not unexpected, however I thought your leading question wondering which of the list of wonderful possible uses people had used their Dilbert light diffuser was very amateur.

What I would like to know is whether you find yourself doing this kind of thing now without even thinking about it or whether it is all planned. I suspect you do very little which is not thought out ahead of time.

In any case, I think the product is very cool. Judging by the fact the www.skyscapes.biz has been inundated, so does everybody else.

[Davesnothere]

Funny you should mention that.
My current job is part of a multinational firefighting force using trained dolphins as firefighters in Iraq.

Dave

[Spud]

When I was growing up I dreamed of creating a blog where I could come up with awesome introductions to product plugs! Scott, you are living my dream! My cubicle farm would never let me put one of these up, but I may have to get one for the home office.

[Harry Bols]

I wanted to be an archeologist...discovering lost cities, looting ancient temples and digging for buried treasures (the shiny and glittering stuff for me, them old shards of clay for the scholarly guys. Finders keepers, thank you very much!). The whole whip and feodora thing, but without spiders.

When I grew older i learned that archeology was about dead languages and lots of pottery, so i went (it was more of a slow stroll) into the exciting world of office work.

Whip and feodora now have to wait till weekend and only if my wife is in a good mood.

[Andy Watt]

This is interesting if you open the question up a bit. Fairly recently a member of our royal family mentioned that it was cruel to tell people (i.e. your average sheep / moron) that they could do anything, as ultimately not everybody can do everything - it's just setting people up for disappointment.

In addition, recently in the UK a lot of kids have been going for "soft" subjects rather than "hard" science: net result, we've been seeing a decline in the number of kids coming through to universities doing some of the materials sciences (chemsitry, physics) and further education establishments have actually been shutting these departments down in places where they thought the money could be better spent.

I think people are getting the impression they can do what they want now: OK, we don't have to spend 30 years down a coalmine, but who's going to do the shit jobs?

[Alucard]

Good for you, Scott, you managed to bring their web server to its knees! They even added a little notice that "Due to the popularity of Dilbert, our servers are experiencing heavy traffic"...

Bet you never thought that you would be a cartoonist, expert blogger and marketing genius when you were growing up. Keep up the good work!

[Dianne]

I don't remember a time when I didn't want to write. I specifically wanted to be in advertising and write radio jingles (the words). In my teens, I wanted to be an author. I decided it was the perfect career because you can work how and when you want and you can make lots of money.

I spent about 8 years in advertising (copywriter) and loved it, I became an editor of a magazine and loved it even more, then moved into corporate communication (loved the work, hated the politics) and finally web development (the most fun you can have with your clothes on!) I plan to be an author still.

Words are amazing things and I still love playing with them after 40 years: I take on the clients I want and I make good money. I may have changed "career" several times, but only to keep up with advancements in the world of the "wordsmith".

Realising what you love to do early on in life makes life very simple. I have friends nearing retirement who not only have never loved what they do, they can't even work out what they COULD love to do. It's sad.

[Angelic@]

I wanted to be a vet.
I am not a copywriter.
I will soon take some courses on how to become a hairdresser.

I'll prolly end up a serial killer.

[Oli]

I went for an MRI scan a month or so ago, they had one of these on the ceiling and it was actually pretty cool.

They could do with some kind of animation though, like the clouds moving across teh ceiling or something.

http://ramblingsofanofficeworker.blogspot.com

[Bum Bum Jones]

I actually knew what i wanted to do with the rest of my life when i was 5 years old. I'm a musician/composer, BUT what i will say is..........I have made money working with audio waves and editing audio (sound designer). I didn't even know that job existed. Also, i have worked on some sets for music videos and films. There are so many jobs with titles that i have never heard of before.

[Bum Bum Jones]

I actually knew what i wanted to do with the rest of my life when i was 5 years old. I'm a musician/composer, BUT what i will say is..........I have made money working with audio waves and editing audio (sound designer). I didn't even know that job existed. Also, i have worked on some sets for music videos and films. There are so many jobs with titles that i have never heard of before.

[Maurice Condie]

It's not just jobs you didn't think off when you were young.
When I was small I never thought I would work with homeless people.
What is more I never thought that it would lead me to have such strange marketing ideas.
My latest springs from the fact that there are, very sadly, a small but significant number of murders and extremely violent incidents that occur in hostels and supported housing schemes for clients sometimes described as the “Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know”.
Inevitably, in this country because we don't go around shooting each other (often), these incidents involve “stabbing” usually with kitchen knives. Please note I say stabbing, not slashing. I am sure that slashing occurs but the killing is generally through stabbing.
We also have a culture of extreme health and safety regulation hear in the UK.
So if one were to design and patent a range of kitchen knives that could not stab, then the health and safety people would insist that all hostels used them because they are the safest option. Indeed employers could be sued if, through their failure to get pointless knives they placed their staff in avoidable danger.
This train of thought progresses fine until you invent the marketing strap line, “pointless knives for pointless lives” and suddenly you either fall about laughing or feel guilty and decide not to head off to the patent office.

[kris]

timmy probably didn't know what's a virgin when he was 5 :P

i realised that i'd write code for a living when i was 12. my current job doesn't involve writing code, but that's just a technicality :D

ps: thanks for the full feeds. your blog's perfect again!

[Ian Alston]

I was born in 78, in 86 at a dinner party held by (non-engineer (industrial chemist doesn't count)) father, I was asked what I wanted to be when I grew up. I stopped, thought a bit, looked the gent in the eye and said 'I want to be an electrical engineer'. I had NO idea what I was saying

Now I'm sitting at my desk at home redesigning the controls for a treatment works...

If there's no such thing as free will then I guess this was the moment when the irrational side of my brain lost the battle and the rational opened the gates to fate.

For mine, I reckon Diana W is on the money, it doesn't matter two bits what you learn, so long as you keep learning...

I think I got off topic there....

[chocmoon]

I think kids today may be more aware of all the career choices.

I sometimes wonder how differently I would have done things if the Internet were around when I was growing up.

[Nathan]

I predict the Wally Sky thingy will sell more than any of the others. Just a hunch.

[Dave Oblad]

I wanted to be a Rocket Jockey or perhaps a Wizard when grown up.
Wasn't too many job listings for Wizard or Rocket Jockey though.
So I changed my list to things I wanted to do someday, instead.
I've done almost everything on my list finally.

Becoming an Engineer satisfied my desire for becoming a Wizard
and I hoped might someday open the door for Rocket Jockey. If I
could just invent something that needed to be put in space and
if that something broke down, they would have to send me into
space to repair it. Well, I invented lots of things but none of
them ever belonged in space.. Rats..

So my greatest hope now is to get rich and buy a friggin ticket
on a spaceship trip, when it becomes available to the public.
Once I mark that off my list, I can die a happy camper.

Many careers I didn't want was more obvious. Top of that list
was "Cop". Then the Army Draft made me into an MP. Again Rats...
But at least I didn't make a career out of it!

Interesting and funny Blog Scott. Best wishes from Dave :^)

[Ken]

Sneaky b@stard, way to market dilbert crap under the guise of a blog post!

[Dick]

The flaw in your logic assumes people want to grow up. Career advice and selection should take this into consideration, for those of us that do not include growing up as one of our goals.

[D. Mented]

I knew what I wanted to be from when I was 11.
That didn't work out.
Retrained for electronic tech. It was good until some bastard invented the test bed and put 90% of us out of work overnight.
I took a lot of "day jobs" while trying to figure out what I could live with that would make decent money. The last of these was a factory that sucked completely except for its college reimbursement program, which was a fantasy; full tuition reimbursement for any curriculum as long as you were getting As, Bs, or Cs. Did not have to be in a job related field.
I stayed at that shithole for seven years while I tried to figure out what I should do now that I had grown up and admitted that my dream would not support me.
Gave up and joined a construction trade union.
I've made it through the apprenticeship, got some expirience, I like the work, love the work atmosphere (what can I say - I have a crude sense of humor) but I no longer have the endurance... and I've got twenty years to go 'till I can retire.
I'm afraid I have to retrain again.
I even know what I want to do this time; pharmacist. It came to me in a mailer for a sucky online college, but the idea stuck.
I just don't know if I can manage it financially now that I've finally figured out what I can do to get through the rest of my life.
Anybody know a good grants program for middle aged women retraining for health purposes?
D. Mented

[BTTFVGO]

Oh, wow, I have GOT to get one of each of those, for some bizarre collectors purpose.

[nsf]

In an article I read a long time ago, and which I've been trying to track down for almost as long, it was asserted that there are really only 12 or 13 essential story elements in literature (that is, only ca. 13 irreducible representations which, in widely varied linear combination, give rise to all stories ever written).

Given how often we find strangers on the street to be familiar in appearance, I've assumed that the same is true of facial features - 5 foreheads x 5 eyebrows x 5 eye types etc. gives rise to the wonderful aparent diversity of human facial feature.

I suspect the same is true of job descriptions. There really aren't a million unique jobs out there (except in the literal I-work-at-111-Jones St.-on-Monday-from-2-until-4 sense). Probably only a half-dozen job parameters which give rise to seemingly wondrous diversity. (This is the point where my wife would ask, "Who the f*** talks like that?")

[TotalBlammBlamm]

When I was a little girl I wanted to be entertainment. A rock star, primarily, but I think really anything would have been fine... a singer, dancer, commedianne, anything. I wanted to go to school for fine arts (I am actually relatively talented and so could back up the dream, so to speak) but my mother convinced me to get an education in business 'to have something to fall back on' in case my show biz career didn't work out so well.

*sigh* Just remembered something new to tell my therapist. Thanks, Scott.

[Frank]

I've done many things well over my life time. Capt. USMC, stock broker at Merrill Lynch, printing business owner, insurance agent with my own agency. I'm 57 this year and still don't know what I want to do when I grow up. I think I'll just retire and go fishing and play golf.

[Ian Gray]

First comment - by Mike Ford - No body knows what engineers do - so true. I was one of the "lucky" ones. I went to my career advisor at high school in New Zealand at the begining of the year that we sat our first external exams (I was about 15). We sat down for about 3 hours and went over all kinds of things and I walked out of his office saying "I want to be an Electrical Engineer" and here i am, 20 years later, still going strong.

His name is Dave Dorset, I don't know if he is still allive or dead.

Post Uni, the conversation stopper at parties was "So what do you do for a living" I went though my early years not being understood - the "Engineers are train drivers" thing came up.
Now, I feel that I am part of the order of wise men that keep society ticking. Anonomously (typical engineer - can't spell!), keeping your power grid going - while - in todays market, making squillions!!!!

[Josie]

I wanted to be a tiger trainer when I was little. I still kinda do.

[Jan]

Dang. Please delete my previous comment, the study is old.

[Jan]

Aspartame researcher?

Here's good news for diet-coke guzzling cartoonists:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/265559_soda05.html

[mr_poopyhead]

light diffusers with designs... that's the best idea i've ever seen in my life! and your dilbert designs are really taking off... this a message i saw on the website:

"PLEASE NOTE: WITH THE POPULARITY OF DILBERT® OUR SERVERS ARE EXPERIENCING HIGH TRAFFIC. IF YOU ARE UNABLE TO VIEW OUR SHOPPING CART PLEASE TRY AGAIN SHORTLY. YOU CAN ALSO ORDER BY CALLING 800.323.4415 9:00 - 5:00 EST"

way to overload their servers!

[Randy]

I just looked at www.skyscapes.biz web page. What a cool idea, Dilbert light diffusors I am need some of those in my office.

[Andrew Denny]

When I was 11-14, I wanted to be an 'Analytical Chemist'. I didn't really know what it was, it just sounded cool. I thought it meant I would know the things my school chemistry teacher didn't know.

Then I made the mistake of telling my peer group, newly awakened with male hormones, and they thought the 'Anal' part at the front really belonged at the back, if you get my drift.

I lost interest in chemistry very quickly, and decided I'd stay a virgin, thank you very much.

[OlsonBW]

I graduated from high school in 1979. I went to a half year of a Lutheran college. It wasn't for me. I went to a Vocational Tech school trying to get a job as a machinist. The class had a 2.5 year waiting list. I asked what else they had (after putting my name on the list) and I narrowed it down to taking "computer programming" because I needed something to do while I waited for the other class to open up.
It's 2008 now and I've been a computer geek/nerd ever since.
As far as anyone helping me think of a career and doing things to work towards that...? My parents and our school counselor were of no help.
As for teachers, they told me I was a lot smarter than what my grades showed. Why weren't my grades better? "Because I'm extremely bored." I told them. Oh, was their response and they ignored me after that.
I'm just extremely lucky I fell into computer programming. I don't actually do that anymore but I'm still in the tech industry as a computer analyst.

[Schmendrick The Magician]

When I was a kid, I wanted to be a ninja. Then, when I was a teenager, I decided to be a technical writer. Now I'm a male stripper!

[WrapAroundSam]

You are a master seller Scott. If there's no story there, make one up so you can push a product related to your characters. No criticism intended. The when I was a kid approach to this is truly ingenious. I'm just in awe of the master...

[phaser]

I'm 42 and still not sure what I want to be when I grow up.. And I'm an engineer... I have a pretty good job now, but is it the one I want to retire from, so that when I am a crotchety old man I can say, "You know, back when I was designing things that no one cares about..."? Or do I want to be able to look back and say, "You know, back when I put the first chimpanzee/dolphin hybrid clone on the moon..."?

[Bob]

The 'dead link' error has been corrected on skyscapes.biz. The evil corporate computer god's must have been at work again. Check them out they are really cool!

[bcammack]

You know, what is odd to me is I never imagined any career for myself. I didn't even have anything in mind when I graduated high school. I was fortunate that the mini/micro computer boom was just gathering momentum then. I fell into that, discovered an aptitude for it, and have been in the field ever since.

[RPK]

The two most popular careers that I recall from my early childhood were Cowboy and Astronaut. How many people actually make a living in those careers today?

If we all grew up to be what we wanted as kids, there would be literally millions of (unemployed) cowboys and astronauts and no janitors or garbagemen.

[Jeff]

Ha! I AM a videographer and I DID figure out that I liked it when I was 11. I started making movies with my mom's video camera and thought "This is kind of fun." I'm one of the few people I know who ended up doing what they wanted to from when they were 11 years old. I guess it's all because I could imagine more than just fireman and test pilot.

[Eric M]

Wow, just another way for you to push product.

hey, remember when you were a kid? Now buy my stuff.....

[CLB]

Wow. Pretty cool. Though I’m not sure about looking UP at the ocean one. Not if you’re already drowning in work ;)

When I was a kid my parents had a “School Years” book where they kept my report cards and such. There was a checklist for each year of “When I grow up I want to be-”

Boys: fireman, policeman, cowboy, astronaut, soldier, baseball player
Girls: mother, nurse, school teacher, airline hostess, model and secretary.

While looking for something for my own kids school records I found that these books are still available today. The only difference is they’ve taken out the headlines of “boys” and “girls” so that it is one list. The job choices are still exactly the same (www. harrietcarter.com – “school years notebook”).

[Adam]

I record phone calls in a call center for a living. While I never thought about it when I was younger, it's a fantastic job. No one really bugs me, I get my own closed-door office (since I'm working with "sensitive and confidential information")...overall, quite laid back.

[Thomas Beck]

Many years ago, the National Lampoon ran a 2-page cartoon depicting the world if everyone grew up to be what they wanted to be as a kid. It was a city street scene, entirely filled with nothing but doctors, nurses, firemen, cowboys, ballerinas, astronauts, and cops. Sort of the opposite of your post, but somehow related.

[Angela]

I took those 'find your ideal career" tests in junior and senior high school. They all came back as interior designer or hairdresser.

I'm a web publisher - a job that didn't even exist in the '80's!

[rockbert]

Antoine Laconte: I'm a gigolo.
Deuce Bigalow: Giga-who?
Antoine Laconte: Women pay me to give them... pleasure.
Deuce Bigalow: How did you get that job?
Antoine Laconte: I just sort of fell into it.
Deuce Bigalow: I'm gonna kill my guidance counselor!

[niCk(MemBeth)]

Shameless self-promotion. BOOOOO! BOOOOO!

[Jean]

At five I told my dad and mom I wanted to be a priest because they work only on Sunday. Later on I started reading comics and I wanted to become one of those weird inventors with their house full of strange inventions. (The closest image is Doc Brown in Back to the Future). That aimed me at engineering. But then I started Super-8 moviemaking and wanted to be a filmmaker. Since my dad said no to that, I finally became an engineer working in a big flat organization and I spend my leasure time doing strange inventions in my basement, mostly related to the video-movie technology. So it all fits together but the priest. I have no interest in religion.

[Fair Witness]

It's Skyscapes, not Skyscrapes. Gee, I think I'll be a blog editor......

[rita mae]

TECHY and I both picked out the same line. [Timmy would die a virgin.] Great minds think alike, huh? Still smiling.

Rita Mae

PS I have a son named Timothy. I still call him Timmy. He lives in Huntington Beach, CA with his wife and two kids. He has a Master's Degree and is an art professor in California. He lets me call him Timmy, but I don't think he is crazy about it.

Timmy would die a virgin. BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

[Crimson_Sky]

Those things are awesome! What a good idea. Would love to see how they look working. Actually, living in an apartment, those things would be awesome on my ceiling if I had the option. ;)

You had 50 job choices? I think I was at like 25. Rofl.

[Craig]

Am I the only one that wishes the Dilbert light diffusers didn't have the vertigo-inducing spiral or have the characters look like they were about to fall right on top of me?

I would rather see something resembling a single panel of a strip. Or, perhaps an image where one could create their own caption.

[mtj]

When I was a kid I wanted to work on a cruise ship (The Loveboat was a huge influence). I loved to color and draw, so when I was in high school I decided to become a graphic artist. I was amazed to learn you could draw and actually get PAID for it. Now I am a professional graphic artist and it is the furthest thing from "drawing and coloring" I could ever have imagined. Most of the time I am just a monkey doing exactly what the boss says to do. "I like this typeface better. I hate that color. Can we fill up the entire page with blabber?"

Oh well. Too late to start over now.

[Ryan W]

Well, it looks like the server went down from exceeding bandwidth while I was looking through the designs.

Your blog breaks the internet!

(cool idea though!)

[RyanRapp]

Way to whore your art out to a cheesy lightmaker. Do you jack off to pictures of Thomas Edison?

btw, jk.

[Sibs]

Thanks to spending most of my childhood TV time with PBS documentaries, I was exposed to more career choices than most children, and the one I settled on was Mahout. You're
not really supposed to know what it is. Most of the adults who asked the four year old that I was didn't either. They left very confused. A Mahout is an elephant trainer, sometimes for circus performances, often for labor, and is a profession that essentially exists only in India, which is about the last place on earth where this exchange will take place.

"My, there are a lot of logs to move here."
"It's okay. I know a guy with an elephant."

In the end, I'm not a mahout. There was a long period wherein my mother convinced me I wanted to be a doctor. Fortunately I determined a distaste for preserving human life before it would have become a problem, and am now in training to be an ecologist. May not be my original plan, but about as close as one can get without knowing a guy in New Deli.

The moral of this story? Apparently it's that educational television puts children on interesting career paths. Either that or mahout is a fun word to say. Try it!

[tajna]

lol, Scott, nice add - but anyway, i'm tempted

and, ironically, since 6 years old, i wanted to be a microbiologist and to study prostist (after a large beautiful white one grew on a boiled potato while we were on holiday for a month). even read books on the subject and learned latin.

ended up with a profession as trivial as a lawyer.

[ND]

"Timmy would die a virgin."

I can't recall the last time that a five-word sentence sent me into such prolonged convulsions of laughter. That's why you're the man, Scott!

When I was a kid and people asked me what I wanted to do when I grew up, I used to say "I want a house with a corner store attached." How's that for thinking outside of the box?

Now I have an office that sort of doubles as a coffee shop in that I collect a quarter per cup from the office coffee drinkers and use the fund to replenish coffee supplies because my employer is too cheap to provide free coffee. Sometimes we have to tweak our dreams a bit, it seems.

[Sean]

you're definitely getting more and more subtle in advertising your stuff... !

[Paul McGuire]

Why do I feel like I have just been subjected to a subliminal advertising campaign loosely desguised as a story about Timmy?

[Jonesenstein]

I was just talking to my wife this morning about how different all of our lives have become since we were little.
I think I’m the only one I know who is actually doing what I wanted to do for a living.
One brother designs tools for new airplanes (I guess because a regular wrench won’t do the job), another is homeless, my cousins are working in a mall (all together. In the same store), one of my wife’s sisters is a data input specialist in a law library, the other receives calls about underpayment of mortgages, my friend sorts mail, and another friend does dispatch at a police station…
None of those are popular answers to “what do you want to be when you grow up?”
I wonder: if kids knew that crap jobs are abundant and good jobs have to be earned, would they try harder to go to college?

[dan]

The problem with the really cool jobs, like dolphin trainer, is there is a very limited number of them and even with out promotion they are hard to get. Astronaut is another example. If they are not inherently limited by something like supply of dolphins, the job would not pay well, cause everybody wants to do it, especially if it were well known.

[T.G.]

Philotainment Doctor

[disembodied consciousness]

When I was 5, all the careers I knew of were on TV; astronaut, fireman, cowboy, cop, doctor, airplane pilot, starship captain.

I didn't know what I wanted to be when I grew up when I went to college. Some loopy adult (parent probably) told me that's what college was for. A lot of work just to find out how many different jobs there are where you sit at a desk and type into a computer.

Lots of people don't know what they're going to be when they grow up when they're 35! They have what they think is a career as, say, a draftsman or a telephone operator, and then some idiot with a computer comes along and now there's no more draftsmen. They have to retread as a network administrator. If you're extremely special, you might get to do this 2 or 3 times before you retire.

And that's just in stable places. You can also go from doctor or lawyer to farm laborer, smuggler, or sex toy when some yahoo takes over your country and rolls out their unique notion of law.

Actually, starship captain sounds pretty good. I wonder if I have enough stamina for all the sex?

[jakesdad]

it has donned on me before that I have spent all but two years of my adult working life in industries that didn't exist when I graduated high school: wireless (then called cellular) from 91-99 and a dot-com for the last eight.

if you had told me on the day of my graduation (spring 87) that I was going to work for a "cellular carrier" for eight years then be the DBA for a "website" for eight I'd have thought you needed medication.

it worked out pretty well, though, and as Joe Walsh would say: I can't complain but sometimes I still do/life's been good to me so far...

[latsot]

Oddly, I ended up doing more or less what I wanted, which is sitting in a dark room thinking. The surprise sting in the tail is that I'm not unemployed. I work for a university, which is nearly as good.

The probably less surprising part is that I had to make a lot of very bad decisions to end up doing what I wanted.

[rgosal]

Nothing to add on today's subject, but just thought I'd drop in and say the new widget works awesome. Added it into facebook and I personally think its the best thing since sliced bread.

Keep up the good work, oh and yeah; still want more animated Dilbert cartoons. Just finished rewatching the entire box set again for the 30th time, can't get enough of it.

[Diana W]

I mentored a class as part of a junior achievement program several years ago and there were at least 2 or 3 future dolphin trainers in the group. Vacations to Sea World get kids all hyped on the idea, so don't worry - no dolphin will go untrained.

As for the Skyscapes, I think it would be most fun to sneak one into the bosses office one night - maybe Alice with her fist of death.

[Richard Lainhart]

When I was in college, I studied music with a little computer science on the side. Computer science then was mainly writing BASIC code on terminals, which would be punched into cards that guys in white coats would feed into the mainframe.

Now, I provide tech support at a company that produces training for digital media software, which job consists mainly of keeping the digital video editing systems running. Occasionally, I and others at my company are asked to speak at the local colleges' career days, usually to the digital media students. The teachers generally expect us to commend the students in their choices to concentrate on learning Apple Final Cut Pro or Adobe After Effects, but I generally disappoint them. I tell them that, based on my own career, it's a waste to concentrate on any particular skill set or software, because the job I do now didn't exist 30 years ago and there's nothing specific I could have studied back then that would help me now. I tell that that I think it's better to learn general skills and logical thinking, and pick up the specifics along the way.

[Mekki]

This is already being attempted in some school boards.

When I was in grade 9, I was presented with a 3-inch thick book of possible career choices. There were tens of thousands listed. We were instructed to go through the book, pick out three of interest, and map out the educational and career requirements to attain that career of choice.

The net result was that the teacher essentially rejected any selection that wasn't one of the common 50. When I handed in my assignment, it had "Engineer" "Physisist" and "Barker". The teacher crossed off "Barker" and replaced it with "Banker", and took off marks because I hadn't "Checked my spelling".

When I pointed out to her that "Barker" was in fact a legitimate career - a person who removes the bark from trees that are being processed before they ship to a paper-making plant - and that I had legitimately chosen this one as a light-weight alternative to the other 2 science/math heavy careers, she retorted in a condescending tone that "You don't actually WANT to do that. You're just trying to be difficult." No amount of explaining that I would be perfectly content with a simple, stress-free life would satisfy her. I was left with the lowest mark in the class.

Often it's not that we aren't presented with the choices, it's that we're really not given the choices by those who guide us. We're shoved into stereotypes and societal roles and deviation from that path is met with fierce resistance and cries of social deviance and maliciousness.

Incidentally, I'm now an engineer.

[twounicycles]

I am a pipeline engineer contractor, with a headache, in a cold office and I feel sick. Out of the window I can see the wall of a grey corrugated steel warehouse and nothing else. The plan is to move us to another office; an office with no windows. What I really need is one of them skyscapes things, that would really cheer the place up. Actually the work is okay, the problem is the office was built on an ancient druidical burial ground and the spirits of the human sacrifices are bringing the mood down.

[techy]

Timmy would die a virgin. Smack that right in the middle, out by itself and it made me chuckle outloud. Everybody looked. Now I'm red faced. teee heee

[Dave thA]

I did one of those computer career selection things at school many years ago - 100 or so questions - and the two top choices it gave me were Dolphin Trainer and Chartered Accountant.

Maybe I should have paid more attention to it.

[bubba]

My dentist also uses these. Seems like an excellent product for someone whose patients spend a lot of time staring at the lights.

[Kelly]

The last line of this entry tied the whole thing together and made it funny. Nicely done.

[Matt]

How well do you think the Wally Skyscape will sell? The description:

"Engineer and cynical employee who has no sense of company loyalty."

[HumbleOpinion]

Did you give up on getting ad revenue now? I see that you are posting full feeds through rss and there are no ads on your blog this morning.

[AmbrMerlinus]

I actually wanted to be a dolphin trainer when I grew up.

[MegaZone]

My dentist's office has covers like these on their ceiling lights. (Coincidentally I'll be there later this morning for my 6 month checkup...) They're kind of nice, especially when you're on your back in the chair staring at the ceiling.

[Katja]

You were so lucky! When I was a kid I only knew 4 jobs - teacher, doctor, accountant and electrician (last two only because I had parents...)
;-)

[Jim H.]

Wow! With a lot more effort, (approaching infinity), one might be able to compose a daily blog panel that actually had some internal meaning. Nah! It's too easy to just let the loggeria flow.

[Dave]

I am thinking you are going to make very little with this licensing deal. The "buy now" link on the skyscrape website is a dead link.
Dave

[rita mae]

Timmy would die a virgin. Great line! Instead of saying, Timmy is a nerd, you made me smile. You sure have a way with words. Some people have a way with words, and some people ummmmmmmmmm not have way, I guess. (stolen from Steve Martin.)

Rita Mae

[jerry w.]

One seldom hears of anyone training to be a "Fluffer" as a lifelong career choice,

But then again, when you describe it you'd have to say that it's a job that really "Sucks".

http://boskolives.wordpress.com/

[Mike Ford]

What I find odd is that no one knows what an engineer is except for children of engineers. All other children think an engineer is someone who drives trains. Sometimes I'm amazed the industry gets any new recruits at all.