Who does what for a living?

[BJRSanDiego]

I always had summer jobs or part time jobs while I was going to college. In 1971 I graduated with a BS in physics from the University of Michigan. The job market was tight so over the next year I worked as dish washer in a hospital, sales clerk in an electronics store, road construction laborer, vacuum cleaner salesman (1 week), and a month of breaking up cardboard boxes at an Avon distribution center. Finally, I hired a placement agency and paid them $500 when they got me a job at 3M servicing copy machines.

Fortunately for me, 3M bought a desktop computer company in 1976 and I moved to Washington DC to service their Linolex computers. I was good at fixing them and I taught myself how to program them. In 1979, 3M offered me a job in St. Paul to provide support for other service techs. 3M paid me to go to grad school in computer science. Eventually I got into software product development and worked on a fax store and forward system, a primitive email system, a system for tracking library books, and Scotchprint, a system that used large format printers for printing truck and building size graphics. Besides developing software, I did archiving, QA, documentation, and supported customers, marketing, manufacturing, developers and technicians.

After 35 years at 3M, I retired at 58. For the past 15 years my only jobs have been pro bono babysitting, travel consulting, and providing PC support to friends and relatives. It's a job I wouldn't be able to do without TeamViewer, an excellent remote control program. In the summer, I spend much of my spare time biking on the large network of scenic trails in and around the Twin Cities.

Impressive resume, Art !

 

[T_R_Oglodyte]

High school: Delivered newspapers for the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. Called 'paperboy' in those days. T

Junior high school I was a paperboy as well. Delivered the Minneapolis Star in the afternoons, Mon-Sat. Then delivered the Minneapolis Tribune Sunday mornings. This was before the Star and Tribune merged news operations.

Never did figure out why the paperboys who delivered the Tribune Mon-Sat didn't deliver it on Sunday morning as well.

When the weather allowed, I would ride my bike with canvas paper bag slung over my forehead and down my bag instead of on my shoulder. Before doing the route, I would fold all of the newspapers into a roll with the ends tucked. Then as I went past the house I would just reach behind me for a folded paper and throw it on the porch.

It was a different time, when it was perfectly acceptable to cut across people front lawns if there wasn't a fence or a hedge. So when I could, I rode my bike across the lawn so I passed right by the front stoop, and I land the paper right in front of the the door.

In the wintertime, when people shoveled snow, they didn't only shovel the sidewalk leading out to the street. Most people would also shovel a pathway from the stoop of their house toward the house on either, just so people going from house to house could easily traverse. Those paths were used by mailmen, meter readers, paperboys, delivery people. It was part of being neighborly.

 

[PcflEZFlng]

Junior high school I was a paperboy as well. Delivered the Minneapolis Star in the afternoons, Mon-Sat. Then delivered the Minneapolis Tribune Sunday mornings. This was before the Star and Tribune merged news operations.

Never did figure out why the paperboys who delivered the Tribune Mon-Sat didn't deliver it on Sunday morning as well.

When the weather allowed, I would ride my bike with canvas paper bag slung over my forehead and down my bag instead of on my shoulder. Before doing the route, I would fold all of the newspapers into a roll with the ends tucked. Then as I went past the house I would just reach behind me for a folded paper and throw it on the porch.

It was a different time, when it was perfectly acceptable to cut across people front lawns if there wasn't a fence or a hedge. So when I could, I rode my bike across the lawn so I passed right by the front stoop, and I land the paper right in front of the the door.

In the wintertime, when people shoveled snow, they didn't only shovel the sidewalk leading out to the street. Most people would also shovel a pathway from the stoop of their house toward the house on either, just so people going from house to house could easily traverse. Those paths were used by mailmen, meter readers, paperboys, delivery people. It was part of being neighborly.

I completely understand and remember all of this. Residential yards were/are quite large in Minnesota, and the snow sticks around all winter long. And people were good neighbors, perhaps partly having to do with living in a hard climate. My time as a paperboy was also before the merge, i.e. I delivered the Star on Mon-Sat afternoons and the Tribune on Sunday.

 

[PcflEZFlng]

Residential yards were/are quite large in Minnesota, and the snow sticks around all winter long. And people were good neighbors, perhaps partly having to do with living in a hard climate.

And speaking of hard climate, Minnesota was and still is, despite climate change, the Nation's Icebox (see map of snow depth below). It's a week into April, and the rest of the country has already had spring for more than a month.

 

[BJRSanDiego]

And speaking of hard climate, Minnesota was and still is, despite climate change, the Nation's Icebox (see map of snow depth below). It's a week into April, and the rest of the country has already had spring for more than a month.

View attachment 75302

My brother (Prior Lake) says that he thinks that they are going to go from winter to summer later this week. Things are (finally) warming up.

 

[PcflEZFlng]

My brother (Prior Lake) says that he thinks that they are going to go from winter to summer later this week. Things are (finally) warming up.

It looks that way (I still follow their weather forecast online). My cousin and aunt in northern Minnesota still have two feet of snow on the ground! Not even a touch of green to be found anywhere.

 

[amycurl]

I was born in Minot, ND, and my mother's joke about living there was that there were two seasons: winter and the 4th of July. Here, we went from summer yesterday (85 and humid, with a late afternoon thunderstorm,) to mid-40s and raining all day. Go home, Mother Nature, you're drunk.

 

[billymach4]

I was born in Minot, ND, and my mother's joke about living there was that there were two seasons: winter and the 4th of July. Here, we went from summer yesterday (85 and humid, with a late afternoon thunderstorm,) to mid-40s and raining all day. Go home Mother Nature, you're drunk.

Were you an USAF Military Brat?
I always associate Minot, ND with the old USAF SAC base. Why not Minot?

 

[amycurl]

Yes, I was born on the military base. My mom was a RN, and my dad was a medic. The both rotated out when I was a few months old, and then spent a good chunk of my first year as a baby camping with a small travel trailer in national parks out west as they slowly wandered their way back east. My mom's dad died at the end of that year, and they were needed to help out my grandmother. There's a great movie of my grandfather holding me on the ferry crossing Lake Champlain, but I have no memory of him. He died in mother's arms as she was trying to give him CPR on Christmas Eve. I have no memory of Minot, either, beyond my mom's home movies. I have always wanted to take the Empire Builder and have a layover in Minot.

 

[BJRSanDiego]

It looks that way (I still follow their weather forecast online). My cousin and aunt in northern Minnesota still have two feet of snow on the ground! Not even a touch of green to be found anywhere.

Where in northern Mn? I used to have a big hunting/fishing/enjoying property up in Aitkin county.

 

[artringwald]

It looks that way (I still follow their weather forecast online). My cousin and aunt in northern Minnesota still have two feet of snow on the ground! Not even a touch of green to be found anywhere.

It doesn't look like spring in the Twin Cities yet, but with warm temperatures predicted next week, much of the snow will melt all at once and cause flooding.

BTW, I had to read the eEdition of the StarTribune because it's 9:15 AM and the paper hasn't been delivered yet.

 

[PcflEZFlng]

Where in northern Mn? I used to have a big hunting/fishing/enjoying property up in Aitkin county.

Near Grand Rapids.

 

[PcflEZFlng]

It doesn't look like spring in the Twin Cities yet, but with warm temperatures predicted next week, much of the snow will melt all at once and cause flooding.

I agree, it doesn't look good. I still remember 1965, the epic flood year. My last year there in 1971, it didn't even hit 50 degrees until March 31st, which finally melted the last of the snow - four inches of ugly crusty snow on the ground all during March. Ugh. Then a week later, it hit 60 degrees (felt glorious).

 

[PcflEZFlng]

I was born in Minot, ND, and my mother's joke about living there was that there were two seasons: winter and the 4th of July.

I once heard a friend say MN has two seasons, Winter and Winter's Coming.

Here, we went from summer yesterday (85 and humid, with a late afternoon thunderstorm,) to mid-40s and raining all day. Go home, Mother Nature, you're drunk.

This winter has been nothing to boast about here in so-called sunny California. We've had a firehose of cold rain for the past three months. Our last 80+ degree day was last year, and we've yet to see one! But the rain was sorely needed, and early spring is one of my favorite times of year here because the hills are such a lush green.

 

[artringwald]

I agree, it doesn't look good. I still remember 1965, the epic flood year. My last year there in 1971, it didn't even hit 50 degrees until March 31st, which finally melted the last of the snow - four inches of ugly crusty snow on the ground all during March. Ugh. Then a week later, it hit 60 degrees (felt glorious).

We still haven't hit 50, but we should today. Here's my favorite song about MN weather.

 

[nomadguy1]

I've truly been fortunate. At 11 years old, my grandfather started taking me with him to the courthouse and library when he researched the family genealogy. I'd retrieve books, microfilm canisters, etc. for him, then he'd explain what he was doing as he poured through them. The genealogy bug bit hard and I never stopped researching. Enjoying history and research, but having no idea what I wanted to do with my life after high school, I ended up spending 13 years earning 8 degrees up to and including a doctorate. Worked my way through high school mowing lawns, shoveling snow, painting houses, then working at the local K-mart. Worked my way through the first three degrees as a bank teller. Fourth degree was in secondary education, obtained my teaching certificate, and taught for a short time until my brother ended up on the wrong side of the law and I had to travel a few states away to bail him out. He worked in oil & gas, introduced me to his boss who asked if I had a laptop, showed me a desk, and told me the others would show me what we were working on. Sat there a minute before realizing he had hired me, went back to tell him I had a job and lived 700 miles away, reconsidered after he told me what my starting pay would be, then drove home to quit my job, pack up my apartment, and drive back four days later.

Continued my education while working in oil & gas, then was laid off at the end of 2009 as the industry came to a screeching halt, as did the entire economy. Substitute taught briefly before taking another job in oil & gas in the Appalachians. When I arrived, the team already in place was struggling to find any current mineral owners as the minerals had been reserved many decades, or in some cases over a century, before. I put my genealogical skills to use in locating the heirs of those reserving owners, created a very nice niche for myself, branched off with my own company two years later, and now a decade later have 18 forensic genealogists working for me. I get to spend my days doing what I love, researching genealogy. And because my work is remote, I've become what I've always wanted to be, a nomad. I work from resorts and hotels as I travel around wherever and whenever I want. I'm 41 years old and have built the ideal life for myself. I may be a long way from retirement, but if I can keep doing as I do, I don't need to retire.

 

[Patri]

We still haven't hit 50, but we should today. Here's my favorite song about MN weather.

Oh, I like that. I miss the lakes and prairies.

 

[artringwald]

Oh, I like that. I miss the lakes and prairies.

"Once or twice it's so damn nice, it feels like heaven to me." Today was one of those days, even though there's still snow on the ground and Ice on the lakes.

White Bear Lake:

 

[PcflEZFlng]

@artringwald The snow and ice are going to disappear fast, like you said. I just looked up the NWS forecast for Minneapolis. It's supposed to hit 81 on Wednesday. We don't have that yet in our forecast, so it looks like you guys'll beat us (San Diego) to the first 80-degree mark for this year!

 

[Superchief]

I have to admit that I've had a very interesting career, although a lot of it was totally unplanned, stressful at the time, and very challenging. I worked from an early age so I could buy what I wanted, and my first real money making job was playing in a local cover rock band in high school. I learned business and marketing because I was responsible for deciding what to play and when to play it. Although we weren't great musicians, we played what people wanted to hear and worked well together. We each made about $300 per weekend in the late 60's/early 70's. I played through high school and until my full time job required being at work at 7am. I went to college for 3 years and majored in changing majors. I was fortunate to get a full-time job at P&G as a lab technician in R&D. This is where I got my first exposure to Marketing and Marketing Research, so I completed my undergrad and MBA in those areas at night and the company paid for all of it.

I spent over 45 years working in marketing research, primarily with corporations although I worked a few years on the supplier side. I worked primarily in consumer products, but also spent several years in pharmaceutical, agriculture, and animal health (primarily companion animals). I always enjoyed problem solving, strategy, and understanding customers. Most of my work involved designing custom research and figuring out how to provide better products to our customers. My favorite research was working with agriculture and animal health professionals.

Unfortunately, working in corporate America involves several mergers, acquisitions, and 'retirement' opportunities. I went through 8 mergers and two 'retirements', and moved 14 times. I usually found another job quickly and it was exciting to learn a new business and work with new people. The work was always mentally stimulating and seldom boring. I worked with Nielsen, IRI, and several custom research suppliers so I may have worked with some of the TUG poster at some point. When I started my career, our focus was on providing better solutions to our customers and having better products than our competitors. I'm glad I worked in the industry when I did because now the focus of many companies is how do we trick people into buying our products or downsizing our packaging. Although I've been retired now for 3 years, I provide free consulting to some friends and hope to do some consulting work. I actually dream about recommending disaggregate discrete choice research to client to help them optimize their products. There was never a dull moment.

 

[moonstone]

When I was in first grade we had to draw a picture of what we wanted to be when we grew up. I drew a nurse. After high school I enrolled in the RN program at a local college, it was a 2 year college course back then. I got excellent marks (1st first year student at that college to ever get 100% in pharmacology, nursing theory and practical nursing) but they kicked me out at the end of the first year because I only had an 83% in biology! This was in the mid '70s in Ontario and there were too many nurses if you can believe it. The way to thin out the graduation rate was to raise the pass rates. My nursing teachers pleaded with the dean to let me do summer school or re-write the exam but rules were rules. I was really disappointed and vowed to start over again in Sept. Well life got in the way, I got a really good summer job as receptionist/switchboard operator, with an offer to stay on full time, at a travel wholesale company and met a great guy, who is now my DH. The travel company was great to work for as we got to go on some great trips to see if they should use a particular hotel. The company gave us our honeymoon (airfare, rental car and 7 nights in the company hotel in Sarasota) as a wedding gift. I became great friends with one of the employees and we remained friends until her death 4 years ago. Her DH got my DH a great job when he decided he didnt want to work in road construction for the rest of his life. More on that below.

I left the travel job when the company started having financial difficulties and advised all the staff that all our vacations were cancelled for that year. DH & I had a 3 week trip to England booked to visit his relatives, so I quit my job to go on vacation. Upon return I got a job with Bell Canada as a repair clerk, answering 611 calls. I applied for a job as an installer or outside repair person like my dad, but Bell said I was too short to safely get ladders on and off the trucks so they gave me an inside job. I still got to learn about repairs and I really enjoyed the job. I worked with many employees who knew and had known my dad for many years, and for a year worked in the same building as where Dad kept his Bell truck. After our 2nd child was born with some relatively minor problems I wanted to drop down to part-time as he needed a lot of medical appointments. Also while I was on Maternity leave with him, our mortgage came up for renewal and our payments dropped by about 75% so we really didnt need my salary. Bell refused, saying there was no part-time positions anywhere in that section of the company, so I resigned after working with them for 8 years.

The best job I had was being a stay-at-home mom to our 3 kids for 14 years. I was very involved in the school as well as their Scouts and Girl Guides groups. I ended up remaining a Scouts Canada volunteer for 20 years, well past when our boys aged out.

When the kids were all in school all day I got a part-time (seasonal) job at the ski hill where we live. I worked in the equipment rental department and signing in school groups. Its a small family run business and they allowed me to come in after the kids were safely on the school bus in the morning and leave in time to meet the bus in the afternoon. On snow days I could bring the kids with me and they could use rental ski equipment or hang out in the lodge with me. As they got older and could stay at home on their own for an hour or so, I could work later and our oldest son got quite good at starting dinner. One winter the snow came early in the fall and stayed late in the spring so I put in a lot of hours, enough to qualify for unemployment insurance when we were laid off in the spring. I didn't want/need the money but along with that came the acceptance into a re-training program our government had to get seasonal workers retrained as something they could do year round. I took all the aptitude tests as required and they all came back that I should go into nursing! The RN program was now a 4 year university degree, and the next step down, a RPN, was a 2 year program. I felt both were a little too long to jump back into school full time after being out for so many years. A newish job was a PSW (Personal Support Worker), like a nurses assistant. It was a 1 year college course and provided training to work in a nursing home with the elderly or disabled. I enrolled in the program at our local college that fall as our oldest entered high school. I really enjoyed going back to school even though I was about 20 years older than many of my classmates. I ended up graduating at the top of my class and received an award. I had 7 nursing homes and one home care agency approach me with job offers before I even graduated.

I chose a nursing home that was close to the high school our son was at and the other 2 kids would be going. I started out as part time on varying shifts but was offered full time after 2 years. I learned a lot that you cant get from textbooks and eventually was asked to train the new employees. After a few years I developed shoulder problems from lifting patients. The company had a mechanical lift on each floor (41 patients) but often when it was in use, 2 of us would "assist" a person to stand up and pivot them from their wheelchair to bed. When about a dozen of us developed shoulder &/or back problems, the Employment Insce (Workmen's Comp) ergonomist folks came in to see what the problem was. They ordered the company to purchase more lift machines and said any patient who could not stand up unaided needed to be a lift assist using one of the 2 types of machines. I was put on light duty (as were 5 others) but there was still plenty to do. I loved my job and worked there for 14 years until one day as I was walking down our stairs at home getting ready for work, my knee decided to bend sideways instead of back. I had a torn ACL and meniscus as well as strained other ligaments. I ended up having surgery and was off for 8 months. While I was off a new manager was brought in and revamped the whole staff compliment & their shifts. All of us on light duty were advised we were being laid off and the remaining full time staff had to apply for their positions and desired shift. Shifts were filled by lottery style drawing and not seniority, so a person that was full time nights could bump and take a full time day staff position. The union squashed that idea but couldn't do anything about the layoffs. The Ontario government snuck in a clause when changing the Workers Comp to Unemployment Insurance that if a worker was injured on the job, even it it was totally the employers fault, the employer was only obligated to keep them for 2 years on light duty. I took early retirement at 57 years of age which DH didn't mind as he had retired 5 months before.

DH had an interesting career. A good friend's DH was employed by the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation and mentioned to DH that they were starting a new lottery draw (Wintario) and needed another staff member who had a truck license as this draw was going to be broadcast live on TV each Thursday evening from a different town around Ontario. DH applied and got the job. The job was transporting all the draws machines and associated equipment, setting it all up and then running the machines. He was away from home for 1 to 3 nights each week depending on where the draw was, but the pay and benefits were great. If I had some days off I could go with him (until we had kids). He and the other guys eventually got their Class A (tractor trailer) license so they could not only take all the lottery machines but all the equipment needed for the television broadcast all around the province, instead of the tv station trucking their own equipment and billing the OLG for doing so. He stayed with the draws dept. until the corporation stopped televising the draws from different towns and then he transferred into sales. He took scratch lottery tickets to all the stores that sold them in his area, put up point of sale posters and trained the retailers on the draws and using the terminals. There were times we had well over $100K in lottery tickets in our basement! When the province allowed gaming and slot machines at harness racing tracks DH applied to work in the one near us. He worked there until he retired, 33 years after he started with the OLG. ETA: DH was also a volunteer firefighter in our community for over 27 years, many as a captain and trainer/facilitator, until he retired last fall.


~Diane

 

[BJRSanDiego]

@artringwald The snow and ice are going to disappear fast, like you said. I just looked up the NWS forecast for Minneapolis. It's supposed to hit 81 on Wednesday. We don't have that yet in our forecast, so it looks like you guys'll beat us (San Diego) to the first 80-degree mark for this year!

I'm going wine tasting up in Temecula on Monday - - it's supposed to hit 82. Escondido? No. I bit less.

 

[artringwald]

I'm going wine tasting up in Temecula on Monday - - it's supposed to hit 82. Escondido? No. I bit less.

Our forecast for Wednesday is 83! In less than 2 weeks we've gone from a blizzard with 8" of snow to 83. Crazy! I guess we don't get a spring this year.

 

[PcflEZFlng]

I'm going wine tasting up in Temecula on Monday - - it's supposed to hit 82. Escondido? No. I bit less.

NWS says it will be 77 here. Then another big cool-down into the 50s again, just like most of our winter has been.

 

[BJRSanDiego]

Our forecast for Wednesday is 83! In less than 2 weeks we've gone from a blizzard with 8" of snow to 83. Crazy! I guess we don't get a spring this year.

Yes, the weather has been crazy this year for Mn. and for southern Ca.