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Anyone else feel the constant urge to leave the field and become a plumber?

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Re: Anyone else feel the constant urge to leave the field and become a plumber?

#291

Post by spaetzleesser »

One way to fix this urge is to leave the field and work as a plumber, electrician or in factory. Unless you have enough money to do it as a hobby most people will quickly see that this is not as great as you may think. While in school I used to work in construction and factories in the summer months. I quickly realized that an engineer job is much nicer and paid way better.

But I have to admit that as a mechanical engineer now working in software I really miss touching the result of my work. Nothing better than designing something, building it and then being able to touch and see it.

Re: Anyone else feel the constant urge to leave the field and become a plumber?

#292

Post by lokalfarm »

grumple wrote: post #187
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Joint and back issues?

You get those from coding too. Sitting in a chair all day wrecks your neck and back, mouse and keyboard use causes carpal tunnel as well. Standing still instead of sitting causes other issues. You have to move around, not remain fixed. There's a balance somewhere between being a dev and being a plumber.

If your idea of physical abuse is carpal tunnel from using a mouse + keyboard, don't go into the trades. Seriously. Go to Home Depot, buy a stick of 1" copper pipe, a Ridgid (wheel) pipe cutter, and some sandpaper. Now go to your backyard, in the cold, kneel on some bricks/concrete, and spend 30 minutes cutting off little portions of the copper stick, and then clean the ends with sandpaper. For bonus points, consider reaming the insides too.

Now tell me how your wrists and hands are feeling. How about your knees? Imagine that everyday, plus an array of powertools such as impact drivers + drills, rotary hammers, sawzalls, band saws, and crimping tools that can weigh 20+ lbs.

That mouse & keyboard will start to look very, very comfortable.

Re: Anyone else feel the constant urge to leave the field and become a plumber?

#293

Post by sonofhans »

_bfhp wrote: post #175
nkozyra wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's something so insidiously, backhandedly condescending about tech workers pining for the simplicity of an honest day's job that drives me nuts. Yes, there are almost always jobs with less strenuous requirements on time, fewer requirements and late nights. But the average tech worker has a pretty good gig. And if they don't they can go down the street in 2022 and get one. Trades scratch a similar itch to develop…

I think it's a manifestation of the inherent feeling that many of us developers are doing something mostly useless compared to others. We know that the world could be different and we could be working jobs that are physically and/or mentally difficult but also fair and useful. Ursula K. Le Guin puts it thus, from her novel "This Dispossessed": "A child free from the guilt of ownership and the burden of economic compe…

Yes! I’m rereading this now. That book is an endless wellspring of reminders about what truly matters.

Re: Anyone else feel the constant urge to leave the field and become a plumber?

#294

Post by [deleted] »

sjg007 wrote: post #236
pessimizer wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like a lot of replies like this assume that everybody is an upper-middle class white kid who hasn't had to shovel shit before. I've had a lot of much worse jobs than being a mechanic; jobs where I looked up from what I was doing when the mechanic walked in with unbelievable jealousy. I'm counting the days until CoPilot suddenly turns a bunch of John Galts into Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists, but an additiona…

Honestly same for most doctors too. They are just human body mechanics.

[deleted]

Re: Anyone else feel the constant urge to leave the field and become a plumber?

#295

Post by fortran77 »

umvi wrote: post #7

I actually think it would be fun to "retire" and go to trade school to become an electrician. Not forever, just long enough to learn the trade. I practically have an EE degree, but since I only ever worked with low voltage, mostly digital circuits I still have poor electrical intuition for things like residential AC. Realistically though, I think my secondary post-retirement career will end up being a teacher of some…

What do you mean by "practically have an EE degree?"

Re: Anyone else feel the constant urge to leave the field and become a plumber?

#296

Post by gfxgirl »

jedberg wrote: post #64

This last summer/fall really put things in perspective for me. We did a major outdoor renovation at our house, which involved landscapers, plumbers, electricians, and carpenters. Every day these guys would show up at 8am and long sleeves and jeans and hard hats, work super hard, pee in a port-a-potty, and be exhausted by the end of the day. They worked out in the 100 degree heat as well as the rain as the job got nea…

OTOH I have a friend who switched from programming to air conditioner repair and is much much happier. they say the number one reason is when they stop for the day the job is over. They don't have their brain running over how they're going to solve/continue/finish the current task at their job

Re: Anyone else feel the constant urge to leave the field and become a plumber?

#297

Post by mbgerring »

For me it’s becoming an electrician, and I actually do a great deal of recreational construction work and enjoy it. But the licensing requirements are insane, and that ultimately is what keeps me writing software.

Although I think that for a lot of people who feel this impulse, the problem might not be the type of work — it might be that the software you’re working on doesn’t do any real good for the world, or have any impact that you can see.

You can change that without having to switch fields — just don’t go to work in ad tech.

Re: Anyone else feel the constant urge to leave the field and become a plumber?

#298

Post by artemonster »

civilized wrote: post #261
artemonster wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I personally dont require that consistency, I was merely asking WHY there is a difference in treatment of the same method (making generalized statements about group behaviour) when applied to different qualifiers. And yes, just as you've said, maintaining that consistency does imply that you suddenly can't use any statistics at all. Point taken on "prosecutor attitude", sorry about that. riding "moral high horse" got…

It sounds like you don't believe what you just said you did? I'm genuinely asking what you believe, as opposed to what you assert for the sake of argument. For me, it's not an easy topic but I would say when negative generalizations escalate to exclusion and dehumanization, that's probably where to draw the line. I know some people with Audis and I don't think worse of them or anything like that. It's just a funny th…

Thank you for the insight on where you draw the line, that explains a lot. Still, a hard terrain to navigate on when you can say something and when you can't, even if you make correct statements backed up by data. Just to be clear we're on the same page: I've made absolutely same observation about other bmw drivers. and we, humans, do exactly that: observe and generalize.

Regarding my personal beliefs, as I've stated above "I personally believe in statistics and I believe you cannot use* them to make derogatory* generalizations"

1. regarding "use": you cannot use specifically statistics/data to justify any *-ist remark. "I hate bmw drivers because most of them are assholes on the road", an example of that (not what you said!)

2. regarding "derogatory": you can(and should!) use statistics to do (just) generalizations, i.e. in a context of talking about group behaviour. "most of bmw drivers are agressive and dangerous drivers, as shown by this data" is a perfectly fine statement.

My problem is that you can say that sort of statements about certain group of drivers, but if you would have pulled up a similar argument and used (for example) PoC and crime rates, you would have been torn to pieces by everyone. And for me, on the surface, the statement and the structure would be absolutely the same (and it is STILL not escalated to exclusion and dehumanization). So whats the difference? And why different treatment? People above are arguing that buying BMW its a choice and using inherent (immutable) properties (i.e. race/gender) is different for the case of stereotyping, but I cannot see the key difference that makes okay to do one and not okay to do another.

Re: Anyone else feel the constant urge to leave the field and become a plumber?

#299

Post by ctvo »

nkozyra wrote: post #166
jedberg wrote: post #64

This last summer/fall really put things in perspective for me. We did a major outdoor renovation at our house, which involved landscapers, plumbers, electricians, and carpenters. Every day these guys would show up at 8am and long sleeves and jeans and hard hats, work super hard, pee in a port-a-potty, and be exhausted by the end of the day. They worked out in the 100 degree heat as well as the rain as the job got nea…

There's something so insidiously, backhandedly condescending about tech workers pining for the simplicity of an honest day's job that drives me nuts. Yes, there are almost always jobs with less strenuous requirements on time, fewer requirements and late nights. But the average tech worker has a pretty good gig. And if they don't they can go down the street in 2022 and get one. Trades scratch a similar itch to develop…

> There's something so insidiously, backhandedly condescending about tech workers pining for the simplicity of an honest day's job that drives me nuts.

Agreed. SO recently left a career in academia to get a job in tech as an entry level software developer. Says this is the easiest job they've ever had in their life, and wondered why they didn't start sooner.

Developers have no idea how difficult even other white collar jobs are, let alone blue collar work that involves physical labor and the outdoors.

Re: Anyone else feel the constant urge to leave the field and become a plumber?

#300

Post by ant12345 »

I did it. Not being a Plummer. I changed from being a programmer to working in sustainable mobility (railways). Did an MBA in the field, got a job at one of the largest companies in the field, supposedly with a fast track into decision roles. This is my outcome:

* I now work more hours than I did as a programmer

* I have to deal with a lot more bullshit, politics and doing annoying tasks

* In total I lost about 5 years of career, due to education and starting at a lower level in a different field (in North America this may not be so bad, in Europe they have difficulty counting years of experience in other fields)

* I lost 2 years of pay (education), then started work at half what my cs peers make. Since programming pay increased a lot, but mine didn't, I'm now at a third.

* Instead of a (internally) well respected expert feeling near the top of my particular field, I am sort of on the path of getting there

I did it because I didn't want to code for work anymore and actually shape the real world, but it's not exactly been an easy path. It should be considered well before doing it. Ymmv.

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