I post online under my real name and it's not a common one, so will be cautious with this: Currently 28. When I was at school I wanted to be a mechanical engineer designing motorcycles, following an OU programme I saw about Aprilia, which looked epic and got me into motorcycles - prior to that it was all about cars for me. I went to Cambridge to study engineering, which to be honest was beyond me, so perhaps it's as well I didn't finish there. However I expect I could still get a job at Borgio Panigale without too much trouble. After a year there, a year off due to illness and a repeat of first year - which I failed - I left there. I'd spent a gap year working for an oil company and gave Geology a try. I graduated from Imperial with a good geology degree and went to work for a small consultancy company as a geologist. The final year of my degree was really intensive and I didn't have the time to do the lengthy mega-corporate application forms for the larger oil companies. I have done them since, but without success. However, recruiters in the geology sector all want people with 10 years experience or more - I have three. It might well be time to move on but there's nothing out there - and two large employers in SE England in the oil and gas sector have recently laid off a large number of staff. Having a settled life with my girlfriend in London I'm loathe to move - really don't want to go to Aberdeen and have done the expat thing in the Gulf before. I have a number of skills and have worked in a variety of jobs to pay my way through uni. I would like to stay working as a geologist but I would be open to a change of direction - I would like to do something I enjoy and find fulfilling...so who knows?
Really interesting the amount of people who wanted to be in uniform. I find that hugely surprising, but I can't really say why.
Glidd do not know uk but in Poland it is a good career line if you start early. Each year you work counts as 2 towards retirement so at age 36 you could go, retire have very good retirement package (in Polish standards) plus few ex police extras. Start your own business as no one can take your police retirement. Also high speed chases, guns and women love men in uniform obviously
Uniform = hierarchy. I'm not that good with hierarchy. I tend to say far too much of what I think and not what people want to hear. it doesn't do you any favours in an organisation, and even fewer favours in a very hierarchical organisation.
From about age 10 I wanted to work on aircraft and then as a teen joined the Air cadets and went into the RAF. I had 23 years of servicing/repairing and overhaul of many types of fixed and rotary wing aircraft and spend my last 5 years teaching the new recruits how to do the same.Loved the job and life but glad to be retired from it now. Now i get to see the family everyday and get bank holidays off. Now work as an engineer in the power industry.
I always wanted to be a pirate as a kid, still do if I`m honest. That`s the seafaring, swashbuckling, looting and pillaging kind of pirate. Not the gay, Harley riding douche bag kind :wink:.
I wanted to be a policeman, rock star, custom bike builder and god knows what else as a kid... ended up working at various levels in a restaurant for a few years, while studying and for a while after I graduated. Currently I work as a media technician at a university and as a freelance photographer and I'm pretty happy :smile: Currently looking to move more towards IT and carry on my photographic carrer on the side.... and I'm slowly putting together a cafe racer in my garage so maybe one day I'll become a custom bike builder after all :smile:
I took a degree in acting and performing arts I wanted to be on stage or on the TV........somewhere along the line I ended up being a sales manager for new homes and an amateur porn star for my other half!!!
I wanted to be a Motorcycle mechanic, did my work experience at Express Motorcycles in Preston which was owned by Don Padgett (Clive Padgetts brother). Ended up working there for a few years never went to collage just picked bits up as I went along. I now sell stuff to people I bumped in to Don Padgett at a BSB round not so long back which was nice after 20 years.
I wanted to be a lorry driver - aim low in order to succeed:wink: Still failed though. Started an engineering apprenticeship but hated it, so went painting and decorating with my dad and loved it. When my dad died I realised it was the company I enjoyed and not the job, so decided to change, and did all sorts of jobs before settling on air conditioning, something I reckon I'll stick out til I retire. Best job was as a 'stained glass artist', repairing church windows and making new designs. An unbelievably dirty and dangerous job, and terrible money (I supplemented my wages by nicking glass from the workshop and making terrariums at home to sell through local flower shops). The boss was a recovering junkie with some very dodgy friends, and he ended up in prison through tax evasion. But lots of my work was published and I am a celebrated artist in the glass trade!
I wanted to be a tall, dark, handsome, millionaire........ Ended up short, fat, ugly and skint!....... But happy!
Nice one Fig, didn`t realise stained glass artist was such a "dodgy" sounding job :wink: :biggrin:. When I came out the army I went to work with my Grandad at his little woodyard, loved it, making fence panels, sheds and stuff. The midnight runs to the docks for wood in his little old lorry, the trip back with the headlights pointing into the sky. When he retired he wanted me to take over but I found the same as you, it wasn`t the job I liked, it was working with my Grandad. Working for him was the best, I still miss the fun times we had :smile:.
We built the biggest sandblasting cabinet in Europe at the time, and I spent days at a time in there sandblasting stock sheets (patterned glass in batches), which was just plain filthy, and leading glass is also a very dirty job. But the danger came from mixing and dipping various acids for etching (I ended up in hospital three times with acid burns) and just the act of moving the glass around (up to 3 metre square sheets) was a bit perilous at times. Right up to the war era of last century the average age of a stained glass worker was very low, as low as mid-thirties, so breathing apparatus was a must at all times.
More dangerous was the three years I spent working for Thames Water doing leak detection work. We worked nights walking the streets in the east end of London checking the water mains. I got attacked a dozen or more times, and had guns aimed at me twice. Some dime bar came at me with a bread knife outside Upton Park one night, but I had a crowbar with me and gave him a good battering. A few nights later a guy was stabbed to death with a bread knife in the same place...
Never a dull moment in your professional life, Fig! PS: loving the new (old) avatar. A great improvement!
