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Career Changes

CriticalCritical Registered User regular
edited July 2008 in Social Entropy++
I have been in the customer service industry since I graduated high school. For the past 8 years I have been either selling something, ordering something, or repairing something. And I have decided: fuck customers.

Recently I have been becoming more and more interested in EMS training. I have been interested in medical knowledge since I was a teenager, and it would be a way to get involved without years of medical school.

I guess it's still customer service, but if these customers bitch I can strap them to a board and poke them with sharp objects.

The local class is only $795 and about 5 months long, as well. So it might be worth a shot.

Anyone else making a major career change after years of grinding away in shit jobs? Are you currently in career training? Have you told any rude fucks to go piss up a flagpole lately?

tl;dr: If you're near Boston and get in a car crash I may be giving you life saving kisses within the next year.

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Critical on
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    OrikaeshigitaeOrikaeshigitae Registered User, ClubPA regular
    edited July 2008
    i'm starting to do graphic design after five years of customer service :D

    do the EMS if you're interested, i knew a guy who does that and he's the most satisfied person i know

    Orikaeshigitae on
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    MysstMysst King Monkey of Hedonism IslandRegistered User regular
    edited July 2008
    I just signed on doing internal tech support for a hospital instead of general internet tech support for retarded mid westerners.

    Double the pay, half the hassle!

    Mysst on
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    JavenJaven Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    It's incredibly stressful work. 24 hour shifts are absolutely balls.

    Javen on
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    TardTard Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    I decided to go into journalism after doing physics for two years and fast food for another two.

    Best choice of my life.

    I know a few people who drive ambulances. Their love for the job is only matched by complaints about the shitty hours.

    Tard on
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    CrackedLensCrackedLens Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    im wanting to get the hell out of tv news

    i either want to work for an independent production company

    or train to get on the local city fire department

    CrackedLens on
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    WeaverWeaver Who are you? What do you want?Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Yeah man go EMT and get a job with a fire department. You get excellent pay & benefits, and you get 2-4 days off at a time.

    Weaver on
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    OrikaeshigitaeOrikaeshigitae Registered User, ClubPA regular
    edited July 2008
    Tard wrote: »
    I decided to go into journalism after doing physics for two years and fast food for another two.

    Best choice of my life.

    how'd you make that switch?

    Orikaeshigitae on
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    CrackedLensCrackedLens Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    ha!!!

    those 2 posts back to back are pretty funny

    CrackedLens on
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    mcpmcp Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    5 months, $795? I would totally do that, and I like my job.

    Are classes at night so you can work during the day?

    mcp on
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    FandyienFandyien But Otto, what about us? Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    My uncle was an EMT, and it is a really psychologically trying job. He said it's really made him more callous about the things that happen to people, and all he ends up responding too are poor people who have overdosed on coke/crack/meth.

    Fandyien on
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    CriticalCritical Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Javen wrote: »
    It's incredibly stressful work. 24 hour shifts are absolutely balls.

    The pay sucks for EMT-Bs as well. $10/hr if you're lucky.

    But if I can bag a job with a company that handles 911 calls, It's mostly downtime. Some guys I know work a 24 hour shift and get 8 hours of sleep.

    The private companies that are basically shuttle services for the elderly too and from hospitals are the ones that are a bitch. Grunt work and no satisfaction at all.

    Critical on
    edesig.jpg
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    TardTard Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Orikaeshigitae wrote: »
    Tard wrote: »
    I decided to go into journalism after doing physics for two years and fast food for another two.

    Best choice of my life.

    how'd you make that switch?

    Ran out of money to finish a physics degree and got tired of fast food.

    Then I applied to a University paper, wrote there for a while as a volunteer. Made my way up to News Editor, which got me enough clippings to freelance in town.

    Soon be applying to journalism schools and national/international jobs. Whichever I swing into first is where I'm headed.

    Tard on
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    CriticalCritical Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    mcp wrote: »
    5 months, $795? I would totally do that, and I like my job.

    Are classes at night so you can work during the day?

    Pretty much, yeah. I work early morning, though, so classes at any time would suffice. This one offers 5-9PM M-W-F, and 9-noon on Sundays. Not too bad. And it includes CPR training and 36 hours of ride alongs where you're actually involved with patient diagnosis and such.

    Critical on
    edesig.jpg
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    HallowedFaithHallowedFaith Call me Cloud. Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Enlist in the U.S. Army.

    HallowedFaith on
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    WeaverWeaver Who are you? What do you want?Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Don't do it, it's a trap.

    Weaver on
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    MysstMysst King Monkey of Hedonism IslandRegistered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Go Navy, they have railguns.

    Mysst on
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    MooblyMoobly Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    I'm actually preparing to move OUT of the medical profession. I love my job, I simply don't like the hours. You have to keep in mind, as a medical professional weekends, holidays, and often just time off come secondary to patient care. It was worth it for quite a few years, but now it's time for something else. Thankfully long hours on shift, when we're not busy, often lead to time for school work.

    Moobly on
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    Riggs BlitzkriegRiggs Blitzkrieg Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Right out of High school I started to do IT/helpdesk work. I'm probably going to be doing this type of work for a long time

    Riggs Blitzkrieg on
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    CriticalCritical Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Weaver wrote: »
    Don't do it, it's a trap.

    Yeah, and considering I'm partially blind in one eye and would probably leak piss while firing any sort of firearm, I probably wouldn't be the best fit.

    Critical on
    edesig.jpg
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    JavenJaven Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    don't do lynn or lowell EMS. It's boring and most of the time you're just carting drunks around

    cambridge would probably be your best bet

    Javen on
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    CriticalCritical Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    There are some current postings for my hometown (Brockton) so they're probably always short staffed. And it would be "fun" around here, considering the gang violence and widespread high school drug problem.

    Apparently there was an A&E documentary about the drug problem here. I missed it, unfortunately.

    Critical on
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    ButtersButters A glass of some milks Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    My company is in the final stages of getting bought out. I am not entirely sure where the new masters are putting me but I and my boss are lobbying for near full-time software development.

    Butters on
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    HunterHunter Chemist with a heart of Au Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    My corporate masters have gutted the company and are trying to restructure, so I've moved from research and Design/Customer Technical Service in the glass industry to working in the Analytical Group. I specifically run trace elemental analysis on anything and everything our company makes or random shit that comes out fucked up from the people that buy our materials.

    I still get to dabble in glass work when projects come up.

    I'd like to start work as a pimp or maybe an assassin.

    Hunter on
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    MysstMysst King Monkey of Hedonism IslandRegistered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Hunter, does that mean you don't get yelled at by people who don't know their Kelvin anymore?

    Mysst on
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    CalliusCallius Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    HallowedFaith wrote: »
    Enlist in the U.S. Army.

    Callius on
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    HunterHunter Chemist with a heart of Au Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Today I'm getting swamped by a customer who wants me to convert %Transmission to Absorbance, correct for a thickness in Absorbance, and then convert back to a corrected %Transmission.

    So I went off to my old friend Beers-Lambert Law and found all the shit I need, set up a calculator in excel, and emailed it to them. BUT OH FUCKING NO! WE WANT YOU TO CONVERT THEM FOR US! WE CAN'T FUCKING APPLY A SIMPLE GODDAMN EXCEL BASED CALCULATOR BECAUSE TEH COMPUTRONZ R TEH HARDZ MATHS!

    I'm charging by the hour, so I'm taking my time and building a full page calculation converter. Unfortunately I have to manually input the 900 values into said converter. 900 values per sample. There are a lot of samples.

    Hunter on
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    HunterHunter Chemist with a heart of Au Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Callius wrote: »
    HallowedFaith wrote: »
    Enlist in the U.S. Army.

    If I enlisted, it would be in the Chair Farce.

    I'd sign up to pilot one of those remote controlled planes and bomb people for the high score.

    Hunter on
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    WeaverWeaver Who are you? What do you want?Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Yeah but man don't you get a bonus for netting the company so many chargeable hours?

    Weaver on
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    HunterHunter Chemist with a heart of Au Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Weaver wrote: »
    Yeah but man don't you get a bonus for netting the company so many chargeable hours?

    My company will puss out and charge a flat fee at a certain point, knowing they've built so much slush into our hourly charge to start with. Also they'll expect me to 'multitask', which is they're nice way of saying do more work in the same amount of time for no extra money. My normal answer is 'fine asshole, but I'm so going to fuck off on the internet on slower days and claim the hours into a project that was way easier then you estimated'.

    Hunter on
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    JavenJaven Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    starting tomorrow I will officially be a business owner.

    I plan on celebrating by taking a long weekend

    Javen on
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    MysstMysst King Monkey of Hedonism IslandRegistered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Javen, what business are you doing?

    Mysst on
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    JavenJaven Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    restaurant

    Javen on
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    gazamcgazamc Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Hunter wrote: »
    My corporate masters have gutted the company and are trying to restructure, so I've moved from research and Design/Customer Technical Service in the glass industry to working in the Analytical Group. I specifically run trace elemental analysis on anything and everything our company makes or random shit that comes out fucked up from the people that buy our materials.

    I still get to dabble in glass work when projects come up.

    I'd like to start work as a pimp or maybe an assassin.

    A pimp assassin.

    Now there is a job. Or a bitchin television series.

    Pimp Hunter.

    gazamc on
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    Indie WinterIndie Winter die Krähe Rudi Hurzlmeier (German, b. 1952)Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    I'm drafted. A year and a half to go 'till discharge.

    yaaaaaaay

    Indie Winter on
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    MysstMysst King Monkey of Hedonism IslandRegistered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Javen wrote: »
    restaurant
    I hope you get a good staff, that's the hardest bit.

    Mysst on
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    HunterHunter Chemist with a heart of Au Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    The best part is one person questioned the validity of the Beers-Lambert Law. A physical law about light transmission that is essentially a constant for our universe. One that we've built much of our technology on. A law based in math and repeatable experimentation.

    For fucks sake. Has questioning science become so fucking vogue that even the boring shit like light passing through a fucking medium has to have the alternatives taught. Don't want to piss off the Light Creationists who think it magically turns to unicorns in the glass and then magically is emitted out the other side minus the absorbed energy necessary to create a fantasy pixie realm of the Unicorns.

    Hunter on
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    RedZeroRedZero Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    High five to the journalism people. I just graduated with a BA in print journalism, and am currently interning for my local weekly newspaper. But now I'm applying for a job as an investigator at a law firm in the DC area. They'd pay me while I train (about 60 hours) to get my PI license, and then it is apparently just investigating different things for the firm, then writing up reports for to be used in court cases.

    Not exactly what I had anticipated doing with my degree, but it definitely seems interesting. Gotta get the application out next week and see where it goes from there.

    RedZero on
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    JavenJaven Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    Mysst wrote: »
    Javen wrote: »
    restaurant
    I hope you get a good staff, that's the hardest bit.

    I already have a staff that I've worked with for 8 years. Today I am part of that staff, tomorrow I will be their boss.

    Javen on
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    FandyienFandyien But Otto, what about us? Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    RedZero wrote: »
    High five to the journalism people. I just graduated with a BA in print journalism, and am currently interning for my local weekly newspaper. But now I'm applying for a job as an investigator at a law firm in the DC area. They'd pay me while I train (about 60 hours) to get my PI license, and then it is apparently just investigating different things for the firm, then writing up reports for to be used in court cases.

    Not exactly what I had anticipated doing with my degree, but it definitely seems interesting. Gotta get the application out next week and see where it goes from there.

    That's awesome. I keep hearing bad things about Journalism as a major, but I'm trying to remain positive. I can't wait to start taking classes next year. I'm stoked about my journalism lab.

    Fandyien on
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    HunterHunter Chemist with a heart of Au Registered User regular
    edited July 2008
    RedZero wrote: »
    High five to the journalism people. I just graduated with a BA in print journalism, and am currently interning for my local weekly newspaper. But now I'm applying for a job as an investigator at a law firm in the DC area. They'd pay me while I train (about 60 hours) to get my PI license, and then it is apparently just investigating different things for the firm, then writing up reports for to be used in court cases.

    Not exactly what I had anticipated doing with my degree, but it definitely seems interesting. Gotta get the application out next week and see where it goes from there.
    Inspector+Clouseau.jpg

    [FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][FONT=Verdana,Arial,Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Does yer dewg bite?[/SIZE][/FONT][/FONT]

    Hunter on
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