I was talking to a family member who lamented that other family members hate their jobs. Hate is really such a mild word for it. She said, "You're lucky, you have a talent for technology and enjoy what you do."
I know that was a compliment, and although I didn't tell her, I felt a little insulted. Talent? All my life I was interested in tech., but not until I was in my mid-twenties did I pursue it, it was never encouraged when I was younger. I was to be a doctor. Blech!
So I got my first taste of it in technical college, and it was hard. So much math, voltage angles, industrial controls, the inner-workings of a processor, logic circuits, machine code, resistors, capacitors, diodes, transistors... Fascinating!
Even though getting off the starting line was slow, I managed to really enjoy learning about tech., and did well. I remember toward the end of my time there, our industrial controls professor brought out a small robot to see how well we could digitally control its movements. The trouble was that the arm was driven by a belt which had flat spots in it. We had to try to compensate for random slippage with commands. It never worked. Looking back, I wonder if the professor was trying to teach us that everything couldn't be solved digitally. I don't know.
The only big technological blunder I had was when my fancy stereo receiver broke (in hindsight I realize I had made it overheat by putting a turntable on top of it - they need a lot of room). So with my newfound knowledge of resistors in my first semester, and the fact that they (I) had supplied me with a multi-meter, I set about checking every exposed resistor I could find in-circuit, desoldering them all like an idiot. Of course I failed miserably, and that receiver never again powered on.
Oh well. I saw anything but talent when looking back to those days, only application and adaptation. Which also made me think about my first real job which was at a department store (Gemco). I didn't really like stocking shelves, cleaning up after messy customers, or later disciplining employees as a manager. There was a lot of stuff I did like though, and I realized I never had a job I truly hated (night shifts around the holidays were a bitch though).
(BTW) One family member who hates his job blames the rise of the city-state, parroting the hypothesis of a book he just finished that before mankind was used as labor for leaders, we didn't know drudgery. Hmm. Is drudgery what bosses make it, or is it us?
Edit: corrected angles from angels. Ha! Thanks Alpha!
I know that was a compliment, and although I didn't tell her, I felt a little insulted. Talent? All my life I was interested in tech., but not until I was in my mid-twenties did I pursue it, it was never encouraged when I was younger. I was to be a doctor. Blech!
So I got my first taste of it in technical college, and it was hard. So much math, voltage angles, industrial controls, the inner-workings of a processor, logic circuits, machine code, resistors, capacitors, diodes, transistors... Fascinating!
Even though getting off the starting line was slow, I managed to really enjoy learning about tech., and did well. I remember toward the end of my time there, our industrial controls professor brought out a small robot to see how well we could digitally control its movements. The trouble was that the arm was driven by a belt which had flat spots in it. We had to try to compensate for random slippage with commands. It never worked. Looking back, I wonder if the professor was trying to teach us that everything couldn't be solved digitally. I don't know.
The only big technological blunder I had was when my fancy stereo receiver broke (in hindsight I realize I had made it overheat by putting a turntable on top of it - they need a lot of room). So with my newfound knowledge of resistors in my first semester, and the fact that they (I) had supplied me with a multi-meter, I set about checking every exposed resistor I could find in-circuit, desoldering them all like an idiot. Of course I failed miserably, and that receiver never again powered on.
Oh well. I saw anything but talent when looking back to those days, only application and adaptation. Which also made me think about my first real job which was at a department store (Gemco). I didn't really like stocking shelves, cleaning up after messy customers, or later disciplining employees as a manager. There was a lot of stuff I did like though, and I realized I never had a job I truly hated (night shifts around the holidays were a bitch though).
(BTW) One family member who hates his job blames the rise of the city-state, parroting the hypothesis of a book he just finished that before mankind was used as labor for leaders, we didn't know drudgery. Hmm. Is drudgery what bosses make it, or is it us?
Edit: corrected angles from angels. Ha! Thanks Alpha!
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