gtfields13
Well-known member
Two dryers functioning tonight.
What's your current headache?
- Thread starter Pauleo1214
- Start date
Currently working through the back plate... just cleaned it up, it's got some character building occlusions but looking better than I was expecting. The front panel is perfect.
This will get carved and hollowed out in the near future but not until the front panels glued and done..
The headache is that the outline of the guitar sides and the template are a little out.. so I'm going to have to give that some additional TLC with a hot pipe then we should be good to crack on.
This will get carved and hollowed out in the near future but not until the front panels glued and done..
The headache is that the outline of the guitar sides and the template are a little out.. so I'm going to have to give that some additional TLC with a hot pipe then we should be good to crack on.
Bricksnbeatles
Member known well
Honestly I’m just kinda crashing out lately. Graduated 6 months ago and still can’t find a job. Stressed out of my mind about money and even more so about what my future looks like.
I legit don’t know what to do.
I can’t find a job as it is, but even when I do like how will I ever be actually happy? I already feel like I don’t have time to do anything I enjoy, and I haven’t been able to pursue any of the things I want to do in life that I’ve been trying to make happen since high school or earlier (recording music, performing live, etc). My social life is already nonexistent so what happens when I have a 9-5? For like the past 2 years I’ve had such absolutely insane chronic fatigue that being awake for more than 12 hours in a day is physically such a challenge no matter how much I try to break that cycle, so like what? How am I ever gonna find a job when I have absolutely zero marketable skills and I’m like 10 years behind the curve on the experience I should have. Really I don’t know what I want to do with my life because literally any avenue i think about makes me dreadfully miserable to think about. I really think I fucked up and picked the wrong paths because the only things I could see myself being happy with are the things that 1) are next to impossible to make a living with to begin with and 2) are things that I’m 10 years late to the game with.
I don’t know why I got an art degree other than the fact that everyone else kinda expected me to— I never wanted to teach art, and I never really wanted to be an artist. It’s just something I was good at and didn’t completely hate, but even still it was a mostly awful experience and was really just because four years after staring college, I didn’t want to be a dropout and I didn’t want my existing student debt to be for nothing. A additional four years later, and I’m a 26 year old with a degree that gives me approximately as much opportunity as I had 8 years ago when I was fresh out of high school— the only difference now is that it’s a lot harder trying to convince anyone to hire a 26 year old whose most recent professional/verifiable job experience is as a temp at a music store in 2019.
Feel like I’m, as the kids say, “cooked”
I legit don’t know what to do.
I can’t find a job as it is, but even when I do like how will I ever be actually happy? I already feel like I don’t have time to do anything I enjoy, and I haven’t been able to pursue any of the things I want to do in life that I’ve been trying to make happen since high school or earlier (recording music, performing live, etc). My social life is already nonexistent so what happens when I have a 9-5? For like the past 2 years I’ve had such absolutely insane chronic fatigue that being awake for more than 12 hours in a day is physically such a challenge no matter how much I try to break that cycle, so like what? How am I ever gonna find a job when I have absolutely zero marketable skills and I’m like 10 years behind the curve on the experience I should have. Really I don’t know what I want to do with my life because literally any avenue i think about makes me dreadfully miserable to think about. I really think I fucked up and picked the wrong paths because the only things I could see myself being happy with are the things that 1) are next to impossible to make a living with to begin with and 2) are things that I’m 10 years late to the game with.
I don’t know why I got an art degree other than the fact that everyone else kinda expected me to— I never wanted to teach art, and I never really wanted to be an artist. It’s just something I was good at and didn’t completely hate, but even still it was a mostly awful experience and was really just because four years after staring college, I didn’t want to be a dropout and I didn’t want my existing student debt to be for nothing. A additional four years later, and I’m a 26 year old with a degree that gives me approximately as much opportunity as I had 8 years ago when I was fresh out of high school— the only difference now is that it’s a lot harder trying to convince anyone to hire a 26 year old whose most recent professional/verifiable job experience is as a temp at a music store in 2019.
Feel like I’m, as the kids say, “cooked”
Nostradoomus
Well-known member
I have no advice for you @Bricksnbeatles because your situation is unique to you. But my DMs are always open if you need an ear. I can distract you by talking about ween at least. 
giovanni
Well-known member
Hey @Bricksnbeatles, I can’t make any promises but DM me and we can discuss if any of my connections could help you out.
vigilante398
Authorized Vendor
I have absolutely no idea and it's way too early on a monday morning for an existential rabbit hole.
My personal choice was to take the first job I could get out of college that paid the bills (applied for literally 40 positions all over the country, got 2 interviews, 1 offer), then wait a couple years to leverage that job experience for a job that I actually wanted. My job DEFINITELY doesn't make me happy, but the work/life balance it provides allows me time to be happy.
Your degree is obviously very different than mine so take this with as much salt as needed, and while you probably won't find a job that makes you happy, hopefully you at least find one that doesn't actively prevent you from being happy. I graduated almost 9 years ago (I was 28), and I recognize that the job market now is worse than it was then, so I don't envy your situation, but I wish you the best of luck and if there's anything I can do to help (you never know) I'll throw my name in with the others that have offered.
mybud
Well-known member
Echoing the sentiments above, any time you feel like chatting I’m available (if it helps in the slightest).
rwl
Well-known member
I'm also happy to talk. I'm a fellow Stony Brook alum (though with a CS degree).
BuddytheReow
Moderator
I'm sure Robert will throw you a couple bucks to put some build docs together.
Bricksnbeatles
Member known well
I appreciate the comments everyone. I’ll circle back to these a bit later, and I may take some of you up on the offers to DM.
wild! Didn’t think there would be any other SB folks here, but with CS I guess it makes sense! I was originally EE when I started at SBU in fall 2017, dropped that major at the end of my second semester when I realized that it was mostly focused on military/defense applications and nothing like the Tom Scholz/Bob Moog/Leon Theremin side of EE that got me hooked in the first place.
vigilante398
Authorized Vendor
As a EE graduate, you are not wrong. Schools seem to be making it easier and easier to land yourself in the defense industry, and once you're in there it's hard to get out. If you have an engineering degree and a security clearance, the recruiters will find you and will never leave you alone.
Same boat - but at 52. I've had a long career in IT (including a software engineering degree) but currently it's like I've been labeled "over the hill". Key for me is there's an expectation that I can magically solve making money.
First - find a local free sports group. It will get you out in a rhythm and get you socialising (not sat in a hole of four walls).
Second - very few people do a job because they enjoy it, they do it because it solves a problem that someone is willing to pay to solve. You're now competing with the world, and your personal brand is the only thing between you and the next person - so you'll need to start building it now, circulating with people in the industry you want. If you look at actors "following their dreams" - most have multiple jobs whilst continuing to find the next acting gig or build their company until they finally get a break (if at all). The hard (and cold fact) is nobody will give you anything for free. If then it's you that is being sold.
Now pick something you can tolerate - pure energy into it.. enjoy the journey (both ups and downs), pick something you love and pure yet more energy into it.
The final thing is - it's a large world out there, lots of people 'influencing' (self-branded sales), so the onus is on you to find your personal revenue and your happiness and not someone else to tell you what that is.
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Very true. I only have a UK perspective but given the clearance needs continuous sponsorship and companies prefer not spending the money afresh for fully vetting non-cleared applicants, it becomes harder as you move forward to move into the industry.
BuddytheReow
Moderator
@Bricksnbeatles you're not alone in your situation. I got out of college in '09 and unless you were on top of your game in school (grades, networking, job fairs, professional fraternities) NOBODY would hire you cuz the economy was taking a big dump at the time. It took me a few years (was also going through something personal) to land an office job (have a degree in finance). What I went to school for isn't what I do now, although accounting and finance are siblings. I did have some odds and ends jobs to pay the bills with the most notable of running a pizzeria for a year (I still love pizza to this day). I must have put in a few hundred job applications and met with about half a dozen recruiters before starting my career.
Right now it must seem overwhelming like you've got this mountain to climb or up a creek without a paddle. VERY few people in this world find their dream job and even if they do there are days they just "gotta go to work today". Just keep looking and you'll find something. I know a bunch of people who work in an office environment with degrees in Biology, Theater, and Art. I've learned in my time that degrees and credentials only get you an interview, nothing more. Job experience will matter more later in your career and you can take that with you wherever you go.
I also know now how to make good pizza because of my work experiences.
Right now it must seem overwhelming like you've got this mountain to climb or up a creek without a paddle. VERY few people in this world find their dream job and even if they do there are days they just "gotta go to work today". Just keep looking and you'll find something. I know a bunch of people who work in an office environment with degrees in Biology, Theater, and Art. I've learned in my time that degrees and credentials only get you an interview, nothing more. Job experience will matter more later in your career and you can take that with you wherever you go.
I also know now how to make good pizza because of my work experiences.
vigilante398
Authorized Vendor
My current headache: corporate bullshit.
I'm trying to debug a new board that we just got in. If I need a multimeter, I have to fill out a form to request one. If I need clip leads instead of banana jacks for the benchtop power supply, I have to fill out a form and request them. I want to solder some wires to test points for easy in-circuit probing, but the only soldering stations are in different labs, and each lab requires a separate access request, which take 2-4 business days to review. All this while the program management is breathing down the team's neck to get this resolved.
So I said screw it, I brought a soldering station and multimeter from home, we're getting this shit done.
I'm trying to debug a new board that we just got in. If I need a multimeter, I have to fill out a form to request one. If I need clip leads instead of banana jacks for the benchtop power supply, I have to fill out a form and request them. I want to solder some wires to test points for easy in-circuit probing, but the only soldering stations are in different labs, and each lab requires a separate access request, which take 2-4 business days to review. All this while the program management is breathing down the team's neck to get this resolved.
So I said screw it, I brought a soldering station and multimeter from home, we're getting this shit done.
BuddytheReow
Moderator
Going rogue, I see...
vigilante398
Authorized Vendor
If that's what it takes I guess. It just pains me that I could get this done in 1-2 hours in my basement workshop, whereas it takes 4-5 business days to do at the professional lab of a corporation that pulled $41B last year.
At my old job I had a soldering station, hot air station, power supply, oscilloscope, multimeter, and microscope all at my desk on an ESD mat with wrist straps. I got shit done there.
Silver Blues
Well-known member
Yup, bureaucratization is but one of the insidious tendrils of enshittification that is overtaking us these days. My workplace, who has no business doing such a thing, switched to using a Certain Corporate Software some time ago for all their operations and all it has done is cause tremendous headaches and protract every single process. Everyone hates it. You used to be able to go to the on-site supply store and ask for something and they would give it to you on the spot, now you have to put in a fucking requisition (even for things in the inventory, on site), so now if I want, say, a pen, I have to wait sometimes up to a couple of business days to get it. If I order something external through this godforsaken system it has to be approved by several people and whenever the requisition goes through and the item is shipped and received, it can just sit around waiting to be processed. Could have needed it yesterday, too bad, it'll happen in a week.
They pressure you to get shit done and serve no purpose but to put obstacles in the way of getting shit done, just so they can ensure they can tell other executive management types that don't actually know or care what we do that we did shit the way they wanted.
They pressure you to get shit done and serve no purpose but to put obstacles in the way of getting shit done, just so they can ensure they can tell other executive management types that don't actually know or care what we do that we did shit the way they wanted.
darwin999
Well-known member
I agree. A very significant part of getting an education is simply learning how to learn - i.e., how to legitimately and properly educate yourself. Because even if you do get a job in the same area as your degree, the state of the art for almost every field completely changes every ~4-10 years. So you have to keep educating yourself, no matter what you do.