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Another getting to know you ?

Perhaps this question has been asked before but, What do you all do for a living? Do you like your job?  If you won the lottery, would you go to work tomorrow?  What does your spouse or S.O. do?

If you're in highschool, what grade? What is your favourite class? What are you going to be when you "grow up?"

If you're in college, what is your major? What are you going to be when you "grow up?"

I'll go first...

I'm a full time mom to two 2-1/2 boys... Usually it's a lot of fun to be with the boys.. but sometimes I go a bit batty if we can't get out because of bad weather or nasty colds.  You can only say "no" so many times before you need a break, hence my part time job...

I'm a part time (3 days per week) draftsperson.  Mostly civil construction (I don't draw the building, I just draw where the building goes).  I won't get rich doing this job, but it allows me a bit of a mental break.  I like my coworkers and the company I work for is really flexible and fair.  It's really cool when the project I help draft gets built.  If I win the lottery today, I would go to work tomorrow... It would be nice to go to work because I want to not because I have to (pesky mortgage!!)

My hubby is a mechanic and is just opening his own shop... It's what he's always wanted... but I'm a bit scared by the whole "maybe I'll get a paycheck today" scenario...

You next...

I'm a primary school teacher. I have been teaching for around 6 years: just over two years in Japan, and four years at my current school in Brisbane. I teach 25 grade ones (5 and 6 year olds), and I love my job...  I look forward to going to school each day because I actually enjoy their company and sense of humour ... and enjoy seeing them grow and achieve ... there are days where I do come home and am so exhausted that I have to lay on the couch and stare at the ceiling for a few mins to gather myself together... but thats life... you got to take the good and learn from the bad ...  Yes, I think you would find me in my classroom on Monday, even if I won the lottery... though I might try and go back to school part time to get my PhD ... My husband is also a teacher... that is where we met... though he is currently on leave for two years from school while he persues his passion ... 

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    I am an interior designer and Will is a cabinet-maker and we own our own business.  Will and I met in art school while I was working on my MFA and he was deciding that he hated graphic design and went back to sculpture and metals. 
    We have a new shop in the early stages of construction.  We are working on having a general      contractor's license by the end of the year.  We have a wide variety of clients, but for the most part we design and build kitchens and bathrooms.  I do not pick out curtains and wallpaper;  I do "healthy home assessments," where I more-or-less inspect the home and the family and outline a report of findings as to what materials are off-gassing or contributing to an unhealthy living environment.  I also consult with clients who are in the construction process by recommending materials and such.     

      In the last 6 months, we have switched our operation entirely to water-based finishing products and  (FINALLY) we can get non- formaldehyde glue ply board locally, which is huge :D
This is what your cabinets are made of (and the cabinets that most people have in their homes are simply dangerous and don't get me started on the horrors of carpet).  I am constantly amazed at the variety of chemicals that they pump into WOOD.  We have a distributer that actually bragged  that their poly-urethane was "banned in California."  Great, please let me bring that into my house.  Just because you can get it doesn't mean you should.

We want to build urban pre-fab ultra modern environmentally sound craftsman produced homes, oh yeah, and affordably. 

If we won the lottery, we'd still do what we are doing now, just faster.  It takes a lot of working capitol to build and compete with the box stores.  Will is fond of saying "I can't compete with 13 year-old Malaysian boys who are paid a bowl of rice and an pack of Lucky Strikes for their time."  It is alarming how many people ask you to bid a project, then when they see the cost say "well, I could buy it at Home Depot for less."  Well, no sh**!  We build custom and with real wood that won't kill you slowly and we buy everything available locally including the wood

oh, K2,
don't fear "the next paycheck,"  it always comes.  it is so worth it!! I did the corporate gig for a while and after leaving to go on my own, I can honestly say I an un-employable in any capacity.  this is what I love!

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I'm a highschool senior.  I only attend school for 2 hours, and take the rest of my courses through correspondence.  In June I graduate (finally!!), and I'm going to attend Ohio Northern University next fall.  I'm going there to pursue a Doctorate of Pharmacy.  (I just found out I won a 20,000 renewable scholarship there!  yes!)

I've worked part time in a retirement community for 3 years.  I work in a dining room/kitchen serving the residents, cooking, cleaning, offering companionship and stuff like that.  The dining room I work in is only a small part of the GIANT retirement community, and they're currently under the process of construction.  Currently, I work with only 4 other people and about 70 residents.  I love my coworkers, and the residents, and the sense of community we all have.  When the construction is complete, however, they're going to demolish our dining room and we all haveto work in this HUGE restaurant-type place.  (Try seating for 400+)  It's going to be a very big change.....that's for sure.

My job is what inspired me to pursure a career in Pharmacy.  I really like the interaction/counseling with the residents, and pharmacy offers that.  There's no way I could be a medical doctor or nurse...because blood freaks me out, and I don't really want to be a social worker...because they "take their jobs home with them."  So hopefully pharmacy is the right choice for me!

And if I won the lottery, I would go to work tomorrow!

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Yet another teaching person. I'm a fourth-year PhD candidate, slogging through my dissertation. It's more fun than it sounds! I've been teaching composition, research writing, and intro to lit courses for about eight years. I also work part-time at a natural foods co-op for a discount, some extra cash, the chance to work with great people, and the opportunity to do something that isn't quite so strictly brain intensive. If I won the lottery, I'd probably give up teaching long enough to finish my diss, give a lot of it to local food banks, and then go back to work. I love this site. My partner and I are both vegan and committed to healthy (well, mostly!) and adventurous cooking. She's also working on her dissertation. We're your typical gay, pop-culture obsessed, academic vegans!  :D 

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A ridiculously disproportionate number of us are teachers... that's got to mean something. 

I am yet another another teaching person and graduate student, also getting my PhD in literature, and also your typical pop culture-obsessed, academic vegan  :D  I'm a third year, though, which means I'm reading for qualifying exams and not yet at the dissertation stage.  I teach freshmen composition and/or literature courses, and when I grow up I want to do pretty much the same thing, except get paid normal professor wages instead of the pittance they pay us grad students for the work.

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I work as a medical transcriptionist.  I don't know how much I love my job for what I do.  Sitting for hours and typing like an athlete is not great for the body.  I have never had carpal tunnel problems, even though I generate something like 23,000 keystrokes an hour.  Because I am about twice as fast as the average MT, I make full time money working rather part time, very rarely more than 6 hours in any 24.

I have my BFA in Design and Fine Arts.  I am a "talented" landscape painter and watercolorist, though I have never really devoted time to it since I got my degree.  When I do, I like what I produce, but I don't stick with it well. 

I am working on my graduate degree in mental health counseling.  I don't know that I am 100% behind this decision, and that is hard to explain.  I am looking for a way to bring my generous intelligence, creativity and intuition to work at the same time, in the same place.  Everything I have ever done uses 1 or 2, but not all 3 at once.  This degree plan meets that idea well, but I don't know how well suited I am to the job in other ways.  My kids are 100% behind it.  My friends are very supportive and tell me I'll make an interesting therapist.  I am not sure what I think of that word...interesting.  It scares me a little.

I am actually having another crisis with decision making.  I know that anything I have ever tried to do, I do well, as long as I really work at it.  I learned to play piano at age 37 and it took 40 lessons to be able to play the adagio to the Moonlight Sonata.  I worked hard at it.  I have worked hard at being a top notch MT.  I am questioning if now is the time to really work hard at writing and painting and see if I can make something of it.  Scratch that, I can make something of it.  I think I am asking if I care enough to put forth the amount of work it will require and right now, I don't know.  Getting another degree is about doing something with definite guidelines and parameters.  My artwork doesn't have these, or if they do, I have not set up time to work at it on a daily basis. 

As for winning the lottery...yes I would continue to work until a suitable replacement could be found.  If I didn't have to work, it would not be fair to take work from someone who needs it.  I'd have to volunteer doing several things and find ways to give my money away.  Work gives my life a rhythm and meaning, it would be hard to give it up. 

I would not move, my house is paid for as in I have the title to it.  It is small for us, but easy to clean.  I'd probably buy another used car and put together extensive college funds for the kids.  I am not wanting to add to my possessions anymore, not beyond what I absolutely need.  It is not me being grand or self-sacrificing...I have been through a lot in my life and I am content with where I am.  Possessions are responsiblity and I am sick of that kind of responsibility.  This is something that is in my face right now as I am going through the deeper recesses of my storage units and seeing that I own too much stuff.  I am pitching stuff out, but the loaded boxes just keep on coming out of there!  Now, when I am in a store, I look at something and ponder whether I can truly use it, where I'll be putting it and if I want mess keeping it picked up and put away.  Mostly that answer is NO NO NO no more crap!

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ungreen: Good luck on your orals! I took mine last year, also in literature. I think I can safely say that they are always anti-climactic. Thankfully! 

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I'm feeling very threatened by the amount of intelligence in this post. But also very glad that it IS smart to be a vegan!  ;)
I graduated from high school with dreams and still have dreams because i've been to afraid to pursue them. So, 10 years later i work at a local business putting designs on shirts and building trophies, make jewelry when i can, and sing a few nights a month with a guitarist at some local hang outs. Yep, that's about it. Basically, if i could get rid of one thing, it would be my fears. They've held me back from alot in life. Trying to learn how to overcome that, though.
If i won the lottery, i'd quit my job and make jewelry and sing and i'd buy a place and fix it so that it's virtually self-sufficient (greenhouse, water & solar power) and i'd give alot away to people who need it alot more than i do.
You all are very good & kind for reading and caring. Thank you

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ungreen: Good luck on your orals! I took mine last year, also in literature. I think I can safely say that they are always anti-climactic. Thankfully! 

Thanks, asenath!  I'm not yet in freak out mode (give me about 3-4 more months!), but that's always nice to hear...  I guess logically they can't possibly test you on all of it, huh?  :)

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Yeah, they really really can't! I completely over-prepared, as we must. I think I answered questions on about one third of what I crammed into my brain! Also, as far as I can tell, they don't let you take the exam unless you're going to pass. Crazy academics.  ;)

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