cobysev ,

I did work in IT, but now I'm retired young. I could go back to work and make double my income, but I just don't wanna. I'd rather have less income with a stable, comfortable life and the freedom to do whatever I want every day, than spend all day stuck in a job just to have no free time to enjoy the extra money I'd be bringing home.

Captainvaqina ,

How did you retire early and at what age? If you don't mind my asking

cobysev ,

I served in the US military. I was in the Air Force, but my profession was IT, so I spent my whole service working as a sysadmin.

You can officially retire and collect a pension after only 20 years served. I joined at 18, so I retired at 38 years old. Normally, a 20-yr pension isn't enough to fully retire on, but I got a bit messed up during my service. The VA gave me a 100% disability rating, which includes a monthly pay bigger than my pension! Plus. My wife also served and was medically discharged with a 100% disability rating as well. So she gets the same medical benefits and pay as I do (minus a pension).

With all three sources of passive income, we can live without working. We're not rich by any stretch of the imagination, but we pull in enough to live comfortably and have all our basic needs met.

Like I said, I could go back into the IT field and double my current income (or more), but then I'd be stuck working all the time again, and I don't want to do that. The military was a 24/7 gig for 20 years. "Service Before Self" was one of our core values; we always had to prioritize the mission over our personal lives, and we could be recalled to work any time, day or night. So it's nice to actually have some "me time" now, where no one can make me go anywhere or do anything. Not looking to go back to work and give that up so soon.

Pra ,

Thanks for your service soldier. I wanted to retire too, but at 8 years my bop code expired and I got a nice little email congratulating me on becoming an mtl at Sheppard. I bop'd out of Texas and there was no way they were getting me to go back. It sucks because I did really like the air Force but the transition from e4 mafia to nco blew lol. No longer do your job and instead I was pushing paper and disciplining troops for ditching pt. And then do only that for 3 years for high schools kids in middle of nowhere Texas? 😂 Denied the retraining, cert'd up my last year, then got a job doing my same job with less work and for way more pay. The air Force classic lol.

Always glad to hear a good retirement story though. Most of the people I knew who retired were jaded as hell by the end of it. Hopefully the air Force didn't break your body too bad though... Have a cold one for me! Air power!

cobysev ,

Yeah, I was pretty jaded by the end of my career. Couldn't wait to retire, which is why I left as soon as I qualified for retirement. I served exactly 20 years and 6 days.

I only made it to Technical Sergeant (E-6), but it was my ideal rank. I had enough rank and authority to manage personnel and resources, but I was also the technical expert and could get down on the ground level and do the work alongside my Airmen and NCOs. All career fields operate differently, but my IT field specifically didn't allow Senior NCOs to do the job. They were upper-management; they always got put behind a desk and made to do paperwork, pass down orders, and oversee projects.

I didn't want that for myself, so I stopped trying to promote once I made TSgt. I expected I'd have to keep working once I retired, so I wanted to stay technical and keep my IT certifications and experience strong, so I could transition into a high-paying gig on the outside.

Little did I know that I'd earn that coveted 100% Permanent & Total disability rating. Now my medical and dental costs are covered for life and my monthly VA check is bigger than my pension, so I'm essentially making a little bit more money than when I was serving, just to sit on my ass all day. So... yeah, I'm enjoying that hard-earned freedom right now.

jo3shmoo ,

Prosthetist. I work with patients to make and fit artificial limbs to them.

FigMcLargeHuge ,

Sounds like you are pretty handy.

DancingBear ,

That’s awful. You don’t even have a leg to stand on

CarbonatedPastaSauce ,

Well he had to get a foot in the door somehow.

DancingBear ,

I’m gonna have to put my foot down, this is completely inappropriate. You’d think his ears were burning but he nose what he did there, he’s gonna put his foot in his mouth if he’s not careful.

elephantium ,
@elephantium@lemmy.world avatar

Reasonable prices, too. With that clientele, you can't just charge an arm and a leg.

BonesOfTheMoon ,

Health care. The things I've seen!

setsneedtofeed OP ,
@setsneedtofeed@lemmy.world avatar
BonesOfTheMoon ,

Quite literally, and when you mix that with meth, a hemorrhoid, and a razor, it gets really real very fast.

setsneedtofeed OP ,
@setsneedtofeed@lemmy.world avatar
ted_pikul ,

What is this from?

toomanypancakes ,
@toomanypancakes@lemmy.world avatar

I approve people applying for disability benefits.

otp ,

That's awesome! Most others seem to only deny people applying for disability benefits.

Thorny_Insight ,

Plumber & Home improvement contractor

I recently started my own business and now I do variety of jobs related to home maintenance except electrical. If this'll pay enough to keep me and my SO fed then based on my experience so far it was the best decision of my life. It doesn't really even feel like work and 98% of customer encounters have been positive. I've gotten 5x more thank yous in 2 months than I got in 10 years at my previous job. We've all had bad experiences with shitty contractors. I truly try to not be one of them.

Fogle ,

Construction electrician

essell ,

I'm a therapist, and I train other therapists.
And I supervise some therapists and I train other therapists to supervise other therapists. And I manage a team of therapists who train other therapists and who train other therapists to supervise other therapists.

Kind "in it" at this stage.

CarbonatedPastaSauce ,

So, what do you do when you need therapy?

essell ,

I find a therapist I don't know!

There's a few of them about!

TimewornTraveler , (edited )

Wow you're pretty high up there. So that sounds like you are yourself a supervisor and supervisor educator and supervisor educators' supervisor? Like some kind of a consulting group where my supervisors probably got trained? I don't actually know who does the licensing for supervisor status - I'm guessing it's just like the entry level where you have to get hours from anywhere that the state board vetted and stamped off on? It's so interesting to me how state licensure has such a long relationship with private entities.

essell ,

I'm in the UK so it's a different structure than the US, and the role is different too, less overlap with the medical approach.

Most of what we so is training counsellors, the training of qualified counsellors in how to provide clinical supervision is a small part of it.

We're a private training company, doing counselling, legal, medical and accounting. I work for the counselling part of course.

TimewornTraveler ,

Very cool! Wish there were more of us on here. r/therapists is still one of the main reasons I use Reddit. Well, uh, I guess you and I could talk? But at that point, with you as a super-super and me as a first-year post-grad, it would just sound like shoddy anonymous online supervision!

essell , (edited )

I'm up for that!

I doubt I could get to know you the way a supervisor would, doesn't mean it wouldn't be worthwhile for both of us.

Talking with colleagues is always a joy. I'm leaving today for a long weekend, hanging out with a dozen counsellors for a person centred encounter group.

Hopefully very restful being in an environment saturated in the core conditions 😁

TimewornTraveler ,

I love that idea too! We just gotta create a space for it, I guess. Boy do I have things to say... my facility's CEO took his life this weekend and it's been a mad scramble. Only in In-patient!

lechatron ,
@lechatron@lemmy.today avatar

OP clearly just wanted an excuse to show off their vast collection of response images....

setsneedtofeed OP ,
@setsneedtofeed@lemmy.world avatar
Tar_alcaran ,

When people work with hazardous materials, they hire me to make sure they do it safely or legally. I mostly work in waste handling, soil remediations and laboratories.

It's pretty fun and interesting, but it's been very bad for my enjoyment of homegrown food, swimming outdoors or going downwind of any industrial sites.

setsneedtofeed OP ,
@setsneedtofeed@lemmy.world avatar
bdonvr ,

I'm a truck driver, well nowadays more in the office than behind the wheel but I do still pull loads here and there.

HobbitFoot ,

And you pull my load of bullshit onto Lemmy!

I unironically love ya!

bdonvr ,

Well just keep bringing me your loads and I'll uh.... yeah what I mean to say is thanks.

hoxbug ,

Soon to be qualified plumber, maybe a month to go or so.

proctonaut ,

I salute you, future turdherder.

skinless_corpus ,

I'm a psychiatric RN out in the community. I work with people who have thought disorders like schizophrenia at their homes or under the bridges.

anon6789 ,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

I'm glad to see there's a few of us in the 5 figure salary club here!

I'm scientific support for a major pharma company. I tell people my job is essentially to be Hank Hill, as I'm in charge of compressed and liquid gases. I keep everyone squared away with liquid nitrogen, liquid helium, liquid argon, and any number and size of gas cylinder.

It's not a bad job. Pay is ok for what I do, people are generally nice, and most days I'm done the bulk of my work in 2-3 hours, so the rest of the time is mine unless someone needs something.

The rest of the day I'll prep and respond to posts here, study music, read comics or books, and watch cartoons. Nobody seems to care as long as the work gets done.

It's low stress and a decent environment, so I got no complaints. It's not as good as my last job, doing data analysis of hazardous chemicals. The place was generally run really well and almost all my work was doing daily reports on inventory. I made macros to do everything, so my work was done in less than half an hour most days and I got to work at home.

Being a nobody in pharma is pretty great as long as your group is cool.

thirteene ,

Mind if I ask a work question? I purchased a cannister of CO2 for a kitchen appliance, but have another project requiring nitrogen. Are there any cleaning procedures or vacuum seal requirements before changing gases to prevent contaimination/interaction?

anon6789 ,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

It's more of a warehouse job than a science job, so I'm probably not qualified to help, but I love learning, so I did some reading.

Different mixes of CO² and nitrogen are available for both carbonating/nitrogenizing beer, and further mixes designed to pressurize the lines for dispensing. Replacement beverage o-rings seem to come in a number of materials from polyurethane, silicone, teflon, and others and looking at o-ring compatibility charts, they all seem to both be listed as compatible for nitrogen and CO².

Since you're not dealing with liquid gas, I don't think you need to worry so much about material as if you're using something food safe made for beverages, it doesn't seem to be an issue what they're made of or which gas you use as far as I can find. You also shouldn't need to worry about the nitrogen freezing the CO² and forming dry ice from the amount I could imagine you using at home.

Without knowing more about what exactly you're working on, that's the best general help I can dig up. Depending on what exactly you're doing, finding a good homebrew or scuba shop/forum could probably get you the most reliable answer to what you're working on since they'll both be blending those gases in a manner safe for the human body.

I hope that was at least marginally helpful!

laranis ,

You deserve a raise! On Lemmy, at least.

anon6789 ,
@anon6789@lemmy.world avatar

Hah, thank you! I just can't see a question going unanswered! I love learning and researching, so it is usually a fun challenge if it's something I don't know.

If you'd like to see more of me doing my thing, check me out at !superbowl every day where I research and teach about more types of owl than you could ever imagine.

HobbitFoot ,

I'm a real engineer.

Cryophilia ,

Thank you!

I consider "software engineers" to be as much engineers as sandwich artists are artists.

lennybird ,
@lennybird@lemmy.world avatar

Really, man? How much do you know about software engineers? Or is this a joke that's whooshing over my head.

tal ,
@tal@lemmy.today avatar

Software engineers don't really -- well, in the US anyway, might differ elsewhere -- have a formal accreditation process, which I understand is common in other areas of engineering and is a bit of a point of friction with people in some other fields. Like, you don't get to just roll up and say "I'm a civil engineer and I'm building a bridge now" the way you can a software engineer writing a software package.

I don't especially think that such a process would be incredibly practical, but...shrugs

lennybird ,
@lennybird@lemmy.world avatar

I can't speak for other engineering trades or even other software degrees from other universities but I know my degree was ABET accredited (US) for what it's worth. A massive chunk of our education was instilling the engineer's mindset in terms of architecture, design, test-driven, development QA/QC, and coordination and integration with other specialties in the system. I really do wish there was a protection over the title, for I agree some may call themselves software engineers but were never actually trained in the engineering design process.

BodePlotHole ,

I'm an electrical engineer, and I've always considered any field where your design work makes you directly liable for the safety/well-being of others earns you the title of "Engineer".

"Engineering" as a verb is something most anyone can do. Working to understand a problem and then developing a solution is a universal joy for people of any age and skill.

Shelbyeileen ,
@Shelbyeileen@lemmy.world avatar

I do cosplay erotica for a living. I make awesome costumes, I take them off, and just post to Patreon. I suppose it's kindof retail, as I'm giving the photos to people, as a reward for subscribing, but I set my own schedule and choose what goes out. The freedom is incredible

LordGimp ,

Where wobblers

laranis ,

First, good on you. As a corpo wage slave who would not be good at either dressing up or removing said dressing, color me envious.

Second, any particular fandom pay the bills better than others?

Now that I'm asking I realize I probably don't actually want to know.

Shelbyeileen ,
@Shelbyeileen@lemmy.world avatar

I specialize in powerful/domme energy characters, because unless you look like a little girl, you don't make money off the sweet/girl next door characters.

My most popular are Lady Dimitrescu (Resident Evil), Cammy (StreetFighter), Mad Moxxi (Borderlands), so video games, win!

Oh, and Velma... my most subscribers ever were for that set, but I shot with a porn star and it was my first girl on girl set. 😅

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