Still looking for that elusive job that I could realistically get...
1. With prior experience only as a software developer, and briefly as a high school CS tutor.
2. Having been largely unemployed for the past 4 years.
3. Where talking to an actual human as you're doing the work is okay.
4. As a middle-aged guy who isn't particularly fit or charismatic.
@jimmy_insane That's a very broad question. What do you mean?
@thor
What do you think of working in a blue collar sphere? Is it disgraceful or unrewarding in Norway? What reputation do the blue collar jobs have here?
@jimmy_insane Not particularly glamorous. The jobs are often held by immigrants from poor countries. You sometimes see locals doing them. My next-door neighbour is a Polish guy who works in construction. He rents a tiny apartment just like me, despite having a job. He smokes and drinks a lot and isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer.
@jimmy_insane He reminds me a lot of a stereotypical blue collar worker from somewhere like New York. "Joe the Italian plumber" type. Including a short temper. Not all immigrant blue collar workers are like that. But people who work in those jobs do seem to be pretty simple-minded. Not that there's anything wrong with being straightforward. But makes for some pretty boring conversation.
@jimmy_insane As I see myself, and my friends know me, I'm capable of some pretty brainy things, but they usually expect you to have some patience, endurance and reliability too. I'm easily bored. Bored out of my mind to the point where I can't concentrate. Bright kid, but never did my homework in school, so my grades suffered. In those cases, I get up to do stuff around the house, or take a walk, because my brain is trash for the rest of the day. Of course, you can't do that while you're at work, so you're just stuck there like some kind of idiot...
@jimmy_insane The worst feeling ever is to pretend to work, and to make up excuses for why stuff hasn't been done.
@thor the worse thing is to be promising but never to actualize your potential people keep talking to you about. I found myself in the situation, in which I feel I'm being gazlit by people into believing that I'm smart and promising but that's not due to their malice but otherwise - due to their politeness and gentleness and my misunderstanding of obvious things they see but I don't and will never do.
@jimmy_insane Being smart isn't all that it's chalked up to be, as I've come to discover. What does seem to count for a lot is everything I'm bad at: diligence, orderliness, patience, self-control, etc. The statistics show that there are medium-IQ college professors and high-IQ janitors.
That janitor with the high IQ might be smart enough to get a PhD, but would he have the motivation and patience for it? Probably not. He probably likes to work with his hands. Maybe he has science and maths as hobbies and is fine with that.
@thor good take. I would also add humane qualities of a man which are in the first place with the rest from intellect to skills being secondary.
So that's a danger of being called high IQ, you think you're too good for the work and destined to succeed.
Of course, there's also the fact that a PhD may not make as much as someone with a common skilled trade. They may be socially higher on the prestige ladder, but prestige doesn't pay your mortgage.
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