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View Full Version : Who is your daddy, and what does he do?



Atcote
2011-06-11, 01:37 AM
... Except not really 'who' he is. More just what he does. And maybe not even your daddy, mums are okay too.

Basically, what did your father, mother or both do for a job/career, and how do you feel that has affected you (if at all)?

My father was a primary school music teacher. I don't think this has affected my choice to get into teaching myself (although it may have), but did cultivate in me an usually appreciation of the importance of music over its construction (I'm an abysmal composer). And my mother was a librarian, but I don't know if that's affected my passion in reading. I do love to write, however, and it did encourage me to emulate her near encyclopedic knowledge in the respective field (for her, books, obviously, for me, well, 'media' would be the oh-so-too vast term for it).

EDIT: I'm not just talking about how they influenced your occupation; your personality or interests or anything that this may have had an impact on counts too!

Title Reference Disclaimer: Please no references to gynecologists, unless that's actually what they did.

Mikhailangelo
2011-06-11, 04:00 AM
My father is a toolroom manager in a factory

I see no possible connection with this and my own position (I'm a law student)

RabbitHoleLost
2011-06-11, 04:24 AM
My dad does... stuff. I'm still not really sure, and he's explained it to me several times.
He works for a company called Xeta, which, as I understand, manages phone and computer networking in businesses like hotels and hospitals. My dad himself is a sales representative. That is to say, he gives quotes and is in phone conferences all day.

It is entirely unrelated to my position as a pharmacy technician.

Serpentine
2011-06-11, 04:25 AM
My mother is and always has been (since she got her qualifications, anyway) a doctor. It doesn't say so on my birth certificate, though, even though she was the primary breadwinner of our family. When I was born, she had to travel about half an hour away to a hospital in another town (in another state), because she was the only doctor in town and couldn't exactly midwife herself.
I think this has contributed to my interest in medical matters and biology, my inability to distinguish what is and is not appropriate conversation topic, and (through the various medical magazines we had lying around) an ability to look at spotty penises without getting excessively grossed out. I don't think that I would want to be a doctor if she weren't one, but it has definitely caused me to not want be one.

My dad has had a lot of jobs, including but not limited to: taxi driver, high school drama and English teacher, something at an art gallery, the owner of a theatre company, a something (manager?) at another theatre company, a substitute teacher, events coordinator for the Australia Day Federation Committee (or something like that), and is currently the Cultural Development Coordinator for a City Council. Although he desperately wants to leave that job now.
His jobs have effected me a lot more than mum's. Not so much the taxi driving and teaching (I was too young - or nonexistant - then). From the art gallery I got more of an interest in art, same for theatre for the theatre companies - I used to get taken out of school to go touring with shows, and it was great. From the latter, and the Australia Day one, I got a lot of social skills - shake hands properly, smile, answer questions properly, the art of conversation, good manners (and when to drop them), and so on: I accompanied him to various events and met several semi-famous and important people (former premier of NSW, actors, paraolympian, the Damtel guy, etc) and had to make good impressions. General cultural exposure, learned the joys of 5 star hotels (for a couple of nights a year, for free)... That sorta thing.

Icewalker
2011-06-11, 04:33 AM
My dad is the president of a non-profit organization, a think-tank that does work on global water issues, climate issues, and some integrity of science work. My personality is definitely influenced by my parents, but I think it's more due to what they are like than what they do. I know a lot more about certain environmentalist ideas because I've heard the details, but that's about all.

My mom used to be the president of another non-profit, which taught elementary school teachers how to teach science. Recently she's shifted, still basically doing the same thing, but instead of teaching to elementary school teachers she's teaching to college students, but same idea: how to teach really basic science in a really simple format to children. Despite this, I don't think it bled into parenting and day to day life much: I probably got more science growing up just because of the general higher education / scientist nature of my parents than because my mom did this kind of work.

Moonshadow
2011-06-11, 04:36 AM
I don't know what my dad does. I haven't seen him in a long time. He lives in France.

Totally Guy
2011-06-11, 04:53 AM
My dad is an actor. He's probably not been in anything that you guys will have seen although he auditioned for Gimli in Lord of the Rings.

In the last couple of years he's moved to California and auditions in Hollywood. But he also has started giving funeral services. He has a good speaking voice and the americans tend to like the british touch at such an event.

But he'd never previously had any money. Neither did my mum. They were separated. I always felt like the poor kid. However I was also taught how to speak "correctly", that was tied to income, so I've always sounded a little bit posh.

I never knew whether to nurture my creative side or my cold rational side. When I had to make a choice I went with cold and rational. I think my dad feels guilty for not being more successful as that influenced my choice.

I went on to get a job that pays me very well but grinds my soul down.

Maybe he was right after all.

Lady Moreta
2011-06-11, 05:03 AM
My father works as - okay, I'm not entirely sure what his job title is - I believe it's 'Airline Clerk'. Bascially he works for Air New Zealand at Christchurch airport - he sits in a room upstairs and does things like weight calculations to see how much weight a plane can carry and how much fuel they'll need, he talks to pilots as they're coming in and tells them which gate to go to (I've lost count of the number of times I've rung him at work and he's said "hang on I have to talk to this pilot" and I then listen to him talk to the pilot), sometimes goes out on the tarmac to direct baggage to the right plane, he does the 'passengers for flight xyz please proceed to gate 23' announcements. When it's really busy he helps on the checkin counters (used to be part of his main job, but isn't any more).

It's affected me - in a couple of ways I guess. One - travel. I have flown for free (or for cheap) my entire life because of Dad. He's been working for AirNZ for over 40 years and gets really good deals on flights. Because of that, I'm a good traveller and the idea of just up and flying somewhere doesn't seem strange to me. I think that probably contributed considerably to the fact that it didn't seem strange to me to move to Australia (of course, the man I married might have been a contributing factor there too :smalltongue:). Possibly the bigger impact has been the fact that Dad was a shift worker, so I got used to him not always being around, it depended on what shift he worked. But mostly, it gave me slightly screwed up ideas about how married couples live together. Because of his shift working, my parents haven't slept in the same bed since I was about 10. They haven't slept in the same room since I was 15. It wasn't til I turned 20 or so that it finally occurred to me that - that's not all together normal.

My mother is a high school teacher - never wanted to be a teacher, I've tried tutoring and I suck at it (my older sister is the teacher of the two of us). That affected me more in domestic ways - I got used to having a mother around a lot of the time, always home by 4pm, dinner by 6pm kind of thing. Got a bit of a surprise when I moved over here and got married and we're lucky if we're eating tea by 8pm, since I don't even get home til 6pm myself. Mum worked as a secretary before she became a teacher and I suppose that has affected me, since I currently work as a receptionist/office admin. I inherited her speedy typing and computery know-how.

CynicalAvocado
2011-06-11, 05:14 AM
dad is a biomed tech (he fixes medical equipment)

mom used to be a radiology tech (MRI's and stuff)

Castaras
2011-06-11, 05:23 AM
Dad's a lawyer, and mum's a legal clerk. As part of work experience through my school a couple of years ago, I sat through one of dad's mornings in a magistrates court. Taught me that I really didn't want to go into Law. :smalltongue:

But they've less affected me through their jobs, more through their passions and personality. Mum is an artist, and also used to be an amateur astronomer. She can be very stubborn and a little nervous around people but is really kind and over the years I'm finding I'm seeing things more and more her way. From her, I'm also rather stubborn at times, and I'm also nervous around people. But I also have artistic talents (not much, but some. :smalltongue:), and I can probably talk quite a bit about astronomy. It's the reason I took Physics, because astrophysics is awesome.

Dad is a writer, and reasonably good with technical stuff. He taught me how to program in Visual Basic when I was 9, and while I've tried my hand at writing, I "grew out" of my writing phase middle of secondary school (middle school for americans? Maybe high school? Your education system is confusing. :smalleek:). But the main way he has influenced me is music. He loves listening to music, and I seem to have inherited music tastes from the 70s and 80s rock scene, for some reason... But then again, I've also inflicted on him some symphonic and heavy metal... Which we now can talk for ages about. It's awesome.

But the biggest influence they've had on me would be D&D. Yep, I'm gaming spawn. Every weekend when we're not doing anything else they'll tell us not to disturb them as they disappear into their gaming world, and for the couple of days around that time I'll hear so much about their characters. For instance, this morning mum was talking about how this evening she's gonna go find a spectre in a dungeon and ask for its autograph and ask it to look at their special spectre killing artefact. And Dad was giggling manically and then they went on to some snake priest person who's joining them. Yeah, I had no hope, did I? :smallcool:

And they also have played some of the more strategy computer games - they introduced me to Civilisation and Myst. Their biggest "mistake" was giving me my own computer though... now they hardly ever see me 'cos I'm stuck in my dark room with just the internet for company. :smalltongue: :smallamused:

Most of all though, they've turned me into what I'd say is a nice person. Which is awesome. I love my mum and dad. ^.^ Don't tell them I said that though... they might get big headed.

Serpentine
2011-06-11, 05:27 AM
My dad used to DM for his students, but I didn't know about that until after I played D&D. I got my interest in popculture, theatre and history from my dad, and interest (if not so much belief) in religion, science and scepticism from mum. Fantasy a bit of both.
My parents are very different people...

Melayl
2011-06-11, 05:41 AM
My father is a Lutheran pastor. I suppose (beyond religion) it helped to influence my desire to care for others and to help as many people as I'm able to. I'm a nurse now. It did tell me that I don't want to be a pastor (they have less vacation time than the only doctor living in a rural area...).

It also influence how I make friends. Dad started Seminary before I started school, and it required us to move every couple of years (internships and whatnot). I got used to adjusting to new groups of people, and having a core of a few "good friends" and a wider group of "friendly aquaintances". I'm still good at adjusting to new groups of people.

Mom's held a lot of different jobs: daycare, medical insurance coder, insurance adjuster (others I forget at the moment).

CrimsonAngel
2011-06-11, 06:23 AM
My dad works at HP, but that's not important right now. What movie is this quote from, again?

Mathis
2011-06-11, 06:27 AM
This is a cool idea for a thread! Well, my dad has been in a lot of different work, such as: bus driver, teacher, chef (the traditional meaning, someone highly skilled in professionally preparing food for others), taxi driver, lumberjack, Special Needs Teacher, was a soldier with the UN peace corpse clearing mines and IEDs for 5 years in Lebanon during the 80s, truck driver, mechanic. The guy has had tons of education in quite a bit of different lines of work.

My mother on the other hand has stayed in one line of work most of her life. She's been a waitress and a cleaning lady, but most notably she's been managing a kindergarten for the past 10 years. My parents haven't influenced my choice of education or career much, that honor would go to my cousin. Of course I have both my mother and father to thank for instilling a love of reading in me, and I'm sure almost all of my mannerisms come from my father as we move, talk and look much the same way.

Mathis
2011-06-11, 06:37 AM
Edit: Doublepost.

Atcote
2011-06-11, 06:46 AM
What movie is this quote from, again?

Kindergarten Cop, with ol' Arnie Nameineverlearnedtospellger, but it's not like you don't know who I mean.

Basically, shouts of 'My daddy looks at vaginas alllll day!' or similar tend to come up if people know the source, so it's best to avoid that from the get go.

CrimsonAngel
2011-06-11, 07:25 AM
Schwarzenegger. I totally did not google it. I totally did.

wxdruid
2011-06-11, 07:25 AM
My Father is a retired school teacher. For ~36 yrs or so, he taught Art and German to Middle and High School students in the Denver Public School System. My Father is the don't mess with me I won't do anything to you kind of person. You can't tell just by looking at him, but start with the childish behavior and you'll get put in your place, he has no tolerance for idiocy, and neither do I. Both of us have no tolerance for practical jokes. It's taken several years for him to unwind from being a school teacher for so long.

My Mother worked for the National Park Service before she got married to my Father. She was a housewife til we were old enough and then she worked for the Census Bureau for a long time.

Trog
2011-06-11, 08:02 AM
My father is a bowling center proprietor (nearly retired). When I was young he worked for a large international air conditioning manufacturer in their corporate office. And before I was born he was in the army as a paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne Division. Prior to that he managed a local drug store when he met my mom. And I suppose he worked on farms as a youth.

My mother was a stay-at-home mom raising us three kids. She did publish a little cookbook thingy once though and had a short stint on the radio talking cooking and such afterward.

None of this relates to my profession as a graphic designer. But they taught me how to be the person that I am today and for that I am eternally grateful. :smallsmile:

RebelRogue
2011-06-11, 08:24 AM
My dad is a carpenter (though he's held quite a few jobs where he did other stuff), and so were his father and his father's father and so on for at least five generations back. Me, I'm a physicist teaching math (high school level), so no, he didn't really affect me as far as career choice goes. The great thing is, that there was never any pressure from him or mum for us to go into any specific career, and thus we've chosen freely according to interests. My brother is a chef. This is probably more due to mum than anything else, as she's been working in canteens a lot (she's actually a tailor by trade, but has never worked as such). But we've both got an (un)healthy interest in food and its preparation; it's always been important to our family.

Insert Name Here
2011-06-11, 08:25 AM
My dad is a computer programmer, turning out to be one of the more competent people in his workplace. He is also possibly the most reasonable man alive. It sometimes frustrates me when I'm trying to get at him, teenage son and all.

My mother is a professional author, who goes by Michelle Sagara, Michelle West, or Michelle Sagara West in some cases. She is pretty blunt and also logical and reasonable as well. I think a few people on these forums know of her. At any rate I'm her son, hi?

My parents raised me with an excess of logic and no care as to what's "normal", so as an aspies child I sort of won the parent lottery.

Eldan
2011-06-11, 08:32 AM
My father? Heh. Let's run down what he told me. Defender on the national hockey team. Potential anarchistic terrorist (our country had a list of those in the 60s). Hippie. Elementary school teacher. Psychiatric nurse (night shift with the more dangerous patients). Law student (would be a Bachelor's degree these days). Back to teaching, this time art teacher for adults and German teacher for foreigners. Back to psychiatry, became a head nurse (loose translation) of an entire station. Now back to night shift, because he "wants to work alone because his co-workers annoyed him".
How he influenced me? Well, I'm a biologist. That's probably connected to his job, he tends to be very savvy in psychiatry and medicine (mostly first aid, but still, he can cut someone down from hanging themselves with a shower curtain and revive them), that comes with being alone with twenty very sick patients for twelve hours for twenty years, I guess.
Oh, and a few valuable pieces of advice. Mostly "Son, if you want to study something at the university, don't decide not to do it just because your father told you to." The story behind that was that my grandfather told him that he should study Law. My father, stubborn silly teenager that he was, decided to become a teacher instead to spite him. When he actually studied it later, he really, really loved it, but had to support a family and had to give it up again soon later.

DraPrime
2011-06-11, 08:32 AM
Hmmm, well my father sort of went through three different kinds of jobs during my lifetime. First, he was a mathematician. He's got a PhD from MIT, so it was the career he originally intended to have. Unfortunately, when my mother divorced him he suddenly had to care for a 1 year old child (me) almost entirely on his own, so suddenly he needed a better paying job. So my dad latched onto the software boom of the 90's, and started working there. He did that until i was about fourteen years old. At that point, he just started living off various investments of his, as he hated programming. In recent years he's become a math tutor, since he enjoys teaching, but hates doing it for large groups.

My mom is a psychologist by training, but she also latched onto the software boom. She's continued to work in this area since then, and currently does classified work for the UN, so I actually don't even remotely know what she does, other than that it's at an atomic research lab.

I think my father was the bigger influence, since he was the one who raised me the most when I was younger. Basically, he taught me to think with reason, and to be very perceptive. The man is a good thirty times more intelligent than I will ever be, and has the ability to notice things that no one else ever does. Ultimately, he gave a hunger for knowledge. However, I don't think his career really affected this. It's just the kind of person he is. Now I myself am training to become a Catholic priest, and I can't say my parents' careers somehow influenced that. Just felt called.

Mauve Shirt
2011-06-11, 08:43 AM
My parents' jobs have affected me directly, as their connections were able to get me a job where they work.

onthetown
2011-06-11, 09:30 AM
My dad was a plumber in a big city and made craptons of money until he had to take an early retirement due to disability, we moved to a small town where there's not much need for more plumbers, and he spent all of the craptons of money on booze.

It's driven me through college and inspires me to become successful enough to make craptons of money and not go on disability pension + spend money on booze. :smallamused:

Gullara
2011-06-11, 01:13 PM
My dad is a farmer. Been on for most of his life. He took over the family farm only a few years after leaving high school.

My mom is a stay at home parent. Quite the job when one has five sons. :smalltongue:

I think the only way it influenced me is that I know I don't want to be a farmer myself. :smalltongue:

arguskos
2011-06-11, 01:51 PM
Dad's had two real jobs in my lifetime (that I can remember), both self-employed. The first was a graphic design business that he was fantastically successful at, but ended up draining his soul (something about working 20-22 hours a day and neglecting your kid seemed to not be very fulfilling), so he switched gears into his current line of work. These days, he does a little design on the side, but mostly is a landlord and property renovator.

Mom has worked for McDonald's Corporate in the Accounting and IT divisions for the last 16 years, and is currently traveling every week for a special initiative they've got going on right now. She seems very happy with her work and with her ability to climb the corporate ladder.

As for their influence on me (I'm an English student, looking to become a professor), all I can say with certainty is that Dad showed me what NOT to do (read: neglecting family in favor of money) and that both of them have illustrated to me that if you want something, you need to work hard and really go for it. Sadly, I haven't exactly lived up to their expectations yet, so perhaps I need to pay more attention to their examples.

Lady Tialait
2011-06-11, 02:02 PM
My dad is a handy man, computer tech, and mechanic.......freelance, also known as unemployed. He doesn't list that when asked, as he is still on college, and has almost 35 years of college on the same subject matter. Computer Science. My dad is a professional student really. My dad is a bit anti-social, and a bit paranoid. He gained the money to be a professional student from his father. So, I think i'll go into that.

My Grandfather was a professional money maker, he started by getting a farm, that he sold to get enough money to start up his first business a low interest loan company. At the time there was a lot of need for loans, and he made a great deal of money in that field, after that he retired to the stock market. He made a lot of money that way, and all of this from a guy who dropped from the third grade! He decided his children would get as much education as they wanted. And my eldest aunt is a bank cleric, and my youngest aunt is a nurse. This left my dad, who is a professional student, learning a subject that is ever changing.


As for my mother, she is a LPN, and loves it.


How all this influenced me? Well, I love staying at home, I dislike going out, same as my dad. And I love taking care of people, I guess that comes from seeing my mom. However, I've seen the hell of dealing with a lot of people, and I kinda am afraid of it. So, it shaped me into a housewife!

Lord Fullbladder, Master of Goblins
2011-06-11, 03:46 PM
Parks and Recreation. My dad works at/in and maintains the Skating Rink, swimming pool, and the parks around our little ol' town. Pruning trees, managing pH levels, driving the zamboni, getting the occasional horrifying lungful of ammonia, he does a lot of stuff over the year.

My mom was trained in waitressing, but she's been in retail for years. Now she's assistant manager at the local Bulk Foods/Movie Rentals place. Yeah.

Orzel
2011-06-11, 03:56 PM
Father works for an insurance corporation and used to do taxes.
Mother works for a health insurance corporation.

I grew up think Big Business wants rock to fall on me when I hit 80.

JOKE'S ON THEM! At 79, I'm wrestling bears.

GrassyGnoll
2011-06-11, 04:00 PM
My parents are both attorneys. Father does litigation, mother does worker's compensation. My sister is a doctor-in-training.

And I am the youngest. No pressure, right?

factotum
2011-06-11, 04:10 PM
My mother was of the generation where you got married and didn't go out to work--she did do some secretarial stuff after me and my twin brother were born to make ends meet, I think, but mostly she was just a housewife. Father's been dead 22 years--I believe he had all sorts of jobs, but I'm not sure what any of them were beyond the fact he worked at Barclaycard for as long as I can remember. I started my career as a computer programmer and moved on to IT systems administration, so I'm not seeing any links here...

Aidan305
2011-06-11, 05:33 PM
My Dad's a respected political scientist, and Vice-Provost of a major university. And I always feel like I'm bragging when I say that. He helped me get in to and through college on a course that I loved (music). He's also most certainly a major influence on my own desire to go in to academic life.
My Mum has spent her life working for various non-profit organisations. From her I get my love of music, gardening, and life in general. She also, however, encouraged me in procrastination through seeing her frequently working herself to exhaustion.

ImaginaryGirl
2011-06-11, 05:56 PM
Particle physicist. And yet I'm terrible at physics....go figure.

SDF
2011-06-11, 06:25 PM
Bob's my dad!

Oh, I get it. Um, well my dad was in the Marine Corps during the Vietnam War. He didn't go to Vietnam mind, instead they taught him Spanish and had him spy on the Reds at Gitmo. Translation: he sat around all day washing the general's jeep, and playing first edition D&D. Now I didn't find out he was a gamer until I was 19 and already into D&D (Thanks for telling me dad). After he got out he got a MS in civil engineering from Stanford and an MBA from MIT. He worked for the fortune 500 company Boise Cascade managing multiple hundred million dollar projects. Now he is the chief of facilities at the veterans hospital in Boise.

My mother is an RN working in endocrinology.

Neither of my parents' careers has affected what I want to do, though I'm sure how the raised me has. My maternal grandfather has had much more of an influence in that regard. He was a doctor and a lawyer with a Ph.D in biophysics. That's more the route I'm interested in.

Nibleswick
2011-06-11, 07:05 PM
My dad was a Genealogist (the study of family history). He worked for the LDS Church cataloging records. It was from him that I learned to love history, not that I want to be a historian mind you. He also taught me logic and how to act responsibly. I thing two of the most important things I learned from him were a sense of Duty and Independence.

Don Julio Anejo
2011-06-12, 04:58 AM
My dad used to be a synchronized interpreter. Sometime halfway through he had a midlife crisis, got an MBA from a high-end US school and opened a hedge fund with a business partner. Then they decided the fund was too stressful (from the whole logistics/paperwork perspective, not from the actual managing it, which was pretty fun). Now what he does can best be described as a "daytrader," even though he spends most of his time on the couch with my mom, my former cat and tea/whiskey/tequila while talking on Skype and reading econ and finance blogs. Still does pretty well daytrading though. If only his partner would stop making bonehead trades for the sake of making bonehead trades...

Mom? Used to be a chef, although she hurt her back during her first job lifting 30 pound pots and pans and it only got worse over the years so she doesn't work anymore.

Neither really affected my choice of career. Well, maybe my dad did - I realized I have a burning hatred for anything office and want to stay as far away from them as possible. And my mom taught me how to cook, but it's not something I enjoy doing more often than once every 2-3 days. Although my dad is very intellectual while at the same time remaining extremely grounded in real life (probably a byproduct of growing up in the USSR and knowing that a communist system just won't work, unlike all the hippie left wing liberals who have a nice working theory that models economic behaviour of spherical horses in vacuum). I inherited this outlook, which makes me weirdly naive and cynical at the same time.

So, I'm in the process of becoming a doctor, or, (recent idea), cop working with youth.

Inhuman Bot
2011-06-12, 08:24 AM
My father is a former businessman, soldier, chef and crook. He's currently retired, though.

thorgrim29
2011-06-12, 12:04 PM
My dad's a business manager, used to manage plants for Baxter, now he does the same for Getinge, they keep wanting to promote him but he doesn't want to move the family again at least until my sister (the youngest) is in college. My mom used to do clerical accounting stuff, but she quit shortly before I was born (I'm the eldest of 3) and now she does volunteer work 15 or so hours a week.

Oh and I'm taking the entrance exam to eventually join the order of Certified Management Accountants of Canada next week (I really should be studying actually...), I'm finishing my Bachelor's Degree in (you guessed it) Management Accounting this summer, and I'm doing an MBA right after. So yeah, I got the business bug from my dad.

grimbold
2011-06-12, 02:03 PM
my dad is a sales manager for an adhesives company

AtlanteanTroll
2011-06-12, 02:42 PM
Uh, my dad works in energy. Specifically Green Energy. Whatever the heck that actually means. He used to work for the City (not saying which :smallwink:), but now he's semi-retired doing consulting. Right now he's working for IGS Gas and just got their new headquarters certified LEED Platinum.

My mom's a College Professor for a small Liberal Arts College where she teaches Peace and Global Studies. She went to the USSR every year during the 80s, so she knows a bit about that. Last year she took sabbatical and worked for a Congressman.

Yeah. I'm a student in High School, so IDK. I sort of want to do something law related..

GallóglachMaxim
2011-06-12, 03:37 PM
My mum was an HR manager for an oil company, which led to us being moved around a lot until I was twelve or so (England, France, Egypt, England again, Peru, Australia, she's now working in the US after a decade or so of more stable work). Some slightly odd perspective things out of that, very little sense of home identity, don't see my extended family more than once every two or three years (and a few of them less than that).

My dad did social impact assessment, first for the UN and then privately as a consultant for mining companies. So most of my childhood my parents were working either very full time or elsewhere. I got used to spending a lot of time by myself.

I probably picked up my interest in history from both my parents (what they both originally studied), and from some of the interesting stuff I got to see growing up. Plus got pretty good at packing up on short notice, and reestablishing myself in a new place.

Flickerdart
2011-06-12, 03:54 PM
My entire family is some denomination of programmer, mathematician or physicist. So naturally I am studying graphic design.

Remmirath
2011-06-12, 04:25 PM
My parents are both sys admins, or have been for the majority of their careers.

One is currently an applications analyst/database administrator for a community college (which does get me a nice discount, but that doesn't really count as influential I'd say), has done some freelance art, music, was at one point a programmer for a small computer game company, has degrees in physics and math, was going to be a veterinarian (but is too allergic to rabbits), and worked at a place-not-to-be-talked-about for quite a few years (in other words, classified).

The other (who I don't live with, but visit frequently) is currently semi-retired and a writer/web designer, most recently worked in the local college's LGBT Resource Centre, once taught computer science in college, and... I think that's it, aside from doing a lot of volunteering at the same theatre company I do things with. Perhaps I don't speak to her about these things as much as I could. :smallconfused:

Anyhow, the only influence career-wise any of that has had on me is that I know I want to do what I like - which is art - and make it work somehow. Non career-wise, all the computer-related stuff is probably why I've always been pretty good with computers (and possibly also why people keep getting me to fix their computers for them).

Hobby-wise I'm more influenced by my parents; D&D, reading, art, listening to music, writing, computer gaming... pretty much all the stuff I like most are things that they also do (and mostly got me into in the first place :smallbiggrin:). Theatre's the exception to that.

KuReshtin
2011-06-12, 04:41 PM
My dad owns a clothes store and has done so for the past 25 or so years.
Before he got that store, he worked in the rivel clothes store just across the street, and all in all, I believe he's worked about 45 years in the 'seling clothes' business. He's supposed to be retired, but he's not been able to retire properly because of some health issues of my mom's that have piled up in the past year or so.

He also worked as a paramedic for a few decades when I was younger, but that was on an on-call basis on evenings and weekends.
His working as a paramedic got me wanting to become a paramedic as well, but instead I ended up working in IT, primarily tech support.

My mom was a housewife when I grew up, andalso had the occasional stints as being a daycare mom, so we tended to have a lot of kids at our house at times when I grew up. When my dad bought the store, though, she started working there. Currently, she's on long term sick leave until about September because of going through cancer treatment.

CoffeeIncluded
2011-06-12, 05:28 PM
Both of my parents are lawyers. My work ethic, analyzing skills, and strong sense of justice are probably related.

thubby
2011-06-12, 10:09 PM
fathers a lawyer
mothers a... well, it's complicated, but a gross oversimplification is to say she tests software.

ZombyWoof
2011-06-12, 10:14 PM
My dad is an attorney at law in California. He specialized in corporate law for a time but I don't really know what type of law he's doing now. He won't admit it but he's extremely skilled at what he does: he's a brilliant man who's an exceptional speaker and has a presence about him.

He also is heavily involved with various charities and owns a furniture restoration business.

My mother is a CPA with JWaddell & Co. She is co-owner of the business with her 4ish partners. She also owns a lot of real estate around the country: at least 1 house in New Orleans, at least 1 condo in Hawaii (north shore of Kauai) and a new condo in Graeagle. Since she doesn't have time she instead donates very large amounts of money to charities, though a lot of her clients are non-profit (she at least used to audit the Crocker Art Museum yearly).

In addition she used to sit on the board of directors for the local zoo.

Revanmal
2011-06-12, 10:24 PM
My father was a prison guard and part-time construction worker. My mother is a personnel officer at the same prison complex.

Neither have really affected what I do or who I am, and I've never felt any desire to do either of their jobs.

Scarlet Knight
2011-06-13, 07:28 AM
My mother was a housewife, caring for 6 children. My father is a retired welder.

He help me choose my career by saying (in his broken English) : "Go to college & get a good job. Don't do what I do. Wear a tie, work in air conditioning. Be able to come home for dinner with you family."

pendell
2011-06-13, 07:34 AM
Before he retired, my father worked 30 years for the Internal Revenue Service. He was the very definition of 'honest cop'. He passed on to me a tradition of work ethic and rigorous integrity.

Of course, we moved around quite a bit, so both he and I were aliens in every city we lived in. The taxman never has many friends, and I lived in government housing which typically didn't have other kids my age, so I grew up alone with books.

I came out of the experience ... a little weird.

My mother was a substitute teacher aspiring to be a full time teacher, but every time she got near completing the credential requirements for the state she was in, we'd move out of state and she'd have to start over from scratch in a new state. So she never achieved her dream of being a real, permanent teacher.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

_Zoot_
2011-06-13, 07:49 AM
Both of my parents were Officers in the Army, my Mother was a Dental Technician and my Father was in the Infantry. My Dad moved from the Army when I was young-ish (I still have the Snorlax plushy that they let me choose as a celebration of him changing jobs!)

I had stuff to say here, but after trying to write it, it didn't work. So in summery, my Dad is awesome. And I would be an infinity worse person with out him.

Extra_Crispy
2011-06-13, 07:55 AM
My father is retired from the Air Force, 28 years, retired as a Master Sargent. Now works at a school as a bus mechanic. He has been a mechanic all his life. Worked on the weapons systems of the A10 for most of his Air Force career, and always worked on the family cars. As a matter of fact I have never owned a car that we did not build or repair in some way. Also never spent more than 3000 on a vechicle so it has saved me lots of money. My father is seriously gifted when it comes to working on vechicles. One car I owned had a leaking vaccuum pod that helped operate the carberator. The only place that had it was the dealer and they wanted 300 for a new one. Well he looked at the carberator on his car for about 10 min then (without measurements) walked over to the garage and using some old angle iron he had and a metal cloths hanger made and bolted on a mechanical replacement for that vaccuum pod. Worked so good that years after I got rid of that car, my father was working at a shop, not the school, at the time, and that car came in. It still had the mechanical replacement on it and the new owner told him that that part still worked great.

My mother spent much of her life as a house wife, which raising me and my older sister made for more than a full time job. :smallamused: Now she drives a special needs bus at the same school my father works at.

And how that has affected me: Well I know alot about cars. I could probably take an engine apart and put it back together with only a book on torque specs and such. As well as a good work ethic. Though I am now a Nurse and dont want to work on cars I still have that knowledge and all it can do is help.

Kobold-Bard
2011-06-13, 12:25 PM
12 years ago my dad's job title was "Quality Control Manager" for a company that makes flavourings. Since then this has changed multiple times, but I long since stopped remembering what they are. He is some sort of manager, has a team of 30 + 2 secretaries & his team have their own lab for some reason.

My mum did assorted minimum wage jobs after my dad left, the longest of which was as a school dinner lady. My step-dad worked at BT since the age of 16, took early retirement recently & the amount they received meant my mum felt it was time to do the same , and is now a "lady of leisure" as she puts it.

MY dad's job hasn't affected me at all because I loathed chemistry & disliked all science/maths subjects, which are his bread & butter.

My mum's jobs mean equally little to me these days, except that I can do a full load of dishes in 1/2 the time it would take most people & won't buy from Greggs after they refused to let her leave after burning herself quite badly.

Pika...
2011-06-14, 01:18 AM
I don't know what my dad does. I haven't seen him in a long time. He lives in France.


Well, consider yourself better than some. Mine is a homeless bomb last I heard. Guy is a con-artist crook who took my mother, and every woman who has had his kid(s) for everything they had.

I hope that by next year I will be getting a text message saying Happy Father's Day from my bmama, and that I end up a much better one than mine was. :smallsmile:

Xanmyral
2011-06-14, 01:24 AM
My father was a general practice doctor. Mother is the owner of a small store.

My mother, career wise, doesn't really influence my life by much. My dad however got me into both computers and D&D/video games/reading books. I plan to later go into some computer related field, probably as a coder of some kind or another, so I would say that while he has influenced me, his job never had.

Anuan
2011-06-16, 01:37 AM
My mother's a bowen-therapist that runs her own business. Previously she was a nurse and a secretary for a chiropractor. Before I was born, she was a dental nurse, and also had a burger-flipping job in her youth that to this day makes her pedantic about the order ingrediants must go in when making burgers at home.

My father's a Field Supervisor with Queensland Rail. Basically, he's one of the "Higher ups." Before that he worked through the ranks of QR for a -long- time (most of his life.) Before that, he worked on farms as a stockman, for cattle and sheep. Also at some point he was a greasemonkey.

I now work with QR as well, though not necessarily because I want to be like my dad. I needed to get a job, we live 40km out of town and there's not much going around there. There were vacancies, and I applied. I got in. It's possible that dad used a little pull to get me to the Night Shift here in Brisbane so I could come home on weekends and not die from the heat (getting used to the physical labour was difficult even with shorter worktimes and cooler nightshift), but I don't know for sure and I couldn't really get an answer out of him if I tried.