Cant do it anymore

I say this, the Sea had a powerful awful pull on me... Part of my family traces back to fort street in 1795, in Baltimore. It's a number three port int he USA at one time.

But heavy equiptment is where it's at, them tonkas is play time with finesse not work at all. Id do it for free eith either a light D9 or a CAT wheeled loader. but don't tell anyone that.

 

Tampa

Interesting that you mentioned that because I am your age and also worked in various industries. Retail, pizza delivery, HVAC field, trucking. Even tried my luck in auto sales which failed miserably. LOL I enjoy driving just not OTR for weeks at a time. I'm too much of a homebody even though my "home" is the size of most people's closets.

 

I hear ya, Playboy.
10 months at it, I dig the job, I'm pretty decent at it... but the weeks away from home, the people and community I care about. That's rough. Dispatchers always trying to get more time out of me... there's even an incentive ON TOP OF the incentive for Maine drivers to team up and support New England thru the holiday hullabaloo... I feel alot like @BostonTanker in that I'm so close to the 'magical' year that I should just stick it out. And on the other hand, I feel like I've already wasted a bunch of my time and I have no reason to just say '#### it' and go local. Leave this 'living' in and babysitting a truck to the guys that want to avoid or don't have a home to go to.
I'm torn, clearly. But I get a little bit more pissed off everyday. Historically that isn't a good thing.

 

Well I did take a slight pay cut but not by much and I'm home every day and work four 10hr shifts a week as a security guard at a casino 3 miles from my house.

 

Definitely have done security jobs before. I'm also looking at other "short time frame" certifications such as phlebotomy in order to not be completely broke. Also, I've lived car-free for quite a time. If need be, take the hit with the vehicle, ride my bicycle and my DR-650, and keep one of my credit cards up and active for the occasional rental car. I'm in the middle of trying to get back into a company I was fired from a year ago, plus waiting on some other apps I put in for various local/regional trucking work. The milk/dairy pickup thing is getting on my last nerve and unless I could get put back into something simple like shuttling trailers to and from plants, a UPS handler job or some other thing outside of the cab is looking pretty fine right now.

 

You must see some interesting things doing that. Like the guy that has a meltdown after losing his whole weekly check in a few rounds of Blackjack.

 

I was very fortunate. When I was a young job hopper, it was absolutely nothing to quit a job cold in the morning, find another in the afternoon, and be working the next day. And like a number of posters here, I've worked numerous different kinds of jobs. I've also worked several jobs at one time, to the point of almost killing myself. And many of the fairly good jobs I had, I also had another one part time. (Not money hungry, just divorced...'nuff said.)

OK, first off you lose the "I deserve it" attitude. (Not saying YOU have it FP, just in general.) Be willing to do things that others may not be willing to do. (As long as it doesn't involve prison time...) Get an education, or technical training. And I don't wanna hear about all the degreed idiots out there that can't find a job. So you have a PhD in underwater basket weaving, so what?
One thing to be sure is that wherever you get your education, if you are a part of a popular education, or trade, you will have to leave that particular geographical area, or you won't make any money. (If you graduate from a Food and Beverage school, don't expect to find local work that pays you anything. There's too many of you looking....)
Be willing to put in your time, and when you are working, ACTUALLY WORK! Untether yourself from your smart phone, your Ipod, and all the other gadgets and doo-dads that folks take to work with them. In other words, have a good work ethic. Without it, you'll just coast along, waiting for somebody to hand you something.
Is it easy to be "successful?" Hell no, but nobody told you life was easy, or fair.

I'm editing this to add another thought here; Being in the right place at the right time really helps, and quite often is just a matter of luck. OTOH, it might be that doing research and staying on top of whatever you want to do, can PUT you in the right place at the right time.

 

Some good thoughts there Don but any kind of school is not possible for me. There is an aviation mechanic school not far from where I live. I went in there several months ago out of curiosity. Bottom line, the school costs thirty five thousand dollars and $50k if you also want to get avionics certified. Supposedly there is a shortage of aircraft mechanics but the pay doesn't justify getting that buried in student loans. Especially considering it took me over a decade to pay off the $10k from HVAC school. Even if I wanted to go to that school I couldn't because I have to work full time or end up homeless.

 

Did you actually complete your HVAC school? If so, why in the world are you under employed in Florida?

 

Yes I completed it and got all the certifications. But it's been 13 years and I forgot literally everything having been out of the field almost that long.