I gather company freight driving, OTR, pays from 40-80K a year.

Most likely all you say would be true. The sun is one thing you would have to deal with all the time and no AC to help. Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn thoughts, Mark Twain did work on steamboats on the river.

Trucking is what it is. Too many cars out there who have no respect for trucks. "He's in a big truck, what are you worried about" ; That was the first thing the passenger in the car, who cut in front of my husband said after the car was totaled on an Atlanta jersey barrier. She missed her exit of course and was 2 lanes over. This is the lawyers yapping fueling problems. He drives at night as much as he can. Government clapping down on truck drivers will be causing more problems with all the changes in HOS and everyone thinking they have the plan to keep drivers from moving around.

Dad worked and died on the railroad. He started eons ago shoveling coal in, then was brakeman, then made engineer finally. They worked around Lake Michigan and he had his sheeplined coat and the cap with the flaps that came down with sheeplining.. No AC or heat much either back then. I don't remember if it was 8 or 10 hrs sleep back then, but it wasn't supposed to be disturbed by work. They ran loads between Gary, Joliet, Rock Island, Blue Island, and I'm sure other places around there. No cars though, but was pretty well contained. Take your lunch and coffee, no restaurants on the road.

 

Oil rigger.

You can do it in IT too if you have a certain finesse with people. The problem with IT is people lacking in people skills are drawn to it and get into that field thinking it wont be an issue. They have all the analytical skills and abilities to troubleshoot and solve problems, but I've seen it time and time again, Sally in accounting doesn't care as much how fast her computer gets fixed, she wants that funny kid named James to go back to her cubicle and fix her computer so she can shoot the crap with him. People skills are very much is an issue. They will promote the guy under you with less than half your experience and knowledge because people like him better. He goes to all the company parties, remembers people's names, and has a way of making people feel good. It doesn't matter he doesn't get half the work done you do.

Office politics are a weird thing I never understood.

 

I have a degree in psychology also ( don't tell anyone, it freaks people out unnecessarily ) so I have the soft skills to "play the game" but I've always had this thing about shoveling bs in order to soothe people's egos in lieu of dealing w/ the truth. One actually solves problems, the other does not. Unfortunately there's a crap load of the former in corporate IT and it's big part of why I worked nights for most of my IT career just so I could stay out of the game. Now I'm just burned out and done w/ the whole thing.
Living in Houston I've known a few "rough necks", mostly guys that worked off-shore oil rigs. They make really good money but man does that seem like a hard life. Harder than being a trucker frankly.

 

I have to ask, what type of trucking are you doing, and what part of the country do you stay in?
In places, 40,000 may not be bad, depending on cost of living, but many places not so good. I was an equipment operator and bumping those numbers even in Texas in the late 70's and early 80's. I roughnecked for a short while in the 80's even when the oilfield was dead and did too, I can't imagine those numbers today, but the cost of living here is high too.

 

I drove with a former oil rigger for a couple of weeks. He told me don't let the image or the recruiters fool you. Oil riggers slack off a lot. It's probably still harder than trucking though, yeah. You can sit in your rig in your underwear with a heater flowing hot air in your face while the rough neck has to stand outside covered in mud looking at a pressure gauge or something.

He told me stories about how he would have to sleep in a day cab because companies don't put sleepers out there for everyone. It's also a feast or famine industry like driving. But he also told me if he had learned to save his money younger in life, he could be retired right now with all the money he made doing it.

He has good work ethic in the sense he's willing to work. But he's a bit hyper. Always turned and jerked the truck abruptly. Stacked pallets too fast and kept dropping boxes, breaking them open. Always GO GO GO. It drove me nuts. He would work hard to finish early so he could drive to a restaurant, drive to the gym, then drive to church. All I wanted to do was park and watch Longmire.

 

I wish they kept that show going. It sure was dramatic.

 

I had a really hard time getting into it at first. It felt like they were trying to hard to portray Walt as an hold fashioned modern day Westerner. But the characters grew on me. I read that the author of the Longmire novels has returned to Wyoming to write more.

 

There is very few newer shows on tv that I bother watching, but I did like longmire.

 

Who didn't like Vic?