What’s your job? Are you happy? What’s next?

[Note]

@Note In graphic design professionally, how do you deal with a client demanding low-resolution Jpeg data being entered into the final product? Do you denoise, then AI upscale it before vectorising, or just recreate it?

Good question, well it really depends on how that particular visual will be used (print or web), how complex the visual is, and the timeframe for getting the work done. I've recreated a lot of assets from scratch in the past, if the project wasn't a rush thing. For example, when laying out a research brief to be printed, if the accompanying charts and figures were all low-res, I would recreate them in Illustrator, so that we had vector files on-hand. Also, there are some Adobe Illustrator tricks to quickly vectorize something if the graphic is simple enough.

Nowadays, it's rare that we actually print something, almost all our materials are online only, so this type of situation doesn't come up as frequently.

[Ack]

@Ack: What's a Right-to-work state? I heard some storied from my brothers working out there. It was a different world back in the 90's at least.

Without getting too into the politics of it, a right-to-work state is a state that makes it illegal for companies, productions, etc., to require union membership. As a result, my union cannot operate as a hiring hall; members are competing with non-members (or out-of-state members) for the same jobs, and all crew on productions receive the same benefits regardless of union membership, with certain exceptions such as union-provided insurance and retirement plans.

[o.pwuaioc]

Ah, Anapan's union is a hiring hall. Lucky duck. I'm in a right-to-work state, which means my union can't operate that way.

You could always move to a civilized state. (Though, Georgia is moving towards Civilization, I'll give them that.) You might even have better luck than some(one in particular) if you wanted to move to NYC.

On a related note, I've been thinking of leaving my job for a while. Is it a good market for upper management yet, or should we wait it out a bit?

[marurun]

It’s always a better market for upper management than most of the rest of us, but I couldn't say if it’s up or down trend-wise.

[SpaceBooger]

I am in my 25th year as a middle school science teacher, track and cross-country coach. I love my job.
Not only do I teach and coach. I also run a 12-hour space simulation mission in a mock shuttle that used to be a storage closet. The students use MS Space Sim to fly the shuttle and an Apple }[ running "The Living Cell" as the life support system.
Before the pandemic, each teacher would teach a class about their hobby and I would teach the history of arcade games once a month where the students would learn and sample the important classic arcade games. This year I started a "Game Club" on Fridays that will be turning into an Esports team (MK, Smash, and chess only for now). In the game club, we play on a Switch (Smash), 2 Wiis (MK and various games), PS1-3, Dreamcast (Power Stone!), 2 Genesis (SF and NBA Jam), 2 NES (Bomberman 2), and a SNES (Dr Marion & Tetris) all running at the same time. The club also has several MTG and Pokemon card players.

[bmoc]

I am in my 25th year as a middle school science teacher, track and cross-country coach. I love my job.
Not only do I teach and coach. I also run a 12-hour space simulation mission in a mock shuttle that used to be a storage closet. The students use MS Space Sim to fly the shuttle and an Apple }[ running "The Living Cell" as the life support system.
Before the pandemic, each teacher would teach a class about their hobby and I would teach the history of arcade games once a month where the students would learn and sample the important classic arcade games. This year I started a "Game Club" on Fridays that will be turning into an Esports team (MK, Smash, and chess only for now). In the game club, we play on a Switch (Smash), 2 Wiis (MK and various games), PS1-3, Dreamcast (Power Stone!), 2 Genesis (SF and NBA Jam), 2 NES (Bomberman 2), and a SNES (Dr Marion & Tetris) all running at the same time. The club also has several MTG and Pokemon card players.

Your game club/esports team sounds really awesome! At my last job, I was approached to sponsor the gaming club which had aspirations of esports competition. I still regret having to turn it down but I had two young kids at the time and just couldn't devote the time to do it right.

I'll be at 25 years in education myself later this year. I've been at my current IT job for a little over 2 years now and things are still going well. It has been a vast improvement over my last job. I've got a great boss and coworkers. I mostly get to work on projects that interest me in between support requests.

Am I happy? I'm happy that I'm getting a decent paycheck and that the workload is manageable. However, I have to agree with Ziggy. I don't think I'll ever be truly happy working a fulltime job. Retirement looks more enticing every year and I've got another 20 to 25 years left to go if nothing goes wrong. Regardless, I aim to stay with my current employer at least another 8 years to qualify for a pension. So I guess the plan is to see how things are going in 8 years. My youngest will be college age by then so I may stick with it for the tuition discount (if she wants to go to college where I work).