Rule

People don’t want help, they want you to fix it.

They’re then not grateful you fixed it, they’re annoyed with you because it broke in the first place.

It’s a great job 👍

Everything's working. Why the hell are we paying for IT

This thing is broken. Why the hell are we paying for IT

Studied computers since I was 11, worked IT for 6 months when I turned 19. Now I hate technology and do exclusively handtool woodwork now.

handtool woodwork

hehehehehehehehehe
- Dick jokes are one the primary joys of woodworking.
The pipeline is real
As a 20 year IT veteran, first help desk, then sysadmin and now R&D, I am jealous. By the end of this year my cost of living will decrease significantly and I'm contemplating taking the financial hit for a career change.
- Ofc I can only go by this short description but I'd do it. In my former job I ended up with depression and it took me 1,5 years for recover. I didn't want to do 1st / 2nd lvl support any more but found a place in another city that I liked and it had the opportunity to opt-out of the support work or keep it to a minimum, once you're skilled enough to do other work.
  
  Now work doesn't get less but instead more, colleagues are - on a social level - find and I even made some friends, but they're so hard to work with. I just came back from a week off because I was sick and after 10 minutes reading my emails and teams chat I'd rather turn the computer back off and go back to bed.
  
  I don't hat the tech. Hell, I even tinker with it in my free time, made the switch from windows to Linux even though I'm a gamer. I got pihole and home assistant running and I'm planning on a home server / NAS for Jellyfin and other stuff. I like this things.. but people man.. they drive me literally crazy.
  
  But since I can't do anything else and I need the money to pay rent and buy food I can't just start another, badly payed, apprenticeship. I'm feeling stuck in a job that I despise because of the people in and around it. So if you have the change go get away from it and use the computer stuff as a nice hobby, do it.
Understandable
3 years helpdesk, just over 10 years now truck driving. Pairs well with selfhosted media at the house, but not working on other people's shit.
a combination of high tech and low tech is the ideal IMO, like being a farmer who uses manual/animal-pulled machines made using modern design and tooling, and gps on their phone in the pocket to stay on course, with a USB fan attached to the underside of the hat
- The blacksmiths who forged the blades I use had state of the art microscopes to analyze the steel structure of their blades. So my tools are high tech in a way.
  
  https://www.japanstones.com/dgyu
  
  Here is one of my favorite makers, Imoto Masao of the Dai-Dogyu brand.

To quote the youtuber, rights for repair activist and repair shop owner Salem Techspert: "You aren't working with Computers. You are working with people"

The computers aren't the problem, but the assholes using them.

It is something else to have to explain to seasoned techs that if they aren't parsing the issue as a people problem or a technical problem right off the bat, they are going to end up wasting a lot of time. Like how did you not come to this a long time ago? You can't fix people problems.
I mean, it's a lot more fun for him to clean off the "gooch" that's found in these nasty computers, and entertain us in the process.

This is why I absolutely love this guy.
The greatest technician that's ever lived

See the trick is to work with computers, not people. People are what fuck everything up. Especially if it's customers and not coworkers.

"Attempted to fix the issue, but the problem exists between the keyboard and chair."
- PICNIC. Problem in chair, not in computer.
This is the truth. Client and user support is often horrific, but if you can land something working with just the technology it can be pretty nice.
- I'm there now finally... I want to retire from here. The stress is just gone. Pure dev. No prod. No emergencies. No on call.

No diagnose, only fix!

Soul crushing. I'm incredibly good at the job but every morning, I look at my case queue and the shotgun on my shelf starts glowing purple.

I wouldn't have been good at any other career, but maybe I could have been happy while floundering.

That's cus the shotgun has no texture asset and is using the default "unknown texture". Check your texturepack
- Smh forgot to download CS: Source

NO! STOP PLAYING VIDEO GAMES!

PLEEEEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE learn for the tests for physics so you can actually study that. Or become a kindergartner if that doesn't work

Become a ~~kindergartener~~ MBA
- What's MBA?

The grass is always greener and all that. I spent the first 15 years of my adult life destroying my body in the trades. Sure the money was good, but the hours sucked and you're still dealing with idiots all the time. Maybe Tracie in accounting doesn't know to not click on every link she receives in her email, but at least she can write a coherent sentence and refrain from smoking crack in the porta-potties...

And don't even get me started on service work. People who can't use computers have nothing on people who can't change a light bulb or plunge a toilet.

I miss the church grandmas.

Nothing beats the feeling you get after an old black lady calls you "honey" with her eyes sparkling because you recovered all the pictures of her grandchildren from a computer Geek Squad had called a lost cause.