Working for ‘the man’? Self Employed?
What’s been happening or getting on your nerves?
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I’m a stay at home dad and the people I have working under me annoy the hell out of me. Most of the time I like them but there are times I wish I could sack them.
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I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing.
I got roped into a new job three weeks ago for which I have zero experience and I’ve spent every day since then trying to bootstrap my way to baseline competence. I thought I was helping a buddy out for a couple of weeks during a transition period. Then he said he wouldn’t let me do it for free, and would I sign on as a contractor. Then he said it made more financial sense to actually hire me. Now I’m the <redacted> Manager.
Last week everyone else in the company conspired to break something important that could have kept humming along for years without maintenance. It’s my job to fix it, in spite of having never touched it before in my life.
I think I did? I hope I did. We should know by the end of the day whether I’m a wizard or a madman. It will be pretty embarrassing if we have to call the previous guy.
Update: I am a wizard.
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I don’t know why anyone even needs to watch horror movies so long as Excel exists. (I mean, everything Windows but that in particular.)
The End. 
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I am semi-sorta still self employed but currently work the the local USPS in Maintenance/Custodial dept but I’m also the Safety Ambassador and Union Shop Steward for my local post offices as well as Regional Shop Steward for the Entire state of South Carolina 
I was full time self employed doing various services for the Spanish-speaking community. My late wife was from Mexico so she would communicate with the Latino community and I would help solve their issues while living/working in this country. It was a very profitable niche we had until she was diagnosed with uterine sarcoma back in June, 2016 and seven months later I’m burying her in her home town of Iguala, Mexico. I ran the business as best I could but knew it wouldn’t last so after working at Target part time for a year I got on with the post office in Sept. 2018. I still have my business license and use that for online ebay sales as well as product reviews on Amazon with my new wife (she’s a retired surgical nurse from Pittsburgh) so it’s some nice side money for us 
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Academic librarian with a side hustle writing for a few pop culture news sites.
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I work at a company that custom prints boxes as a graphic design specialist. It’s not the most thrilling job in the world, but I enjoy it. I don’t actually do much design work, I just make sure other people’s artwork is in good working order before we print. I was in creative fields for decades and it’s nice to be in a job where I don’t have to think so hard.
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I work for an international conservation NGO. I’ve been telecommuting for a decade, so at least the pandemic didn’t change that aspect of my job. As someone in the trenches with extinction, climate change, and all the rest of our fragile planet, you can imagine how grim some days are. We are working like mad, so I always have multiple projects in the air. I do love the work, but it’s hella hard.
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I’ve been self-employed since '97, and have had the same primary customer since '98. Similar to @FlyingSquid I’m a graphic designer who doesn’t really design much anymore. I do concert promotion work, mostly for a single major venue but also for promoters who need someone to handle overflow work or partial/whole tours. 99% of my job is taking someone else’s design (tour art, known as an admat) and converting it into umpteen different shapes and sizes with the date/venue/ticket info. The good/bad news is that the work never stops*.
*Unless, y’know, a pandemic shuts down the entire industry for 12 months.
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I didn’t do much graphic design work before this job, so I don’t really think of myself as a graphic designer despite my title. I worked as a video editor, audio editor and sound man when I lived in L.A. and when I moved back to Indiana, I worked in TV news, made commercials, and did marketing videos for a university before settling in to this job.
The last time I did graphic design work was in the 90s when I was hired by an early eBook company to make thumbnail book covers.
But everyone here says I do a good job, so I guess I’m doing it right.
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Civil Servant.
I’m a Team Leader in a Call Centre for a division of Service Canada.
Beyond that I oversee a team of 8 to 14 members serving the public, really can’t say too much more. Confidentiality, security and all that jazz.
That said used to work for Toys R Us, left during COVID when my location closed due to redevelopment, and I turned down a transfer. That job was less pay but way more interesting.
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Same! Different country and type of role though. I actually went to the Canadian Parliament and was completely blown away by the extent to which it looked like a scaled down version of the Westminster Parliament; right down to green and red colour seats in the lower and upper chambers. You even duplicate totally weird conventions like dragging the speaker (https://www.parliament.uk/about/how/role/traditions/).
Obvs yer Commonwealth so I shouldn’t have been that surprised. But DAMN it was a bit creepy!
Also I think @Starman might have my dream job!
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Never been to Ottawa, so never been in our HOC, but I have been in a replica of the British Parliament at the Granada Studio Tour in Manchester. 
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It’s actually very accurate, so you can skip the real thing!
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Good to know.
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I deal in 0s and 1s. Mostly 0s. Using the 1s sparingly is part of the art.
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There are 10 types of people in this world, you know.
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I did know that. I don’t know why, when I count on my fingers, people threaten to hit me when I reach 4.
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I’m a social worker. Things are different every day, which makes life interesting. Currently our computer system is being what I would diagnose as Oppositional Defiant (my caseload randomly disappears, or the entire system crashes). It’s supposed to be this way all week, which leads to the excitement of “will I get my work done before Friday at 5?” Every day is an adventure! 
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I write technical docs/knowledge base content for data network security software. Nobody reads it unless they’re already desperate and angry. It pays bills.
I also write for fly-fishing magazines, and edit an occasional outdoor sports book for a tiny imprint. It does not pay bills, but I do get to laugh a lot, and it has afforded me a network of couches to crash on for fishing trips to some really beautiful places.
I get to do all of this from home now, so it feels less like work. I’m never going back to a cubicle, and you can’t make me.
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