Since I'm not independently wealthy, and have a strong work ethic instilled in me by my parents (listen up, you lazy OWS bums), I have to actually WORK for a living. Which is fine by me- I'd rather be productive in some way.
I'm in the healthcare industry, and have been for almost 32 years. More specifically, I'm a clinical laboratory technologist. Ir requires a bachelor's degree in the sciences plus a year in an approved training school (not to mention passing a nationally-recognized agency exam) to become one. What I do is perform analysis on blood & body fluids and pass the results on to the physicians, who use these results to help in the diagnosis & treatment of their patients.
We are one of the most anal-retentive folks in the facility when it comes to accuracy of results- we run quality control on each & every thing we test every day (sometimes three times a day), plue we have to be able to spot problems as they occur & solve them. It's more than sticking a needle in someone's arm at 6 in the morning and pushing buttons. We are also one of the least-known departments in lab- usually our only visible representatives are the folks (called phlebotomists) who are out drawing blood specimens.
In my 32 years, I have worked in hospitals as small as 18 beds and as large as 1,000 beds, in urban & rural environments. All shifts, and in the case of the small places even taking call.
Currently I'm a supervisor for the evening & night shift in the facility I work at, a medium-sized medical center in northeastern Oklahoma. What I have largely learned is that crap not only rolls downhil, it can bounce back up. I have also learned that there is still a spot or two on my backside that hasn't been chewed on by someone higher-up. Except now, it's also for someone else's mistakes. Fortunately, it doesn't happen very often...........
Most likely, I'll be doing this job all the way to retirement, God willing. I've had some good times and some less-than-good times, but overall it's been rewarding.
