OT - Do any of you guys have side gigs?

@Botch I hear ya. One of my closet friends used to do rentals. After tenets burned down two of his houses he called it quits. The final straw was when a woman piled everything her cheating boyfriend owned into the living room, gassed it and torched the place. 

My grandparents were in real estate and had lots of rentals.  They were a classic story of the American Dream.  Both started dirt poor, but worked their butts off and ended up doing very well for themselves.  They put three grandkids through college, including me.  But watching them deal with rentals over the years...I have no interest in that at all.  My mom is helping my grandpa with them now, and they're working on getting them sold off and out of their hands.

My dad had a side gig, he did wedding videos in the metro ATL area (Gaddis Video) for 30yrs, part of that full time.  He's phased it out now though, he's burned out, and doesn't need the extra income.  Me and my sister are both grown and out of the house.

My side gig was part hobby turn business part wanting some additional source of income in case I get laid off.  Consulting engineering has lots of work to do...but not always where you live, and I will never be one of those Company Men who uproots his family and moves for a job.  Seen it happen too many times and then they still get laid off when things slow down.  At my previous employer a guy spent about a year leading a project in India, then finally sold his house and moved his wife and kids over there with him, and 3 weeks later the client canceled the job.  He didn't get laid off, just moved to a new project, but he came back to the States, had to buy a new house, etc.  Bump that.

Anyhow...3yrs of side gig and it grew to where it was tough to keep up with it.  Then we decided to move to be closer to family, so I'd have to leave my day job anyways, so now is the time to try and take it full time and see if it'll go.  Here's hoping!!

He gets the silicone at Home Depot!

I've got a part-time sign business - mainly truck lettering and small decals.  It's dying down though.  Lots of competition and technology changes.   

johnkitchens said:

dgaddis1 said:

My grandparents were in real estate and had lots of rentals.  They were a classic story of the American Dream.  Both started dirt poor, but worked their butts off and ended up doing very well for themselves.  They put three grandkids through college, including me.  But watching them deal with rentals over the years...I have no interest in that at all.  My mom is helping my grandpa with them now, and they're working on getting them sold off and out of their hands.

My dad had a side gig, he did wedding videos in the metro ATL area (Gaddis Video) for 30yrs, part of that full time.  He's phased it out now though, he's burned out, and doesn't need the extra income.  Me and my sister are both grown and out of the house.

My side gig was part hobby turn business part wanting some additional source of income in case I get laid off.  Consulting engineering has lots of work to do...but not always where you live, and I will never be one of those Company Men who uproots his family and moves for a job.  Seen it happen too many times and then they still get laid off when things slow down.  At my previous employer a guy spent about a year leading a project in India, then finally sold his house and moved his wife and kids over there with him, and 3 weeks later the client canceled the job.  He didn't get laid off, just moved to a new project, but he came back to the States, had to buy a new house, etc.  Bump that.

Anyhow...3yrs of side gig and it grew to where it was tough to keep up with it.  Then we decided to move to be closer to family, so I'd have to leave my day job anyways, so now is the time to try and take it full time and see if it'll go.  Here's hoping!!

If you don't mind me asking who did you work for in Augusta? 

CH2M Hill was my previous employer.  I think they just go by CH2M now?  They closed the Augusta office 2yrs ago, some folks transferred to Spartanburg/Greeneville, but most of us stayed and re-opened as the engineering arm of Century 3 Inc, which was a great change that I kind of hate to leave.

And for the record, I wasn't trying to call CH out.  I've seen lots of folks be the Company Man and get the shaft from all sorts of companies.  CH actually did right by me for the most part.  When the recession hit they tried to keep as many folks as they could, instead of laying people off they essentially made them part time, where we could work so long as we had billable work, but if not we stayed home without pay, but, we did keep insurance, continue to accrue time off, etc.  

My dad even had 4 different employers (accounting was his day job) in a 1.5yr time frame because everywhere he went got bought out by a larger company and then shut down.  Same thing has happened to my mom several times.  I've been laid off when my office shut down, changed jobs once before I got laid off when the Great Recession hit, changed jobs again when my portion of a project was coming to a close, and changed jobs once because the job sucked and a better *much* higher paying job fell into my lap.

So watching my parents get laid off again and again when companies closed or downsized, and having to change jobs myself (4 moves in the 9yrs I've been out of college), having so many coworkes who've moved all over the country for various employers, all of that has lead me to want to be more independent, to feed myself so to speak, not rely on The Man.  Both of my grandpas worked for the same company in the same location their entire working lives, made decent money, and retired with good pension plans.  That world doesn't exist anymore though.

johnkitchens said:

dgaddis1 said:

If you don't mind me asking who did you work for in Augusta? 

CH2M Hill was my previous employer.

I have never heard of them. I worked in Augusta for a few years. I was just wondering where you had worked. 

The Augusta office used to be Lockwood Greene, which got bought by CH2M Hill, they're one of the largest consulting firms in the world.  We do consulting work with local manufacturing/chemical plants, so I've done projects in a lot of the local plants.

Cool.  I've done some work at Resolute Forest Products (fun trivia - largest user of electricity in GA until last year when a paper mill in Savannah took the lead), a little work at Kimberly Clarke, but most of my work has been in chemical plants doing piping work.  I've got some riding buddies that work at Textron and International Paper.

dgaddis1 said:

johnkitchens said:

dgaddis1 said:

If you don't mind me asking who did you work for in Augusta? 

CH2M Hill was my previous employer.

I have never heard of them. I worked in Augusta for a few years. I was just wondering where you had worked. 

The Augusta office used to be Lockwood Greene, which got bought by CH2M Hill, they're one of the largest consulting firms in the world.  We do consulting work with local manufacturing/chemical plants, so I've done projects in a lot of the local plants.

Very familiar with CH2M. I see their drawings frequently. 

Jupiter Jim said:

Left teaching electrical wiring back in 2007, started the electrical contracting business back up found a great partner to run the business in 2012 and retired. Now a full time BGE cult member! Egg Fest nut! Also buy and sell Junk/Antiques/Collectables.

.....how could you forget your primary work responsibilities?....what ever Ms Kay wants you to do.

I do some IT consulting on the side and help friends and family with PC/IT issue's. I get paid in Bourbon from the friends and family that's the best part. I'm a network engineer M-F

My side gig is playing golf and I will take your money while doing it.