A Sign of a Real Engineer

Tim Wescott · 2012-06-23T03:03:06+00:00

So, my #1 son, 19, was in the hospital for surgery. (Nothing life threatening, but one of those Must Be Done things).He's coming out of general anesthesia, still woozy, and the nurse is explaining the patient-controlled morphine thing. So there he is, half conscious, absolutely _grilling_ the nurse over whether the ten-minute timeout on the thing is ten minutes after the last time the button is pressed, or does the gate open at 11:10, 11:20, etc.All complicated by the fact that it took the nurse several tries to understand that he wasn't anxious about getting his meds -- he just had to understand how the thing _worked_.And "let it go, son" doesn't work well when he's fully awake -- there's no hope of it working when he's in that state.Finally, he fell asleep. We were all relieved.Needless to say, he's entering an engineering program this fall.-- Tim WescottControl system and signal processing consulting

Jun 23, 2012 42 Replies

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spamtrap1888 14 years ago

You can spend that much on a really bad school as well.

A lot of that is living expense. Paradoxically, some of the most expensive places to live are college towns of state flagships. And wages there are not that great. I was shocked at the gap between income and outgo at Penn State.

Your son should plan to live with studious, frugal people. Cheap recreation only, and no car.

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Tim Wescott 14 years ago

Tons. Here's my favorite:

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My liberal friends think I'm a conservative kook. My conservative friends think I'm a liberal kook. Why am I not happy that they have found common ground? Tim Wescott, Communications, Control, Circuits & Software http://www.wescottdesign.com

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krw 14 years ago

Or a lot less on a good school.

A lot of parents at AU buy their kids condos (or let them use their football Saturday digs), then sell them after graduation. When more than one sibling attends the same school it gets particularly attractive.

You want it all! ;-)

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