Those days are gone although I do believe it requires a "stationary engineer" license even now to operate a boiler. Most janitors or head janitors in schools and public buildings still have to have the license to operate the heating systems if ti uses a steam boiler.
Mostly these days I just say "I'm into computers and electronics". People are much less inclined to say stupid things about working with computers these days. And yes, I do do computers, both hardware and software at all all levels, but it hardly covers it. I'd never be able to explain the truth to a layman. I'll have trouble even to explain it to you.
Officially I am the "last of the Electrical Engineers". My class was the last to be designated as having majors like EE, mechanical, chemical and the like. After me, all engineering majors were specified as "engineers" specializing in this or that. As such, the bunch of us were guinea pigs for many of the new "generalized" courses. Mostly, they sucked.
I personally found both physics and EE equally fascinating and tried to take as many cool courses in both as I could. The administration was trying to phase out all the old school EE courses and get the few remaining professors who knew anything about power and the old school EE subjects to retire. A bunch of us fought back by filing petitions to get some of the old courses taught! And it worked. We took this TOTALLY cool course in "industrial electronics" about power circuits and thyratrons and all the rest. Yeah, it was like half electrics and half "history" but it was stuff you simply can't learn about anymore.
At the same time I had a part time job in the physics department and signed up for a bunch of physics classes. You have absolutely NO idea how cool it was to take classes from the likes of Nobel Prize winner Dr. Reines. A truly great guy but who could make the most complex subject understandable. So FEW people today have that ability. All that and the practical experience of the grunt work of building electronic apparatus for the physicists. With an amazing education like that I wonder how it was I turned out to be such a loser! But that is another long story.
As for computers, in those days I hated them and refused to have anything to do with them as best I could. It was later I went into my computer phase. And at the same time I had an E&M phase. I had already studied with the likes of Plonsey and Colin (of the textbook fame) as well as John Kraus (who had one of the first radio telescopes), and had a job with many other top names in E&M dealing with various antenna problems.
When I think of the depth and breadth of my experience and education I even amaze myself. It boggles my mind to think of those typical "engineers" who graduate from school get a job at General Motors designing door handles and do it for the rest of their lives. Feh! The only question that remains is why haven't I done anything important, even design a car door handle?
I guess there is only one answer. And that answer requires a word not even in the vocabulary when I started out:
SLACKER!
So when people ask what my job is, I guess I should just look them in they eye and say "slacker". That should do it.
If only I had taken time to get a stationary engineer's license! People think that the principal is the guy who runs a school, but if you've ever worked there, you'll know that when it comes to getting anything of practical importance actually done, it is the janitor who is really in charge!
Have a nice day!