Engineers

[Denzagrad]

Humor

Q: What is the definition of an engineer?
A: Someone who solves a problem you didn't know you had in a way you don't understand.

Q: When does a person decide to become an engineer?
A: When he realizes he doesn't have the charisma to be an undertaker.

Q: How can you tell an extroverted engineer?
A: When he talks to you, he looks at your shoes instead of his own.

Q: Why did the engineers cross the road?
A: Because they looked in the file and that's what they did last year.

Q: How do you drive an engineer completely insane?
A: Tie him to a chair, stand in front of him, and fold up a road map the wrong way.

[Denzagrad]

Humor

Q: What is the definition of an engineer?
A: Someone who solves a problem you didn't know you had in a way you don't understand.

Q: When does a person decide to become an engineer?
A: When he realizes he doesn't have the charisma to be an undertaker.

Q: How can you tell an extroverted engineer?
A: When he talks to you, he looks at your shoes instead of his own.

Q: Why did the engineers cross the road?
A: Because they looked in the file and that's what they did last year.

Q: How do you drive an engineer completely insane?
A: Tie him to a chair, stand in front of him, and fold up a road map the wrong way.

Tis the last one that makes it applicable to teardrops

[Larwyn]

Humor


Q: How do you drive an engineer completely insane?
A: Tie him to a chair, stand in front of him, and fold up a road map the wrong way.

Oh, now don't get me started on engineers.....

I've been working with electrical engineers for over 20 years now. One thing I have noticed is that American engineers cannot say the words "I don't know". If they do not know the answer to your question they will talk, non stop, all around the question. When they feel they have done this until you have had sufficiant time to forget the question you asked they will pause. If asked the same question all over agian it's as if they never heard it before and do it all over again. So it seems that the number one qualification to become an electrical engineer is to be able to say NOTHING in a thousand words or more....

[TomS]

I have a friend whos job includes barganing with a union of lawyers. When he told me about this, I laughed and said, "Oh my God! A union of lawyers, that's scary!" My friend told me it wasn't too bad. Lawyers are comfortable with contract language. As long as the contract reflects the basic tenents of the agreeement, they're happy.

My friend told me of someone else he knows who bargians with a union of engineers. He said negotiating with engineers is agony. Those guys will nitpick ever single word in the contract to death.

[angib]

As an engineer of sorts (naval architect) myself, I don't disagree with many of those comments. But I will throw in an old (true) definition of an engineer:

An engineer is someone who can do for sixpence what any fool can do for half a crown.

(Sixpence was one fifth the value of half a crown.)

Andrew

[WoodSmith]

In my most recent previous life I was an engineer, this was one of my favorite jokes:

A man is flying in a hot air balloon and realizes he is lost. He reduces height and spots a man down below. He lowers the balloon further and shouts, "Excuse me, can you tell me where I am?"
The man below says, "Yes, you're in a hot air balloon, hovering 30 feet above this field. " "You must be an engineer", says the balloonist. "I am", replies the man. "How did you know?" "Well", says the balloonist, "everything you have told me is technically correct, but it's of no use to anyone."

The man below says, "You must be in management." "I am", replies the balloonist, "but how did you know?" "Well", says the man, "you don't know where you are, or where you're going, but you expect me to be able to help. You're in the same position you were before we met, but now it's my fault."

[Brad Lustig]

One thing I have noticed is that American engineers cannot say the words "I don't know".

You'll get them to say "I don't know" before you'll get them to say, "I made a mistake"

[Larwyn]

As an engineer of sorts (naval architect) myself, I don't disagree with many of those comments. But I will throw in an old (true) definition of an engineer:

An engineer is someone who can do for sixpence what any fool can do for half a crown.

(Sixpence was one fifth the value of half a crown.)

Andrew

Andrew,

One thing I have noticed about British engineers, is that some seem to often speak in engineering terms when most other people would use more common language. Several years ago we were installing a British made power transformer at a small generating plant The factory sent one of their engineers who had actually been involved in the design of the trasformer as a rep. A very smart and helpful engineer but apparently a bit clumsy. On describing a fall he had taken earlier that morning at the hotel, he stated; "I proceeded base over apex, stopping only when the planet earth inhibited my progress" Probably not an exact quote but I know the words base, apex and planet earth were in there somewhere.....

[angib]

he stated; "I proceeded base over apex, stopping only when the planet earth inhibited my progress"

Oh, yeah, we can do fancy talking all you want!

"Falling base over apex" is the polite and/or coy version of the more popular original expression "falling arse (ass) over tit".

Andrew

[Guest]

Ass over tea kettle is what I've always heard...

[asianflava]

One thing I have noticed is that American engineers cannot say the words "I don't know".

You'll get them to say "I don't know" before you'll get them to say, "I made a mistake"

I'll bash my old company by saying that all their management are engineers. Not until they courted an exec from Jack Welsh's original team did they get a manager that wasn't an engineer. They may be great engineers but a great engineer doean't always make a great manager.

[dmb90260]

I'll bash my old company by saying that all their management are engineers. Not until they courted an exec from Jack Welsh's original team did they get a manager that wasn't an engineer. They may be great engineers but a great engineer doean't always make a great manager.

In my working life I was in a division that was mainly engineers or bean counters. Needless to say, but I must, they had constant problems with their staff, not because they were Union people but because they were People who happened to belong to a union. They were completely useless dealing with personnel issues.

[DestinDave]

I've got a brother-in-law who is an electrical engineer. So why did he have to call me to ask how to wire up a ceiling fan? He took down an old fan, put up the new one, and it wouldn't work... Next time I saw him he was working on drawings for the wiring plan for a new Wal-Mart store.
Things that make you go "Hmmmmmm"

[Larwyn]

I've got a brother-in-law who is an electrical engineer. So why did he have to call me to ask how to wire up a ceiling fan? He took down an old fan, put up the new one, and it wouldn't work... Next time I saw him he was working on drawings for the wiring plan for a new Wal-Mart store.
Things that make you go "Hmmmmmm"

Sounds like the engineers I work with. They put someting on paper, the rest of us take it to the field. Try to figure out from the prints what they intended and then with red and green pencil proceed to correct the drawings as the project is commpleted. Once completed the marked up prints are turned back into engineering, where they correct the original prints to the red lines and turn out the final prints. My problem with this is it seems that the technicians are the ones doing all the engineering while the engineers are drawing all the pay. Somewhere along the line engineers quit going into the field they simply copy and paste similar projects and leave it to us. What happens when they get down to technicians who have no idea what to do other than what is on the prints. Scarry thought, that..........

[Bobgorilla]

In one of my former careers (some may have noticed I've had several), I built missiles for Lockheed for the Navy. 90% of "our engineers" had no engineering degree and everybody knows the average quality of a techie who works for the government. One problem was engineers in California would write procedures for us to use in Georgia without actually seeing a missile or talking to someone who had! The words would be in english and in the dictionary (usually) but made no sense as a sentence or in any kind of functioal sequence. We would write up a change to make it work and be fine for a year or so, then someone out there would realize they had nothing to do and send us a "new" way to screw up the work. P.S. I was fired, with 19 years experience, from this job for telling a Navy inspector he was stupid (twice) and telling a co-worker he should do what his boss told him to do, I was apparently creating a "hostile work enviroment".