I hate being asked the question "What do you do for a living?" - it's a question I like to answer literally, to get to the heart of the anwer. It's not the question per se, it's the follow ups I dread. I've now realised this is as much about my answer though as it is their reaction to it.

The conversation often goes like this.

Questioner: "What do you do for a living?"
Me: "I write code".
Questioner: "Ah, right", questioner looks saddened, "And what do you do for fun?"
Me: "I write code".


At which point they get puzzled, saddened and often walk away.

This frustrates me because you wouldn't get the following conversation:

Questioner: "What do you do for a living?"
Artist: "I'm a painter"
Questioner: "Ah, right", questioner looks saddened, "And what do you do for fun?"
Artist: "I'm a painter"


At which point questioner gets puzzled, saddened and often walk away.

This irritates the life out of me because a painter (assuming they're not a painter & decorator - which might be a misconception for an artist) simply wouldn't get the second half of the converation. To me, writing code is as much an act of creation as the artists work.

By answering literally though, I miss conveying the buzz, sheer fun and delight in the work I do. I fail to convey the creative aspect of my work, and the pride which I like to take in it. How do I answer? I say I write code. What should I say? After chatting about this recently, I realised I should be saying this: I create cool code. This is as much a choice as it is anything else. It makes it clear it's creative, it's fun, along with the delight and care.

I've often sidestepped this in the past, by listening to the specific question. "Where do you work, what's your role, what does that entail". Answers to these generally revolves around replying about my employer, the fact I'm employed as a research engineer, and it involves looking how we put the archive online for all the UK, with limited resources.

These are all fine answers leading to interesting areas, and the specific project we're working towards does fascinate people. However these answers also sadden me, since they doesn't state what I do. Based on paraphrasing my new boss (great twist on what I was saying :) - I added one word :) - I've came up the better answer: I create cool code.

After thought: Ironically, this is more about answer the question they were asking, rather than being quite so precise in my answer! Every time I answered "I write code", I wasn't actually telling them anything, after all people generally don't understand what that means in practice!

Oh, and a little sideline I've got going is encouraging others who work with me to do the same. Some of the summer of code work I'm mentoring is really cool code :-)