Was inspired, in January 1996, after a discussion with a young engineer who was lamenting his bad day.

Is it a deadline ? an overbearing boss ? a problem which there just isn’t a solution ? In front of me you stand there, only fractions from being completely immersed in your own self pity. 

I have heard the bemoaning of so many young Engineers before you, dually gracing me with the travesties and tragedies of their day – I do not know whether it was fate or an epiphany, which brought me to this realization about your stress and your bad day. 

So you think you had a bad day ?

You have never walked down the corridor of your office at 6:30 am – only to be met by your boss saying get your gear we have two contractors dead in a pit – killed from a gas which they couldn’t see, smell or taste. You have never had a bad day.

You have never had to be called to your project site and watch your Electrician be pulled down from the ceiling after being electrocuted three days earlier – standing there with what is left of his family watching and looking at you. You have never had a bad day. 

You have never been there when a friend is overcome with Hydrogen Sulfide Gas inside of a manhole – knowing you can’t go get him. You have not had to wait for the Emergency Response Team to arrive; only to pull a lifeless body from the dark. You have never had a bad day.

You have never climbed down the bar screens at the treatment plant to pull an infant baby off. You never wake in the middle of the night knowing somewhere there is another crack baby someone would rather flush than feed. You have never had a bad day.

Now - do you still think you had a bad day ?

This is the reality of your design, of your career, and of your future – this is what being an Engineer is about; this is where the theory stops and hard reality begins.

Now get the hell out of my office, I have work to do.