I attended a lecture-slash-presentation tonight on a rock boring project for a local sewer improvements. It turns out that my PE license is up for renewal at the end of the month and I am short on professional development hours by quite a lot. This time last year I was doing great – and then things got away from me.
So tonight I learned about drilling rock tunnels in fractured rock for sewers, which is actually quite exciting even if the presentation had the deplorable pun “a boring project” as the subtitle. The meeting was at this standby NJ establishment which a colleague has already warned me about. but what does she know about steakhouses? She is a vegetarian! Turns out she knows a lot.
Also, turns out that of 40 attendees I was one of 3 women … And one of the women was a wife, not an engineer. There were an alarming number of “flirt with the young lady” comments – by which I don’t mean coy flirting, but comments from one old dude to another the this was the chance to flirt (with the young lady). Also a few overhead comments from rowdy engineers on the topic of wives and what they’re good for. Ugh. Old school, for sure.
Man, I LOVE the “my, your necklace is pretty” comments. It took one of my gentleman peers to tell me that they weren’t looking at my necklace… Stupid operator conferences.
yeah… it’s been a really long time since I’ve been in a situation like that. It was amazing to see how the older dudes would start out with a line, then realize it was inappropriate, and then gently and surprisingly gracefully back-pedal!