In your line of work, hobby, just life in general.
I don’t want to call it a “stupid” question, because most people just don’t know this. But when I was serving in the US Air Force, if my service ever came up around civilians, it was almost guaranteed that the next words out of their mouth were, “What planes do you fly?” It was such a common occurrence, it was a running joke amongst us Air Force members.
Only 5% of the Air Force are pilots. The other 95% work in career fields that either directly or indirectly support those pilots. We have doctors, lawyers, electricians, police, accountants, cooks… You name it, we likely have a similar career for it.
I personally worked in IT. I fixed computers for 20 years, usually in some cold, dark server room deep in the bowels of a facility. (Sometimes underground even!) I was about as far removed from the airplanes as one could get. So despite my 20 years working for the Air Force, I know absolutely nothing about planes.
Also, it kind of bothers me when people thank me for my service because I didn’t do anything. I’m no hero. Anyone could’ve done my job. Heck, I deployed with Marines once and they told me, if shit hits the fan, to just duck under my desk and let them take care of it. Even in the Air Force, we’re told that Security Forces (our version of military police) are the ones trained to handle combat with enemy forces and to get out of their way if anything happens.
When I was deployed with the Marines, my Marine boss told me once that she hopes to god that she never sees an Air Force person with a rifle in their arms. That means the planes are down, the Marines are dead, and the base is overrun. She said we are the absolute last resort to defend against enemy forces. So if we come under fire, she asked that I hand my weapon to the nearest Marine and then go take cover.
Yaky@slrpnk.net 17 minutes ago
If you are a (younger?) immigrant in the US, you will be asked by a curious American:
The second thing you want to know about my language is how to insult someone? Baffling, but happened more than once.