What are the neatest things you've done in your career?

[Ed Anger]

Meh, I've done all sorts of neat things, too many neat things to mention because it won't get me laid here.

But I was thinking about it, and for a variety of different work and non-work reasons, I've been a guest on MSNBC (albeit by telephone) in its early days, I've been quoted on ESPN, responsible for an embarrassingly hilarious (non-work related) quote in a front page piece in the Washington Post that I will never tell any of you monkeys about, sat in on a group "technical advisors" session for a two-part episode of "Homicide: Life on the Street", was in a Russian-made documentary about US law enforcement, and had a one-line speaking role in a never-distributed minor motion picture that let me fill out SAG paperwork.   

Time for my closeup, Mr. Josh DeMille.

And danced in a rabbit suit.

[CountDeMoney]

My greatest role.

[Ed Anger]

It was glorious.

[Razgovory]

I once hit a guy with a broom.

[The Brain]

I once hit a guy with a broom.

You thought he was a witch?

[stjaba]

I argued and won a wrongful death summary judgment in a case where the decedent allegedly contracted pulmonary disease due to exposure to chemicals. That was pretty cool because its 1) hard to get those kind of opportunities as a second year lawyer and 2) its basically impossible to win summary judgment in personal injury cases in state court, at least in Florida.

[DGuller]

Damn, reading all these accounts makes me realize that actuarial profession doesn't tend to generate interesting neat stories.

My day to day job is probably as boring as yours. But you can still do some interesting things; I spent a good bit of my workdays as a fake internet personality that was both sane and reasonable.   

My day to day job is not boring at all, my days go by very quickly.  However, it's not that exciting to recount the story of how I implemented a very clever algorithm to quickly do some complex calculation.

[Razgovory]

No Dguller, I've checked, your job is boring.

[Queequeg]

Back in the Cold War I developed and proved a method by which US SSBNs could be resupplied for additional patrols using commercial ports rather than their home ports (which would presumably be staked out by Soviet SSNs).  This developed into an entire black programs in which we actually carried out the replenishment of US boomers from various ports which had no existing USN presence.  There was also a 3-day limit on the replenishment, because that was the window for the Soviets to discover what was happening and redeploy their assets.  We had a SEAL team that played the Red Team, so operational and physical security were the two biggest challenges.

It was really neat to see an idea I came up with in a brainstorming session turn into an entire program with a budget and a cast of thousands.  Probably the thing that surprised me most was how readily all of the bureaucratic stakeholders changed all of their assumptions when presented with the logic of the program.

[jimmy olsen]

I defended a lawsuit in which my client was sued by Jesus Christ (a/k/a The Son of Man).

And no, it wasn't a frivolous suit, or brought by a lunatic - millions of real dollars were at stake. 

I know you've told us this story, but I forget. How was this possibly not frivolous or brought by a lunatic?

[Phillip V]

I am just trying to survive; so far successful.

[Syt]

Having worked low profile back office jobs all my "career" I have no neat stories to report.

[Iormlund]

I've done a lot of thing that I would class as neat personally but others probably wouldn't (like designing my own SCADA software).

Perhaps the most notable thing is to modify the code of a big assembly line while work is being done. It's a weird sensation, knowing that it is you that enables hundreds of people to do their jobs and even a tiny fuckup can bring the whole thing crashing down. Many people can't deal with the stress.

[celedhring]

Dunno, I once had an interview with WB to write the film adaptation of The Twilight Zone - alas, they finally chose somebody else. But *that* would've been the neatest thing I'd ever done. I actually think it's one of the best projects I have ever written.

Besides that... dunno... most stuff I think of neat it's probably silly to most people here. I worked in a very popular children show once, where I did all sorts of weird stuff (like writing an entire episode based around a Flaming Lips song), yet kids seemed to love it. That was very fulfilling.

I could list a bunch of celebs I met/had beers with but none of them will actually remember who I am so it's quite pointless 

[alfred russel]

I am just trying to survive; so far successful.

But I suspect you are just setting up for long term failure.