Wow, there seems to be a lot of variety here! Most of us seem to be traditional blue collar skilled trade workers!
I'm a Telecom Tech that works in Transport for a long distance company. Basicly the telecom field can be broken down into two general areas. If you pick up your phone and call you friend accross town, that's all handled by a Local Exchange Carrier (your local phone company) equipment and maintained by your LEC techs. I did that work for the Coast Guard after they put me through an Associats degree worth of training in 6 months. It's fun work. Now lets say you pick up your phone and call your friend in the next town, county, state or accross country, that's handled by a long distance company's equipment and maintained by people like me. We transport more than just phone calls, but that's a service that most people can relate to.
Jamison