On the bright side, I don't think many people reading Hacker News fall in to the category of brutish, construction worker-type. :)

I did work construction when I was younger, and I must say, I enjoyed it immensely. I always love to help out someone build a shed or throw up some drywall.

It's just plain fun to build things with your hands, even if you're mainly doing the work with your finger-tips these days.