Well, very late to the talk, I can not tell you what to do, or what you should do. I can tell you what I have done, what I liked and did not like, even that can change due to people, life, weather, and as one said the day of the week, and a big etc. It is very hard to get the education you want or think you need while trying to hold a job, support a family, eat, do some things you want, and on and on.
What I do know is that you will a better engineer because of any hands on work you do. If you pull wrench, you learn about clearances for a wrench, dig a hole, learn need a place to put dirt from the hole and water fills holes. You are doing some machine work and welding,planning, math, material uses, machine uses. This in and of itself makes a better engineer. In many cases engineers do not know how to make things, how to put things together, even how to move things, or even how to talk to workers.
I am not an engineer, never will be. I would have liked to be one, but I had no idea about such things. Yes, any job can be boring, lots of the same old, day after day, however, that 5 minutes of excitement sometimes makes it worth it.
I have sent a few engineers off the job, some had them replaced or I would pull my crew and go home, many times have told some, that if they can not make/ design it to work, don't expect me to made it work, or to try operate it.
The good engineers would even go to shops, job sites, offer to help, ask questions, see how it could be done, what steps needed to be done in what order and so on.
I guess what you can do with the job you have is try to make the best of it each day, but do not let it affect your health and family, try to make the off time,hobbies, family a reward for doing that job.
I maybe a poor one to talk, as I have had many different jobs, sometimes worked for experience, some jobs a day or two, learning that was not it, or like to try that more. Some jobs been fired, layed off, run out of work, left cause of other people, to dam dangerous to do.
What I have learned about engineering, is the letters after the name/job title make the money after there is some experience to go with them. As has been said by many of the others, learning, even a little bit can make it all worth while.
