I would have said “I don’t know, why don’t you google it?”.
Actually I would have stammered something incoherent, but that’s what I would have thought of saying 5 minutes later…
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And if that doesn’t work, you can always just say you have a particular set of skills.
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“That depends on what’s going on.”
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When I worked at Spencer Gifts, this was my favorite question in the world. I would look them dead in the eye and say “I’m a vibrator salesman.”
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Another I like, recommended by a friend, is, “what have you been up to?”
It’s kind of like what someone else mentioned above, asking more about how someone spends their time.
Just don’t be a problem that needs solving, and we should be fine 
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Me: Shopping for a car, decided to dress down, shades, stubble, t-shirt. I was still fairly ripped at this point. Salesperson on the test drive: blonde, attractive, trying to size up my wallet. “So what do you do?” Me: “It’s tricky to explain.” Her: “In general terms?” Me, pauses, then deadpan: “Let’s just say… I take care of other people’s risks.” Her: …silence…
Yes, at the time I had been in financial risk management 
but I was hoping to get a decent price on the car… and did.
When I went to pick up the car I went reasonably dressed and filled in the details. She admitted “OMG I thought you were some kind of hit man…”
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Within our company (my first employer), the most common first question heard when working with someone you never met before was, “Who do you work for?” I could only figure that the question was meant to quickly identify the program(s) and/or department one is supporting and some level in the company’s technical hierarchy. Even today, I still find the question to be a strange one.
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i feel… much better now. yes.
so you’re saying financial risk management is a euphemism!?
i feel like ive learned so much today here on this thread.
( slinks away. quietly )
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Note the services description…
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“I aspire, respire, and perspire.”
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I color comic books, so I actually like being asked this question. How people respond is usually either a good icebreaker or a good “I should go talk to someone else” filter.
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Just to clarify: In my younger days, telling someone what I do for a living would often get worried looks from people, who would often ask what my plans were for a real job. I don’t often get that now that I’m a grey beard, but I guess it really stuck with me.
To be fair, it’s a weird job, and I can see how people might not think it could possibly pay the bills, but still - People can be really insensitive. If I HAD been a struggling colorist, I’m sure it would have been soul-crushing.
It must be hell being a clown. “I hate clowns! But not you.” etc.
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“Exist, temporarily.”
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I’d share your disagreement with that particular ‘test’ for bullshit-jobness; but I do think there is something to be said for taking a category that was originally constructed based on people who recognized the nature of their jobs and looking at expanding it to cases where the nature of the job is similar but the person doing the job isn’t bothered by it; because those sorts of jobs tend to be a sign of systemic sickness as well as personal dissatisfaction for the people doing them.
I don’t doubt that some of the people deliberately building ‘defi’ nonsense in the spirit of enthusiastically embracing the past mistakes of real markets love what they do and things it makes them a randian ubermench; but I wouldn’t want a definition of bullshit job sufficiently constrained that what they do can’t fit in it.
I could see that. It’s such a straightforward answer, too. Mine is so mixed, like working on policy development, doing quality control stuff, developing resources to help people do the work, etc., etc. it sounds like one of those bullshit jobs being made fun of upthread, but it’s not.
But answering the question thinking I need to actually describe what I do in a comprehensive way leads to that. And so does saying, “I’m a consultant.” 
Coloring comic books sounds awesome. Congrats on making a life in such a creative field!
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Yeah… problem is, I absolutely have no idea what I’m doing.
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i fish. i grow things. i cook.
sometimes, it rains.
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I always have to fight the temptation to quote my favorite profoundly incompetent post-apocalyptic systems administrator when asked about what I’m doing in professional contexts; most especially when doing it would be telling the truth.
“I know exactly what I’m doing. I just don’t know what effect it’s going to have.”
“I push buttons. I turn dials. I read numbers. Sometimes I make up little stories in my head about what the numbers mean.”
edit: that and the immortal words of wisdom, not mine but not certain of the source: “everyone has a test environment; far fewer people also have a production environment”
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