And with a kid, i barely have time to clean my house, let alone try to learn something I see in a job application. My wife gets mad if my free time isn't spent with her...
You simply tell her it's not free time and let the housework go to hell once in a while. If she doesn't get it, she's the problem. Do not spend all your time on techy stuff, and choose your time so that you're commuting or they're asleep where you can.
I'm not saying this as an outsider - I have a 1 year old, a 3 year old and a wife with a bad back. In fact we both have medical issues. No I don't have as much time to tinker as I once did, but I do have some time.
So as the manager looking to hire somebody, If you don't like what you do every day, can't I safely assume that your not going to be as good at it as somebody who honestly loves doing it? And if so, why should I hire you over the guy who loves it?
tl;dr - interest in coding is not a good predictor of ability to get the job done.
The guy that loves coding might not be interested in the problems he has to solve for you. I've seen this in a company where half were attached young women and the rest were unattached young male geeks. The women actually did better than the men in meeting their goals. Why? They didn't care about experimenting and playing around, and were not easily distracted by other things. The guys had the better knowledge and arguable skill, but the girls applied it better. Mind you I don't think that advantage remains as the coders get older. Don't know many greybeards who are easily distracted...and there are less women who'll stick it out in software engineering after that age where they're having a family.
Really, if you've written off mangement as a career advancement opportunity then you've put a cap on your career anyway.
This isn't insightful...the grass is always greener. I've had friends move into management that bemoaned the fact that middle managers are the most expendable when downsizing. If you like management by all means progress that way. But not everyone needs to become a manager. A specialist "greybeard" can make big money with niche skills or by keeping skills current and being a cut above the rest. The key is to develop a reputation for being able to get the job done when others just won't cut it.
Driving without the license plate was legal, parking in the handicap spot was not. Had I been in the area, I would have taken videos of Jobs parking and staying in the spot and sent them to the police and/or calling and reporting everytime the spot with illegaly filled. You don't need a license plate to be towed and good luck finding the car again after it's been removed. People who believe they're better than everyone else and act on those beliefs desevered to be bitchslapped every once in a while.
Bonus points if you use a Mac and Final Cut Pro to do it!
The old people are still going to have to walk around the entire super market, so why can't they cross the carpark like other people? Parents however have little kids to manage who haven't spent the last 70 years of their life not being hit by a car and its safer to not have to cross the carpark.
...and how do you think these kids learn if they're wrapped in cotton wool. I have a 3 year old and a 1 year old. The 3 year old knows to stand where he's told in a car park or hold an adult's hand even if he's smack bang in the middle of having a tantrum. The 1 year old isn't old enough and so she's either in hand or in our arms in a car park. Likewise I'm not in favour of school zones. Children need to learn about danger in order to progress towards adulthood, and when they don't know about danger the false sense of security of accomodating them without fully removing the danger does a lot more harm than good. I see to many teenagers who should know much better wandering out in front of cars without looking because they're so use to living in a place where the fault is placed on the driver even if they are being idiots.
For example, I remember hearing a news story a year or two back about a guy who was going around some state (I think California) and suing any business that didn't follow rather restrictive and arbitrary laws about accommodations to the letter. He would just show up in a town, wander around, and a month later, half a dozen businesses would get threatened with a lawsuit. Often, because of space issues or building design issues or whatever, the businesses couldn't actually put in whatever random accommodation, so they would settle -- effectively paying shake-down money to this guy.
this was precisely one of the things in the Penn & Teller video linked in the first post.
Sounds like BS to me! What's to stop another guy doing the same to them? No point in paying shake-down money if someone else can come in and demand the same. It's often called "protection" money for a reason. The guy extorting you offers to stop others doing the same.
It isn't ever as simple as "just stop eating" - at the very least you have to make significant, painful changes to your diet.
Unless you can photosynthesize then yes, it is as simple as eating less.
Imagine being at your hungriest ALL THE TIME. Now try resisting the temptation of food ALL THE TIME.
I can eat a large meal - I'm talking big ass bowl of salad - whole lettuce, 6 tomatoes, 3 cucumbers, 1 onion, jar of olives, 70g of fetta and be hungry an hour later. I can do the same with most foods but I'm trying to choose healthier options most of the time now. I've lost 15kg - but it's taken months and I know keeping it off is the harder part.
Not everyone is the same. Just because YOU can control your weight, the assumption that it is just as easy (or not much harder) for others is ridiculous. What you've said is the equivalent of an Olympic runner saying that anyone could run as fast if they just trained. It's not true.
I got a handicapped placard because I'd be subject to bouts of fatigue. Essentially, when my damaged brain had enough, I'd mostly fall asleep
If your tendency to doze off is bad enough that you can't walk an extra twenty metres, it's bad enough that you shouldn't be driving.
Where I live at least in a large shopping center that distance can be 300-400 meters. Be fair.
That said if he dozes off without warning, that is a driving safety issue. But even 3 minutes warning is enough to pull over usually, but not enough to get to your car 400m away.
On the other, here in CA they give out the placards for obesity. If you are obese, you should be given a placard that forces you to park at the other end of the supermarket lot so you can get a whole 0.1 miles of walking in before buying 2 dozen bacon-wrapped-cupcakes.
I'm obese. Have been since about age 3. I've lost weight a couple of times in my life. Most recently over the last few months after being diagnosed with diabetes (in my mid 30s...but hey that's my fault because I'm fat right. Never mind that since both parents are diabetic my odds of getting type 2 diabetes are 75%...it's much easier to blame it on my weight). I've lost about 15kg in about 6 months (well mostly in the first 4 while trying to cut out all carbs and discovering that it ages me to the point where I need a nap by midday....but anyway). There's a
While I accept I'm responsible.
First I have a bad ankle (well both actually but one is worse). At age 15 I went ice skating and bent it badly. Nothing showed up on the X-rays. Fast forward about a decade and a half and I'm told that one of the bones in my ankle had blood supply cut off and is dead and that I need to have the ankle fused post haste or I won't be walking by Christmas....that was 5 years ago. Both ankles are arthritic. No I haven't had the worse one fused. I looked into it it's a horrible option and a last resort. The pain would be back 10 fold in 5-7 years if the operation took (30% failure rate, 3-6 months on my back and no weight on it at all. can't afford that!). Some days walking a kilometer leaves me in agony. I got to be on a boat on new years day for a couple of hours and I won't tell you what that did to my ankles.
So do some exercise that doesn't involve the ankle you say? Swimming should be perfect....well yes except that I get terrible ear infections and have never found earplugs that are effective. I admit I could do upper body workouts and upper body cardio, and one day I might. No doubt I'll injure something else. Have to find the time with young kids and a wife who has her own medical issues, a full time job that takes up 60 hours of my week, chores etc. Then add to that that I HATE boring repedative excercise and well...it's hard to get motivated.
Finally, I'm always hungry. I mean that half an hour after a large meal I'm often starving. There are exceptions but they're rare. Usually I have to simply distract myself as much as I can so I'm not thinking about food. Even then I could be eating in the background unless I control myself. I resort to huge bowls of salad - a whole iceberg lettuce, 5-6 tomatoes, 3 cucumbers, 1 onion, 70g of fetta cheese, a jar of spanish olive. That will typically fill me so I don't think about food for maybe an hour. Any time I mention this to a doctor they try to get me to see a shrink. That's just bullshit. It doesn't matter if I'm happy or sad, up or down, stressed or relaxed, doing well or doing badly. The hunger is physical.
Do I use disabled parking spots? No, not yet. I don't need them yet. Will I? Most certainly. Will I enjoy self-riteous pricks who have no idea what my life is like telling me the reason I'm in pain is that I'm worthless, glutenous and lazy. Hell no.
By the way I hope but doubt you realize that some of those who are obese have other issues and forcing them to walk would see them in an emergency room.
It's funny. A smoker or alcoholic or serial sun tanner will often get much more sympathy than an obese person because we have a built in revulsion to fat in this society and perhaps in our inate psyches. Few people are without any vices at all.
Where I live they have such cards and handicapped people are suppose to display them when parking in a handicapped spot, otherwise a fine is issued. (No meters etc - that would add cost and there are usually ways around them). So what happens? Corruption! People find any way they can to obtain such a card - from exaggerating injuries, to faking cards etc. etc.
illegal parking in handicapped spots is a problem just about everywhere.. and there aren't too many reserved spots either. if anything there isn't enough -- partly because of that illegal parking. but without adequate enforcement, adding more spots would just increase the occurrence of illegal parking in them.
Simple solution: If someone who isn't handicapped parks in one, make them handicapped.
I am of course joking - I'm not that barbaric. But it is frustrating to see people enjoying the benefits of a civilized society while unwilling to pay for that in any way...they're happy to collect when it's their turn to benefit, and will tell you how unfair it is if they don't get what is coming to them under the rules...but ask them to go out of their way to provide benefits for others and they'll scream bloody murder then try to fight, sneak, or steal their way out of not doing what's required.
What's the point of opensourcing Facebook? It's the userbase that matters to web-developers, not the server code.
It's all about forking. Everyone on Facebook is all about forking too, but that's not what I mean;-) If Facebook retain control of the code, they can choose to make whatever changes they wish and users will never defect to a competing network. If they open sourced, Microsoft for example could fork it and include it as a feature of Hotmail - okay not the best example but you get what I'm saying. Take an existing user base and hijack/poach Facebook users.
Old people on the other hand have a better idea of how much their expertise is worth.
Older people should also have a better understanding of what friends and colleagues are worth.
Yes, a lot more than your average stint as a personal assistant. I can't believe there are so many people here so ignorant. If you put down PA to Steven Hawking on your resume, a lot of future employers will just read PA.
I think the only career it would put you in good stead for is technical assistant to other rich and famous. That's IF you get along with Hawking. If you look at people who are successful CTOs etc. they rise quickly. They do not stick at low paying jobs for half a decade for brownie points.
What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.
Yes! Because in Shakespeare's time, everyone took pictures, spoke internationally on their iPhones and travelled clear across the planet in less than 24 hours.
So, here we have a golden opportunity to work for one of the most brilliant humans to ever exist, tinkering with an amazing if poorly documented system, jetsetting around the globe, being paid to attend sold-out physics lectures... and all half the/. community can think to do is bitch about the pay grade.Seems the Green-Eyed Monster (and this global recession) has ruined a lot of folks.
I am the sole earner for my family. When I can pay the bills for their food, clothing, shelter medical, education and transport by saying I work for Steven Hawking (let alone having anything on the side to buy luxury items like gadgets) you can call me greedy. In the mean time grow up and stop calling people greedy when it is clear you don't have much of a grasp on what it might be like to really struggle. This is a job. Unless you're independently wealthy, you do it for the pay. You are not going to be paid to smoke a pipe and discuss the universe with Hawking - you are going to be his servant.
The way I see it, the fact that Hawking is likely footing the bill for the room, board, and travel expenses of whoever gets the gig (as they would be considered a member of his 'care team'), not to mention getting to hang out with Stephen fucking Hawking, $38,000 per annum seems like a pretty damn good deal.
Now, if only I could get my wife on board... I wonder if he needs an economist, too...
If you're seriously considering perhaps your wife would do better with a counsellor or failing that a divorce lawyer. You are suppose to be the bread winner for your family - travelling and getting free board may appeal to you but you are displaying a non-financial form of greed by not thinking about your family.
Unless they halve the prices, why bother? Blu-Ray on a 46" modern TV is most of the experience for cheaper per movie and you can't put a price on the freedom it provides in terms of food, not putting up with jerks and being able to not miss anything if you have to go to the bathroom. Best Buy and Walmart charge prices for new releases that are less than the cost of two tickets to see them in the theaters around here (metro DC).
Mod this way the fuck up! Movie theatres were successful when the equipment was too expensive to own. $500 will buy you a decent home theatre setup. And you always get premium seats!
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And with a kid, i barely have time to clean my house, let alone try to learn something I see in a job application. My wife gets mad if my free time isn't spent with her...
You simply tell her it's not free time and let the housework go to hell once in a while. If she doesn't get it, she's the problem. Do not spend all your time on techy stuff, and choose your time so that you're commuting or they're asleep where you can.
I'm not saying this as an outsider - I have a 1 year old, a 3 year old and a wife with a bad back. In fact we both have medical issues. No I don't have as much time to tinker as I once did, but I do have some time.
So as the manager looking to hire somebody, If you don't like what you do every day, can't I safely assume that your not going to be as good at it as somebody who honestly loves doing it? And if so, why should I hire you over the guy who loves it?
tl;dr - interest in coding is not a good predictor of ability to get the job done.
The guy that loves coding might not be interested in the problems he has to solve for you. I've seen this in a company where half were attached young women and the rest were unattached young male geeks. The women actually did better than the men in meeting their goals. Why? They didn't care about experimenting and playing around, and were not easily distracted by other things. The guys had the better knowledge and arguable skill, but the girls applied it better. Mind you I don't think that advantage remains as the coders get older. Don't know many greybeards who are easily distracted...and there are less women who'll stick it out in software engineering after that age where they're having a family.
Really, if you've written off mangement as a career advancement opportunity then you've put a cap on your career anyway.
This isn't insightful...the grass is always greener. I've had friends move into management that bemoaned the fact that middle managers are the most expendable when downsizing. If you like management by all means progress that way. But not everyone needs to become a manager. A specialist "greybeard" can make big money with niche skills or by keeping skills current and being a cut above the rest. The key is to develop a reputation for being able to get the job done when others just won't cut it.
Driving without the license plate was legal, parking in the handicap spot was not. Had I been in the area, I would have taken videos of Jobs parking and staying in the spot and sent them to the police and/or calling and reporting everytime the spot with illegaly filled. You don't need a license plate to be towed and good luck finding the car again after it's been removed. People who believe they're better than everyone else and act on those beliefs desevered to be bitchslapped every once in a while.
Bonus points if you use a Mac and Final Cut Pro to do it!
The old people are still going to have to walk around the entire super market, so why can't they cross the carpark like other people? Parents however have little kids to manage who haven't spent the last 70 years of their life not being hit by a car and its safer to not have to cross the carpark.
...and how do you think these kids learn if they're wrapped in cotton wool. I have a 3 year old and a 1 year old. The 3 year old knows to stand where he's told in a car park or hold an adult's hand even if he's smack bang in the middle of having a tantrum. The 1 year old isn't old enough and so she's either in hand or in our arms in a car park. Likewise I'm not in favour of school zones. Children need to learn about danger in order to progress towards adulthood, and when they don't know about danger the false sense of security of accomodating them without fully removing the danger does a lot more harm than good. I see to many teenagers who should know much better wandering out in front of cars without looking because they're so use to living in a place where the fault is placed on the driver even if they are being idiots.
For example, I remember hearing a news story a year or two back about a guy who was going around some state (I think California) and suing any business that didn't follow rather restrictive and arbitrary laws about accommodations to the letter. He would just show up in a town, wander around, and a month later, half a dozen businesses would get threatened with a lawsuit. Often, because of space issues or building design issues or whatever, the businesses couldn't actually put in whatever random accommodation, so they would settle -- effectively paying shake-down money to this guy.
this was precisely one of the things in the Penn & Teller video linked in the first post.
Sounds like BS to me! What's to stop another guy doing the same to them? No point in paying shake-down money if someone else can come in and demand the same. It's often called "protection" money for a reason. The guy extorting you offers to stop others doing the same.
Unless you can photosynthesize then yes, it is as simple as eating less.
Imagine being at your hungriest ALL THE TIME. Now try resisting the temptation of food ALL THE TIME.
I can eat a large meal - I'm talking big ass bowl of salad - whole lettuce, 6 tomatoes, 3 cucumbers, 1 onion, jar of olives, 70g of fetta and be hungry an hour later. I can do the same with most foods but I'm trying to choose healthier options most of the time now. I've lost 15kg - but it's taken months and I know keeping it off is the harder part.
Not everyone is the same. Just because YOU can control your weight, the assumption that it is just as easy (or not much harder) for others is ridiculous. What you've said is the equivalent of an Olympic runner saying that anyone could run as fast if they just trained. It's not true.
If your tendency to doze off is bad enough that you can't walk an extra twenty metres, it's bad enough that you shouldn't be driving.
Where I live at least in a large shopping center that distance can be 300-400 meters. Be fair.
That said if he dozes off without warning, that is a driving safety issue. But even 3 minutes warning is enough to pull over usually, but not enough to get to your car 400m away.
So at one level I can see your resentment. Its not fair to subsidize the irresponsible.
In a civilized society everyone is subsidized (otherwise it's law of the jungle). Also most people have vices of one kind or another.
I guess it takes the village to raise the self entitled idiot.
I agree.
On the other, here in CA they give out the placards for obesity. If you are obese, you should be given a placard that forces you to park at the other end of the supermarket lot so you can get a whole 0.1 miles of walking in before buying 2 dozen bacon-wrapped-cupcakes.
I'm obese. Have been since about age 3. I've lost weight a couple of times in my life. Most recently over the last few months after being diagnosed with diabetes (in my mid 30s...but hey that's my fault because I'm fat right. Never mind that since both parents are diabetic my odds of getting type 2 diabetes are 75%...it's much easier to blame it on my weight). I've lost about 15kg in about 6 months (well mostly in the first 4 while trying to cut out all carbs and discovering that it ages me to the point where I need a nap by midday....but anyway). There's a
While I accept I'm responsible.
First I have a bad ankle (well both actually but one is worse). At age 15 I went ice skating and bent it badly. Nothing showed up on the X-rays. Fast forward about a decade and a half and I'm told that one of the bones in my ankle had blood supply cut off and is dead and that I need to have the ankle fused post haste or I won't be walking by Christmas....that was 5 years ago. Both ankles are arthritic. No I haven't had the worse one fused. I looked into it it's a horrible option and a last resort. The pain would be back 10 fold in 5-7 years if the operation took (30% failure rate, 3-6 months on my back and no weight on it at all. can't afford that!). Some days walking a kilometer leaves me in agony. I got to be on a boat on new years day for a couple of hours and I won't tell you what that did to my ankles.
So do some exercise that doesn't involve the ankle you say? Swimming should be perfect....well yes except that I get terrible ear infections and have never found earplugs that are effective. I admit I could do upper body workouts and upper body cardio, and one day I might. No doubt I'll injure something else. Have to find the time with young kids and a wife who has her own medical issues, a full time job that takes up 60 hours of my week, chores etc. Then add to that that I HATE boring repedative excercise and well...it's hard to get motivated.
Finally, I'm always hungry. I mean that half an hour after a large meal I'm often starving. There are exceptions but they're rare. Usually I have to simply distract myself as much as I can so I'm not thinking about food. Even then I could be eating in the background unless I control myself. I resort to huge bowls of salad - a whole iceberg lettuce, 5-6 tomatoes, 3 cucumbers, 1 onion, 70g of fetta cheese, a jar of spanish olive. That will typically fill me so I don't think about food for maybe an hour. Any time I mention this to a doctor they try to get me to see a shrink. That's just bullshit. It doesn't matter if I'm happy or sad, up or down, stressed or relaxed, doing well or doing badly. The hunger is physical.
Do I use disabled parking spots? No, not yet. I don't need them yet. Will I? Most certainly. Will I enjoy self-riteous pricks who have no idea what my life is like telling me the reason I'm in pain is that I'm worthless, glutenous and lazy. Hell no.
By the way I hope but doubt you realize that some of those who are obese have other issues and forcing them to walk would see them in an emergency room.
It's funny. A smoker or alcoholic or serial sun tanner will often get much more sympathy than an obese person because we have a built in revulsion to fat in this society and perhaps in our inate psyches. Few people are without any vices at all.
Where I live they have such cards and handicapped people are suppose to display them when parking in a handicapped spot, otherwise a fine is issued. (No meters etc - that would add cost and there are usually ways around them). So what happens? Corruption! People find any way they can to obtain such a card - from exaggerating injuries, to faking cards etc. etc.
illegal parking in handicapped spots is a problem just about everywhere.. and there aren't too many reserved spots either. if anything there isn't enough -- partly because of that illegal parking. but without adequate enforcement, adding more spots would just increase the occurrence of illegal parking in them.
Simple solution: If someone who isn't handicapped parks in one, make them handicapped.
I am of course joking - I'm not that barbaric. But it is frustrating to see people enjoying the benefits of a civilized society while unwilling to pay for that in any way...they're happy to collect when it's their turn to benefit, and will tell you how unfair it is if they don't get what is coming to them under the rules...but ask them to go out of their way to provide benefits for others and they'll scream bloody murder then try to fight, sneak, or steal their way out of not doing what's required.
What's the point of opensourcing Facebook? It's the userbase that matters to web-developers, not the server code.
It's all about forking. Everyone on Facebook is all about forking too, but that's not what I mean ;-) If Facebook retain control of the code, they can choose to make whatever changes they wish and users will never defect to a competing network. If they open sourced, Microsoft for example could fork it and include it as a feature of Hotmail - okay not the best example but you get what I'm saying. Take an existing user base and hijack/poach Facebook users.
also he will steal your girlfriend if you have one.
I can see it now - Steven Hawking, the sitcom!
Old people on the other hand have a better idea of how much their expertise is worth.
Older people should also have a better understanding of what friends and colleagues are worth.
Yes, a lot more than your average stint as a personal assistant. I can't believe there are so many people here so ignorant. If you put down PA to Steven Hawking on your resume, a lot of future employers will just read PA.
If you make a mistake the world will say you broke Stephen Hawking.
He was already broken when I got there. Honest!
I think the only career it would put you in good stead for is technical assistant to other rich and famous. That's IF you get along with Hawking. If you look at people who are successful CTOs etc. they rise quickly. They do not stick at low paying jobs for half a decade for brownie points.
Is money the only value you could derive from a working relationship with Stephen Hawking?
You don't get to be his equal and discuss the universe in smoking jackets. You get to be his bitch!
What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.
Yes! Because in Shakespeare's time, everyone took pictures, spoke internationally on their iPhones and travelled clear across the planet in less than 24 hours.
OF COURSE THINGS CHANGE.
You forgot Duke Nukem Forever j/k
Yeah I didn't love the plot...especially the 14 year load time for first load!
You are something, I'll say that....
Well, that's good - it would be a sign of insanity if I were nothing and you were abusing a product of your own imagination.
Anyway I've got better things to do, so go ahead and have the last word now child, I won't be reading it.
Making wine from water there, methinks.
So you're saying you think I'm Jesus Christ? Well I'm an atheist but thanks for the compliment anyway.
Bozo.
Finding someone for that kind of pay who is able to do all of this and do it well won't be easy:
Academics have a name for such people. They're called "grad students".
So, here we have a golden opportunity to work for one of the most brilliant humans to ever exist, tinkering with an amazing if poorly documented system, jetsetting around the globe, being paid to attend sold-out physics lectures... and all half the /. community can think to do is bitch about the pay grade.Seems the Green-Eyed Monster (and this global recession) has ruined a lot of folks.
I am the sole earner for my family. When I can pay the bills for their food, clothing, shelter medical, education and transport by saying I work for Steven Hawking (let alone having anything on the side to buy luxury items like gadgets) you can call me greedy. In the mean time grow up and stop calling people greedy when it is clear you don't have much of a grasp on what it might be like to really struggle. This is a job. Unless you're independently wealthy, you do it for the pay. You are not going to be paid to smoke a pipe and discuss the universe with Hawking - you are going to be his servant.
The way I see it, the fact that Hawking is likely footing the bill for the room, board, and travel expenses of whoever gets the gig (as they would be considered a member of his 'care team'), not to mention getting to hang out with Stephen fucking Hawking, $38,000 per annum seems like a pretty damn good deal.
Now, if only I could get my wife on board... I wonder if he needs an economist, too...
If you're seriously considering perhaps your wife would do better with a counsellor or failing that a divorce lawyer. You are suppose to be the bread winner for your family - travelling and getting free board may appeal to you but you are displaying a non-financial form of greed by not thinking about your family.
Unless they halve the prices, why bother? Blu-Ray on a 46" modern TV is most of the experience for cheaper per movie and you can't put a price on the freedom it provides in terms of food, not putting up with jerks and being able to not miss anything if you have to go to the bathroom. Best Buy and Walmart charge prices for new releases that are less than the cost of two tickets to see them in the theaters around here (metro DC).
Mod this way the fuck up! Movie theatres were successful when the equipment was too expensive to own. $500 will buy you a decent home theatre setup. And you always get premium seats!