I got a job as a bicycle mechanic trainee -- righty tighty, lefty loosey (except pedals, bottom brackets and spokes, which are reverse-threaded, and go the other way). That's more or less all there is to it. Details will come with time, I hope. Yesterday (remember, the blog dates are screwed up this week) I built (with a lot of help) either three or four bikes from boxed kits. This isn't really all that involved -- it just requires that the front wheel and handle bars be put on, brake and gear cables attached and adjusted, and reflectors screwed into place. There might be a few other details, depending on the bike. The last bike I built was quite difficult -- it was an expensive fuji road bike, and it was more or less in pieces out of the box. I needed a particular lot of help with that one, and was afraid of tightening something too much or not enough, potentially ruining this $1,500 bike.
Anyway, what I really wanted to write about was my salary, and a discussion I had with some english people about it. I earn $9 an hour (or about 4.8 UKP an hour at current exchange rates). I was asked 'is that a lot?' this got me thinking.
Yes and no. For peon-style jobs, job-application jobs, jobs in the service industry, on-your-feet-all-day jobs, HS and college jobs, art major jobs, marginally employed jobs, etc -- yes, it is better than most salaries, which seem to hover around $6.50 an hour. Most in my position, in my social location, so to speak, would be very happy to get $9 an hour. Bear with me for a brief aside:
the standard formula for approximate conversion of full-time hourly pay to annual salary: double an hourly rate of pay, and that's how many thousands of dollars an employee earns a year, assuming full-time employment. This formula is almost right on the money, but is in fact a bit of an underestimate -- the approximate figure will be 96% of the actual figure. For instance, $9 an hour working 40 hours a week for 52 weeks a year comes to $18,720 a year. The formula yields $18,000. So, it's really not much of an underestimate.
Most people I know would not be able to live on $18,000 a year (before taxes): groceries, car expenses, utilities, clothing, rent (obviously there isn't any home ownership at $18,000 a year), holidays and birthdays, entertainment (including travel), student loan payments, medical co-payments (full-time employers are obligated to provide health insurance). Maybe this person dreams of budgeting more money into classes so they can perhaps better their salary a bit. I'm assuming that savings and investment are fantasies similar to home ownership, as is other insurance (property, life, etc). Let's not even consider charities. These expenses eat away $18,000 a year rapidly, and will most likely incur some credit card debt as well (add credit card payments to the list of expenses).
I'm not even considering the fact that most employers will keep employee hours hovering just under 40 hours a week to avoid paying health benefits. Without benefits, an employee needs to buy his or her own insurance at $150 a month or so, which is even more costly when co-payments and deductibles are factored in. Or, they don't buy insurance, and are saddled with medical bills.
It seems as though there are two classes here: those who would be happy to be earning $9 an hour, and those who would be outraged at earning $18,000 a year.
I think the people who earn $9 an hour and have to make it on their own might also have second jobs. Or, they might rent a room instead of an apartment (and share that room with three other people). Or, they might not own a car. Or, they might not see the doctor too often. Or, they might default on student loans. Or, they might eat a lot of ramen noodles. It's pretty much a given that they're not taking trips to hawaii, saving $5 every week until they amass $3,000 after 12 years.
To service industry peons, $9 an hour might still not be very much. But it's more than what the vast majority of service industry jobs pay, and a service industry job is all someone who doesn't have a good work history or good set of experiences can get. Comparatively, $9 an hour is a lot, and I think even those who are forced to live on this meager salary consider it to be 'a lot.' 'wow! I scored a $9-an-hour job! Mcdonalds once a week for me!'
The price of a burger at mcdonalds doesn't slide up and down, depending on whether one makes a lot or a little. $800 in rent every month is still $800, regardless of whether one makes $1,500 in a month or $15,000. A meal at a restaurant is always going to cost the same, whether it's 50% of the week's earnings or 5%. The expenses of society aren't on a sliding scale. If they were, then being rich wouldn't have a lot of meaning. This is why everyone wants to be rich: it's that much easier to live when buying a car is like blowing some change at a vending machine. I guess this is truism, but I still find it striking.
To illustrate this further, here's a by-category guide on what percentage of income to spend (here's where I got it):
* Housing and utilities: 25-30%
* Food: 10-15%
* Vehicles: 10-15%
* Insurance: 5%
* Saving and investing: 10-15%
* Entertainment: 5%
* Clothing: 5%
* Medical: 5%
* Childcare and education: 1-8%
* Gifts and charity: up to you
Consider a corporate executive earning $1M dollars a year. According to this chart, he'd spend 15% of that on food, or $150,000 a year. That comes to a weekly food budget of about $2,885. He'd have to eat out, every meal of every day, spending an average of $137 per meal. Perhaps possible, but not very likely. More likely is that his food bill is closer to $200 or so a week. Let's be generous here -- after all, he's rich, and probably buys a lot of smoked salmon. That's almost exactly 1% of his income on food -- a far cry from 15%.
Similarly, consider a fast food fry cook earning $6 an hour, working full time. According to this chart, he spends 30% of his income on housing and utilities. This amounts to $312 a month for rent PLUS water, electricity, and possibly gas. I would say that's about $250 a month in rent, if he's lucky. Maybe somewhere this is possible, renting a trailer in missouri with a roommate, etc.
What's a lot more likely is that the fry cook is going to spend a lot more than 30% of his income on rent, and consequently eat fewer healthy, expensive foods like meat and produce while opting for less expensive, less healthy foods like little debbies and mini-ravioli, save nothing whatsoever, buy no new clothes when old ones wear out, not have a car, never go to a movie, etc. Misery and deprivation, albeit on an american scale (he's probably not going to starve or die of hypothermia).
You just can't compare a rich person and a poor person -- it isn't simply a matter of working out percentages of income and learning to live on them, because products have a fixed cost.
On 24 sep 04, I wrote:
that is, if there even are any terrorists. We've had yellow and orange alerts alternating for a long time now. People have predicted that a terrorist attack is 'extremely likely' for a similarly long time. We're still waiting, and in the meantime, while we wait for what may very well never happen, we are saddled with the patriot act, department of homeland security, wars overseas, etc.
Today, I read this article about a film, 'the power of nightmare.' here is a relevant passage:
(The film) was very clear in arguing that although there is a serious threat of terrorism from some radical Islamists, the nightmare vision of a uniquely powerful hidden organisation waiting to strike our societies is an illusion.
As the films showed, wherever one looks for this "al-Qaeda" organisation - from the mountains of Afghanistan to the "sleeper cells" in America - the British and Americans are pursuing a fantasy.
It's nice to have sentiments echoed. Of course, earlier on, I blogged about how terrorism was the wave of the future, that increasingly people who have no other alternatives for combating an international coalition of elite will turn to terrorism, and how the united states is right in pouring more money into the DHS, NSA, CIA, etc. It's funny how my opinion changes.
It's also funny how the date of this entry, 24 jan 05, is tomorrow's date. See? If I were using greymatter, movable type, bloxsom, etc, then manipulation like this would not be possible. QED for coding your own blog.
Alpesh's sister-in-law kajal has most generously gifted me (and my mother) a television set. This new TV replaces the 20-year-old model that I've blogged about before.
Sadly, the old TV set that's been with my family since long before it split into divorced fragments is now, it looks like, going to fall into disuse, and be relegated to languish in the cold, dusty basement for untold aeons.
The only way I might be able to get any use out of it would be to get another box from the cable company, and use it up in my room. The ancient piece of circa 1985 electronics has only a pair of antenna screws on top of it -- no s-video, RCA, or even coaxial input/output. Of course, it's not remote-capable, and channels are selected with two dials: VHF (channels 2-13) and UHF (channels 14-82). I suppose it's officially an antique at 20 years old.
I'm angry. I'm very angry, Ralph. You know, you can ball my wife, if she wants you to. You can lounge around here on her sofa, in her ex-husband's dead-tech, post-modernistic bullshit house if you want to. But you do NOT...get to watch...my fucking television set! - Al Pacino as Vincent Hanna in 'Heat'
Unfortunately, the old thing doesn't work right. The picture quality, I realize now when I watch kajal's TV, is abysmal. It's milky, sallow, colorless, and blurry, and the single speaker below the tuning dials is fuzzy and rangeless. Also, the volume knob broke off, maybe 5 years ago. Since then, one has to push either the tip of one's pinky or a pencil eraser hard enough against the nub so that it will rotate along with chosen tool.
As I set up the new television and somewhat new DVD player, I realized that I needed my old black cable box to continue getting the channels I'm not supposed to be getting, to get better reception on some of those channels, and to be able to advance smoothly up or down one channel at a time (the TV on its own likes to skip channels that are fuzzy, which without the box are quite a few). The cable couldn't just come out of the wall into the new TV, but rather had to pass through the cable box first.
So, I then had three objects set up and interconnected (the new TV, the black cable box, and the DVD player), each of which paired with a remote control (RC). Operation of the whole mechanism is a bit complex for some.
In order to watch tv, one has to use the cable box's RC to turn on the TV, which is constantly in an 'on' state, set to channel 3, and plugged into the cable box. Volume can be turned up and down with either the cable box's RC or the TV's RC, but it's best to keep the cable box volume all the way up and treat it as a master volume, then control the actual volume with the TV's RC, since the TV gives a visual display of volume level. In order to watch a DVD, the 'tv/vcr' button needs to be pushed on the TV's RC. Then, the DVD player is operable normally via its own RC. And, of course, if one wants to watch TV and the screen is grey, then one needs to push the 'tv/vcr' button on the TV's RC, telling the TV to pay attention not to the DVD player and it's RCA inputs, but rather to the cable TV signal coming in via coaxial cable.
In addition to all of these considerations, a big issue is that there were suddenly three remote controls all floating around the living room, where it had been hard enough to keep track of one. I solved this problem by constructing The Device (below).
The Device was built from a toilet paper tube folded into a triangle, and the three remotes tied to it in three places with multiple loops of string. The loops don't obscure the buttons, and it seems pretty sturdy. The Device solves the problem of lost remote controls not only by reducing the number from three to one, but also by being so enormous that it will be impossible to lose -- it would be like losing a thermos bottle.
This is how manly I am: below is a print of my BARE FOOT IN THE SNOW.
I had to go out to the backyard this morning to right the upended trash can, and I felt that the discomfort of snow on my bare feet and draft in my bathrobe (weather.com says it's 26 degrees) would be worth not having to go downstairs, get my shoes, put them on, shake the snow from them, and then replace them downstairs. Also, I got to enjoy being YMIR THE FROST GIANT, if only for a minute.
I can't imagine that bare human feet aren't able to be in snow without ill effect. I remember hearing something about an aboriginal tribe somewhere in the pacific -- australia, possibly -- who stuck their feet out of their blanket at night, and let them drop way below a normal body temperature to conserve heat. I think the feet must enjoy rubust circulation, and don't mind being chilled occasionally. It's sort of fun to walk in the snow, every once and a while. Katy really enjoyed romping in the snow.
Oh -- by the way, tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of her death.
I think the difference between me and many other people might be that I don't find the superficial sensation of cold to be uncomfortable. In fact, I relish it. This is not to say that I don't have a body temperature to maintain, just like everyone else. But I find those few minutes out in the cold, before internal cold starts to set in and the teeth begin to chatter, to be physically pleasant. I also don't cool off internally as quickly as many people -- I can retain my body temperature for longer. This might be because I am large and oafish. Elephants and other large beasts have similar physiology when it comes to the relationship between body and environmental temperature -- they generally have more problems keeping cool than staying warm. The opposite tends to be true for small creatures.
But, I'm not that much bigger than the average human. Well, roughly twice as big, if not a little bigger. But I'm not very big, relative to creatures like elephants, rhinoceroses, and hippopotami. Probably equally responsible for my relative preference for cold over heat is a relatively fast and hot-burning metabolism, and lots of insulating body fat. But mainly, I think it's just that I like the way cold things feel on my skin, including air, whereas most people don't. If I were to sit out in the 26-degree weather for a few hours in nothing but my robe, I'd complain about the cold too. But for a few minutes, the cold on my skin feels good while my body easily maintains 98.6F.
Of course, james is the same way (although not quite to my degree, I don't think), and he's one of the skinniest people I've ever seen. I'm not sure that if I had so little body fat I would be as hot as he is.
Man, what an inane blog.
I finally recorded all of the jazz tunes I know, arranged for solo electric guitar, and posted mp3s on the web. The quality of the recordings is pretty bad, because I'm mic'ing a guitar amplifier, using a cheap four-track as a microphone pre-amp, and then running the four-track into a USB audio peripheral on my old macintosh. So, the sound isn't the best; lots of hiss, and some distortion. But it's sort of an interesting effect with the jazz tunes -- the listener can imagine it's an old recording from the 40s or something.
here they are.
Nine short tunes. It was hard enough getting through each tune once without screwing up and having to do a re-take, so I didn't repeat the tune a couple of times with improvisation, as I think one is supposed to do.
Clearly, I'm no joe pass. But I'm not displeased, I guess. Making recordings of someone else's work is very different than improvising while laying in my own bed, or even at a wedding. It's sort of hard to play someone else's pieces, not so much because of the finger-dexterity involved (although this can be a hurdle at times), but because I get distracted while I'm playing and simply forget the next chord. So, I end up having to do take after take after take.
I think these tunes sound amateurish, but they're the best I can do. They're sort of boring and free of improvisation, but my tendency to forget the next chord is even greater when I do that, so I usually play these tunes fairly straight.
Everything in the 'jazz' directory is featured in the 'real book' (a well-respected fake book), except 'deacon blue,' which I worked out several months ago. I'm definitely most comfortable playing that one. Hopefully, I can achieve the same comfort level with the others, perhaps after a few months of playing with them, improvising around the chords, etc.
I drove to the NIH (national institutes of health) today to visit my dad at work. This is a trip I've been making for years; I drove down wisconsin avenue, and made a right turn onto what I knew to be the correct side street. After I made the turn, I saw that a gate had been installed, complete with security booth. After stopping at the gate, I was told by the guard to make a u-turn, and re-enter the NIH campus a few blocks up from where I was. I pointed out to the guard that the visitor parking for my dad's building was right there, visible to the left, that all I needed to do was drive up and park there, and 'why do I need to enter somewhere else?' I was a little bit annoyed.
The guard was very polite, and launched into a 'yes sir, I understand that, but...' speech. Apparently, policy dictated that my vehicle be subject to a security check and issued a pass. I did as the guard asked, and navigated to the other campus entrance. Stopped cars, orange cones, barrels, and blue-suited campus cops were everywhere. I pulled my car into an sort of open canopy structure where it would be inspected. I can see how the procedure might become tedious if one had to do it day after day, but it was actually interesting just the once, because it had never happened to me before.
Security officers waved some device over my steering wheel (my dad told me that they were scanning for traces of explosives on my hands, which is actually a pretty good idea), checked my trunk, and looked inside a bit. Then an NIH cop asked me 'what's going on with your tags?'
What my tags have to do with being a terrorist bomber, I don't know. Nevertheless, I was told to park my car out of the way in front of the cop's jeep cherokee cruiser while she investigated my license and registration. I waited for a while, occasionally glancing in my rear view mirror to watch the cop stare down at her computer.
It turns out that my mom had neglected to affix renewal stickers to her tags. After the long process of running the registration through her car's computer, the cop allowed that indeed the tags were coming up as expiring in 2006, but that it was very important for my mother to put her stickers on. 'i could tow your car for this,' she said. When she handed back my license and mother's registration, I gave the simpering, ingratiating 'thank you!' that one has to give when a cop lets one off easy -- hey, they're people too.
I don't like that the NIH police had used a security checkpoint to check up on another law enforcement issue, especially one as trivial as this. I can understand refusing to politely ignore a 16 year-old girl tied up in the trunk, but making a fuss about my tags' lack of renewal stickers seemed a bit much. But, I suppose a police officer is under obligation to report or otherwise intervene when s/he sees the law being broken.
This is why it is generally a good idea to avoid police officers, something that post 9-11 security measure make significantly more difficult. Even when not coupled with security checkpoints, cars are an excellent law enforcement loophole -- not only are there so many things that are legitimate legal reasons for scrutiny (forgotten renewal stickers, for one), but there is also a host of qualitative nonsense that basically gives cops free reign to pull a person over any time they feel like it; 'driving unsafely' comes to mind.
'i saw you swerve back there. License and registration? ::sniff sniff:: I smell marijuana, which is cause for a search. Step out of the car.'
If the airport cops find a joint between your toes while they're checking for shoe-bombs, then you're going to get busted for possession. If the FBI authorizes a wiretap on your house because of associations with possible terrorists, and discovers that you're running a football gambling ring, then you're going to get busted for racketeering. And, of course, if your car is being checked for explosives at the NIH gates, and they discover that your renewal stickers are missing, you get detained and threatened with towing and fines.
This is why I object to increased security -- it puts police in an easy position to enforce more petty and moral laws against victimless crimes. And, at the same time, it doesn't really do anything to prevent terrorism. It doesn't take a genius to familiarize himself with security procedures, and then circumvent them. Certainly a smart, motivated terrorist would remember his renewal stickers.
The NIH cops didn't check under my car, nor did they search my person, or even the interior of my car very thoroughly. Not that I expected them to, for the sake of national security -- campus cops are responsible for hundreds of cars coming through that gate every day, and procedure have to be streamlined. Carefully checking every vehicle and person would simply take too long. Airport screeners are in the same position: they check hundreds of people every day in exactly the same cursory way. It wouldn't be hard for a motivated individual or organization to conceive of an easy loophole -- ceramic knives, for instance. Chemically unconventional explosives. Firearms hidden in a chassis cavity. Etc.
The fact that mass security screenings like the ones performed at NIH are clearly ineffective seems to point to two things: 1) it generates the appearance of security, which is important in instilling public confidence in the government's ability to protect. 2) it gives law enforcement a chance to better check up on the citizenry -- an opportunity for more effective social control.
Of course, this was on federal property; as of now, the county police aren't coming around and performing surprise inspections of random homes (2nd amendment rights are starting to look better and better). I wouldn't expect a police officer doing a security inspection to gloss over a severed head and meat cleaver in the passenger seat. However, I don't really think it's appropriate to enforce petty laws under the guise of national security. This is really exactly the kind of thing civil libertarians are afraid is only going to get worse.
I suppose I'd better blog. I don't have much to say these days, except for talking about my mood, daily life, and general failures as a human being. It's 6:47am, and I haven't been to bed. I slept yesterday from about 4pm-9pm, and then had a craving for some coke. I tried to sleep at about 2am or so, but couldn't. I did get some pretty good guitar practice in, though, before I turned out the light. Instead of lying there, my brain wide awake and my eyes closed, I came downstairs and chatted online until just now.
I'm nervous about my tentative job at the bicycle repair shop, because 1) I'm very uncertain that I'll be able to do it, 2) I have to drive this girl home on Monday or else she'll freeze to death at the metro station, and the bike shop might want me to start on Monday, 3) if they take me immediately, I won't have time to do other interviews for other jobs, 4) I have to take my car in to get the muffler checked out on Sunday night/Monday morning, and I'm not sure when or how I'll get there or pick it up or if that'll otherwise interfere, 5) I just hate everything and am upset by the general nature of existence and reality, which is such that it is unpredictable and uncontrollable. You can never plan anything precisely, you always have to think on your feet, and unexpected things always come up. I don't know if the girl will call from the metro on Monday. I don't know if I'll have to work Monday. I don't know if I even have the job. I don't know when my car will be ready. I don't know how it will be payed for. It's just a world of unknowns, and I find it extremely stressful. I guess everyone does.
I suppose the only thing to do in these situations is say 'fuck it,' and accept the fact that I can't control anything. That's the buddhist thing to do, I think. But it's funny -- people are always giving me advice like that. To just 'let go', or to 'not worry about it.' but these people have no idea what it's like to be me. Life is very much easier and more pleasant for most other people than it is for me.
I was talking to someone today who has debilitating leg ulcers, cannot work, and has to spend the bulk of each day lying around with his legs elevated. He's really sick. I asked him if he ever considered suicide, or thinks that life isn't worth living, and he was incredulous: 'no way! There are people worse off than me.' this demonstrated to me that the degree to which an individual suffers is not objectively measurable in any way. Someone might have their family killed in a car crash and suffer LESS than someone who loses their keys. People's brains vary a lot, and they create misery and happiness arbitrarily. People talk a lot about trivializing the suffering of others, but how do they know that those others really suffered, in a comparative sense? Who's to say that someone in auschwitz had a worse time than a preschooler who has his crayons stolen by another kid? Suffering isn't measurable by circumstances.
My plan is to record my renditions of all of the jazz standards I've worked out, and put them on the web for people to download. That should be fun.
I have a suspicion that what I thought was postmodern zen enlightenment is merely confused thinking and the beginnings of delusional madness. My head just isn't a very orderly place, it seems to me. I notice that I don't write about philosophy as I used to, but instead ramble on about myself.
I talked to an SDF user from vancouver island, and he recommended a place called gabriola island, situated between vancouver island and the BC coast. Apparently, it's full of hippies and artists, and is slow-paced. That's one of the things I hate about this area: it moves too fast for me, and is too hectic. I need things to be quiet, relaxed and unhurried. This area, along with moving too quickly, is too crowded, and the people too obsessed with money and status. It doesn't have any character beyond that which is created by television programs and stores. People just drive around from store to store, from restaurant to restaurant, and they talk about sports teams or shows on television that they watch between going to stores, working jobs, and sleeping in their beds. Or, they talk about the things they buy. Or, they talk about their jobs. Someone should mercifully nuke the entire east coast and put all of these miserable drones, hopped up on prozac and caffeine, out of their misery.
I can't blame my location entirely, of course, although that's a big part of my discontent. Also responsible is my emotional oversensitiviy, lack of emotional control, and my essential fear of people.
If I'm not able to do something, I'll feel like I want to start crying. If someone wrongs me in traffic, I jump out of my car, yell at them and threaten them with death. Almost any stimulus, but especially those that have to do with other people, trigger a disorganized tangle of seizure-like misfirings in my right temporal lobe that manifest as a confused, explosive, volatile, and labile emotional state. I simply don't have control over my emotions, and almost anything can set me off.
I like computers, and language, and music, and food -- but not people. I like them when they're little boxes of text on my computer screen, but not in person. They're just too much in person. Their presence confuses and upsets me, and overloads my mind with threat-responses, perceptual stimulation, and empathy overload. People are just too much for me. I can't relax around them, completely. When I'm alone and when I'm in the company of others are like two different states of essential being.
So, 1) the east coast sucks, 2) I'm too sensitive, and 3) I hate and fear humans. I'm sure there's something that I'm leaving out.
One of the reasons I write on the web is to let the world know just how unbearable existence is for me, the degree to which life really is suffering. Just so people know why I sometimes don't run around like an idiot applying for peon jobs, working out in a gym, talking to girls in bars, or generally bowing and scraping to social structures, trying to get a hold of the right forms to fill out. I just want everyone to understand why for the most part, the best I can hope for is to convince myself that I just don't give a shit.