Vivian on 15/5/2013 at 17:10
I can't believe fucking meat-trimmers get more money than lifeguards.
faetal on 15/5/2013 at 18:01
Life guards receive the ability to run through waves in slow motion though, which offsets that a great deal.
faetal on 15/5/2013 at 18:04
Quote Posted by Thirith
Isn't it upside down then to be pissed off with waiters getting so much sympathy (which, by the way, I think is much more of a US thing, where tipping seems to be a sacrosanct rule, whereas here where waiters get a salary they can live off no one raises an eyebrow if people don't always tip 10-15%), rather than to be pissed off that there are people who are even worse off in terms of salaries?
I agree totally. It's like when people employed in the private sector in the UK start loudly complaining that public sector workers are paid too much or their pensions are too good when they should be trying to argue that
ALL salaries & benefits be that good (obviously worth mentioning that not all UK PSWs are paid well with good pensions).
DDL on 15/5/2013 at 18:25
Easier to gripe about others than to demand better for yourself, though. "Make their life as shit as mine" means you don't actually have to think about changing your situation, whereas "make my life as good as theirs" means change and the distinct worry that even if given a level playing field, you might still think your life is shit, and THEN what would you do?
People are funny.
SubJeff on 15/5/2013 at 19:16
Yep, is an odd world. The injustice of below minimum wage jobs is just a reflection of the whole messed up system. We live in a world where you can get rich just by moving other people's money around and where celebrity sportspeople get paid more in a week than many do in a year. And no amount of taxation makes up for that. Then there are people who work hard to help others but who aren't rewarded for it and often end up in situations that seem more like punishment.
On the other end of the scale we have people (certainly here in the UK) who have never worked and whose parents have never worked, who have never paid taxes or done anything to contribute to anything other than their own needs. But somehow the government feels it has to support them financially.
It's a crazy world. I used to work at a place where operating theatre staff weren't allowed to sleep on a night shift, even though I was, just because they were the same grade as the ITU nurses and the ITU nurses obviously don't get a chance to sleep. This meant that I'd be rested fit a 4 am emergency but the rest of the team wasn't. It was just pretty protocol driven madness.
But that's the way the world spins.
gunsmoke on 15/5/2013 at 19:29
Quote Posted by Yakoob
I've always heard (and recently reading Blood, Bones & Butter by Gabriel Hamilton kind of confirms) that being a chef is really one of the "works of passion" like making art, teaching, or game programming i.e. it's really demanding for often small benefits so you really need to love it or you will end up hating it.
Personally I love cooking and been getting into it more and more the past few years, but don't think I could ever work as a chef. Both for the reasons above, and because I always thought that while experimenting with food at home may be fun, cooking the same dish day after day in a hectic kitchen sounds a little... repetitive/stressful/mundane? How do you guys keep it from boring you out?
Mostly with nightly specials and events like beer pairings and wine tastings.
gunsmoke on 15/5/2013 at 19:35
Quote Posted by Subjective Effect
Don't get me wrong; I tip and when I tip well I tip really really really well. Like stupid well.
Buy I don't tip just because I think I should, I tip where I think it's deserved.
If you're in a job that relies on tips you should do it really well and being a waiter isn't that hard in the grand scheme of things.
Serving is 90% common sense the rest is just being polite. It's easy as shit unless you are a complete jerk.
faetal on 15/5/2013 at 19:43
SubJeff - the people who live on benefits cost the state a minuscule amount in the scheme of things - we just hear more about them because the tabloids choose to over-represent "single mum gets £70k in benefits" stories as though they were common. Spongers getting paid is just the result of a criteria driven system. Anything which is decided by criteria is vulnerable to false positives and false negatives. Make the criteria too stringent and genuine claimants get fucked. Make it too lenient and the workshy get paid. I'm not saying the balance is perfect, but the fact that the UK currently has an average 6 job seekers per vacancy (not adjusted for qualification), we pretty much have to accept right now that a bunch of people are going to have to be on benefits. This is not helped by the UK becoming more and more dominated by large businesses who tend to reduce their overheads by outsourcing and centralising, which reduces the overall number of jobs which exist in the UK.
It's a tricky issue. Not to mention that the entire UK benefits bill per year is dwarfed by what we're owed in corporation tax and likely dwarfed again by what is legitimately (but hardly fairly) dodged by tax avoidance systems.
Queue on 15/5/2013 at 19:45
Quote Posted by faetal
Life guards receive the ability to run through waves in slow motion though, which offsets that a great deal.
And don't forget all the breasts. Tits everywhere. It's a veritable smorgasbord of boobs!
OH GOD, I WANNA BE A LIFEGUARD!
UU
jimjack on 16/5/2013 at 02:30
Quote Posted by Vivian
Yo jimjack, you ever weld anything for yourself? Like framework or whatever. Metalwork is the only bit of DIY-ish stuff I've never done (bar cold-shaping metal plates for my girlfriend to angle-grind for her shows, which is fun), and welding is actually something I'd love to learn so I could make shit like bike trailers and nice benches, etc. How long does it take to learn? I mean, not to a professional standard like yourself, but to the point where you can join two bits of metal together and have it be of a practical strength? Is arc-welding easier than gas-mix torches? I think my dad's got an arc welder somewhere, but I was always too terrified by his tales of arc-eye to touch it. 'like having hot sand instead of eye-balls for a couple of days' was his exact description.
When I was learning with my uncle (also works in the shipyards, for that matter so did my grandad) so it seemed to be the course I was going to take, and I wanted to and yeah I did in between learning the basics make myself bits and pieces of welded together metal lol, Im not artisitic in anyway. But it is a learning process. So far, I've taken in the past two years, :science, maths and communications, modern welding, mig, tig, FCAW (flux cored arc welding) welding metallurgy (joining metal parts w/ heat lol),oxyacetylene welding, sheet metal layout, blueprint reading,mechanical properties of metal, ferrous metals (metals that contain iron lol) and non-ferrous metals and safety
Quote Posted by Subjective Effect
One of my regrets in life is not learning to weld with my father. He used to weld loads of stuff out of necessity when we were in Africa, and my brother trained as a welder at some point in the 80s so I'd have had a couple of good teachers. I just remember watching it all through what I thought was an awesome and spooky mask but I was too young and stupid to realise the true utility of it all and so never asked him to teach me :(
Models are in that top 300 list. Lol.
I was lucky to have learned alot from my uncle. Otherwise maybe I'd not chosen that career. Besides the classroom, you have to practical on site or in shop with a "mentor". I was really lucky to be able to get paid as I learned after the first month on a construction site. I had some interesting mentors but most were pretty decent. I'd just learn to shut my mouth most of the time, watch and be on the ready to go for whatever, usually the coffees. So you work your way up without being a prat on the site. Ive also been lucky to have had my second practical on a major construction site downtown and I was actually up on the beams, pretty awesome. But where im at now, again with luck I am working in a shipyard, repairing old tugs mostly and the occasional ferry.
Also the mask made me as a kid, feel darth vaderish. :)
