getting paid. a birthday. and battle!
so it seems that, since i am only going to be here for three months, i do not get paid by check. i mean, i could i guess. but then i would have to open a bank account. for which i would need a "sofinumber", or social fiscal number. yeah, like a social security number.
and that's not really worth the hassle.
i think.
in order to be paid, on the last day of the month i am to go to the HME-2 building on mathildelaan... which is adjacent to the philips football stadium. where the PSV plays. but that's not bad. it's maybe a 15 minute walk. however, this place is only open during office hours. as in, when i'm supposed to be at work. sort of ironic, i thought, that i had to take time off of work to go get paid.
also, i just want to say... that there is a "john f kennedyplein" in eindhoven.
laan = lane/alley, weg = way, plein = square. not that surprising.
so i found the building and was told by the receptionist to go to the "kas" desk on the second floor. of course, when i found it, the woman had no record of me to receive any payment. after checking the paperwork at the cash desk, she went to make some calls. then came back... asked for some HR names of people i had dealt with, and went to make more calls. after standing around for what seemed like a half an hour... i finally got paid.
and now i'm wondering how i'm going to get paid for the half of april i will be working... if this place is only open on the last day of the month. and also i'm wondering why i got paid for less than half of what i was told i'd be paid per month. since i started on the 16th.
but she gave me a receipt. in dutch. and the name of my "salary administrator" from whom i can hopefully find the answers.
i spent my birthday hanging out in my apartment. playing poker on pokerstars. i won a buttload of fake money. so there's that.
by the time i had gotten up the nerve (yes, i am that much of a dork) to go ask one of my flatmates if he wanted to go out for a few pints, he had already left. (and returned around 4am. with a crapload of people. or just a few drunken people which sounded like a crapload.) but he's pretty cool. he's the one that hooked up the wireless router and let me know so i could get internet in my room. so maybe i'll bug him later. not sure that i want to "party" like an undergrad, if that is indeed his style.
why does it now the seem to be the mainstream that... if you call for deference toward those who know better than most on a topic, you are branded a "self-important, arrogant prick"?
i'm using this example of a common and, in the grand scheme of things, silly occurance to illustrate a much more important point that has been getting on my nerves more and more these days.
it seems to me to line up quite well with the seeming "republican war on science" that has been building steam lately. and although i've generally don't subscribe to the "well he did it first" justification of argument tactics, i think using such language is justified.
but the funny thing is... in this oh-so-unimportant interweb battle (and it sould be noted, that i have a history with this cat... constantly calling me an arrogant "college boy" who thinks he knows more than everyone, and he and a few others constant try to use the fact that i'm in higher education as an insult... which i, and it seems a fwe of my friends, find hysterical... and yet also very sad), i didn't even tell state an official opinion on the actual issue at hand. merely that i was sick and tied of all this "armchair science" that seems be flying around lately.
from congressmen thinking they can decide, better than doctors, the condition of a woman in a vegetative state (and even an actual "doctor", whose area of expertise is pulmonary, by the way, and not neurological, got up and did what would normally incur a malpractice suit in any other situation) to people who clearly have no idea what "science" means demanding that intelligent design be included in science curricula... and all the way to everyone and their brother weighing in on global warming.
so all i stated was we should let those that know what they're doing, make the conclusions. (but by the time it degenerated into a pointless flame war... i admittedly decided to have a little fun with him...)
not that i don't believe people should talk about it. not in the slightest. but when you try to point to "evidence" that actually has NO bearing on the issue... you're polluting the discourse in such a way that is helping us lose sight of the actual facts.
look at al gore. he's been lampooned for years about a comment he made about his role in the creation of the internet. what he stated was in fact, completely and utterly true. but it was misquoted and reinterpreted, most likely on purpose, until it turned into a ridiculous story of saying he "invented the internet". and now people throw that story around as if it were fact.
edit: in looking for a link to the story i've found that it was, indeed on purpose... perpetrated by one dick armey. heheh.
now imagine how bad it could get if this were a topic in which most people are not properly trained to analyze fully and correctly.
i don't go up to musicians and tell them how to play.
and don't people get all up-in-arms when they say their HMOs are making medical decisions, or overriding doctors' prognoses about what medications and treatments they need? this is not all that different.
it seems to me this is a side effect of some mutated sense of the "american dream" where people think that, along with being able to be whomever you want to be and do whatever you want to do... your opinion on anything at all is going to be valid. but quite simply, that's not the case. (and i certainly include myself in this.) on a lot of things, sure, it will. but not whether or not the earth is flat. not physics. not math. and not on topics for which you are less than half informed on the entirety of information you would need to make a proper conclusion. that's not arrogance. that's common sense. if a blind man feels around and finds an elephant's tail, and only the tail... should we entertain his theories on what he thinks he has found? sure he may conclude it's an elephant. but most likely, he'll believe it a rope. either way, he hasn't enough information to make a valid conclusion.
if you don't know what you're talking about, please. shut the fuck up. you're making yourself look like an ass. and although one ignorant jackass doesn't have much of an impact... by extension, en masse, you're helping make our country look like a mass of asses.
A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking largely sobers us again.
Alexander Pope (1688-1744)
and that's not really worth the hassle.
i think.
in order to be paid, on the last day of the month i am to go to the HME-2 building on mathildelaan... which is adjacent to the philips football stadium. where the PSV plays. but that's not bad. it's maybe a 15 minute walk. however, this place is only open during office hours. as in, when i'm supposed to be at work. sort of ironic, i thought, that i had to take time off of work to go get paid.
also, i just want to say... that there is a "john f kennedyplein" in eindhoven.
laan = lane/alley, weg = way, plein = square. not that surprising.
so i found the building and was told by the receptionist to go to the "kas" desk on the second floor. of course, when i found it, the woman had no record of me to receive any payment. after checking the paperwork at the cash desk, she went to make some calls. then came back... asked for some HR names of people i had dealt with, and went to make more calls. after standing around for what seemed like a half an hour... i finally got paid.
and now i'm wondering how i'm going to get paid for the half of april i will be working... if this place is only open on the last day of the month. and also i'm wondering why i got paid for less than half of what i was told i'd be paid per month. since i started on the 16th.
but she gave me a receipt. in dutch. and the name of my "salary administrator" from whom i can hopefully find the answers.
i spent my birthday hanging out in my apartment. playing poker on pokerstars. i won a buttload of fake money. so there's that.
by the time i had gotten up the nerve (yes, i am that much of a dork) to go ask one of my flatmates if he wanted to go out for a few pints, he had already left. (and returned around 4am. with a crapload of people. or just a few drunken people which sounded like a crapload.) but he's pretty cool. he's the one that hooked up the wireless router and let me know so i could get internet in my room. so maybe i'll bug him later. not sure that i want to "party" like an undergrad, if that is indeed his style.
why does it now the seem to be the mainstream that... if you call for deference toward those who know better than most on a topic, you are branded a "self-important, arrogant prick"?
i'm using this example of a common and, in the grand scheme of things, silly occurance to illustrate a much more important point that has been getting on my nerves more and more these days.
it seems to me to line up quite well with the seeming "republican war on science" that has been building steam lately. and although i've generally don't subscribe to the "well he did it first" justification of argument tactics, i think using such language is justified.
but the funny thing is... in this oh-so-unimportant interweb battle (and it sould be noted, that i have a history with this cat... constantly calling me an arrogant "college boy" who thinks he knows more than everyone, and he and a few others constant try to use the fact that i'm in higher education as an insult... which i, and it seems a fwe of my friends, find hysterical... and yet also very sad), i didn't even tell state an official opinion on the actual issue at hand. merely that i was sick and tied of all this "armchair science" that seems be flying around lately.
from congressmen thinking they can decide, better than doctors, the condition of a woman in a vegetative state (and even an actual "doctor", whose area of expertise is pulmonary, by the way, and not neurological, got up and did what would normally incur a malpractice suit in any other situation) to people who clearly have no idea what "science" means demanding that intelligent design be included in science curricula... and all the way to everyone and their brother weighing in on global warming.
so all i stated was we should let those that know what they're doing, make the conclusions. (but by the time it degenerated into a pointless flame war... i admittedly decided to have a little fun with him...)
not that i don't believe people should talk about it. not in the slightest. but when you try to point to "evidence" that actually has NO bearing on the issue... you're polluting the discourse in such a way that is helping us lose sight of the actual facts.
look at al gore. he's been lampooned for years about a comment he made about his role in the creation of the internet. what he stated was in fact, completely and utterly true. but it was misquoted and reinterpreted, most likely on purpose, until it turned into a ridiculous story of saying he "invented the internet". and now people throw that story around as if it were fact.
edit: in looking for a link to the story i've found that it was, indeed on purpose... perpetrated by one dick armey. heheh.
now imagine how bad it could get if this were a topic in which most people are not properly trained to analyze fully and correctly.
i don't go up to musicians and tell them how to play.
and don't people get all up-in-arms when they say their HMOs are making medical decisions, or overriding doctors' prognoses about what medications and treatments they need? this is not all that different.
it seems to me this is a side effect of some mutated sense of the "american dream" where people think that, along with being able to be whomever you want to be and do whatever you want to do... your opinion on anything at all is going to be valid. but quite simply, that's not the case. (and i certainly include myself in this.) on a lot of things, sure, it will. but not whether or not the earth is flat. not physics. not math. and not on topics for which you are less than half informed on the entirety of information you would need to make a proper conclusion. that's not arrogance. that's common sense. if a blind man feels around and finds an elephant's tail, and only the tail... should we entertain his theories on what he thinks he has found? sure he may conclude it's an elephant. but most likely, he'll believe it a rope. either way, he hasn't enough information to make a valid conclusion.
if you don't know what you're talking about, please. shut the fuck up. you're making yourself look like an ass. and although one ignorant jackass doesn't have much of an impact... by extension, en masse, you're helping make our country look like a mass of asses.
A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking largely sobers us again.
Alexander Pope (1688-1744)