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Tunnel of Love by Dire Straits is the best song ever. Fact. I’ve been through a slight non-blogging phase lately. A few reasons for that. I’ve either wanted to write about something, but not wanted my writings on that something to be available freely on the Internet; or I’ve not had anything to write about; or I’ve wanted to write about things on which I’m more than happy for my writings to be freely available, but I’ve not been able to articulate what I’ve wanted to a sufficiently high standard that I could get my point across well. In summary: Moping, Unimagination and Laziness. Another reason is that I’ve been working for the last week, which is really rather tiring. I’m sure theres something wrong with the fact that I seem to work harder over my summer vacations than I do over the rest of the year, but there you go. I realised the other day that I’ve not had a completely free summer since about 2002. Weird. Working’s been pretty good to me though, to be honest. For those who don’t know, I work in a bank as a cashier. I first did it when I was 16, and looking back now at how I was then and now it’s probably one of the best things I’ve done, for a bunch of reasons. Mostly because the job I do is essentially a proper job that proper people do, rather than a “student” job (and I don’t mean that in a derogatory way towards other stuff btw). I’ve worked with all sorts of people from my age upto 60-odd - and obviously dealt with a nice array of customers - and I think it’s whats largely responsible for turning the shy, nervy 16 year-old I was into the slightly less shy, chilled-out 20 year-old I am now. Theres a few of the customers in the branch I’m in at the moment who can’t work out how to use the front door. This isnt important, but I just felt you ought to know. This is probably the last year I’ll be working in the bank. Next year I’ll be doing proper work, and who knows what I’ll be doing the year after. I’m considering doing an MSc after I graduate, and I was thinking about what sort of course I want to do. Research or taught? What area? Do I wanna do it somewhere other than Cardiff? Lots of choices. I was also thinking about my car the other day. I’ve just got mine back on the road (first time I can drive regularly for a couple of years), and I was thinking of getting a different car in a few months. And then I looked at insurance. It’s frustrating, because I can afford some pretty decent cars, but the insurance is… Well I probably could afford it, but I’m not paying £2500-£5000 for it (admittedly the larger quote was for a Fiat Coupe. With the 20v turbo engine…). Ho hum. Might just keep what I’ve got. I’ve also been thinking about racing a lot lately. Actually, since the British Grand Prix a couple of weeks ago, I’ve been thinking about Lewis Hamilton an awful lot. I’m probably gonna write another entry about that though, so I wont say much for now, other than: wow. Tempted to pay to do a race weekend of some sort in the next year. I was thinking either karting, or possibly car racing in something like a Caterham. I’m almost definitely going to race when I’m in full-time work, because it’s something I love. Then, I’ll probably go karting to start with (cheaper…), but for a one-off I’m tempted to jump in the deep end. We’ll see. Bleh, I’m tired. Should probably sleep. This has been a really awful entry, but as I’ve typed it (and think I should publish something), it’s going up. Sorry. P.S. Theres also a few sites I keep meaning to add to the Blogroll. I’ll get round to it at some point, probably. Posted by Dickie :: 1 Comment
Since buying my Eee last week, Ive been thinking back to other gadgety goodness I’ve indulged in over the years. And it got me thinking about money, and how my attitudes towards it have changed. The reason I got from gadgets to money is that you generally need the latter to acquire the former (unless you steal them, i guess). I was thinking back to about 5 years ago, when I really wanted a PDA* (for pretty much no practical reason, I may add). These things can cost anywhere from £75 to £300, depending on how much you’ve got to throw away. And at the time the one I wanted was about £90 (it was a Handspring Visor, by the way, and as an aside How did Palm and Handspring throw away the PDA market? At the time their products were demonstrably better than any Windows-based effort, but now Handspring doesn’t exist and Palm is just making a complete hash of things. I digress…). I remember that, at the time, £90 seemed like a huge amount of money to throw away on a gadget, mainly because I didn’t have it. I did get some money together eventually, and got the PDA (which I played with for a few months before burying it at the bottom of a drawer…), but it still felt like a huge amount of money. Somewhere along the way, my idea of “a vast amount of money” has changed somewhat. Obviously, I have access to more money now thanks to things like loans and overdrafts and a job, but even so, when I bought the Eee last week I spent over £200 almost on a whim, because the display model was ever so shiny… I really notice the whole perception-change thing at work. I work in a bank, and the way you look at money there is somewhat skewed. When someone wants to withdraw, say, £100, I think “pah, only a hundred? Take out a thousand, you wimp”. Never mind that its just over twice what I earn in a day… You can sit with £1500 sat in your till and think to yourself “good, thats not much, I’m fine”. At the end of the day there can be tens of thousands of pounds on the floor waiting to be counted, and you don’t really think of it as “a lot of money”. Actually I kind of disconnect completely with the concept of money when I’m at work; I don’t think “that’s £5,000 there it can buy me a nice car and insurance and a year’s running costs”, I just think of it as, well, just a number, really. It’s slightly odd, now I come to think of it, although probably good to stop temptation… Once again I’m not sure where I’m going with this, so I’ll leave it here. After people saying the last entry was “damn good” and “interesting and worthwhile”, it feels as if theres some sort of pressure to keep writing to a high standard… I don’t generally think what I write is that good; I write loads of things only to get halfway through and think “what the hell are you on about? This is crap”. I must’ve written the last entry at least a couple of times in the past and never posted it… Ho hum. * If it wasnt clear before, that really marks me out as a geek… Posted by Dickie :: 4 Comments
Sometime last year, Microsoft bought 1.6% of Facebook. They paid $240 million, which puts the value of Facebook at about $15 billion. $15 billion. For a website. So, any guesses what Ford, a massive international company with lots of physical assets and a large base of loyal customers, is worth (according to Wall Street)? Less than $15 billion. OK, Ford is in dire straits at the moment (name an American car company that isn’t) but even so, thats complete madness. Posted by Dickie :: 4 Comments
I’ve just come across a Facebook group called “Campaign Against 4.8% Student Loan Interest“. Ok, so the interest rate on student loans is set to track the retail price index (RPI) at the end of the previous tax year. In March 2006, the RPI was 2.4%, so the interest rate on student loans was set at 2.4% from September 2006. The RPI in March 2007 was 4.8%, so thats what the new interest rate for student loans is from September 2007. Basically, the RPI is an average measure of changes in the prices of goods, and is basically a measure of inflation. Think of it in terms of ice creams; a few years ago, a Flake 99 cost about 99p in most places. Now, it costs about £1.40. Thats because the price of goods has risen, so £1 buys less now than it did a few years ago. So really the interest rate of student loans is set so that you pay back the “real world” cost of your initial debt - i.e. if you borrowed 99p a few years ago for your ice cream, what you’d pay back now is ~£1.40. So the lender hasn’t actually made any money off you. As an indicator, a typical rate of interest on a credit card is about 14% APR, about 7% APR for loans, about 8% for mortgages and about 18% AER for overdrafts. Student loans are effectively free debt. So we have absolutely no right to moan. Bloody hell, students annoy me sometimes… (N.b. I’m no economist, so most of this post could well be complete bollocks. Sorry if it is). Posted by Dickie :: 7 Comments
So you spend your days working for a certain well-known high-street bank, doing what is really a pretty shitty job (I’m not listing my gripes now, that’s for another day). You look forward to leaving, to getting home, to escaping. You turn your P.C. on to slob out in front of the best the net has to offer, only to see… That certain well-known high-street bank’s advertising coming at you from the bottom of the MSN window. AAAARRRGGHH! Posted by Dickie :: 1 Comment
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