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Setsuna's crazy adventures - a cataloguing

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Setsuna:

--- Quote from: Naryoril on October 21, 2015, 09:35:48 am ---Of course you are right, but imo banking, especially investment banking, attracts exactly the type of person that will do almost anything if it's for money. They already are into money, so it's only natural they are going for a job where they can operate with millions and sometimes even billions, especially if it isn't their money they potentially loose (but they still get paid a ton extra if they get lucky and pick the right assets).

But sorry for drifting off topic here. I'm a bit marked on this topic as a) Swiss (tax evasion and all that stuff) and b) someone who develops an asset management software (in a small company, but we do only book keeping and reporting) and c) thus often has contact with banks

--- End quote ---

Oh definitely. Basically the worst that can happen is 'You get fired' for making a decision that can destroy millions of people's lives. I mean, I remember the two trillion dollar 'fat finger trade' that JP Morgan did only what, a year and a half ago? The amount of straight upright theft you can see in those units is downright disturbing.

You tend to find that a lot of the legal departments are very conservative (mostly cause it's their entire job to ensure that it's legal enough they can get out of trouble) but the trading desks tend to get the right of way if there's enough money 'left on the table' so to speak.

I should know, cause I used to work the FX tables once upon a time. I can tell all sorts of really stupid stories, and about how stupid I was (mostly it amounts to 'I left because I valued being able to sleep at night. I have a conscience that WORKS, which, unfortunately is not an asset if you intend to get deep into investment finance.) back in those days. Needless to say, I could have been a souless millionare, but I value my sanity more than the money.

For most sane people out there, seeing the set of sentences I described there should have you running for cover. The amount of risk loaded words should be enough to convince anyone financially literate to run away screaming (if for no other reason than 'I don't want any of this on me')

Setsuna:
Well, I'll put in another edition - this time to give a little bit of a background into how I actually think.

Oh, and if anyone's interested , the 'in investigation' fraud number got inflated by between 50-70 billion total. It moves the average (based on the average) about 40 million a day. It's only one of the biggest (Well, was) companies in the US by Market Capitalisation.

http://brontecapital.blogspot.com/2015/10/some-comments-on-valeant-conference-call.html

If you're wondering. There's nothing like the smell of probable fraud in the morning, and daylight robbery to make all those street gangs jealous with envy. Real robbery comes under the guise of it looking legal, and the best part? Most of the victims are willing, and often defend the fraud.


Now, where was I? Oh yes, I promised a (somewhat) curtain pulled back into my perspective, and I think I'll speak my mind, since although I am tired of getting shot at, I do have enough to hide behind today.

If you've seen me comment on the forums, you'll notice that I keep my counsel a lot, and every so often, I even say so. I get questions every so often about why I say something like that. 

I often decline to be drawn into the circumstances when I make comments like that, and I suspect I leave a lot of people just wondering why I would make a cryptic comment like that.
You'll also note that when I turn to counter attack in an argument, I do so with a viciousness that leaves people reeling. No, I don't give any mercy.

There's a reason I often say that, and why I can make an argument so well that I can make people physically flinch when I want to - I do my research well before I even decide to open my mouth, and will often have considered your counterarguments to anything I've got to say, the rebuttals to your counterarguments, counterarguments to your rebuttals AND have rebuttals to even THOSE counterarguments.

No, it's not perfect, because nothing ever is. Yes, this is a cited reason why I don't have a significant other (If you really have to ask, it amounts to this - no one likes a woman who will win 85%+ any arguments she picks. Why? Because unless you can keep up (or you're careful enough to take positions that are unassailable) you will just get VERY scared of having a discussion with me after long enough), but on the other hand, I often get consulted regarding business for this exact reason (If you're trying to make money, you REALLY want to be sure that your ideas will actually work on a good %, and if I can't reasonably blow holes in your business plan, you're probably onto something.)

It's for this reason I get accused a hell of a lot of having a crystal ball that can see into the future.

Unfortunately, no, I don't have any precognition, and if you dare say that to my face, my response will be (and this is me being kind) that 'I get very tired having to predict everything, and if you ask me to do any prediction, I'll shove that crystal ball where the sun doesn't shine'.

Yes, I have said that to my superiors at work. No, surprisingly I didn't get fired for it, because he damn well knew why I said that, and would ask me to predict his day just to rib me while I was working.

There IS a reason why I worked on the FX tables at a major bank at one point in my life.

I then get asked 'How the hell do you land so quickly on a position so quickly? You can't possibly know everything, can you?'

Well, the truth to that is 'No, I don't know everything, but I know enough about almost anything so I can go out there and find out what I need to know.'

As an example, I don't know enough physics to design a new jumbo jet. I do however have a fairly good understanding of design, knowledge of how weights and expected glide distance, fuel economy and a myriad of other things to actually understand why Boeing would cheap out and put in unsafe battery designs, or why airlines did not like the idea of putting in a bulletproof reinforced door (weight meaning significant economy loss and to an airline that's actually significant.) and I also know people and places who will talk to me when I need the specifics, and will do so very quickly on demand.

The same goes for virtually every field you can name. I don't have an infinitely deep knowledge pool, I just have access to one that's really, REALLY deep, I know how to use it, and I'm prepared to use it.

Of course, since this sort of thing is a discipline and like anything you want to get good at, you must PRACTICE to get any good at it, you'll end up finding that you end up with very different opinions to your friends, mostly cause your approach has to be 'How precise can I be?' rather than 'Does the facts suit my opinion?'

You'll also find out that if you learn to do things like this that you'll learn to pick your arguments very, very carefully, and of course, the fact you won't have many friends, mostly because you'll watch them march off to their doom, and you won't be able to stop them.

So generally for the people who do know me, when I make an opinion (unless I'm clearly joking around) most people tend to pay attention.

And most people who know me when I end up challenging their opinion tend to get very, VERY worried. For good reason.

Setsuna:
http://www.dailylife.com.au/life-and-love/love-sex-and-relationships/are-men-only-attracted-to-smart-women-in-theory-20151025-gki1j5.html

People have always asked me 'You're smart, you can beat virtually anyone in a fight. How the hell can you simply not find a boyfriend?'

Well, it's mostly the fact that people simply do not like women that can let you set your own trap and then let you execute yourself on the said trap.

Why? It's mostly a perception that a woman who can strike you down without you seeing them coming is a sneaky conniving bitch. You know, the type who will sneak around your back and backstab you, turning your friends against you.

Actually, I think ANY woman who has the ability to strike people down in any sense is considered a massive threat to society as a whole. Off the top of my head, Macbeth comes to mind, and although I couldn't quote her name off the top of my head, I'm pretty sure if you've read the play, you'd know who I'm talking about. There's stuff like various witches and the like too, folklore and the like.

So there's a lot of natural distrust (at least in the modern day) of women who seem too clever by half. I don't necessarily mean smart as in the traditional 'Oh, I can score better than you in a test'.
I'm talking stuff like the ability to be perceptive (Or basically, know where the wind is blowing well before the gust arrives), the ability to pay attention, or the ability to recall things (I'm famously poor at recollection, so don't ask me to remember a damn thing). There's probably others, like the ability to rapidly assess situations and determine solutions and the like too.

Basically, society does not like women who seem to be able to get an intangible advantage over other people. Men who are successful are called career politicans, if nothing else.

There's also other bits of relationship advice that sort of disapprove of anyone who has these intangible advantages to not show them at all. Some of it is basic relationship advice - a relationship is a partnership of equals, so if you REALLY think about it...

So how does my average date manifest anyway?

Something along these lines: People offer, and if I'm interested, I'd let them suggest somewhere to meet up. Some people are disappointed, since apparently the first date is a request for sex, more or less, because I decline those.

Most people tend to arrive fashionably late.

Me? I tend to scout out the place, determine where it is, what sort of clientele frequent the place, and try to understand the person that asked, from what I know about them, and what I know from experience about people like them.

What ends up happening at most first dates (if you call them that) is that the person tries their hardest to impress me, usually by thinking they can catch me off guard. Sometimes it's some sort of trick (Yes, I actually was asked out by someone who thought they could impress me with a card trick once), other times it's an attempt to surprise me either with their perceived depth in some field, or even some sort of physical surprise otherwise (outlandish gifts or something).

Problem is that I've lived a very long time operating on the principle that being caught out in surprise can get you killed. To be fair, all my brushes with death (or with someone ELSE'S death) all coincided with me being caught flatfooted, and as some of you may be aware, I don't stay surprised for very long at all.

What invariably happens is that I'll either replicate their trick within twenty minutes, or I'd turn the tables on them and shoot their knowledge of their field (which they were hoping to impress me with) with questions that someone who doesn't know anything about their field (no matter what that field is) shouldn't be asking, or I figure out exactly where the gift they got me came from, as well as a lot of other things I can derive from their gift using other information available to me (stuff like if they're living with their parents, what sort of income they earn, what they do for a living, previous girlfriends and the like)

A LOT of people who do dates bank on that working - basically you come in with your best card to impress.

Unfortunately, I'm almost impossible to impress by that sort of standard, because I've done things like brush shoulders and have arguments with celebrities (Journalism is like that) and I find that all the celebs I've dealt with would rather be treated as a human being, rather than you being struck with awe, kissing the ground they walk on.

Of course, you could also guess at what DOES impress me. It's really not too hard, IF you make the time to know me. If you need some suggestions, perhaps 'Try to consider your next move before it blows up in your face and not make the move, not after you do it, and hell rains on you?' for one.

So their best card fizzles, and generally my date gets distrustful of me, because I seem to know what they're going to do before they do it.

If you're young and female, my advice if you want to live something resembling a normal life with a social life etc would be this - You know those dumb jokes about stupid blondes? You're statistically better off being a 'stupid blonde' because at least THEN you'll have a decent social life, and judging from one of my friends, an awesome sex life.

... Yes, I should be all about feminism and all that. It doesn't mean that I can't point out the obvious, and despite what some segments of society will claim, having a healthy sex life DOES have some advantages, and it's not about you being a slut. (excuse me)

Then again, I know all kinds, including someone who frankly could write a revised edition of the Kama sutra. Besides, apparently if a male hits up 20 women, he's considered a stud, but if a woman hits up more than 1 male, she's considered a shameful slut. Is it just me, or is there a massive 'wait a second, didn't anyone do the math?' moment?

So there's another word of wisdom, if you can call it that - intelligence (of any kind) is not necessarily considered an asset, not if you want any sort of social life.

Setsuna:
Now, for another episode of 'So how can this happen?' starring my favourite entity - the government department.

(If you haven't figured it out by now, I'm being very sarcastic)

Okay, for those who don't know, I was in the middle of picking up a course in Security and Risk management (Mostly due to the fact I like to keep my skills sharp, and keeping things tucked away is a MO, only cause - Hey, you read everything I've said so far, haven't you? Frankly, I'm convinced I'll need to learn how to maintain a machine gun before my life is over, because I wouldn't be surprised if I get caught up in a civil war before I'm done with life) before the fire happened.

Since I'm mostly stable (although outfitting to bring things back to speed will take over 6 months so for the im@s requests, that'll be a VERY long time) I figured I might as well do something to improve myself. Besides, looking for work is proving fruitless, since well, it's somewhat difficult to do so when you're running off charity for a wardrobe (And expansion is very, very slow, as you can guess), and you need proper business attire.

Of course, since I was previously studying, I was granted a deferral until such time as I could return.

I was also being paid a stipend from the government (not much, but it's enough to keep the household running and slowly creep things along) and they previously agreed to let me time to recover, as long as I stayed on another payment (and looked for work in the meantime, which I did because replacing and prepping this place requires money, not because they insisted)

So since I was granted a deferral, and I was more or less prepared to move back to study, a provisional date to transfer back to what I was doing on August 15th was set to November 5th (Yesterday)

Thing is...

Well, you remember how I had to lie about the initial application?

Well, apparently something ELSE went wrong.

I think the recap I did to a friend should be enough really. Sometimes, you can't make real life up.

According to Centrelink, my record has been locked for at least two days and they can't adjust things to reflect my new status as a student, and the cause of this is according to the customer service officer I spoke with, my fault, even though there's no way for me to actually access the system as the processing is done by the department.

Now, apparently since I'm technically looking for work, I'm supposed to attend this job program, but due to the fact the system's locked and I'm now a student, the system removed me from the program as I'm no longer eligible. There's a problem with this, where the program is being run in an office building with security. Since I'm 'not on the list' I have no access.

But the system removed me from that list, but not the actual obligation, due to the record lockdown apparently preventing even the internal system controls from altering my record.

So basically, the system has (while it's locked down from their own staff being able to do a damn thing to it) decided to literally make me do something I cannot do short of committing trespass in a secured government building.

Which I might add is an instant 2 years in jail.

I was told to focus on the actual obligation (study like I'm supposed to) but because the system would deem me in breech, I will have to pay a penalty.

Since apparently it's my fault I broke a system I don't even know about, and I apparently am legally allowed to break the law so I can fufill my obligcations to a government department, and apparently a (seemingly massive) failure I have no control whatsoever over, to the point where both the customer service officer AND his manager admitted on a recorded call said there was no physical way I could be at fault, is according to Centrelink, my fault, and consequently the system dictates I have to pay a penalty.

Yes, they actually said this in a recorded conversation (as all communication with this department by law is required to be recorded) and apparently NEITHER of them thought there was an issue with what they said.

Of course, there's a real kicker in this.

You know how I mentioned that for me to fulfill my obligations, I needed to sneak into an office block and get into a program?

The block in question is owned by Centrelink, and apparently their system won't allow them to add me as a visitor, because manual additions must be for contractors or other staff, and any 'job seekers' must be cleared by the automated system.

Setsuna:
... Sometimes you remember that no, you're not as strong as you think you are.

No matter how apparently superhuman some of the things we do seem, sometimes little things can... unsettle you.

A fire alarm was going off in the new apartment , and considering how my last adventure with a fire turned out, this time around had me packed up, ready to leave in twenty seconds, and had me investigating when the alarm was going off for more than a minute.

I followed the alarm upstairs, and knocked on the door, because you know, fire alarm, and the door was answered by a woman, which in turn let the smoke out and set off the fire alarm in the hallway.

The conversation then went like this:

'It's fine, what are you being worked up over?'
'Oh, maybe the fire alarm going off and all that smoke.'
'It's just cooking. You make it sound like the place is going to burn down'
'Sure, that's what the tenant of the place I was staying in last time was probably thinking before I ended up moving out.'
'What's that supposed to mean?'
'I've already been through one fire this year, and I don't want to have to rescue you or your kids because you thought it'd just be fine, just like I had to for the last place I stayed at.'

The awkward silence before she carefully closed the door was probably all I needed to know. I was tempted to kick the door in, but I went back downstairs, and the alarm stopped another minute and a half later.

I get the feeling that I'm either going to turn into a serial killer, or I'm just going to let consequences happen for other people. To be fair? She probably never ever experienced the consequences of a fire, so the danger is something that happens to other people.

The problem is of course, that their poor decisions affect other people.

If you're reading this, all I can suggest is that you might want to be more careful and more mindful. Risk management, statistical odds and consequences are three things humans are incredibly terrible at understanding, generally because 'bad things only happen to other people'.

... And sometimes I wonder if the best course of action is to teach the painful lesson that maybe you should heed it, because someone decides you're 'other people'.

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