"Ричард Фейнман. Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!/Вы, конечно, шутите, мистер Фейнман! (англ.)" - читать интересную книгу автора

if I'm going to talk to anybody else, I'll have to use the standard symbols,
so I eventually gave up my own symbols.
I had also invented a set of symbols for the typewriter, like fortran
has to do, so I could type equations. I also fixed typewriters, with paper
clips and rubber bands (the rubber bands didn't break down like they do here
in Los Angeles), but I wasn't a professional repairman; I'd just fix them so
they would work. But the whole problem of discovering what was the matter,
and figuring out what you have to do to fix it - that was interesting to
me, like a puzzle.


----
String Beans


I must have been seventeen or eighteen when I worked one summer in a
hotel run by my aunt. I don't know how much I got - twenty-two dollars a
month, I think - and I alternated eleven hours one day and thirteen the
next as a desk clerk or as a busboy in the restaurant. And during the
afternoon, when you were desk clerk, you had to bring milk up to Mrs. D-,
an invalid woman who never gave us a tip. That's the way the world was: You
worked long hours and got nothing for it, every day.
This was a resort hotel, by the beach, on the outskirts of New York
City. The husbands would go to work in the city and leave the wives behind
to play cards, so you would always have to get the bridge tables out. Then
at night the guys would play poker, so you'd get the tables ready for them
- clean out the ashtrays and so on. I was always up until late at night,
like two o'clock, so it really was thirteen and eleven hours a day.
There were certain things I didn't like, such as tipping. I thought we
should be paid more, and not have to have any tips. But when I proposed that
to the boss, I got nothing but laughter. She told everybody, "Richard
doesn't want his tips, hee, hee, hee; he doesn't want his tips, ha, ha, ha."
The world is full of this kind of dumb smart-alec who doesn't understand
anything.
Anyway, at one stage there was a group of men who, when they'd come
back from working in the city, would right away want ice for their drinks.
Now the other guy working with me had really been a desk clerk. He was older
than I was, and a lot more professional. One time he said to me, "Listen,
we're always bringing ice up to that guy Ungar and he never gives us a tip
- not even ten cents. Next time, when they ask for ice, just don't do a
damn thing. Then they'll call you back, and when they call you back, you
say, 'Oh, I'm sorry. I forgot. We're all forgetful sometimes.'"
So I did it, and Ungar gave me fifteen cents! But now, when I think
back on it, I realize that the other desk clerk, the professional, had
really known what to do - tell the other guy to take the risk of getting
into trouble. He put me to the job of training this fella to give tips. He
never said anything; he made me do it!
I had to clean up tables in the dining room as a busboy. You pile all
this stuff from the tables on to a tray at the side, and when it gets high
enough you carry it into the kitchen. So you get a new tray, right? You