Memory-Lane:

Yesterday (Thursday, June 21, 2007; the summer-solstice) was elections of the leaders of Local-282, Amalgamated Transit Union........
So I went to the union-office to vote — a voting area had been set out off the old meeting-room.
It of course meant seeing 89 bazilyun former coworkers, people I used to work with at Regional Transit Service.
I no longer feel a part of this effort — in fact, I haven’t paid the retiree union-dues in two years.
I also stopped attending union-meetings about two years ago. At that time I was doing the web-sites for the Post weeklies, and they were published on Thursday — the Union-meeting day. Those web-sites were getting in the way. I might not get out until 6 p.m., after which it was rush home, glom a few tidbits, and then make the hour-drive into Rochester for the Union-meeting.
Union-meetings were rather unbearable: lots of yelling and screaming and macho strutting.
Usually for naught — the puny membership present (a quorum was always in doubt) would vote to arbitrate or deduct, and then bellyache loudly about the cost of what they had just approved.
I then had to drive back home — another hour trip, so that I might not get home until 10:30.
The Post web-sites were also why I got out of the Boughton-Park Board. Their meeting was also Thursday-night — another rush-job with the possibility of no time for supper.
Regional Transit Service. 16&1/2 years of utter mayhem. Working for jerks in a job where ya might get beat up or shot.
—Although I liked driving bus. I used to say if it weren’t for driving bus, I’d quit.
But the stroke ended all that. It also ended the dreaded 282-News, my Union-newsletter that caused weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth among Transit managers.
Of course the 282-News is what got me in at the mighty Mezz. And I continued there for almost 10 years, because they liked me and what I was doing.
Some who started when I did are about to retire, or have retired. Dominick Zarcone, the Catholic zealot, was running for office. I hardly recognized him — a dear friend, but his hair was totally gray; it had been black the last I saw him.
Some recognized me, but many are after my time — they have 2300-badges; mine is 1763.
The same two that were union-officials when I had the stroke, are still in office.
That means they have been through three Transit-administrations: first Jack Garrity, then ex-Greece town-supervisor Don Riley (who was appointed as a REPUBLICAN to replace Jack Garrity), and now Mark Aesch, who had been an aide for REPUBLICAN ex-Congressman Bill Paxon, a sanctimonious jerk.
Aesch had been hired by Riley to help reorganize Transit — a reward when Paxon quit.
“At least Garrity followed the contract, even though he was a jerk,” ATU business-agent Frank Falzone observed. “Riley didn’t, and now Aesch doesn’t.”
Falzone was in office when I did the 282-News. He once called Garrity a Bolshevik, but then we had to pull his comment back out of the 282-News.
What he calls Aesch is unprintable.
“Okay you guys,” I said, pointing at Union-prez Joe Carey and Falzone, our two full-time local union-officials. “Our pension has stayed the same for......”
“........eight years,” Falzone said.
Our pension amount can be varied — supposedly a big increase is in the works.
Another there was Ray Dunbar — so-called “Radical-Dude” — who together with me ran the 282-News. He mainly was the one circulating it, especially to local politicos. He’s running for vice-president, and once got fired — the usual management shenanigans. (He was later reinstated.)

“Post weeklies” were 10 weekly newspapers published by Messenger-Post Newspapers, my old employer.

“Boughton-Park” is the local park where we walk our dog. I was on the “Boughton-Park Board” for a while — all volunteer.

I drove transit-bus for “Regional Transit Service,” the transit bus-company in Rochester, for 16&1/2 years, until my stroke.

“The mighty Mezz” is the Canandaigua Daily-Messenger newspaper, where I once worked.

“Greece” is a large suburban town west of Rochester.