No Fireworks

No bellowing or screaming or threats of fisticuffs.
“I pay my union dues like everyone else here, so I’m gonna tell ya what I think!
You told us we had a winner last contract — that we would win an interest-arbitration. And look what happened.......
We got sold down the river!”
Another regular monthly business meeting of Local 282 of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit Union (“What’s ‘Ah-two?’”), my old union at Regional Transit Service, where I drove transit-bus 16&1/2 years, came and went.
I’m told the fireworks will be next meeting, when someone from the national office comes to tell us our local is not complying with a national bylaw change made years ago.
The bylaw states that locals are to have only one paid full-time officer, a combined Business-Agent/President.
We have two, and have since I started in 1977; a President and a Business-Agent.
Our current Business-Agent has been that for years; since well before my stroke.
The current Prez was elected President when a previous union-prez died.
The two union officials were at loggerheads at first.
The Business-Agent is an activist; the union-prez more go-with-the-flow.
Both are older than me, so if the two positions get collapsed into one, they’ll probably retire.
Or else the current Business-Agent may run for the office — he’s already defacto prez anyway.
Another guy, who I call the Catholic-Zealot, may also run for such an office.
He’s currently a Union-Representative, and acts as an attorney in disputes with Transit management.
He’s come a long way since the hoary days of my Union newsletter, when he was kind of a jerk.
I remember a proposed arbitration about the Company not following procedure concerning a bus-driver with a drug charge.
My friend got up and said the guy should repent.
“WHOA-WHOA-WHOA! Hold it, Dominick. The point of this arbitration is not sin; it’s the Company not following procedure.”
A similar arbitration was under consideration last night — not as serious as a drug charge. But the Company was not following procedure.
Here’s Dominick defending the arbitration, not out of forgiving a so-called sinner, but because the Company wasn’t following procedure.
Catholic-zealot goes into a zealous rage when the Company treats us as idiots.
Well, I like that.
We need a leader that collects his thoughts and gets royally incensed.
But to my mind, we also need a leader who’s media-savvy — plays the media like a violin.
Robert Flavin (“FLAY-vin”), the longtime head of the local Communications Workers of America union (the telephone workers), was always a good media interview about a union issue.
But Flavin died.
The good interview became Adam Urbanski (“er-BAN-skee”), the head of the local teachers’ union.
But he’s more education issues.
Our current union officials aren’t interested in media-play.
My hope is for a union official interested in media-play.
I’m told the union membership is for only one union official; yet the union’s Executive-Board is against.
Fireworks, everyone.
Grist for the mill — a story for sure.

Our dog stalks a squirrel at Baker Park in Canandaigua. (Photo by the so-called “old guy” with the dreaded and utterly reprehensible Nikon D100.)

Since the union-meeting was so dead last night, I guess I hafta turn to something else: mainly the insanity of trying to fly nine dog pictures on our famblee-site; a response to the single pik I flew of our dog looking out the bedroom-window, titled “Not Enough Dogs.”
My post started with “Hold your horses, Elz.” My sister in south Floridy (“Elz”) had already commented on the single “Not Enough Dogs” pik before I got to fly the others.
I post a slew of pictures probably the same way all my siblings do — at least everyone but the all-knowing supposedly ‘pyooter-savvy Bluster-King; I’ve yet to see him post any pictures.
I post a period, edit, and then “add files.” Files uploaded, I “insert file(s) into HTML.”
Okay, I did that, like I always do, and bold the “Hold your horses, Elz.”
View post, and all it is is the jpeg picture titles in bold, and “Hold your horses, Elz.”
Okay, I surmise; something is wrong with the HTML. But it’s 6:15, and I have to begin eating supper so I can start in at 7 for this union meeting.
“Why is it everything screws up when you’re pressed for time?” Linda asks.
Delete “Hold your horses, Elz” and fly only the lead pik until I can return from the union-meeting.
Back home about 10:20 and start from scratch.
Upload pictures again, and “insert file(s) in HTML.”
View post; I guess they’re all there everyone.
As always; “why did it work this time?” Same HTML (far as I know).

For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service, the transit-bus operator in Rochester, NY. While there I belonged to the local division (“Local 282”) of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit Union. Our local holds a regular business meeting the third Thursday of each month.

“What’s ‘ah-two?’” is something my mother asked seeing my ATU (Amalgamated Transit Union) button.

“Catholic-Zealot” is my friend Dominick Zarcone (“zar-CONE”) a fellow bus-driver hired shortly after me. I call him “Catholic-Zealot” because he’s a tub-thumping born-again Christian, but also Catholic (what he was raised as).

“The Company” is Regional Transit Service.

During my final year at Transit I did a voluntary union newsletter called the “282-News” that caused weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth among Transit management. It was great fun; and I did it with Microsoft Word — although it required a lot of time.

“Communications Workers of America” union in Rochester, NY.

Our current dog is “Scarlett;” a rescue Irish-Setter. She’s three-plus, and is our sixth Irish-Setter.

RE: “‘Old guy’ with the dreaded and utterly reprehensible Nikon D100.......” —My macho, blowhard brother-from-Boston, who is 13 years younger than me, calls me “the old guy” as a put-down (I also am the oldest). I also am loudly excoriated by all my siblings for preferring a professional camera (like the Nikon D100) instead of a point-and-shoot. This is because I long ago sold photos to nationally published magazines.

The “famblee-site” is our family’s web-site at MyFamily.com.

Our family’s web-site is overwhelmed with cat pictures, so I flew a bunch of dog pictures titled “Not Enough Dogs.”

“Response” is computer-response; a text and/or picture response to an original post on our family’s web-site. I can post a single picture as the original post, and add a bunch more as a response. If each picture was an original post, it’d be nine separate posts. (I’ve only put one picture on this blog.)

“Elz” is my sister Betty (Elizabeth). She’s second after me, 63 (I’m the oldest at 65). She lives in Fort Lauderdale, FL, and is married to a guy named Tom.

The “Bluster-King” is my all-knowing, blowhard brother-from-Boston, the macho ad-hominem king, who noisily badmouths everything I do or say. He claims to be an authority on computers, and that I am completely clueless compared to him.

“A period” is “.” —A handle to edit; edit to add pictures.

“Linda” is my wife of 41+ years.