My time is more valuable than that

Yesterday (Wednesday, December 19th, 2012) was supposed to be an annual Christmas-luncheon for the dreaded RTS Alumni.
The so-called “Alumni” are the union retirees of Regional Transit Service in Rochester, NY.
For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service (RTS — “Transit”), a public employer, the transit-bus operator in Rochester and environs.
While a bus-driver there I belonged to the Rochester Division of the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU), Local 282. (ATU is nationwide.)
The Alumni was a reaction to the fact Transit upper-management retirees ran roughshod over union retirees — a continuation of the bad vibes at Transit, management versus union.
Transit had a club for long-time employees, and I was in it. It was called the “15/25-year Club;” I guess at first the “25-year Club.” But they lowered the employment requirement, and renamed it “15/25-year Club.” The employment requirement was lowered even more; I joined at 10 years.
My employ there ended in 1993 with my stroke (disability retirement); and the “Alumni” didn’t exist then.
The Alumni is a special club — you have to join.
It’s an Amalgamated Transit Union functionary. It isn’t just a social club.
It has bylaws, officers, and an Executive Board.
In many ways it’s just like our union-local, except it entertains issues of interest to retirees; like Medicare, healthcare, and diabetes and Alzheimer’s.
“Dreaded” because all my siblings are flagrantly anti-union, like the proper way for hourlies to parry the massive management juggernaut is one employee at a time; in which case that single employee gets trampled because he’s not presenting a united front with power equal to management.
The proletariate’s attempt to exact a living wage from bloated management fat-cats is what’s wrong with this country.
It was announced the luncheon would be served from 11 a.m. until 1:30 p.m.
Up at 6 a.m. so I can eat breakfast, walk my dog, then take the dog to doggie-daycare in nearby Canandaigua.
Yet still allow the hour it might take to get from Canandaigua to the restaurant on the other side of Rochester.
I got there at 11:01 despite stopping for a bathroom-break on the N.Y. State Thruway. I had to use the Thruway to get from Canandaigua to Rochester.
Plus getting to the restaurant required juking all around.
It’s not located near an expressway-exit. The Thruway doesn’t go through Rochester, but interchanges with expressways that do.
At the restaurant old Transit coworkers were standing around.
The restaurant declared they would start serving at 1 p.m.
“WHA-A-A-A.......”
Apparently the start-time had been changed without notification.
Not the restaurant, Alumni officials.
I’m supposed to stand around two hours twiddling my thumbs?
NOT THIS KID!
Sorry, but if the restaurant begins serving at 1 p.m., my doggie-daycare is turning into an extended stay, plus I had a surfeit of errands I planned to do after 1:30.
They compromised and said they would try to start serving at 12:30.
They had to do something. About 20 of us were standing around blocking the restaurant.
I decided to split. I couldn’t even afford an hour-and-a-half.
My time is more valuable than that.
An Alumni official was profusely sorry and apologized.
Sorry, I gotta leave! My time is more valuable than an hour-and-a-half wasted.
So they lost me, and I’m out my $5 pre-reservation.
But they gotta do better.
Change the time of an event, and they have to notify me.
I may be retired, but I’m scheduled to the hilt.
I can’t just blow that time when time is so precious.

• “Canandaigua” (“cannan-DAY-gwuh”) is a small city nearby where I live in Western NY. The city is also within a rural town called “Canandaigua.” The name is Indian, and means “Chosen Spot.” It’s about 14 miles east. —I live in the small rural town of West Bloomfield, southeast of Rochester.