Rained out

“It looks like we might get rained out.” I said that to my silly dog as we started toward Rochester.
Today, Saturday August 17th, was our annual Transit retirees picnic at Ellison Park east of Rochester.
I’m sure constant-readers know of my 16&1/2 year career driving transit-bus for Regional Transit Service. If not, see footnote below.
It was a stupid, meaningless job for a college-graduate who can recite Shakespeare’s 116th Sonnet almost entirely. But it paid well, so I stayed with it. —I always say it paid for our (my) house, which I now fully own.
It was dry when we started, but a dark horizon-filling cloud was approaching from the west. It started raining as we neared Rochester, then began pouring on the I-590 expressway.
It was coming down in buckets as we drove into Ellison. I circled the parking-lot, and “Guess we gotta give up!”
I never got out of my car.
For me to attend that picnic, it has to be not raining. The picnic is in a lodge, but I can’t go in, since I have my dog with me.
Registration and signup (?) is more-or-less outside. They were under a roof. But I’d hafta trudge a downpour to get to it.
“Gotta go home,” I said to my dog. “We can’t have fun if it’s pouring.”
Ellison is a wonderful place to hike your dog: smells and critters galore.
I never fit well at Transit. I’m not loud, and I don’t modify all spoken phrases with the F-bomb.
My bus-driving ended with my stroke almost 26 years ago. I feel like I’m no longer a bus-driver. In fact, I’m no longer that person.
My stroke occurred at a lucky time. I had no idea how I’d do 14 more years.
My stroke led me to the Canandaigua Daily-Messenger newspaper. Fulfillment for a word-guy.
But I don’t regret Transit. I made many friends, and it gave me the ability to finally shut down my overly-judgmental father.
As I motored home the downpour stopped. It poured later here at home.
I always feel out-of-it at these Transit retiree functions. But “so much for our annual Transit retirees picnic; we coulda had a good time.”

• For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service (RTS) in Rochester, NY, a public employer, the transit-bus operator in Rochester and environs. My heart-defect caused stroke October 26th, 1993 ended that. I retired on medical-disability, and that defect was repaired. I recovered well enough to return to work at a newspaper; I retired from that over 13 years ago.
• Click that “116th Sonnet” link, readers. It’s an audio-clip.
• RE: “our (my) house......” —I live alone (with my dog) in the house my wife and I designed over 30 years ago. A contractor built it for us. My beloved wife died over seven years ago.
• At Transit I was a union-employee. Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 282.
• Transit retirees call themselves “the Alumni.” It’s an official club sanctioned by ATU Local 282.

Banquet

Alumni Christmas banquet. (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

Another Alumni Christmas banquet drifts into the filmy past.
The “Alumni” are union retirees of Regional Transit Service (RTS) in Rochester, NY, a public employer, the transit-bus operator in Rochester and environs.
Our transit union is 282, the Rochester local of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit 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 requirement was lowered even more; I joined at 10 years.
The Alumni was a reaction to the fact Transit management retirees ran roughshod over union retirees — a continuation of the bad vibes at Transit: management versus union.
My employ at RTS ended in 1993 with my stroke; and the “Alumni” didn’t exist then. The Alumni is a special club — you have to join. It’s an offshoot of Local 282.
I arrived early; driving was challenging due to snow.
I also got lost, but not actually lost. Just going the wrong way due to misperception.
The banquet was to begin at 11 a.m. I arrived about 10:45. Only a few others were there by then, and driving was difficult enough to prompt thinking I might be the only one that showed.
“That means you get to eat everything,” said ***** *********, president of the Alumni.
After 11 a.m. more trickled in. In not too long the banquet-hall was filled; 60 attended.
My fellow retirees are hand shakers, not huggy-poo, thankfully. Lots of hand shaking, then a lady I didn’t know shook my hand and greeted me. I didn’t let go. “Yer hand is ice ice-cold,” I said. “Gotta transfer some heat.”
I think she was also a retired bus-driver like me, but I didn’t know her from the moon. She may have been after-my-time. My stroke ended my bus-driving 24 years ago
I’m glad she said hello. Also glad I didn’t let go.
Driving bus was a job I was tiring of after 16&1/2 years. My stroke was somewhat a blessing.
Shortly before my stroke I began a voluntary newsletter for my bus-union. It was great fun.
Following my stroke I said I’d rather do something similar than return to driving bus. I started at a newspaper in nearby Canandaigua as an unpaid intern. Stroke-survivors often return to work that way, but soon that newspaper hired me — incredible moxie on their part, but I was recovering fairly well.
Bus-driving meant parrying Transit’s management, although bus-drivers could be jerks too. Management wanted us to be “professionals,” yet refused to call us “professionals.”
In management’s favor, some bus-drivers were unprofessional, so I find it hard to think we were all “professional.” I feel I was, and I wasn’t the only one. You had to be somewhat professional to not get fired.
Management was probably afraid calling us “professionals” might prompt us to want higher pay. Certainly the nonprofessionals among us didn’t deserve it. Yet our union represented all, both professional and nonprofessional.
Table-by-table we slowly sauntered into an alcove to fill our plates. Pasta in tomato-sauce, tiny boiled potatoes, barbecued chicken, roast beef, and some sort of cooked greenery. All I had was the pasta and roast-beef — I never can eat much.
There also were salads, plus a grandiose cake for dessert. I guess there was also a bar, but hardly anyone was drinking.
Yada-yada-yada-yada-yada. Knee-replacements, pacemakers, hip-replacements, back fusings and open-heart surgery. A profusion of canes was noticed — no canes for this kid yet: I should be able to walk without a cane.
Like-it-or-not, we’re all getting old. The Alumni’s sparkplug announced he was giving up his sparkplug function.
“The moving finger having writ moves on.”
I hope the Alumni continues without him, but not by me. I have plenty of other interests.
But we all shared driving bus. It wasn’t easy, mainly our clientele, although I tilted toward suburban runs.
Also the four-wheelers: “Oh, LOOK, Dora! A bus; PULL OUT, PULL OUT!”

The boat didn’t sink

We approach the State Street bridge in Pittsford. (The captain is at left in the red tee-shirt.) (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

On Wednesday, October 4th, the “Alumni” held a cruise on the Erie Canal.
The “Alumni” are retired union employees of Regional Transit Service (RTS) in Rochester, NY, a public employer, the transit-bus operator in Rochester and environs.
Most of us are retired bus-drivers. My career ended in late 1993 with my stroke. 16 & 1/2 years. The job was okay at first — it paid for my house. But I was tiring of it, especially our clientele.
We bus-drivers had an unwritten rule = DON’T GET SHOT! We were supposed to enforce many rules, and often got called in.
Paramount was not getting killed — like over a 15¢ fare discrepancy.
I used to say there were three givens to avoid getting fired: -a) show up, -b) don’t hit anything, and -c) keep yer hands outta the farebox.
Who knows what all I got blown in for, but I never was taken “outta service,” probably because I followed those three rules.
I was an hour late starting out — would I miss the boat? We bus-drivers had terminology for failing to show on time for assignment. We “slipped.” You were likely sent home to lose the entire day, or be held for piecework. You might only work a couple hours instead of eight.
Our boat would start loading before noon. I also had to drop off my dog for doggy daycare = about 5-10 minutes.
I made it. Our boat was the Colonial Belle, a fairly large double-decker.
We had at least 50, maybe more. But as always I’m sorta out-of-it. I’m a bleeding-heart liberal, not the kind of person that makes a bus-driver.
But bus-driving made me more sociable and assertive.
“Siddown and shaddup!” I once told some unruly teenagers. “As long as I’m drivin’ the bus, I’m captain of the ship!”
Before bus-driving I couldna done that. Bus-driving brought that out.
My beloved wife, who died five years ago, commented bus-driving was an excellent fit for me. To successfully parry our clientele you had to be ornery. I already was.
Most stayed downstairs inside the boat. A few of us went topside out in the open.
The boat’s captain was also topside in an open cubical with wheel and controls. He provided running commentary of our cruise.
I kept my mouth shut. He didn’t make any grievous errors, but failed to say Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York City, in the early 1800s, were competing to become this nation’s premier ocean port.
Philadelphia and Baltimore both had the Appalachians problem, particularly Allegheny Mountain.
New York didn’t. No Appalachians up toward Lake Ontario. A canal in NY didn’t have the mountain challenges of PA and MD.
And so the Erie Canal, funded more-or-less by the state, which made NY the Empire-State. —It made New York City our nation’s premier ocean port.
He also failed to note canals were quickly outmoded by railroads. Railroads had numerous advantages, but mainly they didn’t freeze in Winter.
Digging the Erie with early 1800s technology, mainly pick-and-shovel, was an immense engineering success. From Buffalo to the Hudson at Albany the canal descended 566 feet. This required a slew of locks, but there was no Allegheny Mountain.
For a while the Erie Canal was an astounding commercial success. It opened this nation’s interior to trade. The boom lasted maybe 30-50 years. Canals were a good idea, but quickly superseded by railroading.
The canal was improved over-the-years. At first it was only four feet deep, but in 1836 it was deepened to seven feet and widened. The number of locks was reduced.
It was improved again in 1918, and renamed the “State Barge Canal,” deep enough to accommodate tugboats with barges. It has since been renamed back to the “Erie Canal.”
There were numerous challenges. Perhaps most difficult were -A) getting up out of the Hudson River valley, and -B) up the Niagara Escarpment toward Buffalo.
There were numerous rivers to cross, which was often done with aqueducts, canal-carrying bridges.
We were traveling an aqueduct of sorts. One challenge was getting across Irondequoit defile. The earthen canal-sides were built up enough to raise the canal above the defile. Our boat was at roof and treetop level of things down in the defile.
Most sat downstairs, but a few of us went topside. I started with an old friend and his wife. They had never done the canal-cruise; I did last time, which I think was two years ago, the first time the Alumni did it.
Our cruise was supposedly “Fall foliage,” but fall-foliage had hardly begun. My perception was it was a get-together for Transit retirees, that just happened to be an Erie Canal cruise.
Speed-limit on the canal is 10 mph; we weren’t doing that. Bicyclists passed on the old towpath, converted to a canal-side trail.
Canal-side condos drifted lazily by, along with canal-side residences. They probably cost a fortune.
The canal is no longer the commercial success it once was. It sees little commercial traffic; mostly recreational boating. Part of it gets drained in Winter.
Driving bus we said there were two seasons: canal-full and canal-empty.
I felt like those downstairs were missing out. Socializing instead of taking it all in, which is fine.
I ended up off by myself, a feeble attempt to take better topside photographs with my iPhone, plus silently critique the captain.
Eventually we turned around to return to Fairport where we started. I requested coworkers move so I could get a better picture.
“So how’s yer wife doing?” one asked.
“My wife died over five years ago,” I said.
Our cruise ended with coworkers bellowing the merits of the Trump administration.
“He’s doing a wonderful job,” one yelled; “yet them hoity-toity over-educated liberals (gasp) badmouth everything he says or does.”
I normally duck out of political or religious discussions, wanting to not lose friends. BUT  “And so it was under Obama. Limbaugh and his lackeys supplied the vitriol for CONSERVATIVES. They blamed him for everything.”
“Execute Hillary!” they screamed.
They even claimed Obama was an Islamic terrorist Hell-bent on destroying America. They even questioned his citizenship. “Named after Saddam Hussein, I tell ya!”
Grist for haters.
Some of my coworkers badmouthed unions. “HEX-KYOOZE me, but why yer wages were half-decent is because of unions.”
We ambled slowly off the boat. I noticed a proliferation of canes among attendees. My friend also had difficulty going down stairs. So do I. “Watch yer step, Bob,” someone said.
We’re getting old, but “No cane fer this kid yet. I shouldn’t need no cane. My balance is dreadful, but I do okay without a cane.” —And will continue to do so.
My final stop was to reclaim my dog from doggy daycare. The owner appeared with my dog.
“As you can see,” I said; “the boat didn’t sink.
The lady laughed. “No charge,” she said.
“Wait a minute,” I said. “Yer running a business here. Are you sure?”
“She was only here a couple hours. Anyway, we like you as well as your dog.”
There it is again, dear readers. Make ‘em laugh = collect freebie.

Alumni picnic

Another Alumni picnic recedes into the filmy past.
The “Alumni” are retirees of Regional Transit Service (RTS), a public supplier of transit bus-service in Rochester (NY) and environs.
The Alumni are a club affiliated with Local 282 of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit Union.
282 is our union at Regional Transit.
For 16&1/2 years Yr Fthfl Srvnt drove bus for Regional Transit.
It was supposed to be temporary while I continued searching for employ as a word-slinger (writer).
But I stayed with it. The pay was pretty good, and I enjoyed getting the hang of driving large vehicles.
As a driver I was pretty much on-my-own, free of office politics.
If anything memorable occurred at this shindig it was toward the end, when fellow college graduate Dominick Zarcone (pronounced exactly as spelled: “Zar-KONE;” as in “cone”), who had just retired, told me I was the atheist he loved most.
“Wait one cotton-pickin’ minute,” I said.
“‘Atheist’ no; the word you want is ‘agnostic.’”
We discussed that, and then he said “If you wanna become Catholic (he’s Catholic), call me up.”
“Catholic for you, tub-thumping Baptist for Chip Walker, Latter-Day Saints for Harriman, Jehovah’s Witlesses for a guy I knew at the newspaper.
How come you guys never tried to convert thugs? Ronnie Culp, or George Weber. Two hulking bar-bouncers hot to bust heads.
No, yer always after me — the guy who listened instead of telling you to buzz off.
A Liberal (Gasp!), unable to pass judgment, lest you say something that might answer questions.”
Zarcone turned toward his car.
Zarcone and I were always friends, a devout Christian versus an agnostic.
He’s younger than me, but hired on right after me.
I had a stroke after 16&1/2 years, in 1993, which ended my bus-driving.
Zarcone completed 39 years; a lifetime of bus-driving.
I was tiring of it: our clientele, and also the idiot fat-cats that ran Transit.
You have to be a people-person, which Zarcone was.
He also could speak multiple languages, so people wondered why he drove bus.
He could gush love on his passengers, and witness to them.
I tried to be helpful, but could be a jerk if necessary. If a blowhard became angry, I’d say “suit yourself,” for which he paid dearly.
Zarcone might shower the guy with more love.
I did that too: my “guile-and-cunning” strategy. I ain’t Attila the Hun; threats of violence or the Police never worked.
Push too hard and yer liable to get shot.
So my stroke pushed me toward the BEST job I ever had, working for a newspaper in nearby Canandaigua (“cannon-DAY-gwuh”), The Daily Messenger.
My post-stroke rehabers wanted to get my job back driving bus, but I wasn’t interested.
Bus-driving woulda paid much more, but the Messenger was fun.
Word-slinger at last.
Dominick continued driving bus, relishing every day.
He also become a union official. Transit managers found themselves dealing with someone more intelligent than them.
I used to want Dominick to become president of our Local, but mainly to be a spokesman for Rochester labor.
The camera would have loved him; always smiling.
Rochester labor has a spokesman of sorts, the president of the local teachers’ union.
But he comes across like a Gestapo agent. Does he ever smile?
So now finally Dominick is retired; he can attend Alumni meetings.
But to my mind the Alumni is faltering. Our previous sparkplug died years ago, and our current president recently died.
So now the sparkplug is our Financial Secretary, who puts out a newsletter and organizes things.
At this picnic perhaps 10-15 were outside, and another 10 were inside the lodge. Contrast that with how many attended previous picnics.
And I always feel out-of-it, like not one of them. Bus-drivers are loud and assertive, which I’m not.
I had to be assertive to drive bus — it did wonders for my self-confidence.
But much as they always welcome me, I feel I don’t fit.

Christmas-Party

The other day, Wednesday, December 17th, 2014, I attended the annual Alumni Christmas-party.
The so-called “Alumni” are the union retirees (Local 282, the Rochester local of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit Union) of Regional Transit Service in Rochester, NY. For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service (RTS), the transit-bus operator in Rochester, NY and environs.
The Alumni was a reaction to the fact Transit management oldsters ran roughshod over union oldsters — 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; and the “Alumni” didn’t exist then. The Alumni is a special club — you have to join.
The Alumni is also an official branch of Local 282 of the Amalgamated Transit Union.
Driving bus was supposed to be a temporary job until I could find more suitable employ.
But it ended up being a career, 16&1/2 years.
It ended with my stroke October 26th, 1993. I was retired on disability, but recovered fairly well.
Everything works; I can pass for never having had a stroke.
My stroke was sort-of a blessing: I was tiring of driving bus, and wondered how I’d last 14 more years.
When I graduated college in 1966, I had no idea what to do with my life.
I wouldn’t be drafted into the Vietnam war-effort; I was 4-F. I developed a duodenal ulcer in college.
After I graduated I returned home to northern DE, the same madness left behind while in college.
For four years I had been on-my-own, free of parental meddling.
Returning was exasperating.
I also returned to the same employer I had during summers while in college. They liked having me around, but it was awful.
We were sandblasting the inside of a giant oil-tank.
And doing it from 10 p.m. until 6 a.m. to avoid baking in the tank.
Sand from the sandblasters would mix with tar, then had to be removed.
That is, shovel up the tarry sand, then heave it outside through a manhole.
A few weeks after we began, a union-steward demanded I join the painter-union.
I refused; I hadn’t earned my college-degree for this.
Beyond that, I was tired of living at home. My father was unpredictable and almost insane. My mother was concerned, but couldn’t do anything. My father was head-of-the-household, a cantankerous zealot.
So I finally decided to move out on my own. I would go to Rochester (NY) to be near my eventual wife.
She was attending library-school at Geneseo state college (“jen-uh-SEE-oh”). She had graduated college in the same class as me; and library-school was also a shot-in-the-dark.
I wound up in a tiny sleeping-room in Rochester; my life wasn’t much, but at last I was free of madness.
But my money was running out.
So I went to a downtown clothing-store looking for Christmas workers.
No doubt this is what my father was hoping for: re-enactment of the Biblical prodigal-son story.
(And what does the fatted calf think?)
But no way could I return to madness. —Thereby saving the fatted calf.
I was thereafter branded as “rebellious.”
I was hired, and began working in their tailor-shop; minimum-wage, which at that time was $1.60 per hour. I had earned way more during my summer employ with the painters, maybe $3 or more per hour.
This lasted almost a year, and I befriended some tailors whose son was a rising star at a large bank next door.
They suggested I apply, and picked out suits for me.
I was hired by the bank as a “chief-clerk trainee” at $100 per week. My wife-to-be had also begun work at the same bank as a teller.
I lasted about three years, during which time I married. The “chief-clerk” position was withering away as branches became more dependent on a downtown “central-proof” department.
I ended up as a chief-clerk at a busy suburban branch, but it was awful because the branch-manager was a jerk who liked to override me.
If I’d known then what I know now, I’d have protested; an Assistant Branch-Manager did.
“You say you want me to manage, but when I do you override me, in which case gimme a transfer!”
With the chief-clerk position withering away, I was directed toward front-desk duty. Meet the public and sales, for which I was poorly suited.
Finally the bank offered me a transfer to auditing, more-or-less a prison-sentence. It was in a dungeon.
I refused, so was therefore cut loose. Fired, whatever; I don’t know. The bank was mad I wasn’t a viper, hot to rip off customers.
The branch staff held a going-away party for me; another good one lost by the branch-manager.
The restaurant-staff congratulated me on my promotion, to which I said “Yeah, promoted out the door.”
By then I had become interested in photography, so the branch-manager tried to line me up with one of his customers: an aerial-survey company using photography.
That went nowhere, so I began a seven-year sojourn trying to figure out who I was, and where I fit in the employment world.
I got more interested in car-racing photography, and tried to freelance. I sold some photos to national magazines.
I also started writing sportscar racing coverage for a small weekly newspaper in Rochester.
I never made any money at it. It was more a tax-dodge depreciating my camera equipment.
Meanwhile my wife and I moved out of our first apartment into our second, and then bought our first house, based on my wife’s income.
My wife had also changed jobs to Lawyer’s Cooperative Publishing , which became her 33-year career. (Lawyer’s is now part of Thomson-West.) She started as a proofer, then supervised the Library, and eventually became a computer-programmer.
Our first house was next to a girl who drove bus for Regional Transit.
I had already spent a few months interviewing at public-relations firms based on my writing at that weekly newspaper.
But it was going nowhere, so I decided to try bus-driving.
And so began the reason I’m a Transit retiree; 16&1/2 years of driving bus, where it was pleasant to safely maneuver large vehicles, but our clientele was rancorous and cantankerous.
My income was pretty good at first, more than my wife. We had a cost-of-living escalator in our contract, which kept me ahead of my wife.
But that was taken out, and eventually my wife passed me.
I also began doing a voluntary union newsletter on my computer. It blew a lot of time, but I enjoyed it.
Management loathed it, but couldn’t fire me. I was a stellar employee.
Furthermore, if they had fired me, the local politicians who read my newsletter, and funded Transit, might hold their feet to the fire.
My stroke ended my job driving bus, and I didn’t return, as well as I recovered, and much as my stroke-rehab wanted.
I found employ at a local newspaper, which didn’t pay as well, but was much more my style.
But I continue to attend Transit-retiree gigs, like this Christmas-party.
I’m sort of out-of-it, but I made friends at Transit. And we have so many stories to share.
It was a difficult job, but could be pleasant. What I enjoyed most was pulling out; after that I was pretty-much on-my-own.

• My wife of over 44 years died of cancer April 17th, 2012. I miss her dearly.
• RE: “sandblasting......”— Compressed-air blasts sand and air through a hose at the surface to be sandblasted. Like sandpaper, scale and old paint is removed. Sandblasting is usually performed before painting, sometimes down to bare metal.

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.

Business-as-usual

Breakfast for the dreaded Alumni. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

The other day (Wednesday, May 16, 2012) was the first meeting of the dreaded Alumni I attended since my wife died.
I could have skipped this meeting, but I attended to fight depression. I find if I keep active I don’t have time to get depressed.
And I can get extraordinarily depressed with time on my hands.
Fortunately the sun was out the following day, so I could mow.
I was outta town for a wedding the following weekend, so the lawn could have jumped ahead.
Then too mowing our huge is cathartic. It kills time.
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.
Thankfully this meeting wasn’t a love-fest.
I was afraid it might be. Old coworkers trying to comfort me in my loss.
A few condolences were offered with handshakes and sorry looks.
But people weren’t making a big deal of it.
I also was afraid of people buying me breakfast.
Thankfully that didn’t happen.
I ordered my own short stack of two pancakes, and paid for them myself.
My short stack was probably the smallest order.
Others were glomming huge omelets, or toast and eggs-sunnyside-up with bacon and home-fries.
Way too much for this kid.
Many of these people are diabetic.
I had brought along a small bottle of pure maple-syrup my wife purchased last February.
I passed it around, but some had to refuse it to use “sugar-free.”
Business-as-usual. 50-50 drawing; people hawking raffle-tickets.
Breakfast consumed, the meeting moved on to a representative of a healthcare business.
She detailed how diabetics are entitled to free shoes under Medicare.
Something about good shoes negating amputations.
This doesn’t apply to me, since I’m not diabetic.
“Anyone wanna sign up?” she asked. “I can service you right here.”
“Just don’t say that in front of my wife,” an old coworker snapped.
Retired bus-drivers. Filthy-minded.

• I had a stroke October 26, 1993, from which I pretty much recovered.

I could tell stories!

Yesterday (Wednesday, January 18, 2012) the dreaded 282 Alumni held one of its regular quarterly meetings.
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.
Like the proletariate’s attempt to exact a living wage from bloated management fat-cats is what’s wrong with this country.
My younger brother from northern Delaware, perhaps a fat-cat, but only because of his high salary, recently declared the “occupy Wall-Street” crowd a bunch of freeloaders.
Little did he know my wife would blast him from his high-horse with all the evils and stupidity of corporate America.
“Don’t you get Rush Limbaugh up here?” he asked me.
“What, pray tell, would I wanna listen to that blowhard for?” I commented.
Not many were in attendance at this meeting, perhaps 10-15.
We usually rate about 30.
Joe Carey (“kar-eee;” as in “arrow”), the recently retired president of Local 282, and de facto leader of the Alumni, apologized.
Apparently people had asked him if there was a meeting, and he told them he wasn’t sure.
Which explains the low turnout.
There also was no speaker.
Previous meetings had a speaker; our Vision-Care, our Dental-plan (both with reduced negotiated rates), or BJ’s Wholesale Club. (What am I gonna do with 100 pounds of bulk rice?)
Last time we had a podiatrist. His best comment was high-heels were keeping him in business.
We also had a diabetes specialist once. Most of our Transit retirees are diabetic, yet I’m not.
It’s no wonder, with all the sugar they dump into their coffee. —I drink it black, and decaf only.
So it was more a social meeting.
People were complaining about the Alumni newsletter, that it looks so bad compared to my old union newsletter, also an unpaid volunteer effort.
The Alumni newsletter is generated by an aging computer-savvy retired bus-driver.
Like all of us, he’s getting older. A newsletter is an incredible time-gobbler; I know from experience doing my union newsletter.
That retiree is falling apart, and I’m sure he wants someone else to do it.
He asked me once if I could help, but I told him I was up-against-the-wall already.
I’ve told him since I could edit stuff, check spelling, grammar, syntax, etc.
I haven’t heard from him since.
He also related his greatest difficulty was getting promised copy on time — a problem I knew all too well. The whole idea of a union newsletter was articles from union officialdom, which I never received during the entire year I did it.
People suggested I could make the newsletter look better, but all I can suggest is -a) two columns per page (instead of one), and -b) don’t distort the pictures by stretching them.
Which isn’t paginating the entire newsletter, which I don’t want to do.
“It doesn’t look that bad,” I said.
Around-and-around we we went, over pancakes for me, and gigundo omelets for some of the others.
A management person was there, Gary Coleman (“Coal-min”), husband of a recent bus-driver retiree.
Apparently Gary had been told to not show at Alumni meetings.
Well, why not?
Gary was lower-level management and once a bus-driver.
He’s one of us.
He knows the insanity we all faced; he’s not one of the high-and-mighty that refused to ride with the riffraff. (That was their term for our passengers.)
His wife Mary is a recently-retired bus-driver.
She was glad to get out!
Things seem to have got worse since we were there, although I was gone before most of the others.
We seemed to get madness from all quarters; passengers, upper management, etc.
I could tell stories!

• I had a stroke October 26, 1993, from which I pretty much recovered. It ended my career driving bus.
• RE: “De facto leader of the Alumni.....” —Joe Carey is not the president of the Alumni, but more-or-less leads our meetings.
• I once did a newsletter for our union; it lasted a year, and ended with my stroke.
• “Pagination” is the complete generation of a page; layout of story-text, ads, and pictures (“art”).

Rocket-ride

Yesterday’s misadventure (Wednesday, October 19, 2011) was not the actual Alumni meeting itself, it was the return drive.
The dreaded “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.
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 (ATU) functionary. (ATU is nationwide.)
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 the management juggernaut.
The return drive was not home; it was to Ontario Honda in nearby Canandaigua, where I bought our car (a 2003 Honda CR-V), to get its oil changed — a free oil-change.
As such the return drive would not be the route I took to the meeting, which involved Interstate-390.
Interstate 390 and I-590, south around Rochester, would be roundabout.
More direct would be Interstate-490 through Rochester; a frenzied rocket-ride I haven’t done in years.
Leaving the meeting I got on Lyell Ave. (“lile;” as in “aisle”) which interchanges with 390.
From Lyell onto 390 is the right-most lane of four.
About 100 yards after Lyell is the ramp to Interstate-490 toward Rochester, out of the left-most lane.
I remember doing this with a transit bus, an extraordinary and daring maneuver.
Stomp the left turn-signal foot-button and hold it, then stand and look for an opening.
I had 100 yards to cross four lanes of NASCAR rush-hour.
I was coming from Spencerport, a western suburb, then 490 to Rochester.
Always a bucking bronco, but I never failed to make it.
Opposing drivers — and they were always opposing — cut some slack for a charging bus; after all, that’s nine tons of hurtling steel.
So here I am yesterday in our CR-V, suddenly realizing the lane I’m in directs me toward Buffalo.
And I have only 100 yards to get into the left-most lane of four.
Drama; I haven’t done this for years, and I’m old and slightly stroke-disabled. I have to concentrate extremely hard to drive.
The old waazoo; signal on, look for an opening.
It’s not NASCAR rush-hour, but everyone is frenzied, and I’m in a car, not a bus.
I pulled it off; charged into a huge gap. Not to Buffalo, and not roundabout south of Rochester.
The interstate through Rochester is also contorted, lanes charging this way and that onto exits into the city.
Signage can be confusing.
When I drove bus I knew all the moves.
I’m surrounded by hurtling Hummers and gigantic black Expeditions on glittering chrome-spoked wheels, thin tires like rubber-bands.
All at 65+; some doing 100!
I pulled that off too.
Weaving and bending under the old New York Central railroad-tracks, up over Main St., past the Public Safety Building, and then finally over the beautiful new Frederick Douglass bridge over the Genesee (“jen-uh-SEE”) river.
A rocket-ride.
Then another tortured S-curve east of the river, then out along the route of the old Erie Canal through the city.
Things are less frantic past the city, I’m on roads I’m familiar with — even though it’s interstate, I don’t have to concentrate as hard.
To think I used to do this daily with a bus.
Frenzied rocket-rides in rush-hour traffic.
Cutting slack for the NASCAR wannabees and befuddled grannies, yet getting my passengers to work on time.
(“Oh look Dora, a bus. Pull out! Pull out!”)
I wonder how much longer I can do it?

• I had a stroke October 26, 1993, from which I pretty much recovered.
• “Canandaigua” (“cannan-DAY-gwuh”) is a small city nearby where we 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 away. —We live in the small rural town of West Bloomfield, southeast of Rochester. Canandaigua is about 25-30 miles southeast of Rochester.
• The “CR-V” is our 2003 Honda CR-V SUV.
• “Interstate-390” is the main interstate into Rochester from the south.
• RE: “Turn-signal foot-button.......” —Buses didn’t commonly use steering-column stalks to activate turn-signals. They used foot-button switches.
• “Spencerport” is an old farm-town west of Rochester, now a suburb. I was driving a “Park-and-Ride.” (“Park-and-Rides” were trips from suburban or rural end-points, usually through Park-and-Ride parking-lots, where passengers would park their cars, for a bus-ride to work in Rochester.)
• Interstate-490 west goes toward Buffalo via the NY state Thruway (Interstate 90). Interstate-490 east goes through Rochester toward Syracuse via the NY state Thruway. (The “Thruway” is a toll interstate from New York City to the Pennsylvania state line west of Buffalo. It’s the main east-west highway through New York state. —It more-or-less parallels the Erie Canal, avoiding mountains.)
• The “Genesee river” is a fairly large river that runs south-to-north across Western New York, runs through Rochester, including over falls, and empties into Lake Ontario.
• The Erie Canal no longer goes through Rochester. It was rerouted south of the city. Interstates are in the old Erie Canal right-of-way east of Rochester; Interstates 490 and 590.

Show of hands

“I need a show of hands,” said Linda Giordano, a sales representative for Care-Point Medical, at a recent meeting the the dreaded 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.
The Alumni was a reaction to the fact Transit 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; and the “Alumni” didn’t exist then.
The Alumni is a special club — you have to join. It’s an Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) functionary. (ATU is nationwide.)
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 the management juggernaut.
“How many in this room have diabetes?” she asked.
A forest of hands shot up.
“Everyone in this room has diabetes,” said Major Anderson, a retired bus-driver.
“Not me,” I shouted.
“Nor me,” said my friend Ray Dunbar (“done-bar”), recently retired, sitting across from me.
It was Dunbar (who I called “Radical-Dude”) and I who caused great consternation among Transit management by publishing a union newsletter.
I was the volunteer editor and publisher, and Dunbar circulated it among local politicians.
We were loudly excoriated as despicable union activists by Transit management because for once our side was getting perused by those that funded Transit.
We were rocking the boat — DREAD!
Our meeting was held at the Golden Fox Restaurant, not the infamous Blue Horizon, site of previous meetings.
The Blue Horizon was being remodeled.
We also call it the Blue Cockroach, since it seems to be cockroach infested.
“I hope those remodelers have hazmat suits,” I observed.
“And ya don’t even need to go into the rest rooms,” said my friend Gary Colvin (“COAL-vin”), also a retired bus-driver.
“All ya do is open the door and aim in.
Ya don’t dare go in lest ya get peed on.”
Last meeting I went in the rest-room and Brother Tom Hyder (“high-drrrr”), another retired bus-driver, and Recording Secretary of the Alumni, was sitting on the can.
He came out, and “you dared sit on that seat?” I said.
“Ya gotta be careful,” he said. “It’s not attached.”
Which means toilet-users have to stash the seat. It won’t prop open.
People don’t.
“Cooties,” I said.
“Make sure ya shower!” I told him.
Ms. Giordano trotted out her display of various medical paraphernalia.
Including shoes.
“Everyone with diabetes is entitled the one free pair of shoes per year. Medicare pays for them. Our shoes are specially designed for diabetes patients.
Plus here we have our back-braces.
Velcro attachment with a pulley to pull it tight.”
Funny, I’ve never needed a back-brace; I use a McKenzie Lumbar Roll.
Dunbar related how the bottom five vertebra of his spine fused together after collapse and required an operation.
Driving bus would do that to you, sitting in that seat.
I got so I used the Lumbar Roll while bus-driving to put the proper lumbar curve in my back.
I told management they could save a bundle on disability for back-pain, but was laughed at.
Like, I’m just a bus-driver — what do I know?
Same with the driver-seats, which had a habit of collapsing and throwing you on the floor.
“Can’t possibly happen,” I was told.
“It just happened to me!”
The old waazoo — “You’re just a bus-driver; what could you possibly know?”
“I’ll send out a sign-up sheet,” Ms. Giordano said. “Write down your name and phone-number, and I’ll come to your house and fit you for shoes. They won’t cost you anything. Medicare and your secondary insurance.”
“But I’m out in the boondocks,” Colvin said.
(He lives about 40 miles east of Rochester, in a very rural area.
His road isn’t in Google Street-Views.)
“I see you already have the free shoes,” Ms. Giordano said to Colvin. “Dr. Comfort.”
“Also free,” Colvin said. “But not Care-Point.”

• I had a stroke October 26, 1993.
• “Google Street-Views” are a Google picture of what’s viewable from the street. Apparently a car traveled the street with a fish-eye video camera to record everything viewable from the street. This is nationwide, but not every road is in “Google Street-Views,” although most are.

Another quarterly meeting.....

..........of the dreaded 282 Alumni drifts into the filmy past.
This was yesterday (Wednesday, October 20, 2010).
Perhaps 25-30 were in attendance.
The so-called “Alumni” are the union retirees (Local 282, the Rochester local of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit Union) of Regional Transit Service in Rochester, NY.
For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service (RTS), the transit-bus operator in Rochester and environs.
The Alumni was a reaction to the fact Transit 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; and the “Alumni” didn’t exist then. The Alumni is a special club — you have to join.
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.
Joe Carey (“Carry”), the retired president of Local 282, mentioned the importance of colonoscopies — he’s done it himself.
So have I (we); but they seem to be a fragile topic.
A loud “Ewwwwwwww” erupted from the crowd.
I get the feeling many in attendance never do colonoscopies.
I always feel a little out-of-it at these shindigs, like the only reason I’m there is because like the others I drove bus for Transit.
Like them, I am experienced.
Transit could be difficult. Many of management were complete jerks.
So too were many of the hourlies, who were unionized, which led to constant insane union/management bickering.
Beyond that was our clientele, who could be rancorous and cantankerous.
It was possible to avoid the complete idiots by picking runs accordingly, usually Park-and-Rides.
But it was hard to avoid madness; muggings and mayhem.
I was bopped over the head by a Senior with her umbrella when I had the awful temerity and unmitigated gall and horrific audacity to request Senior ID as required by rule.
Another time I had a passenger try to strangle me. —It was the last time I wore anything other than a clip-on tie.
Okay, be sociable this time.
Skip breakfast at home, and order just like the others.
Pancakes and sausage. —Looks interesting.
Never again!
The pancakes were like lead — soggy and semi-cooked.
They reminded me of the single pancake I once got at Inlow’s Restaurant near Altoona (“al-TUNE-uh;” as in the name “Al”), PA.
At the insistence of my all-knowing brother-from-Boston.
They were cooked by a bloated greaseball, in bacon-grease; I was told I needed to see that guy — a person who obviously liked to eat.
My brother likes to eat too. (He weighs almost 250 pounds.)
The Alumni pancakes were hardly the pancakes we get at Mighty Perkins in Altoona.
Altoona is the location of Horseshoe Curve (the “Mighty Curve”), by far the BEST railfan spot I have ever been to. Horseshoe Curve was a trick by the Pennsylvania Railroad to get over the Allegheny mountains without steep grades. Horseshoe Curve was opened in 1854, and is now a national historic site.
I am a railfan, and have been since I was a child. —I’ve been there hundreds of times, since it’s only about five hours away, and I had dragooned my brother into visiting.
Two retired bus-drivers sat across from me, Gary Colvin (“Coal-vin”) and Joe Libonati (“lih-bih-NOT-eee”).
Libonati is after my time, I think, which ended with my stroke in late October of 1993.
It was Libonati and I that tried to help Art Dana remove the steering-box out of his hot-rod 1949 Ford.
Art was the retired bus-driver from Regional Transit with fairly severe Parkinson's disease.
Art's wife was gone, so he lived with his sister Vicki in Pittsford. He was 69.
Art and I had similar interests, hot-rod cars and trains.
Art is recently deceased.
The steering in his ’49 Ford was sloppy, so he drove it all the way to my house out here in West Bloomfield, because I have a pit.
That was two summers ago.
We failed, but there was a trick to it.
Art had his friend Louie come out, and he had it out in a jiffy.
All it was was removing the floorboards.
I guess Louie has a couple Shoebox Fords himself; ‘49-‘51.
Louie and Art rebuilt the steering-box, reinstalled it, and Art drove home.
“Whaddya think of calling Vicki?” Colvin asked Libonati.
Art had a massive collection of HO model-train equipment, and Colvin is a model-train nut himself.
“Johnny was gonna call me, but hasn’t,” Colvin said.
Johnny is Vicki’s live-in boyfriend, or husband — I never knew.
A really nice guy, who also took care of Art.
Art had lots of stuff, but could never do anything with it — the Parkinson’s.
All he could do was a simple running-track.
“Well, I don’t think it would hurt,” I interjected.
“Over a month has passed,” Colvin said.
Carey began talking about Medicare, a supposed continual wrestling-match.
“We all have Excellus-Extended,” Carey said.
“Not this kid,” I was tempted to shout.
“Excellus-Extended,” a local Blue Cross-Blue Shield plan, is the health insurance most retired with.
But not me.
I’m part of MVP, a local Medicare-Advantage plan.
It was recommended by Transit to replace a healthcare insurance that was no longer going to be offered by Blue Cross-Blue Shield.
Carey listed all the hoops you hafta navigate to get Medicare to pay stuff.
Well, two things:
—1) I don’t feel like my whole world is tumbling in.
When I pursue healthcare, Medicare is primary and pays its part, and MVP pays most of the rest.
I have a copay of $5-$20 or so.
Same with prescriptions, I guess.
Medicare Part D, as part of MVP.
I usually have a slight copay, sometimes as much as $85 for non-generic drugs. (Usually it’s nowhere near that much.)
I also work out at the Canandaigua YMCA. MVP pays my YMCA membership — their “Silver-Sneakers” program.
So I don’t have diabetes or all the health dramas most others have.
I also have only two prescriptions, not 20; and am nowhere near the “donut-hole.”
It also may be what I eat; not quantity, and healthy I guess.
I watch as diabetes patients pour tons of sugar into their coffee.
Mine is black decaf.
—2) People were tiring of all the so-called “high-finance.”
People began walking out — “we got other things to do.”
A retired bus-driver was being a lightning-rod, but he was asking Carey questions specific to his case.
Jim Douty (“doubt-eee”), another ex-driver with part of a leg amputated, and using a prothesis, wondered aloud if the other guy was a spokesman, and if he qualified.
“Shaddup, Douty!” Colvin snapped: “or I’ll take off your other leg.”
Demonstrating why Colvin was successful driving bus. A wisecracker.
We’re all like that; a pack of ne’er-do-wells.
I feel sorta out-of-it, but it’s always great to hear and see all these blowhards.
“Hank, how ya doin’? That was me at that hospital.”
Finally, “this meeting is adjourned” from Alumni president Steward Broadhurst.
“Aw, is that it?” Colvin asked. “Ya mean I gotta go home to my wife?”
Somehow I think Colvin was mainly blowin’ smoke. His wife ain’t that bad.
Mine neither. I’m sure not unhappy to go home.
What I abhor is these Alumni meetings at the Blue Horizon Restaurant, a cockroach-infested dive that’s falling apart.
Their rest-rooms stink of urine, and the toilet-seat fell off in my hand when I lifted it.

• “Dreaded” because all my siblings are flagrantly anti-union.
• “We” is me and my wife of almost 43 years, “Linda.”
• “Park-and-Rides” were trips from suburban end-points, usually through Park-and-Ride parking-lots, where passengers would park their cars, for a bus-ride to work in Rochester.
• We live in the small rural town of West Bloomfield in Western NY, southeast of Rochester.
• The ‘49-‘51 Fords were called “shoeboxes,” because of their squarish styling.
• “HO” scale is 3.5 mm (0.14 in) equals one real foot (1:87.086). HO rails are 16.5 mm (0.650 in) apart; half-O-gauge. HO is the most popular model-railroad gauge, mainly because it’s small and can more accurately model things.
• The “Blue Horizon Restaurant“ is an old restaurant across from the Rochester International Airport. It’s getting our business probably because it’s cheap.

They WERE bus-drivers

The third table. (That’s the Lodge behind.) (Photo by BobbaLew.)

Yesterday (Saturday, August 21, 2010) we attended the annual Alumni picnic at Hazelwood Lodge in Ellison Park near Rochester.
The so-called “Alumni” are the union retirees (Local 282, the Rochester local of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit Union [“What’s ‘ah-two?’”]) of Regional Transit Service in Rochester, NY.
For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service (RTS), the transit-bus operator in Rochester and environs.
The Alumni was a reaction to the fact Transit 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; and the “Alumni” didn’t exist then. The Alumni is a special club — you have to join.
Every summer the Alumni hold an annual picnic.
It seems to have replaced the annual Transit picnic, which included both management and union people.
I attended it once long ago.
I attend these Alumni shindigs, even though I sorta don’t fit, since I too drove bus.
It’s always pleasant to see people I used to work with.
After our long trip to the picnic site, about 45 minutes, we got out of our van and leashed our dog.
“What’s all that yelling?” my wife asked.
A torrent of noisy yelling and bellowing was emanating the Lodge area, about 75 yards away.
“Well, they were bus-drivers,” I said.
The job made us that way.
I walked up to the Lodge, and was heartily greeted.
“Please sign in,” signs said.
“Okay, where’s the sign-in book?” I asked.
“Over here.” I was directed to another table.
“I don’t see no sign-in book,” I said.
“Inside,” I was told.
I walked inside the near-empty Lodge.
Covered dishes of macaroni salad and potato salad were on picnic tables, attracting flies.
Still no sign-in book.
“Out at the greeting table,” I was told.
Back to Square One.
“So where’s this sign-in book?” I asked. “I keep getting told to sign in, yet I don’t see no book.”
“Over there,” I was told.
Over to a third table. Still no sign-in book.
“Back at the greeting table,” I was told.
Back to Square One.
“Looks like if I don’t sign in, all Hell will break loose.”
Back to that third table.
“It looks like I’ve finally found the elusive sign-in book” (under a pile of papers).
I signed in, staving off Armageddon, engaging sweetness and light.
We thereafter disappeared.
Ellison Park, after all, is a park, a place to walk our dog.
There’s just one problem.
Lots of other dogs use it, and our dog is not very well socialized.
We have to keep her away from other dogs, lest she go into fighting mode.
We hiked a trail that disappeared into heavy undergrowth, but then crossed a bridge over a creek into a main trail.
Mosquitos galore; more than at Boughton Park (“BOW-tin;” as in “wow”), where we usually walk our dog.
Walking down a wooded trail, a young puppy was coming the other way.
We got off to the side.
But young puppy would have none of it, dragging her young leash-girl toward our dog.
All-of-a-sudden roar-snarl!
The poor girl was knocked to the ground.
“Here, Tabatha. Are you all right?”
Her knees were covered with dirt.
“We’re sorry,” everyone was saying, including us.
“It’s our dog,” we said. “She can be that way.”
That was encounter number one.
Number two was a loose dog, unleashed.
We can try to avoid, but here comes the dog.
Again roar-snarl!
And “We’re sorry.”
Other dog-encounters occurred during our walk, but we managed to avoid dog-fights.
One was two loose dogs.
“You’ll be sorry, Tex.”
“We tell them to stay away, but where do they go?” a lady said.
More dogs.
We diverted into a large pasture.
“Hopefully these bushes will keep them from seeing each other.”
“What a beautiful dog,” someone said, referring to our Irish-Setter.
”But a snapper,” I said.
“She doesn’t like strange dogs getting in her face,” my wife said.
“At our other park (Boughton Park), she knows all the other dogs. No angry encounters.
By then we returned to Hazelwood Lodge, after skirting a pavilion birthday-party with booming rap-music. Boom-chicka-boom-chicka-boom-chicka-boom-chicka, with resonant F-bombs galore.
“I gotta use the rest-rooms,” I said.
I hiked up to ‘em, but they all appeared to be locked.
There were six; three per side.
And they were unisex.
But they were all locked open.
I tried one, but it apparently was occupied, locked inside.
I found an open door, but no lock inside.
“Ya’ll hafta guard the door,” I said to my wife.
“Any hot-dogs?” I asked the guy cooking things over an outdoor grill.
“Sure,” he said, uncovering a pan.
I pointed to our dog.
“It’s pretty hot,” my wife said. “I’ll have to cool it.”
Finally chomp! “That hot-dog was for me!”
“They got potato salad inside,” I said to my wife.
“But I don’t wanna go in there,” my wife said. “I’d be alone.”
I’d hafta hang onto the dog while she went inside.
“Well, I guess we oughta get outta here,” I said.
We’d been there about two hours, enough to jaw with a few people, and walk our dog.
We drifted toward the parking-lot; no goodbyes or strident histrionics.
I’m sort of a misfit at these shindigs; was as a bus-driver too.
Plus my stroke may have something to do with it. I tend to avoid talking to people.
“Is that Stitt?” I asked, pointing out Terry Stitt.
“He finally retired, after 40-some years.”

• ”Ellison Park” is a large county park east of Rochester.
• “What’s ‘ah-two?’” is something my mother asked seeing my ATU (Amalgamated Transit Union) button.
• I had a stroke October 26, 1993, and it slightly compromised my speech. (Difficulty putting words together.)
• Our current dog is “Scarlett;” a rescue Irish-Setter. She’s five, and is our sixth Irish-Setter. (A “rescue Irish Setter” is an Irish Setter rescued from a bad home; e.g. abusive or a puppy-mill. By getting a rescue-dog, we avoid puppydom, but the dog is often messed up. —Scarlett isn't too bad.)
• My wife of 42+ years is “Linda.”
• “Boughton Park” is where I run and we walk our dog. It’s a nearby town park.

Distorted

The newsletter of the dreaded “282 Alumni” arrived yesterday, Thursday, July 15, 2010.
The so-called “Alumni” are the union retirees (Local 282, the Rochester local of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit Union) of Regional Transit Service.
For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit (RTS).
The Alumni was a reaction to the fact Transit 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; and the “Alumni” didn’t exist then. The Alumni is a special club — you have to join.
“Dreaded” because all my siblings are flagrantly anti-union.
It had pictures on its front-page, two of our recent train-ride.
Sorry, but they’re immensely distorted. (See above.)
Well, the photos weren’t taken by a professional photographer, and I bet the photos were Word inserts.
Far as I know, the Alumni newsletter is done with Microsoft Word®, just like my 282 News was.
Word will do photo inserts as file-objects; spreadsheets, photos, whatever.
I never did photo inserts in my 282 News; don’t know if I could have — that was 17 years ago.
That was an ancient app. My operating-system was Windows 3.1.
So the editor of the Alumni newsletter inserted the two photos, but they didn’t fill the entire page.
They were probably only half a page wide.
That looked weird, so what to do?
I got it! Just stretch out the pictures horizontally to full page width.
HEX-KYOOZE ME; that distorts the picture.
It’s just the “282 Alumni newsletter,” so I shouldn’t be so critical.
But I laughed when I saw it.

• I had a stroke October 26, 1993.
• During my final year at Transit, I did a voluntary union newsletter on my computer. It was called “The 282 News.”
• “App” equals computer software application.

Train ride

Midway. (End of trolley-wire.) (Photo by BobbaLew.)

The other day (Thursday, June 10, 2010) the dreaded Alumni held its train-ride.
The so-called “Alumni” are the union retirees (Local 282, the Rochester local of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit Union) of Regional Transit Service in Rochester, NY. For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service (RTS), the transit-bus operator in Rochester.
The Alumni was a reaction to the fact Transit 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; and the “Alumni” didn’t exist then. The Alumni is a special club — you have to join.
“Dreaded” because my siblings are all anti-union.
It was a train-ride only in the sense it was on railroad track, the short connector between New York Museum of Transportation (NYMT) and the Rochester Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society’s (NRHS) Rochester & Genesee Valley Railroad Museum in Industry, NY.
The track is only about two miles or more, and somewhat torturous.
It was built by Chapter members.
It climbs out of the Genesee river-valley, up to the plateau the New York Museum of Transportation is on.
The Rochester & Genesee Valley Railroad Museum is down in the valley of the Genesee River.
The Rochester & Genesee Valley Railroad Museum is in the old Industry depot, an old railway station along the old Erie Railroad Rochester branch.
The Erie crossed the southern part of the state.
The Rochester branch wasn’t originally Erie, but came to be.
Parts of it were abandoned and torn up to the south, but Livonia, Avon & Lakeville Railroad, a shortline, began operating between Livonia (“liv-OWN-eee-yah”) and Avon (“AH-vahn,” as in “at,” and “Ron;” not “aye”), and also a short stub into Lakeville.
LA&L abandoned part of the line to Livonia, but has since expanded and now operates the trackage past the Industry depot.
Rochester Chapter of the NRHS is one of the founding NRHS chapters, the fifth. It was founded in 1937.
It now has a surfeit of old railroad equipment, including several operating diesel locomotives.
It also built its own railroad, a full-size Lionel set.
They built up to nearby New York Museum of Transportation, which has several old trolley cars, and antique highway equipment, including old Regional Transit Service buses.
I picked up Art Dana (“DAY-nuh”) on the way there.
Dana is the retired bus-driver from Regional Transit with fairly severe Parkinson's disease.
Art's wife is gone, so he lives with his sister in nearby Pittsford. He's 69.
Art and I have similar interests, hot-rod cars and trains.
We drove to the parking-lot of our old union hall, 22 Fourth St. in Rochester.
Actually, it’s the hall of the local Laborers’ Union, Local 435.
We hold our union meetings therein, and our union offices are in the building.
Stuffed with donuts and coffee, we all got into our cars for convoy to the New York Museum of Transportation, which is out in the hinterlands.
Google-maps were issued with step-by-step directions.
I had brought our van for carrying people, but didn’t need to.
It was just me and my wife and Art.
Everyone went their own way. Some followed the Google-directions, but not this kid.
”Them Google-directions are not of the real world,” I said. “I know where it is, and I’m headed for the expressway.
Just follow me,” I said to retired bus-driver Teddy Dunn (“done”).
“Them Google-directions are wonky.”
On the expressway, I got jabbering with Art.
“Where are we?” I said. “I hope we’re going the right way. Teddy is still following me.”
We were, and as soon as we pulled into the NYMT parking-lot, we all started yammering at each other.
Old bus-drivers.
“Whadja go that way for?”
“Thems were the Google-directions.”
“Them Google-directions were crazy!” I said.
”I had no idea where this museum was, but I sure wasn’t driving through the city” (the Google-directions), said another.
We all went inside, and assembled in the museum store.
They had us reserved — we’d made reservations, but we had to pay the remaining balance.
Our NYMT tour-guide collected the remaining balance from the “money-man” (Frank Randisi [“rann-DEE-zee;” as in “Anne”], the Alumni vice-president).
Tour-guide explained our train ride would be by trolley-car to the end of its overhead wire (“Midway”), and then by track-speeder down to the Industry depot.
Track-speeders are tiny motorized cars for carrying section-crews for maintaining track.
They’re not full-size railroad equipment, and at first they were powered by a pump lever — humanly powered.
It’s the train-ride both museums usually give, manned by volunteers.
The guy driving one speeder had full oxygen equipment, with a tank on his belt.
The speeder has benches for sitting, and ya hope it doesn’t rain.
At least in the trolley you’re inside.


”Say cheese!” (Photo by BobbaLew.)

The picture above has both speeders we used — actually the speeders are pulling trailers.
Curvature out of the NYMT is incredibly sharp; okay for a trolley, but probably too sharp for railroad equipment.
And the grade up from the Industry depot is around four percent (four feet up for every 100 feet forward); too steep for a regular mainline railroad.
But operable by Chapter diesel-locomotives.
Tour-guide and his associates were obsessed with safety, and you could see why.
Railroad operation could take a limb off.
The second problem was elderly passengers getting off the equipment.
They needed step-stools.
Perhaps 10 mph; ker-click, ker-click!
It ain’t welded rail.
It’s the old jointed rail, what railroads used to be.
33-foot sections of steel rail joined together into a continuous railroad with steel splices.
You can still find such applications, but now its mostly ribbon-rail, welded into quarter-mile lengths, perhaps longer.
The connector isn’t a serious railroad, but it’s better than nothing.
Without it the Rochester Chapter couldn’t store and maintain all the antique railroad equipment it has.
We passed a siding to their maintenance-shed, plus who knows how many old railroad cars.
Plus cars of the “Empire State Express” which they got, and use in excursion service.
The “Empire State Express” was a New York Central Railroad train of fluted-steel streamlined passenger cars, which ran across New York state.
No heat, and they’re deteriorating.
But the Rochester Chapter keeps them up — I rode a fall foliage excursion in them years ago.
But I doubt those “Empire State Express” cars could handle that curve into the New York Museum of Transportation.
The “Empire State Express” cars are pushing 80 feet; a trolley about 35-40 feet.
The trolley was an old Philadelphia & Western car, that ran out to Norristown, a suburb of Philadelphia.
It’s not Rochester based.
This isn’t the first time I’ve seen a Philadelphia & Western car; I also rode one down in Scranton, PA.
Apparently Philadelphia & Western hung around long after most trolley lines; in fact, Philadelphia still has a few.
But they’re five foot gauge; five feet between the rails, not standard gauge, four feet 8&1/2 inches — what most railroads are.
Some of us were told cars had to be retrucked by NYMT down to standard gauge.
What a job that must have been.
First ya gotta jack up the heavy carbody, so the five-foot truck could be wheeled out.
Then ya gotta put it all back together with a standard-gauge truck.
The New York Museum of Transportation is not a trolley shop. Heavy lifting is done by guile and cunning, and all by volunteers.
Philadelphia & Western was competition for the Pennsylvania Railroad, which had begun heavy commuter service out to the Philadelphia suburbs.
But it also served suburbs Pennsy didn’t serve, and operated trolley lines out to other suburbs.
Ride complete, we all ambled through the museum.
But not without looking at various restoration projects.
The New York Museum of Transportation has a surfeit of old trolley equipment, including some in complete shambles (especially the wooden cars).
Apparently restored was a trolley set up as a dining-car, but only wide enough for four-seat tables on one side, and two-seat on the other (seats facing each other).
Everything was dressed up pretty with checkered linen tablecloths, red on white.
The car was divided into two sections — one wonders if by sex.
We were told the Industry depot had two waiting rooms; men and women.
This was because the men often missed the spittoons, and ladies’ dresses swept the floor.
A fellow retiree and I surveyed a track-sweeper. It had giant electric motors inside, I suppose to rotate the giant sweeper-brushes under the undercarriage.
We also looked at a giant model-railroad.
Actually, there were three; two were N-gauge, the other was HO.
One was an interpretation of the infamous Rochester Subway, which was long ago installed in the abandoned Erie Canal bed that once went through Rochester.
The Subway was not like New York City. It only used trolleys, although often multipled as two.
Plus it was dedicated equipment; slightly larger than a city trolley.
It was abandoned in 1956.
“Where’s Lawyers Coop?” (“co-op”), my wife asked, pointing to model buildings next to the model Genesee River.
“Well this is Rochester in 1932,” the caretaker said.
“Lawyers Coop existed in 1932,” my wife said. “It’s not here.
I worked at that place 35 years.”
The layout was automated.
Tiny N-scale trolley-cars rocketed between stations at 89 bazilyun scale mph, and suddenly stopped at each station.
“Stop like that,” I said; “and ya throw the passengers out of the seats.”
Next stop was the mighty Calkins Road Weggers in deepest, darkest Henrietta, “The one with that silly clock-tower.”
But not without observing old Regional Transit bus #815 in a compound.
815 was a GM model “RTS” bus, wide-bodied (102 inches), with a turbocharged 6-92 V6 motor, 92 cubic inches per cylinder.
GM also sold the RTS at eight feet wide, 96 inches.
“I bet we drove that old turkey hundreds of times,” I said to Teddy Dunn.
815 was down on the ground, as dead buses always are.
The suspension is air bellows, and they leak down when the bus isn’t running.
The door was open, so I climbed aboard.
Dusty tan plastic; what I was always greeted with.
“You should get in the driver-seat,” our tour-guide said. “Little kids always do.”
We were supposed to convoy to Weggers, but retired bus-drivers don’t convoy.
I think many went directly home.
Only a few did the Weggers lunch.
We were supposed to get Alumni dollar coupons, so I asked Randisi.
He was passing out dollar-bills; cash. The food coupons.
Wegmans has a restaurant inside, its “Market Cafe.”
It’s a buffet with 89 bazilyun offerings. They sell food by the pound.
$8.61 for too much pulled-pork, and a side of macaroni and cheese.
That’s a fortune. No idea what the cost will be until you check out.
Would I recommend the train-ride?
I’ve wanted to do it for years; ever since the Rochester Chapter put up that trolley-wire.
Track speeders are a bit off-the-wall; what if it rains?
Track speeders are not a real railroad.
I rode that Lionel set years ago, and was surprised at how rudimentary that railroad was.
But it wasn’t the Arcade & Attica, which is in a creek-bed.
It’s not a commercial enterprise. The railroad went up hill and down dale. They couldn’t do extensive cuts and fills.
The grade out of Industry is incredibly steep.
But it’s a railroad.

• I had a stroke October 26, 1993.
• “Industry” is small rural town south of Rochester; the location of a reform school.
• The “Genesee River” is a fairly large river that runs south-to-north across Western New York, runs through Rochester, including over falls, and empties into Lake Ontario.
• “Lakeville” is a small town at the north end of Conesus (“kuh-NEE-shis”) Lake, a tiny Finger Lake in Western, NY. (The “Finger Lakes” are a series of long north-south glacier-formed lakes, that appear to have been formed by a large hand imprinted in the terrain.) —Livonia and Avon are rural towns south of Industry. The original Erie Rochester branch went southeast from Avon to Livonia.
• RE: “Section-crews for maintaining track....” —The track-maintainers maintained a section of track.
• “N-gauge” is a model railroad scaled to 1:148 scale with 9 mm between the rails. “HO-gauge” is about 1:87.086 with 16.5 mm between the rails (half 0-gauge). —N is quite a bit smaller than HO, which itself is quite small.
• “Lawyers Coop” was a Rochester-based publisher of law books. It has since been bought out by Thomson West.
• “Deepest, darkest Henrietta” is a rather effusive and obnoxious suburb south of Rochester. Calkins Road goes through it.
• “Bellows” are rubber bags filled with air, in place of springs. They are inflated by the same air-pump that operates the air-brakes, and the wipers.
• “Mighty Weggers” is Wegmans, a large supermarket-chain based in Rochester we often buy groceries at. It dominates area grocery stores.
• “Arcade and Attica” are two towns in the southwestern part of NY. The “Arcade & Attica” is a small tourist-line that connects the two. It has restored steam-locomotives, but they’re not superheated. (Superheated is to pipe the steam back through the firebox exhaust flues, to superheat it. Superheat became the norm for railroad steam-engines after about 1910. It’s more efficient.)

Good ole 1703

Yesterday (Wednesday, October 21, 2009) was a regular quarterly meeting of the dreaded 282 Alumni.
“Dreaded” because all my siblings are flagrantly anti-union, and my all-knowing blowhard brother-from-Boston, the macho ad-hominem king, who noisily badmouths everything I do or say, declares all bus-drivers are no-good, do-nothing, lazy layabouts who just sit on their cans all day.
My brother collects a six-figure salary for policing Porta-Johns at an electric-power generating station.
The so-called “Alumni” are the union retirees (Local 282, the Rochester local of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit Union) of Regional Transit Service in Rochester, N.Y. (For 16&1/2 years [1977-1993] I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service [RTS], the transit-bus operator in Rochester, NY.) The Alumni was a reaction to the fact Transit 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; and the “Alumni” didn’t exist then. The Alumni is a special club — you have to join.
Of interest to me was the appearance of two retired bus-drivers.
—1) Bobby McAuliff (“Mick-ALL-iff”), a white guy who was once the president of the 15/25-year Club; and
—2) Eugene Muhammad (“Muh-HUM-med”), a black guy who drove bus 20 years, and then went to the Rochester City School-District.
“Who’s that guy standing next to Broadhurst?” someone asked.
That’s Gene Muhammad,” someone answered.
“Oh yeah,” I said. “That’s Gene. It’s him, only his hair is white now.”
Eugene eventually sat across from me.
“Okay Gene,” I said. “Here we go.
You drove 1703 a long time, and then switched off it.
After you, I drove it a long time; at least three years.
It was the nicest ride I ever had.”
“And after you, Hazel drove it for a while,” someone piped up.
“Hazel had more seniority than me,” I said. “I don’t remember her driving 1703. 1701 and 1702. She always gravitated toward the 17.”
“But they broke up the run she’d been driving, so she switched to 1703.”
“The only thing wrong with it,” I said; “was three trips, which is one too many.
Plus ya got Fred at Nazareth College. Fred was always in your face. He even sent me a Christmas-card.
Plus it got done at 7:30.”
“I remember Fred,” Eugene said. “7:30 too.
Plus they started pulling into every college while I drove it; St. John Fisher, Nazareth — all the way out to that high-school.”
“No high-school when I drove it. By then that was the 700-line. I looped in the old Pittsford loop.”
“That high-school was impossible,” Gene said. “Not enough time.”
“Probably timed with a supervisor-car on a Sunday morning,” I said.
Muhammad is not a member of the Alumni, so was being plied by Alumni Vice-President Frank Randisi (“ran-DEE-zee;” as in “Anne”).
The whole point of this program was a presentation by Rochester Optical to solicit the business of us retirees.
Big deal! All I can see is their couponing my co-pay. My healthcare insurance pays for eye exams — I might have to co-pay $10.
Rochester Optical would use my insurance, but pay my co-pay.
I can afford $10 for -A) an optical shop nearby and more convenient, and -B) my vision being cared for by competent people, including a Houghton-grad.
“Anything from you, Frank?” asked Randisi of Frank Falzone (“Foul-ZONE”), the Business-Agent of Local 282 of our old bus-union.
“They’re messin’ with us,” Frank said, referring to a letter to all 282 members from the International President Warren George in Washington D.C. threatening to trustee our union.
“They wanna compress our union leadership into one full-time person. Most locals our size have only one full-timer.”
(We currently have two full-timers.)
“But we’ll be all right — we always are........”
Frank is 61; the union-prez is over 65 — retirement age.
I think they are both too old to be running a union, against a massive forest of publicly-funded young lackeys.
It’s us retirees they represent — not the current employees.
“Have the Army remove them,” Eugene said.

• I had a stroke October 26, 1993.
• “1700”-line and “700”-line are two different bus-routes, but both end up in Pittsford (an old suburb southeast of Rochester). —Pittsford was a rich suburb, so many of our passengers on the 17 were domestic help. The Pittsford loop was an old trolley-loop in Pittsford — tracks long-gone and paved. The high-school (Pittsford-Mendon; Mendon being an adjacent town) was far past it.
• RE: “Supervisor-car.......” —Road-supervisors (supervised bus operations by radio from the administrative offices), used company cars. They were marked as supervisor-cars, and had a flashing yellow beacon.
• “Houghton” is Houghton College in western New York, from where I graduated with a BA in 1966. —Every Houghton-grad I’ve met had their feet on the ground.
• RE: “Trustee our union......” is to administer it from Washington D.C., no longer locally. There are two questions at issue: —1) we have too much debt, and —2) no contract has been agreed to for over three years. —Our union’s response is that this is because our bosses are stonewalling. Debt is mainly legal fees — we have to arbitrate every grievance, and there are over 400 pending. Lawyers aren’t paid until the case is settled.

Mike Green

Yesterday (Wednesday, April 15, 2009; Tax Day) another quarterly meeting of the dreaded Alumni came-and-went.
The so-called “Alumni” are the union retirees (Local 282, the Rochester local of the nationwide Amalgamated Transit Union) of Regional Transit Service (“Transit”) in Rochester, N.Y. (For 16&1/2 years [1977-1993] I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service [RTS], the transit-bus operator in Rochester, NY.) The Alumni was a reaction to the fact Transit 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; and the “Alumni” didn’t exist then. The Alumni is a special club — you have to join.
It was held, as always, at the vaunted Blue Horizon Diner across from the Rochester International Airport; a diner badly in need of Ty Pennington.
Everything seems dusty and moldy, as if it’s been that way since the Disco Era.
The Rest Rooms look like holding-cells from Guantánamo — no windows; the electricity has to work.
The Rest Room door hung ajar until I slammed it shut, the booth-door lock didn’t work, and the toilet-seat came off in my hand.
The single bare bulb looked some something Thomas Edison had invented.
The toilet looked like it hadn’t been cleaned in years; what I could see of it in the dim light.
At least it flushed, although it made a gurgling sound.
I didn’t have to take off the lid and jiggle the plunger.
Jets flew low overhead on final approach to Runway 22.
Our meeting was in a lounge with a bar, although they weren’t serving drinks.
Every once in a while, everything went dark, as someone flipped the wrong light-switch.
That lounge was another dungeon; no windows.

Mike Green

The Monroe County District Attorney, one Mike Green (pictured), a media-star, had come, ostensibly to talk about Senior scams.
Green runs a HUGE operation; 80 attorneys. They prosecute crimes; misdemeanors and felonies, including murders.
It woulda been one of his minions, but his visit was arranged by previous Transit head-honcho, Don Riley, who also was there, and had made use of his political connections.
“I’ve been granted a reprieve by my probation officer,” Riley said; “since I threatened to kill Joe and Frank (Local 282’s officers) so many times.
And the empty chairs are people avoiding arrest for skipping probation,” Riley added. “They’ll return after Green leaves.”
Green started with his tax joke.
“IRS agents wanted to prosecute people who haven’t paid taxes. They opened the Yellow Pages and started calling attorneys at random.
Sure enough, they found a slew of attorneys that hadn’t paid their taxes.”
The meeting was supposed to be about Senior scams, but was more a campaign event. (The Monroe County DA is elected.)
Green bewailed reform of the Rockefeller Drug Laws, that are being reformed because they supposedly toss the undeserving in jail.
“We rarely jail the low-grade user. We try to get them into Rehab.
The ones we jail are the kingpins.”
Finally, the meeting turned to Senior scams.
“Be very careful,” Green said. “Scammers are ‘phishing;’ putting up Internet web-sites that mimic bank web-sites. It’s a way to steal your identity.
Call the bank first, and see if they asked for an update.”
“What about these e-mails I get saying I’ve won 89 bazilyun dollars, and all I hafta do is send $1,500 to begin collection?” someone asked.
“Probably from Kenya,” Green said.
“DELETE!” I shouted. “If I don’t recognize the sender, I trash it immediately, and that includes the stuff supposedly from PayPal.”
Vinnie Arena (“ah-REE-nuh”) a fellow retired bus-driver who started shortly after me, and once got mugged in the driver-seat by punks, said he responded to the 89 bazilyun dollar e-mails by suggesting the sender skim off what they need, and send the remainder.
“NOT THIS KID!” I said. “Respond to such an e-mail, and they think they hooked one.”
“And what about all the credit-card offers, and notification of HUGE inheritances mailed from Nepal?” someone asked.
“IN THE SHREDDER!” I said. “There is no free lunch! If it looks suspicious, it is.”
The discussion turned to “sexting.” (I don’t know what this has to do with Senior scams.)
“People have no idea how serious this is,” Green said.
“Someone snaps an innocent though pornographic picture, and soon it’s on every teenager’s cellphone.
My suggestion is talk to your kids. I did, and my kids were dumbfounded I knew what ‘sexting’ was.”
“One more question,” Riley said.
“We always appreciated the efforts of Mike when we lost Mary Jackson,” Joe said. (Joe Carey [“CARRY”] is the president of Local 282.)
Bus-driver Mary Jackson was killed on duty by a bus-passenger. That passenger was later charged with murder and imprisoned.
“We got justice,” Green said.
“Yeah, but now he’s back on-the-street,” someone said.
“He is,” another added.
“Isn’t there some way we can put these thugs in the slammer, and throw away the key?” someone asked.
“Not under the current laws,” Green said. “Serve two-thirds of your sentence with good behavior, and you’re eligible for parole.
The only way to reverse that is change the law.”

RE: “Dreaded Alumni......” —All my siblings are anti-union. The “Alumni” are retired union employees.

I had a stroke October 26, 1993.

“Don Riley” succeeded Jack Garrity after Garrity retired, which was after my stroke. “Riley” retired not too long ago, and was replaced by one of his minions. The only one I ever knew was “Jack Garrity;” somewhat a jerk, but at least a bus-driver in his past. Riley was a retired Town Manager, with no bus-driving experience whatsoever. His successor is even more out-of-touch.

Joe Carey (“CARRY”) and Frank Falzone (“foul-ZONE”).

“The Rockefeller Drug Laws” are drug-laws that were passed under the administration of Nelson Rockefeller in 1973 as Governor of N.Y. state. They are rather stringent.