No strike! But lots of whinning

Blog 100808

Lots of bitching to follow…

The good:

The union workers voted overwhelmingly to accept the new contract at work. This is a HUGE relief. Basically, about 100 people that had voted ‘no’ this time voted ‘yes’. A strike would have helped no one in this case. 49 people still voted ‘no’ but something like 300 voted ‘yes’. And 2 or 3 people left the ballet blank. I don’t get that one.

So this means that I should have some security in my job. That’s a huge relief. Because I have switched to third I get a 10% differential so I’ll be making the highest amount of money per hour in my life. I’m still middle class but I should be able to afford things just a bit easier now. Pretty much, it’s about $1.50 raise including everything.

I think I’m pretty worn out though right now. Between the vote and the day shift switch to nights I feel pretty worn out. Add in working 6 days a week mandatory and then driving to see people so that I’m out of the house 8+ hours every Sunday and I just sorta feel exhausted.

This brings me to tonight. I felt kind of bad about what I did. My nephew is kind of weird. I think he entertains himself since it seems his mother doesn’t pay any attention to him for the past few years. So he talks to the TV. This has me disturbed. He just sits there and babbles to the tv. I just couldn’t take it tonight. I asked him three times tonight to stop. I mentioned how it’s weird and not right to talk to the TV. Bad on my part to say that but I did. It didn’t make any difference. He just kept babbling. And it was Wheel of Fortune. It was really kind of sad. I got so frustrated I got up and left the room. That didn’t stop him. I went and started cleaning my bedroom and I could still hear him announcing every little thing and talking to the tv. I just turned on the radio in my room and drown him out. At one point I came out and nobody was watching the TV. I turned it off. The next time I came out of my room I saw my nephew and my brother doing some sort of activity on the floor. I didn’t say anything but I did applaud this. My nephew’s life is the TV. If he isn’t playing video games he’s just sitting there watching TV. I consider that a huge contributor to his fatness. He’s not huge but he’s got a definite gut.

Cleaning my room wasn’t fun and it still probably doesn’t look clean to the casual observer but I did organize a lot. I organized enough so that I last my night stand. Of course, my night stand was a pile of three or four boxes…

Still, because my house is so small there are spatial issues. I’m forced to have my comic book long boxes in my bedroom. I currently have 6 in my bedroom and also a half box. I also have another 8 or 10 out in the garage. I have my brother’s giant speaker tower – almost 5 feet tall – just sitting in my kitchen. Because he apparently lost his jam session place his monstrous bass speaker which is about the size of a small dryer clogs up the area where the real washer and drier are. There are also more bass components on top of that. And my niece and nephew have been living here full time for over a month now. I really don’t expect my brother to move out. Ever. Not until at least one kid is 18 or older. So I have a person living in my living room as a bedroom. It sucks. Especially since I’m a bit of a loner.

Further, there’s no real way of getting away from noise in the house. Only the loft where my niece and nephew share a room does it get quiet. So I get to hear virtually every sound in my bedroom as I try and sleep. Probably the biggest noises are the front door opening and closing and slapping footsteps in the kitchen. When my nephew does his homework in the kitchen he’s literally in front of my bedroom door.

So I’m real whinny tonight which is why I believe I’m so tired. And I still have an 8 hour work shift ahead of me to go.

I’m REALLY hoping we are not working this Saturday. We have Columbus Day off as a paid holiday. I haven’t told anyone about it because I do have a good problem. I get invited to go places. My friend Dwain will invite me over or my parents will for supper. But it could be the day I really need just to myself. No traveling, just relaxing. I’m LOVING just the thought of it. I will be heavily disheartened if my brother has it off too. I just get really sick of him. I don’t hate him but even as I write this he’s literally 3 feet away on his computer. I just get sick of his constant presence. The only way to get away is to literally leave the house.

On a lighter note I ran into a problem the other. I was hungry so I ate a bowl of cereal. I finished but was still hungry. SO I emptied the last remaints of my Frankberry into my bowl. There was only enough for about half a bowl so I had it hanging around for awhile. It was starting to get stale but I walked over to my computer and started eating down spoonfuls. Clicking on a screen I noticed the feeling of something on my finger. I thought it was a flea. I am certain the kids have brought fleas from my parents house to my house. The kids are up there a lot as my brother uses our mother very often as a babysitter for several hours each visit. My mother has a dog that no matter how much they bathe or clean it, often spending $30+ on flea products the dog has fleas. So look down expecting a flea but find a tiny ant on my finger. I then look into my bowl and it’s like the wreck of the Titanic. There are about 20 to 30 ants floating in my cereal bowl. Some are drowning in the bowl and some are using the Frankenberry cereal as life rafts. I resign myself to the fact that I have probably eaten several mouthfuls of ants along with my cereal. I ended up tossing the rest of the cereal though.

And finally, weather in New England. The past two mornings I’ve had to use my ice scraper to remove heavy frost from my car windows. It’s only early October. Oy. My friend from work said the Farmer’s Almanac said it’s going to be a tough winter. Such is life.

Work Strike!!!! Well, hopefully not.

Blog 100708

Still in a bit of a rattled moment. At work the union people bid on a new contract and rejected it. This outright scared me. It was a fairly decent contract but a couple of rabble rousers apparently got to enough people to vote it down. It lost by 2 votes. So we had a meeting at work to discuss about the rejection. Basically, we voted again today. I don’t know the results as I write this. If it was voted down again since it was the companies final offer a vote of ‘no’ is giving the okay to strike. There is a 2/3 of the workforce needed to vote no to actually strike from what I understand. It was explained that if we voted ‘no’ again we could continue working without a contract. I just hope the contract passed. I have some money in the bank but a strike would damage me financially beyond belief. I don’t think I’d recoup what I had lost even if the strike ended and I went back to work. The potential strike has stopped me from giving the $550 I was going to give to my parents for heating oil. I also put the kabosch on other things and plans too. Hopefully the ‘no’ people smartened up and voted ‘yes’. It doesn’t seem smart to me to vote down a contract when the whole world is on the verge of an economic slump. But with people you never know. And actually, if we strike, there could be a number of people putting their lives in jeopardy. All benefits stop immediately with a strike. A number of people that work at my company have been there 20 or 30 years. I know one family there that the husband has had open heart surgery and the wife constantly has serious medical problems resulting in something like 5 surgeries in 5 years. A strike might actually KILL them. Their daughter works there too and they all live in the same house with her kids all high school age. I couldn’t imagine trying to survive if they went on strike. I have no idea how they voted.

I have Columbus Day off as a paid holiday which is a nice treat. With any luck we’ll also get Saturday off instead of mandatory over-time. I’ve worked the last 4 Saturdays and while the money is helpful is does wear me down.

Sigh, the economy continues to suck. I hate to think of how much money my 401k’s and mutual funds investments have lost. Just another reason our potential strike has really shaken me.

My brother cleaned the house this past weekend. While he volunteered to do it, it’s not lost on me why he did this. A child services place called for an update and will probably visit. Its the first time he cleaned the house since,… the last time child services was coming to check in on things. Otherwise I do all the cleaning. At least the reviews he seems to get are decent from the services.

I finally got my first win in my buddy’s fantasy football league. My team is now 1-4. My team went to the SuperBowl last year and I lost because I gaffed on the final day. Starting off 0-4 really sucked. And to make it worse 4 of out my last 5 loses were by 1.2 points or less. That’s a single tackle. Oy!

Rockband 2 is awesome. I like the songs a little better in Rockband but now upwards of three of us play where it was often just me in Rockband.

I can’t help me, the more Sara Palin opens her mouth the less I like her. It just seems to keep getting more and more negative. I want to like her bad damn she’s making it tough. And the Republicans just seem to be liars and complete exaggerators. I’m an independent voter that has voted for both parties in the past but McCain and Palin are REALLY starting to turn me off to their party.

I’ve missed every Red Sox play-off game so far. That sucks! They’ve been good competitive games too! The Patriots on the other hand have me worried. I just don’t believe in Matt Cassel. I’ve never been impressed by him and don’t believe that he can lead the Patriots deep into the play-off’s. I see the Patriots winning 10 games and making the play-off’s but then getting bounced in the first or second round.

I’m really loving some comic books lately. Marvel’s 1985 is by far my favorite. Maybe because it goes back to when I first got into comics and makes me feel nostalgic or something. Whatever the case is each issue leaves me wanting more and wanting it now! A couple of comics leave me this way where I almost shiver in excitement. I love that feeling. I’ll end it here on a good note!

W-u-u-nder-ful

The union workers voted down the contract. Tuesday we revote. We either accept the same contract or go on strike. I have no idea what what we'll be fighting for if we go on strike. It seemed like a decent contract to me. I see nothing but ruin if we strike.