Thanks for Nothing, Roger Toussaint

Written on 11:34 PM by Jack B.

Roger Toussaint is the union leader of the local TWU (Transit Workers Union) and has you might have heard he and the rest of his group have called off their strike that has crippled New York City even though talks about the contracts continue. So what was the point of it then? The Union has to pay $3 million dollars and each worker lost 9 days of pay. The City and MTA haven't really backed down from their demands to change the pension system. Several small businesses might end up going OUT OF BUSINESS - because of all the sales lost and all the employees couldn't come to work. Many said workers who couldn't come to work (such as myself) ended up losing days of pay they couldn't afford. And the TWU expected the average people to sympathize with them? Union workers who get to retire with full pensions at age 55 (most NYers don't even get pensions anymore) and who make an average of more than $50,0000 a year or so (most NYers don't make that much either)? God, what a fiasco this has been.

Speaking for myself, after missing work on Tuesday and Wednesday because of the strike I was determined to get to work on Thursday - if only if it was because it to be last day before Christmas vacation. So I walked to work. Miles and miles (I have no idea how many). It took almost an hour and a half there (and then I walked back home - another hour and a half). In other words, I spent three hours out of 24 on Thursday just WALKING! Since I don't excercise (bad me, I know) it was a new experience for me. I came home with blisters on my feet and aches in places I didn't know I had. While at work, I was so dehydrated and frazzled that my brain was on the fritz and I couldn't think straight. When I came home, I went straight to bed and didn't wake till the next day. And yes, as I was told by several people during the day, I was CRAZY to do it (and those polite folk who didn't say it aloud were obviously thinking it - heck, so was I!) and that coming to work for a couple of hours wasn't worth killing myself over. But I had to prove that I wasn't going to let any strike stop me from going on with my life, if others could walk so could I!...Yes, I am indeed that much of an idiot.

As it turns out, the strike was called off on Thursday itself but the buses and trains wouldn't start running till FRIDAY - by which time I was on vacation and didn't need to use them anymore. So, to Mr. Roger Toussaint, TWU Local 100, and everybody at the Metropolitan Transit Authority I say: Thanks for Nothing! And a Merry Christmas!