this may be a bad sign

 

My Blacky Cat woke me up at 4:30, half an hour before I get up during the week.  Since I went to bed early last night, that’s not necessarily a bad sign itself… but the papers boss called me last night to tell me that the Sunday First Edition papers are in bundles of tens… again.

That. is. not. a. good. sign.

The fatness of the Sunday papers is made up of mostly ads, and that is why some people buy the Sunday paper, for the ads.  For four weeks now, the Sundays have been THIN – barely bigger than, say, a Thursday paper, the fattest of the workweek.  I have never seen that long a run of thin Sunday papers, and it worries me, because that’s my job, to deliver the Sunday papers to various businesses commercially (Not home deliveries).  That’s the job that adds to my income so that I can afford the car payments that get me to work.

As of the first of the year, I got a 25 cent an hour raise from the School District to drive my school bus, and looking at my check stub, I see that the District is ponying up quite a bit for my health, dental, and vision insurance. I also see that the taxes taken from my pay are quite significant too – where are those tax cuts those political whores always tell me about?

Oh, I forgot, the tax cuts went to people who don’t NEED them.

I was watching the news last night and it was crying about white collar workers losing their jobs and about how tight it was to support their million dollar homes in the suburbs, and about how their wives had to go back to work, in the case illustrated, as an Emergency Room nurse, making a bare $50,000 a year.

Well boo fucking hoo.  That’s more than twice what I make, and all I’ve got to say is welcome to my life, assholes.  You people who’ve spent your lives looking down on people like me who do the jobs that NEED to be done while you push papers and make NOTHING tangible – I’ve got no pity for you,  Sell that mansion and move back into the city.  Sell that third car – that second one too if you’re so broke.  Don’t buy those four dollar Starbucks drinks twice a day. ( and what about the Middle School kids who get aboard my bus with Large Lattes Every morning?  I-Pods plugged in and so loud they don’t hear or even acknowlege my "good morning"s?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, they find it hard to adjust to a life of less, but, no pity here at all.

***

The big news here nowadays is not the economy, it’s the mayor, who was boning a teenager and lied about it in written statements and news conferances  when it came out in the election.  As the first big city openly gay mayor, he played the homophobia card and smeared the opponent that revealed his dallying with that "protege", that boy who he met at 17. (oh, but they waited uh huh, waited til the kid turned 18 to get it on, in a weekend getaway on the kid’s birthday).  Uh huh.

If I, as a 40 something guy, took up with a TEENAGER, the reaction would be "Ewww!" and as a school bus driver, I’d IMMEADIATELY lose my job, and would likely face criminal charges too.  That mayor has been a  political player all his life, and, according to the paper, "has nothing else" but politics.  Seems to me it’s that kind of person that’s gotten us into the mess we’re in now and I voted for someone else, who WAS’NT part of the mess, an "outsider".  To my mind, and I believe this, it is Government of, by, and for the people.  One term and you are out – get a real job and stop sucking at the public tit.

We’re supposed to cut the mayor a break, because he’s gay, and we’re oh so tolerant of that here in San Franciso north.

Excuse me, but ewww.

***

Well, it makes bulk in the papers, reporting this shit, so I guess from a delivery guy’s point of view, well, it’s "good" to bulk up the papers with this shit… But times are tough (9% unemployment in Oregon, and that’s not REAL number either – the number of people really looking for work is far higher) and we need to think of other things besides who lied when and what story they’re telling this week.  The guy lied at least once to get elected – a big one too, so why should we believe anything he says now to save his political skin?  Even the Gay Community is calling for his resignation, in addition to the Police and Fire unions, and if the city’s eseential services don’t want to work for/with you, you’re toast, I’d think.

***

Well, I should get busy and make those slideshows of the pictures I took Monday of waterfalls in the Gorge.

*****