That's right. I am not done yet. Age is weighing heavy on this body, but no way no how am I giving up or giving in (punching my way out of this paper bag of human pretense with alacrity and osmosis, even. I know when I've been used and discarded, I've experienced it many times before. As you well know if you know me at all and cared enough to listen to me whine - or just asked because you cared. Never give up, never surrender.
Yup, busy day at work. I got in early, checked mail and calendar and desk work stuff, and then headed out to a meeting that didn't happen> My bad, I had the wrong day. I decided it was a cool enough morning to make a tour of some parks, so I did that. Walking through parks and checking equipment ad bridges and boat ramps and anything where safety can be improved and taking some photos is a really cool job. I documented flooding conditions continue in several places even though the water levels went down.
Within an hour I received a call about a landfill truck in an accident overturning in a ditch. So I headed there and helping out and guided and helped out some more. I answered questions for the county and did the safety officer thing. A pick up truck ran a stop sign and her right front end collided with the left front end of a ten thousand pound tractor (cab, in some lingos) hooked to a seventy six thousand pound trailer full of compacted trash. The pick up spun around three times and was stopped by a guard rail without a right front quarter panel. The tire and rim were also gone. The pick up driver received a citation and our driver was praised for choosing to run into a guard rail (the guard rail is history), a telephone pole, and a ditch. The guard rail did it's job, the ditch finished the job, the almost ninety thousand pound vehicle stopped. The choice for our driver was that or a line of cars waiting at the light. Good noble choice, driver.
The best news was that there were no major injuries. The driver of the pick-up was checked out by paramedics, but refused further treatment. Our driver has a sore shoulder from the seat belt. It took two enormous wreckers most of three hours to get the truck and trailer out of the ditch. When they finally did, they towed it to the landfill so our people could offload the trash and then both tractor and trailer will be towed to our service department for a complete check up and repairs. More than two hundred thousand dollars... hopefully the other driver has good insurance. Then there's the cost of replacing the guardrail. Few people have property damage that can cover all that. Most people should.
The County Manager and Deputy County Manager stopped by and thanked me for being out there. I communicated with several departments to coordinate services needed. All on the fly as I am still learning the specifics of who does what in the county. The Sheriff handles traffic and crowd control until the accident cite is cleared and determines fault and issues citations and does the accident report. The Fire Department handles environmental safety and medical care. The damaged vehicles are extricated and towed by contracted towing companies. The guard rail and road damage is handled by the county roads division. The solid waste division does the county incident report because it was their driver and vehicle. The County Engineering Division will come out, inspect, and insure the Roads Division has the right plans for fixing the shoulder and guard rail good as new. The County Traffic Division will evaluate the need for a full stop light replacing the stop signs (There are two stop signs an a flashing red light on the north south street and a yellow flasher on the main road). The Risk Management Division recovers the costs of damages from a cited driver's insurance. The Safety Officer investigates and assists at the accident scene and insures policies, procedures, and safe practices are followed by all of the Divisions and Departments - also gives a report the the Risk Management Division, County Manager, and County Commissioners (sometimes to others who ask for it).
Back to the accident scene and the day that was, after the wreckers finally got the rig moved and a downed telephone pole was loaded on another truck and taken to the landfill, the roads crew was out there to fill in the damage to the shoulder and to put up barricades until the guard rail gets replaced. All in all, a very efficient clean up and safe-up.
After the scene was finally safe again (or as safe as it was before the accident except for the missing guard rail), I realized I missed an afternoon meeting so I visited a few more parks. Local neighborhood unmanned parks that were all on the way back to the office. Then I headed back to the office for some paperwork and to transfer photos from my phones to the desktop. The County phone was glitching and I had to call 311 and the tech even came up to my office to try to fix it but for today, no fix. So my report waits and tomorrow I will troubleshoot with tech support once again. The photos are on the phone, they just won't show up on the desktop.
Left work and stopped for a quick dinner - leftover pizza, eggplant Parmesan, a yogurt, and some protein drink. I watched a little TV and did some writing before I cleaned up and headed to softball. What a wasted trip. Three of our batters got up, three outs, I and nine other payers didn't even touch a bat tonight. Game over 21-0 in one and a half innings. Well over a dozen errors. The six outs we were able to get included a pop up to me, a ground ball to me, and four fly balls to the outfield. It's free, the coach is paying, but I'd like to at least have reality set in because he thinks he and the team he put together is a lot better than they are. Our record is 0-6 and I doubt we'll win a game, but at least I'd like to get one at bat. Oh well, free. Except for the 30 minute drive each way.
After the less than ten minute game I stopped upstairs to say hello to scorekeepers and others and I reminded the the field director and assistant director that this team did not belong on the upper field and reminded them I had told them this before the start of the season. They said give it a shot. We now have an 0-6 record with every game but one a run-ruled game so the outcome proved my point. They said they will move us down next season. I told them that I don't know if we'll be back next season and the $440 the county would have definitely received if we were assigned to the right field may go somewhere else.
As a customer-ballplayer, I explained that this is not what we paid for, not fun, and players are not showing up anymore. As a manager-Level county employee and safety officer, I explained that losing teams by not retaining them due to poor division assignments and poor scheduling loses revenue for the field and the county and that is the bottom line of their evaluation by their bosses. I further explained that imbalanced division assignments are dangerous to players and puts the county at risk if a player is injured in spite of the liability waiver they sign.
I'll be meeting with the Parks and Recreation Division Manager later this week and I may bring this up after the meeting. It is not a simple issue nor is there an easy fix, but my job is to point out unsafe county practices and assigning a team to an upper division where players with very limited skills could get seriously hurt is an on-gong risk that needs to be addressed before someone on with very weak skills is seriously hurt and either is, knows, or gets a good lawyer.
Meanwhile, in the recesses of the brain int the head of this body, the riots continue. Good changes are bubbling up (as the past couple of entries or weeks should show if you read me). Sadness is deep, an abyss, yet accepting disappointment and broken promises and loss of trust, as challengingly painful as it is at first, is the start of facing and feeling the open wound and cleaning it up and healing.
So I drank more protein shake and ate more eggplant parm and drank a ten ounce juice bottle and all those calories before bed is stupid, but so yummy and sleep will come much easier with a sugar crash.
Shhhhh.
Narf :)
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