Sour Grapes!

Sometimes, I have to gripe.
Well, I have to gripe a lot because I am burned out and need a change.
I don't need a physical change. I took care of that. I am living and healthy now, at least for my age. I still have lots of aches and pains resulting from years of neglect and abuse of my body. That's my fault, I know.
Now, I am getting abused by the President of the United States, and the Congress of the United States.
It is finally trickling down to my level.
I have been moving forward physically with the comfort of knowing that I had the summer off to clean the house and fix things that I couldn't fix when I was fat. I knew I could take comfort in that fact that I was working for a good solid company, and a great employer who took care of his people.
That was until the government got their hands in things.
They just announced that they were changing my pay rate, and the way I get paid. That means, I will end up taking a huge pay cut to do the same work.
I can't afford to do that. After all, I have taxes to pay.
They gave me the choice of changing to a full size school bus, from a van that I drive now. Both vehicles have advantages and disadvantages.
I like to drive the special needs van. I was glad to get away from the school bus.
The advantages of driving a van:

• The van allows you to deal with fewer children. Although, some of those children have serious problems and it takes lots of patience. Some are just angels too. It is so much better for me to deal with a kid one on one instead of being observed by 70+ other kids who think I am the enemy.
• The van goes home with me. That way, I can save my gas, and wear and tear on my car. It also allows me to be called at a minutes notice to help out somewhere. I try to be available for everything, but don't always succeed.
• I get to drive all over the county. I pick up kids at one end of the county, and then weave my way through the rest until I get them to their destination, far, far, away. I like the long drives. Very little stop and go traffic, and little or no city driving. It does get a bit scary in the bad weather, however.
  
• I have contact with parents, teachers, and administration. This allows for much better communication, and faster discipline.
  

The disadvantages:

• Because of the strange hours, I am not able to take any extra runs that come up. So, I can't make extra money. That is why we should get paid the old way. Sometimes, we drive an extra half hour, or more and we don't charge the company. Sometimes, we are lucky and get home a few minutes early. It all balances out in the end. Now, I will write down every extra minute. It will be a real pain to do.
• We don't have contact with the general population drivers. We are gone when they have meetings, so we don't get the little details about changes and such. That gets to be a pain, but we take the good with the bad.
• When a job is posted, we generally don't get to see it right away. Since. I only go to the garage once a week, if they post on Monday, I may not see it until Friday.

So, I was given the choice of taking a school bus, or staying where I was. At first I thought a school bus would be fine. But, I live about 20 miles from the garage and would have to travel back and forth twice a day. That's an extra 80 miles a day on my car that I don't need. The time involved traveling would vary depending on the time of day too. The roads get pretty clogged between here and there. With my van, I get to slide through the back roads quite nicely. But, my trip to and from the garage is mostly main roads.
I have spoken for years about how I would like to become a snow bird. That is someone who spends the summer here in central PA, and winters in Florida.
I have spoken to my wife about this many many times. But, she has her roots here in Lancaster County, and wouldn't move if her life depended on it.
I don't like being forced to make a change. I would rather plan and organize my changes.
It doesn't look life I will have a choice. I can either be very poor and miserable here this winter, or, I can take a chance and head South. It will be a big chance since I am a conservative, and Floridians are mostly liberal.
Oh well.........