the Devil made me do it!

Back when I belonged to the local Cooks and Assistants Union it was a weak, company controlled organization.  I recall hiking across Seattle to lodge a complaint against my employer.  The Kress Dime Store had a large lunch counter.  They paid their employees no overtime, but your work had to be completed before you could clock out.  So the other workers would clock out and then return to finish up their work.  This did not seem fair to me at all.  So I would finish my work and then clock out. 

Of course I received no overtime pay.  Off I trotted to my boss, a kindly fellow who looked like he used to work as a prison guard or a drill sergeant.  I showed him my time card and asked how come I had not been paid in full.  "Everyone else gets their work done during their shift," he told me.  Naturally none of the other workers would back me.  Yet we had been ordered to join the union in order to work there.  So, off I went.  The union hall, a shabby hole in the wall, had two older fellows, one leaning against the wall and the other seated at a table reading the paper.  I leveled my complaint and they went into action.  Like Hell they did!  They just looked at me and shoved a form for me to write down what I'd told them.  "We'll check it out," they told me. 

When I returned to work my boss called me into his office.  "you're back on pots and pans", he growled.  "Pots and pans?" I gasped, "That's the entry level job".  Pots and pans were huge containers that often had several inches of goo burned to their bottoms. 

"Like it or leave it", he snapped. 

Somehow he'd gotten the word from the union hall.  I clocked out and came back the next payday to collect my money. 

A couple of weeks later I was sitting on my front steps at my parents house and the phone rang.  It was old Gestapo himself.  "I need someone to fill in.  Would you be willing to come back?"  he asked in a very friendly voice. 

I almost slammed the phone down in his ear when the Devil popped up on my shoulder.  "Uh...when would you need me?" I asked.  "As soon as possible", he replied. 

"I'll be there in 45 minutes."  I hung up the phone, looked at the time and after an hour had passed I began to giggle. 

 

Curious Carl