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Wednesday, Sept. 10, 2003 - 7:56 p.m. The suspended employee is one of the newer guys. He didn�t make it through his probationary period. That�s about the only way you can be fired at the NDDOT. Well, there is failing a drug test. That is the only thing that has claimed one of my Mohall coworkers in the 20+ years I have been employed here. And that was a good 7 years ago. Maybe discharging a firearm into the chest cavity of a lead worker would get you fired. But I bet the Teamsters would represent you for at least a little while before dropping their support for you. No, I figured drugs (that would include alcohol- it is a drug, even if most people don�t think of it the same as marijuana) would be the only way one of coworkers would be shown the door. I was wrong. What did this man do to get to the �discharge� state? Plenty. I won�t run down the whole list here, but I will say that everyone who had to work with him on the road (and I use the term �work� very loosely for him) had major problems with him. He would stay inside of the truck while the others got out to patch holes, for instance. He was a very , VERY bad driver, nearly causing several accidents (and actually causing one big one). Hell, the first week he was employed, he was standing around at quitting time, talking with the guys. He bragged to them, �Once I get through my probationary period, I ain�t doing a lick of work! I didn�t take this job to work.� That�s the way to make friends out of your new coworkers, isn�t it? Tell them that they will be carrying you for the rest of your days at NDDOT? His mistake was not doing �a lick of work� in the first place. When you have several (make that almost every) employee complaining (and documenting) how unsafe you are, and how they won�t ride in a truck that you are driving, you might try to improve your attitude. He never did. Now, before you start thinking about how lazy highway workers are (admit it- you have heard the jokes, and most likely laughed at them, too), let this tale be a reminder that almost to a man we take what we do seriously. We look out for the safety of each other, and try to do the best job we can every day. With the exception of bad weather or a roadside breakdown, most people don�t give what we do much thought on a regular basis. If we are doing our job well, you shouldn�t have to think about us�� Now, the question is- is he gone? Who knows. He will squawk, saying he is being picked on and singled out. I am sure of that. Listen- if someone comes into a job with the attitude that they are getting a free ride (something he had from a brother�s business for most of his life before the bro shut down and NDDOT picked him up) , they aren�t likely to walk away without a fight. I imagine he will sue. Isn�t that what most people do now days? Even if you are totally at fault, hire a lawyer. There�s money in them thar hills! He�ll probably end up working in another department somewhere, annoying the Hell out of everyone he comes across daily. Driver�s License Bureau seems like the perfect fit for him�.. Notice: To all of the people who put in a full days work at the local Driver�s License Bureau, I mean you no disrespect. Every office has their slackers. I am sure most of you also take what you do quite seriously. That said: I had the misfortune of crossing paths with one exceptionally bad examiner several times at the Mohall facility, starting with the day I took my driver�s exam at age 16 (he kicked me out of the class, mainly because I had gave him a hard time a year before when he was a substitute teacher at my high school), and being ignored by him once , several years later, when I had the misfortune of standing in his line at the bureau (damn, he had a long memory, and this is one long, run-on sentence!). Considering the fact that I am also a taxpayer, I hope that the state of North Dakota has the chutzpa to keep our non-coworker away from the state payroll� My sister came home to her house at lunchtime today, and was shocked by what she saw on her front bay window. It was an orange label the size of a �for sale� sign (like the realtors put in your front lawn). The local community standards officer had put it there. This person�s job is to field complaints from citizens for code violations. Anything from junk cars in your driveway to improper use of city property fall under his command. If he follows up a complaint and there is a violation, his job is to try to get you to fix it. If you don�t, it becomes a legal matter. Court could be in your future, if what you are doing is bad enough. The sticker totally freaked her out (as it would me, too). It read �Notice to Abate!�, and in small print was the offices phone number. It also said removal of this sticker was punishable with fines and such. In the violation box was these words, �All foliage and growth over 10� tall must be removed�. That�s all it said. ALL GROWTH OVER 10�! Have I mentioned that my Sis has one huge garden, containing wild bird, prairie restoration, rose beds, and other defined areas? She is into the non-eatable gardening as much as I am into the edible. Someone had complained about her yard. Yes, some areas aren�t your typical 2� tall Kentucky Bluegrass. So what? You own the land; you should be able to grow whatever you want within reason. I talked to her on the phone for some time, and I told her to tell the officer that he needed to point out what was wrong with her landscaping. Prove to her that she had to remove everything over 10� tall. And if she had to, then everyone else in Mohall would have to do the same or she would fight him in court. She called him up, and here is what he wanted her to do: Cut down three canes of one of her native rose bushes that were hanging over the sidewalk in front of her house! For that, he posted her house with a giant orange �Notice to Abate!� sign? Crazy! I had already fueled up my chainsaw, just in case she needed me to chop down anything large for her����..
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