BURNED OUT OR FED UP

SENIORS DESERVE TO BE CROTCHETY!

I was the kid editor in the discussion on whether we should hire an older reporter when Doug Creighton,  my agreeable boss, voted no on the grounds he was "burned out."
I blurted out that he wasn't burned out,  he just wouldn't take the shit any more.
Creighton, who was the best publisher I have ever seen, regarded me thoughtfully and said I was probably right. Both Doug and I when we became older were bosses, so we didn't have to take the crap that newspapers, and indeed a lot of businesses, routinely dish out to their older employees. But we could see what was inflicted on veteran employees who are given crummy assignments and have their hours and vacations routinely changed by kid/editors who were probably still in diapers when these reporter got their first bylines.
I was 25 when I became an editor and then was an editor in some form or other for more than 30 years.
There is nothing like confronting a reporter twice your age who was killing Germans when I was in public school to make you tread carefully.
Newspapers in Toronto are rowdy competitive beasts that trampled egos and shred tempers. So I thought a little civility in the middle of the battles was the decent way to survive.
 Perhaps I went too far. When I was City Editor of the old Toronto Telegram (and that is a key position on any major paper)  I was gently sending a grumpy beat reporter out to do a "much better job" when he snapped at me about why I was being so polite when obviously I was unhappy. So I said that if he wasn't out the door in the next five seconds, he was fired.
Occasionally there should be steel inside the velvet .
I am not sure my family would agree with what I have just written and indeed anything I would say  about being diplomatic in the face of someone screwing up.  They would claim I have a short fuse. And I would argue in return that I just won't take the shit any more.
BUT!!!! The waitress, the receptionist, the builder, the mechanic etc. are entitled to expect that I will not explode at the first goof. But don't keep it up.
Unfortunately, it has become difficult during this incredible period of poor service not to become someone perceived as a crank, a crotchety old geezer prone to snapping at people because they keep screwing up routine chores.
Don't you become cranky when.....
You wander a store looking for a clerk....
Find the dentist's receptionist has screwed up an appointment three different times...
The clerk supposed to help you decides to answer the phone when you have taken the trouble to be there in person....
The bank at the noon rush has only two tellers, and they are deep in conversation about their dates...
The phone call just at the critical point of the TV movie is from some jerk ignoring the do-not-call ban...
The best part of the TV movie is edited to make it fit into the assigned time...
The TV commercials continue to blare, despite the government ban insisting they can't be louder than the programs...
The lout lounging in the rear exit of the bus calls you a stupid old man when you squeeze by and then some woman objects when you tell him to f.... off...
The idiot who has just put a lure into your boat tells you he has the right to fish your dock even if you are standing there...
Wrong number at 4 a.m.....
Renovation crews that place their big steel bins almost across the road....
That is when I become a crotchety geezer who remembers that the good old days some times were actually better and service staff were not armoured with righteousness and expected to be told off when they goofed.