As of yesterday the Writer’s Guild of America (the people who write your favorite TV shows and movies) have gone on strike. USA Today explains:
“Hollywood writers have left their keyboards behind.
At 12:01am Tuesday, the Writers Guild of America, the union representing most of Hollywood’s scribes behind your favorite TV shows and films, went on strike. The board of directors for the WGA, which includes both a West and an East branch, voted unanimously to strike after talks between the guild and Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), which bargains on behalf of the nine largest studios, failed to reach a contract. Writers, they said, are facing an “existential crisis.”
If it feels like a TV repeat, that’s because it’s all happened before. For 100 days in 2007 and 2008, writers went on strike, bringing the entertainment industry to a halt. Now those behind everything from network series like CBS’s “NCIS” to Marvel movies to streaming series including Netflix’s “Stranger Things” will hit the picket lines for the first time in 15 years.”
And this from Vanity Fair: Chris Keyser, showrunner for the HBO Max series Julia, acknowledged that the entertainment industry is in a tumultuous transition amid a tough economic climate, all of which has complicated matters for the studios. “Here’s the thing: We made them a hundred billion over the last five years,” he said. “They paid us very little of that, and every time we asked for some more, they said they couldn’t afford it. As I said to the committee some time ago, the problem is not only are they crying wolf. Wolf is the only thing they cry all the time.”
I don’t blame the writers a single bit for this. They are regularly screwed over when it comes to payment for movie and TV work and that screwing just got harder and even more lubeless with streaming. As Central Park showrunner Sanjay Shah said, “I’ve been hearing, especially from younger writers, that they feel like these are gig jobs now. When I started, you could live a pretty good middle-class life on one show a year. That’s gone.” I would also not be surprised to see studios start to approach indie authors and other non-WGA writers to see if they’re willing to cross a picket line.
Much as I would love some money right now, I wouldn’t do that. The only way any large entity, be it a studio or corporation or what have you, will ever start paying people what they deserve is if those people band together with all their colleagues and stand as one. So donate to the WGA members if you can spare a couple of bucks and plan on finding something else to do if your favorite show goes dark during the strike—say, read a book.
And a most blessed Beltane to everyone who celebrates.
Got the dendritic quartz with moonstone cabochons set in sterling silver with a handmade bail, and even I’m surprised at how well this turned out. A friend said that it looks Art Deco-ish, and Lyndon says that it looks futuristic. I added the texture on the back plate with a very small ball burr for some visual interest (and to kinda make it look like the surface of the moon), and with the offset jump ring and bail it hangs straight on a chain.
In the garage on the bench, mainly. I have this pretty little triangular cab of dendritic quartz that looks like a moonrise over the limb of a planet, so I’m going to set it in sterling with three 5mm moonstone cabs along the lowest side. I think it’s going to be really cool and kind of mid-century astro-futuristic, if that’s a thing, when it’s done.
I bet you thought our cable saga was over? Oh, no—there’s more.
It never ceases to amuse me that Eric Bana, Scarlet Johansson, Natalie Portman, Benedict Cumberbatch, and Andrew Garfield from The Other Boleyn Girl went on to play The Hulk, Black Widow, Jane Foster/The Mighty Thor, Doctor Strange, and Spiderman in the MCU. I am nothing if not a font of meta knowledge.
The nice thing about knowing that I have weather migraines is that what helps regular migraines—caffeine, sugar, and aspirin—also helps weather migraines.
In any case the clouds are most definitely building to the west and south so this migraine was spot on when it came to predicting bad weather. But it’s still sunny at the moment and the local rabbit families are making the best of things and scampering around on the front lawns playing tag (or maybe trying to make baby bunnies, who knows). While all of this is going on Jemma and Jasmine are absolutely fascinated and are watching from the front window. Those two are the hunters in the J Crew so it’s not surprising that they’re keeping an eye on “meat on the hoof” and making the occasional hunting chitter. I keep having to explain that there are even larger predators out there, including falcons that could carry Jasmine off, and they’re safer staying inside and eating canned food, but I don’t think they believe me.
I have no idea why but I woke up anxious AF this morning, spent the day stumbling around the house like a zombie, then plumped for Braum’s for dinner because I couldn’t bring myself to cook.
As part of Operation Finish All The Projects in 2023, I have been tackling the craft room over the last few weeks and working on cleaning/organizing it to the best of my ability. The original plan was that Lyndon and I would use it for our respective crafts, but over the years it has turned into a store room for various computer bits and pieces and a place where he would work on his vintage computers. There are so many computer cases, monitors, keyboards, boxes of circuit boards, et al piled in there that I couldn’t get to my dollhouse table or my storage shelving units.
Melanie Fletcher 