SCAB!

I was walking home today and noticed some kind of film production on Nostrand about a block from Fulton. Fully aware that the writers' strike is still going on, I made a rash decision-- now was my chance to break into the industry. Here was what looked to be a multimillion dollar production-- I mean there was a million in honeywagons alone! They had actors, makeup people, lights, bullhorns, pyrotechnics, line-producers, assistant-directors, bagels, cream cheese, script-girls... but obviously no scripts! This was my big opportunity.

As I approached the picket line, manned by angry writers (you could tell they were writers because... well, you can just tell), I held my laptop high over my head as if I was forging a stream or something, trying to keep it dry. Really, it was just so the producers (more obvious than the writers, as they were a large group of well-dressed white people doing nothing) would see that I indeed had a laptop and was ready to start cranking out scenarios. Pretty cheesy, I know, but I have not had a single call back for all the crap office jobs I've been applying to-- so right-- I'm desperate.

As I parted the line of unshaven, poorly dressed writers and began signing contracts the producers and lawyers placed in front of me, I made the mistake of looking back at the poor bastards as they pathetically hurled objects at me. Not rocks, not rotten fruit, but ineffective things like plastic water bottles and latte cups. An Altoids tin nailed me on the shoulder, but that was the worst of it. The thing was, then, I looked at the faces of those writers-- and they weren't just anonymous stepping stones in the river to a new career-- they were human beings, with feelings, and souls, and some of them kind of famous. I recognized Ethan Coen and Shane Black. Was that Charlie Kaufman? No, just Ethan Coen again. And there was Nora Ephron, I think, and Hampton Fancher. David Mamet wasn't there, but what would he say? And was that Joe Eszterhas? No, just a guy who looked like Joe Eszterhas. And another guy who looked just like Joe Eszterhas. A whole line of guys who looked like Joe Eszterhas, all yelling at me, pleading with me to reconsider.

I woke up then, my bedbug bites throbbing, a cat lying on my face, his butthole directly over my nose. Thank god it was just a dream!