7th day working. 16-plus hours.
1st 3 days, 2nd meal was walk-away. 4th day, 2nd meal was cold pizza. 5th day, 2nd meal was colder pizza. 6th day, 2nd meal was warm pizza completely eaten by everyone else. Tonight? Tonight no 2nd meal. On the clock 11 hours past lunch.
Wrapped out a cable from the mud, in the dark. Had to crack it out of frozen mud. Fingers so callused that they feel like sandpaper. Bruise on my leg the size of an orange. Asked my wife why the world feels like it's swaying while I'm lying in bed, and she observed that it's probably hypothermia. Having been hypothermic twice before in my life, hell yes it's hypothermia.
There's supposed to be an inch and a half of rain tomorrow.
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The show's gonna flip, friends. All that has to happen is IATSE needs to sit the production company down and have a little chat about working conditions under a Union contract. In short, we just need to threaten to strike, and we've all been assured that the Union is very much interested in this show.
Which means your daughter is assured healthcare for another year.
Which means your pension is vested for another year.
Which means you're looking at between a 50% and a 75% pay raise.
And let's be honest - the way the contract works you've been on a 2x wage multiplier for about two days. That all becomes retroactive when things flip. Even without the Union stepping in, your paycheck for last week was probably between $1500 and $2000 higher than you would have gotten if life were normal.
______________________BUT_______________________________
...the production couldn't get trailers in time because their credit cards were overextended.
...and several of the runs the PAs made today got turned around without buying anything because the credit cards were declined.
...and wouldn't it be lovely if this show turned and the Teamsters came in and said "no, you're not allowed to drive an airbraked 10-ton truck at all without a commercial endorsement, let alone up a winding mountain road of dirt in the pouring rain
but let's be honest. Even the cold pizza tap ran dry tonight. You may never get paid AT ALL.
'cuz let's be real. It may be network, but shows do die. They might just kill this bitch. And then you get to squeeze blood from a stone.
What's your breaking point, Hubski?
I broke about two weeks ago. It was my third straight month of 80 hour plus work weeks and I got the news that a relative of mine blew her head off. I was already feeling a bit disassociated from my life and there was no way I was going to make any type of funeral. I only broke on the inside, didn't really let it show except for the day after when I opened the shop about 10 minutes late and was kind of out if it.
Withdrew from hubski, held my daughter a little closed, tried to look at my wife with eyes that weren't as weary. Got my shift back together after about a week of hard (don't have a word for this feeling, it's not depression or at least not the flavor that visits me from time to time, not chemical imbalance but it wasn't a fun time).
I wrote a post as a draft a week ago with a shop update where I talked about my little dark time. Maybe I'm back here and I'll look over and post it tomorrow, maybe I'm not and I won't.
posted 3083 days ago