Walking the Walk

It is incumbent upon the Man of Semi-Leisure to stay busy. Particularly one who is also widowed. It would be far too easy to wallow in self pity, pre-empt Day Drinking with Morning Drinking and fall into some kind of sloppy Bukowskian dystopia.

That's not for me.

My current vice is exercise. I've always felt like an athlete but never lived like one. Now, with time on my hand, a Peloton in my daughter's old bedroom, a clean pool within 7 minutes of my front doorstep, and a pair of barely broken in hiking shoes at my disposal, I plan to go all Bruce Jenner on myself.

Well, not all.

To that end, I thought, why not make good use of the time I've set aside for walking and put this shrinking torso to good use by marching with the writers up the street at Sony Studios. And so, with nobody to tell me, "What are you crazy Rich, you can't just stroll up to one of their pop up tents, grab a sign and pretend you're in the Writer's Guild?"

Fast cut to:

The astute reader will notice the words on the sign coincidentally match up with one of my suggestions, in a post I had earlier on the topic. Let's be honest, the Ray Liotta line from Goodfellas was some low-hanging fruit. Let's also be candid and note that writers make terrible art directors.

For a group of professionals who make a living in the communicative arts, writers have no idea how to achieve readability. It's almost as if they don't want their disgruntled bon mots to be noticed.

Similarly, it was sad to see the collection of signs that were NOT witty or funny or even worthy of a Writer's Strike. "UNION! STRONG", "Corporate Greed Sucks" and "Bite Me, Netflix".

Seriously?

No offense, but I think the Teamsters could do better. 

This morning I go back out there on the line. My Bolshevik grandmother from the Litvak area of Belarus, who used to organize labor marches on behalf of the Garment Workers Local 451 in the Bronx, would be proud. 

And so would all the art directors I've ever worked with, for making my headline excessively readable.

PS. Originally 'Angry' was 'Unsafe', but that wouldn't fit on the sign. 

PSS. There's nothing better than making other writers laugh.

UPDATE: I went out there late yesterday with another handmade original...