I specifically waited until after The Office...

so that I could pepper this link with a fabulous quotes from this week's episode.


Here's is Dwight (Oh, boy was Dwight awesome in this episode): I keep various weaponry strategically placed around the office. ... People say "Oh, it's dangerous to keep weapons in the home or the workplace." Well I say it's better to be hurt by someone you know accidentally, than by a stranger on purpose.

I've never actually had a full-time, paying job. When I was a teenager, I babysat pretty regularly & subbed as the secretary at the local rectory. For two years before I got sick, I'd been an assistant dance teacher at the dancing school I took lessons at, but it was paid in kind - teaching classes to pay for my classes & a discount on the costumes. (Did I ever mention that? That I was a dancer before I got sick? I can't remember now...) When I got sick, I was 15 - about 9 months shy of being old enough to get my work papers (without parental permission and a whole lotta red tape). It worked for us. Anyways...

Then I got sick, and I went to school ~ still took some babysitting jobs here and there, but that was all I could manage. Then I did my placements and internships and semesters as a student teacher, but none of those are paid positions.

So I've never been in a union. What I know about unions comes from repeated viewings of Newsies and the scattering of information to be found in economics classes, history classes, & sociology classes about the intersections of poverty and prosperity. I realize I don't know too much about this strike beyond it's ability to impact me, as a television viewer (No Daily Show! No Jon Stewart! No Steven Colbert! How will I liiiiiive??)

But it seems to me that the contracts of workers should have to keep up with the development of newer technologies in that particular field. I don't find it absurd that they're asking to be included on ALL of the profits from their work... in fact, it makes no sense to me that there's even a debate about it. Aside from greed (or other excuses that seem to boil down to greed), I haven't heard any justification of the opposition's position to this increase.

And that's why I'm so glad that Steve Carell said he wouldn't cross the picket line, even if it means that there won't be any new episodes of the Office to watch for a while... Because he's standing up for the people on his team, doing what seems right to him. As if I didn't already love him enough.