I was a truck driver a few years ago, working on a dedicated account that had me rapidly experiencing burnout. 14-hour days, sleeping in the truck. I was supposed to work 5 days a week, but more often than not, I’d have to work a 6th day to end up at my house. I technically got weekends off, but I had to go back to work at 12:01 on Monday morning, to stay on time. I was in a death spiral for a while there.

One morning, having overslept, I’d let myself get into a rush, and I’d backed my truck into a parking bollard at my first pickup. Damaged my hood, bumper, mirrors, and a bunch of other important bits. My truck was going to be in the shop for a few weeks, at least.

After my safety department got their pound of flesh, my dispatcher gave me some alternative work in the meantime, covering for an absent driver in a local position. Said position involved doing shuttle runs for a nearby factory, just taking truckloads of their product to a warehouse a few miles away, dropping them off, and bringing empty trailers back to the factory. No appointments, no paperwork, no live unloads. Just showing up and driving, for an hourly wage instead of mileage. 8-hour shifts, without having to sleep on the truck. A diamond in the rough I didn’t even know my company offered.

I asked to be moved to that position, and I was instantly approved, since dispatch wanted to replace that other driver anyway. That was late February 2020; shortly after I got acclimated to the new digs, the pandemic hit. I didn’t lose my job; my trucking company kept all of their shuttle drivers on-site at the factory. Said factory only ran a skeleton crew though, not putting out enough product to keep all of us busy. None of the drivers complained though, we embraced getting paid to sit on our asses with open arms.

Generally, bad movies won’t have pre-release reviews, period. I couldn’t tell you about this particular decision, though.

Reviewers were asked not to talk directly about the writing or characters, at least according to the review I heard on NPR a few days ago. Probably has a lot to do with it.

Contingency, from Local58

Emergency broadcasts of any sort, fictitious or no, already put me on edge, but the idea of the US government having one ready to go, specifically to order people to commit suicide to spite some kind of existential threat, is especially chilling.

https://youtu.be/3c66w6fVqOI?si=JsF_-x6A65iwbaC_

I started to lose interest with Glenn’s dumpster thing, totally stopped when they made Negan’s introduction into a cliffhanger. In hindsight, I wish I’d stopped watching when Rick first arrives at Alexandria’s gate, before he ever goes inside.

As a slight tangent, I also feel like that considering the messaging of the show itself, there could be quite a bit of interesting mileage that could be achieved by having a companion who is a species that is normally an enemy. Maybe something like a Dalek.

Funny that you mention this; there was a short time during Matt Smith’s run where he was friendly with a Sontaran.

Last Week Tonight is mainly known for taking deep dives into things people ought to be more concerned about, whereas most other late-night shows tend to focus on politics and pop culture stuff.