Before the new year, this site was becoming largely a daily recap of the picket line — the strike was making this blog bloggier. With that in mind, I decided this week to bundle my strike and picket news in one end-of-week super-post.

This was a mistake, for several reasons.

For starters, I underestimated the degree to which my daily recountings helped vent and refocus my frustrations with the strike. Yes, I generally talk about the good things that happen — the interesting conversations, the writers I never would have met if it weren’t for this strange situation. But these blessings are bright points of light against a backdrop of gloomy uncertainty: no one knows how much longer this strike is going to go on.

No one. Not the writers, not the studios, not any pundit. It’s like we’re all in a footrace, but no one knows if it’s a marathon, or one of those insane super-marathons. We can count the markers along the side of the road — days on the picket line, millions of dollars lost — but none of us know how close that puts us towards the finish line.

Do we reach a deal before the Oscars? Before SAG goes out? If we knew how long the race was, we could pace ourselves. But since we don’t, since we can’t, all we can do is focus on the road under our feet. And that’s what the daily recaps were for me. A chance to look at what was happening in the moment.

Another reason for the daily recaps is that screenwriters — and for a change, I’m using this term strictly for feature writers — don’t have the sense of structure and community that television writers do. TV staffs work together. They largely picket together. They can point to showrunners as opinion leaders.

Not so for feature writers. We work alone, or in pairs. The most prominent screenwriters have fraction of the clout or connections of the TV showrunners. Yet as one of the more publicly visible feature writers, I get some half-joking variation of the following every day:

Hey John, can you get this strike wrapped up?

And dude, I wish. For family reasons, I didn’t join the negotiating committee. And I’m not privy to any secret insider information about What’s Really Going On. My pledge to myself was that I would do every hour of service asked, and lead by example if not by position.

A big portion of this blog’s readership is WGA feature writers, and there’s an obvious if unstated if-I-can-do-it, you-can-do-it aspect to my daily recaps. So, back to those next week.

In the meantime, here’s briefly the week that was.

MONDAY

It rained all weekend, and was supposed to rain during the early shift, so I pulled out the rain pants and braced myself for hypothermia. Fortunately the rain tapered off. Yet the shift was still cold, dreary and endless. Barbara Turner asked the time, then glared at me with unsettling darkness when I told her it was only 7.

TUESDAY

Barbara brought doughnuts. So while it was even colder — wearing gloves in Los Angeles feels like a betrayal of geography — the extra sugar was a huge help. More of the regulars were back from Christmas vacation, along with several non-WGA blog-readers.

Also back was Angry Cadillac Woman, who has barreled through the Van Ness gate nearly every day without showing any regard for the fact that human beings are walking there. On this day, she shouted “Get out my way!” as she nearly ran me over. Angry Cadillac Woman is in her late 50’s, with dark hair and a handicapped placard on her rear-view mirror. Her license plate number was duly noted on the incident report I filed. That, combined with the Paramount video surveillance, would hopefully get her disciplined or fired if it happens again.

WEDNESDAY

I was the first person at the gate. Walking in circles alone at 5:45 in the morning is odd. You’re not self-conscious, really, because there’s no one to watch you other than the Paramount guard. But it’s always a relief when the rest of the crew shows up.

Angry Cadillac Woman didn’t come close to hitting anyone while zooming into the Van Ness gate, but it was mostly just lucky timing.

THURSDAY

Thursday was great. It was the day it finally got back to normal, with many more people at our gate. Barbara brought more doughnuts. My assistant, Matt, brought coffee and bagels. David N. Weiss, WGA VP, spoke to us at length. By the time 9 a.m. rolled around, we had multiple picketers to relieve us.

That night, we had a screenwriters house meeting to talk about the past, present and possible end-points of the strike. It was a long and refreshingly candid session. I’d strongly recommend members attend them, because it’s a chance to have a conversation with leadership, rather than a presentation by leadership. I left the meeting no more or less optimistic, but I was gratified to see one of the things we asked for come about: concentrated picketing.

Picketing on Monday will be at Warners. Not Fox, not Sony, not Paramount, not Universal, not CBS. By bringing everyone to one place, we can focus attention on a single issue — in this case, WB’s plans to axe employees rather than return to the bargaining table.

I’ll be hitting the 5-8 a.m. shift, and look forward to seeing not just my normal crew, but lots of other friends and colleagues who’ve been scattered around town. I hope it’s successful, because it’s something I’d love to see continue.

And whatever happens, I’ll give a recap.