I read on MSNBC that the Screen Actors Guild is planning on launching a campaign to educate its 120,000 plus members that they should vote to authorize a strike. 75 percent of the membership would need to vote to approve the strike for it to happen. Their contract expired on June 30. I don’t know all of the details but I do know this. The economy is bad right now. Not just for people but for businesses and investors. The more that actors demand to get paid the more a film or show will cost to be made. The more that movies and tv shows cost to be made the less likely they are to be made because there won’t be anyone to pay for them. I hope the actors consider everything carefully. Sometimes you lose, even when you win. Besides, I really hate the thought of even more reality television, and you know that’s what we poor folk would end up with in the event of a strike.

We’ve been watching coverage of Hurricane Ike for a while now. More me than RB, he fell asleep on the couch two hours ago. We found a Houston channel on our DirecTv that’s broadcasting nothing but storm coverage. The win is really picking up now, sometimes the reporters look like they’re having a hard time keeping their feet on the ground. Ike is close and they’re predicting the eye will cross the coast any time now. He is huge and nasty looking. The Houston channel is showing footage similar to this one that comes from The Weather Channel. I’ve heard it mentioned several times that Ike is almost the size of Texas. In this picture he also looks almost the size of the Gulf.

Are you fascinated by live coverage of severe weather, or do you turn it off?

I’ve known since the week before the movie released that I’d never go see it. In fact, it will never been watched in my home - not on tv or dvd. Why? Because it’s very offensive. I’m no prude, and I can easily handle the language in most movies. But Tropic Thunder misuses the word retard a minimum of seventeen times in 107 minutes.  That averages out to once every six and a half minutes. The studio and cast claim the movie is poking fun at Hollywood. That may be the case. But what they have chosen to ignore is that their brand of fun causes others pain. It’s been in the news that a number of disability groups and celebrities have chosen to boycott this movie, which I will gladly do. Please think before you go see this movie. And please think before you speak.

There was a crazy segment on the Today show. A couple that owns a home in Concord, NC were notified recently by the tenants living in the house that honey was oozing from the walls. The couple discovered that when siding was put on the house three years or so ago and apparently at least one opening was left and that’s how the bees got in. The honey bees made a giant home larger than 2 ft by 6ft. In the interview the homeowners said that the buzzing of the bees was really loud but had never been noticed because noone slept in the room. The bees were removed and relocated peacefully. If you want to see pieces of the bees and the wall just visit this link on MSNBC and click on the video in the upper right.

There are many different news shows on a number of different channels. The news I watch the most is the 10pm broadcast of the local news on Channel 11. It’s broadcast from New York but it’s about as local as I can get. (Yes channel 9 is closer but I don’t like them.) My second choice is going online to Msnbc. I rarely watch the 24 hour a day giant news networks because it’s just too much. I only watch them if I’m looking for news on a big story and don’t want to wait for my local news. The ticker going across the bottom of the screen constantly is annoying, do they think I’m a futures broker or something? How do you like to watch your news?

I’ve mentioned before on this blog how much I dislike preemptions. By preemption I mean an interruption of regular viewing for a large period of time, usually long enough to cause you to miss a piece of storyline. I haven’t mentioned interruptions. I know, a preemption is an interruption really. But I’m referring to the “brief interruption” stations sometimes make, of maybe two to three minutes or less. While annoying, the “brief interruption” is short enough to tolerate, and not miss a piece of storyline. I tend to think most news a station considers important frequently only merits a brief interruption. What news do you think is worthy of a brief interruption? What news do you think is worthy of cutting a huge chunk out of a show?

I’m sure the rest of the country is hearing about it this week, but here in the New York - New Jersey area most of the news this week has been about New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, the Emperors Club VIP escorts (aka expensive prostitutes), sex, morals, standards and scandal. Yesterday Spitzer announced his resignation, which was not unexpected. News had reported his impeachment would be sought if he did not resign. I hate preemptions and news interruptions. I also notice that every show I tivo during the day (three of them) have been interrupted with this news, while many of the night time shows have run in entirety.

I heard on the news this week that Warner Brothers is putting out a fourth Terminator movie next year. It is titled Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins and currently has a release date of 05/22/09. I looked online and there’s not a lot of info yet, but the two actors mentioned are Christian Bale as John Connor and Sam Worthington. The last Terminator movie was released in 2003.

One of the reasons we like the Channel 11 news is that they don’t tend to put the celeb news before the real news. I don’t usually find out who’s in drug rehab on a newscast. I usually find that out on the internet before I get a chance to see it on the news. The on air staff of Channel 11 News is great, and Mr G is our favorite weatherman. He’s got a great personality and he’s got a better track record when it comes to accuracy. We do crack up a little bit when he’s on though, because his hair never moves. Why do you watch the news you watch?

Britney had a busy week, didn’t she. On Thursday she was taken out of her home on a stretcher after a 5150 was called in to the police. She’d locked herself in the house in a four hour standoff when someone came to pick the kids up from visitation to go back to Kfed. One of the kids was heard screaming over the phone. She was taken to Cedars Sinai, which she checked herself out of on Saturday. She lost visitation rights on Saturday as well.

Nicole Ritchie and Christina Aguilera both gave birth on Friday. Ritchie gave birth to a girl and Aguilera gave birth to a boy.

Nicole Kidman and hubby Keith Urban are expecting.