(GK: Garrison Keillor; SS: Sue Scott; TR: Tim Russell; FN: Fred Newman)
(THEME)
TR: A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets, but here on the 12th floor of the Acme Building, one man is still trying to find the answers to life's persistent questions ---- Guy Noir, Private Eye. (MUSIC UP AND OUT)
GK: It was December in Minnesota, the sort of cloudy day that when you open your shades in the morning, the room gets darker. It was so cold it made your face hurt. The sort of day that God designed to show Christians that sometimes joyfulness is kind of a stretch. I was looking at a postcard from my old girlfriend Sugar who was in Florida with her new boyfriend, a wealthy un-indicted financier. It said, "The weather is here. Wish you were beautiful."
I was thinking I oughta shop for Christmas but I was afraid that if I heard "The Little Drummer Boy" I might lose control of myself during the Rum tum tum tum tum tum part. The Little Drummer Boy drives me nuts. And "Do You Hear What I Hear." If we could get rid of them, and Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker, this would be a better world.
(PHONE RING, PICKUP)
TR (RICO): Noir?
GK: Yeah, Rico.
TR (RICO): This is Rico.
GK: Right.
TR (RICO): We seem to have a bad connection, Noir.
GK: I can hear you fine, Rico.
TR (RICO): I said, This is Rico.
GK: Hearing you loud and clear, Rico.
TR (RICO): Will you answer? Don't just sit there breathin in the phone, ya big meatball.
GK: It's me, Rico. Go ahead.
TR (RICO): What kind of a jerk are you? Pick up the phone and you just sit there breathin into it? Guys like you--- boy, you make me mad.
GK: Your cell phone isn't working, Rico.
TR (RICO): Say something, Noir, or I'm gonna come over there and treat you to a knuckle sandwich. (BRIDGE)
GK: So that's how I found myself sitting in the Del Ray Lounge, killing time, listening to a band called the Dial Tones and that's how I met Ernie. (JAZZ COMBO)
FN: Hi.
GK: Hello.
FN: Nice band.
GK: Yeah. For a cocktail lounge in St. Paul, Minnesota, at 10 a.m., they're okay.
FN: You waiting for somebody?
GK: Waiting for somebody to go away.
FN: Me? Sorry, I'll just go over andff
GK: No, no---- just some big goombah who's dumber than a box of hammers. That's why I came in here. Because it's dark.
FN: Oh. I'm waiting for Mitzi. A girl I met online.
GK: Ahh. First date, huh?
FN: No, no, no---- nothing like that. Heh heh heh. No, we met in a chat room talking about environmental issues. We're both in the Fruitcake Coalition.
GK: I see.
FN: You know about fruitcake?
GK: Know what?
FN: Did you know that every Christmas fifty million fruitcakes are sold in this country and after Christmas fifty-one million fruitcakes are thrown away. The fifty million plus the million that people were saving in their refrigerators since last Christmas.
GK: That's a lot of fruitcake.
FN: Fifty-one million fruitcakes are hauled every year to a hazardous fruit disposal site in Utah and the concentration of all that fruitcake is affecting the earth's orbit and making it wobble and possibly bringing us into a collision course with an asteroid.
GK: I see.
FN: We're seeing changes in the breeding habits of owls that lead us to believe that we're heading towards the end of the world in a fiery immolation in space and all of us will become a cloud of carbon molecules drifting through the Milky Way, along with tiny chunks of dried cherries.
GK: Well. I guess we should try to make this Christmas the best ever then.
FN: We've got to do something.
GK: And right then, she walked in. (MUSIC) A blonde so beautiful she took my breath away and wouldn't give it back. Her jeans were so tight, they looked like she'd put them on with a spray can. And a black T-shirt with Mount Rushmore on it. Those Presidents never looked so good. Especially Jefferson and Lincoln.
SS: Hi. You must be Ernie----
FN: Mitzi?
GK: And I must have died and gone to heaven.
FN: This is---- I'm sorry---- what's your name?
GK: Cary Grant.
SS: Hi, Cary. I'm Mitzi. You in the Fruitcake Coalition too?
GK: Honey, I'd join the Trent Lott for President club if it meant I got to meet you----
SS: So you know about the fruitcake crisis in the world?
GK: I do and I think it's important to stay calm.
FN: Mitzi and I think maybe we should go to Washington.
GK: I think you should go to Washington, Ernie, as soon as possible, like Tuesday. I think Mitzi should open up a St. Paul office. I'd rent you mine. In the Acme Building. Cheap. Cause the overhead'll kill you. She can have my desk. I'll wash the coffee cup. (BRIDGE) We sat and talked, or rather Ernie talked. A lot of stuff about owls and dolphins and the icecap and she listened to him and I gazed at her. A bombshell. And I was the one about to explode. And just then---- (DOOR FLUNG OPEN, FOOTSTEPS)
TR (RICO): Aha! I found ya! Ya big fruitcake!
FN: Fruitcake! You're absolutely right! We found each other!!
TR (RICO): Who asked you, dingbell? This is between me and him----
FN: It's between all of us. It's bigger than all of us. It's destroying the earth.
TR (RICO): Butt out or I'll destroy you.
FN: Have you seen the photos of the dumpsite in Utah and the huge piles it's forming---
TR (RICO): Am I Mormon? No way.
FN: Let me show you this book about it----it's interesting-----
TR (RICO): Let me show you this set of knuckles--- (HE SWINGS, FN OOOF, HE FALLS). (MUSIC STOPS) Who is this gumball, Noir? (CELL PHONE RINGS) Just a minute. ---- Yeah? Yeah, this is Rico. --- Oh, hi, Tony. Yeah--- I'll be right there. ---- Right away. (CLOSE CELL PHONE) See ya round, Noir. Nice dame. Ya got good taste. (FOOTSTEPS, DOOR OPEN, CLOSE) (MUSIC RESUMES)
SS: This is so weird. I just met Ernie and now he's lying on the floor unconscious.
GK: He's just resting. Care for a drink?
SS: Could I have a glass of glacier water?
GK: A glass of glacier water, waiter! --- Ah, Mitzi. I don't even know your last name.
SS: You're right, you don't.
GK: Have I met you somewhere before?
SS: I don't think so.
GK: Well, you're pretty memorable. And I never forget a face either.
SS: You're cute.
GK: Okay. I can settle for cute. We can try for magnificent later.
SS: Are you French?
GK: No, but if you want me to be, I would plug my nose and give
it a try. ---- (WAITER APPROACH, GLASS OF WATER, ETC.)
The waiter brought her a glass of water. I looked into her face. Her jeans
were so tight I could read the embroidery on her underwear. It said Seasons
Greetings. I was in love. A beautiful woman is nothing but grief, I know
that, I've been over that cliff before, my heart has been broken so many
times, it jingles when I walk, but still I was ready to marry her then
and there. The ring, the house, the lawn care, the whole thing. She made
me feel privileged just to be breathing air she had recently exhaled.
SS: Do you listen to public radio, Mr. Noir?
GK: Mitzi, I associate public radio with people who suffer from very bad hair.
SS: I love public radio.
GK: Well, what do I know? Probably I'm wrong about it--- I never listen ----
SS: I could never be with a man who isn't a public radio listener.
GK: I'm not saying I never listen. I listen some. When I'm not busy with environmental things. ---- I pulled out a Lucky Strike and lit it, just to see how she felt about the Clear Air Act. If a woman will tolerate some smoke, I figure she might be open-minded about other things. --- (BASS SOLO STARTS IN HERE SOMEWHERE) Let's go to my apartment. We could listen to the radio. Maybe there's an in-depth report on. An update on the fruitcake situation.
SS: Shhhh.
GK: What?
SS: I love bass solos.
GK: Right. I never knew public radio played this sort of-----
SS: Shhhhh. I love this. ----Right here. You hear that?
GK: Yeah.
SS: Hear it?
GK: Yeah, I think so.
SS: This part here.
GK: Right.
SS: I love this part. ---Listen. ---- I love what he does here.
GK: Mitzi---- how'd you like a Martini? With a soybean?
SS: How could I possibly--- with the world facing imminent destruction due to millions of fruitcakes about to bring the world to a flaming end?
GK: Well, the end of the world is no big deal to me. What do I have to look forward to? My last big romance was back in the Carter administration. I'm a flowering plant trying to grow in the dark. I signed up with a dating service called Beautiful Losers and nothing happened. I'm old and homely and I got a bum ticker, so let the world end. I don't care. ---- She put her hand on my shoulder.
SS: You really ought to join public radio. You could hear more about fruitcakes and they have wonderful membership premiums.
GK: Like what, for example?
SS: T-shirts.
GK: She gave me a look so sweet you could've poured it on your pancakes. ---Okay, I'll join.
SS: Wonderful. ----
GK: And she crossed her arms and pulled the T-shirt up over her head. Underneath she wore a Spandex halter so skimpy, if it was cut any shorter, it would've been a shoulder strap.
SS: Here.
GK: Thanks.
FN: MOAN
SS: It's Ernie, he's getting up. (KONK, FN OOHHHH, FALLS BACK)
GK: Whoops. Dropped the vase on him. --- Maybe we should go, Mitzi.
SS: I've got things to do----
GK: Me too. But it looks to me as if the earth's orbit has changed, babes --- and maybe we're heading for a collision. Let's not wait until the last minute to think about enjoying ourselves-----
SS: Bye. Enjoy the T-shirt. (FOOTSTEPS AWAY)
GK: She put on her coat and went out the door and there I was, alone, with a guy sleeping on the floor and a jazz quartet and a glass full of ice cubes and a T-shirt with four stone-faced presidents.
TR (WAITER): Anything for you, pal?
GK: Sure.
TR (WAITER): Another glass of glacier water?
GK: How about a glass of water from a melted snowman?
TR (WAITER): A snowman?
GK: Right.
TR (WAITER): You want a lump of coal with that?
GK: Sure.
TR (WAITER): From a snowman at a house with a dog, or a house without a dog?
GK: Without---
(THEME)
TR: A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets, but there on the 12th floor of the Acme Building, one man is still trying to find the answers to life's persistent questions ---- Guy Noir, Private Eye. (MUSIC UP AND OUT)
© Garrison Keillor 2002