(THEME)
TR: A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets, but 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. (THEME OUT)
GK: It was June. The first day of summer. The ice cream truck came by (BELL PLAYING A TUNE) and I would've bought a popsicle but I was on my way to a job. The big news was that NASA discovered ice on the planet Mars. It's one of the few success stories of this administration and it happened in another world. To improve my cash flow situation, I had taken a part-time position at the ballpark -- (BALLPARK CROWD) HEY GET YOUR COLD BEER HERE--..COLD BEER--..I used to work on cases and now I was trying to sell them. GET YOUR COLD BEER, COLD BEER, RIGHT HERE--
TR: (OFF) Couple of brewskis! Down here!
GK: Two beers coming up!
(OFF, SWING OF BAT, ROAR OF CROWD)
GK: And while I was opening the beers, this foul ball comes in hard (WHIZZ OF BALL, LOUD KONK, GK FALL, WORRIED BYSTANDERS: Hey mister, you all right?-- What happened? --Hit the beer vendor---(BRIDGE)
GK: The next thing I knew I was dueling a couple of evil ninjas with laser swords (NINJAS, SWORDPLAY) and then I was with a tall Spanish woman (TANGO PICKUP PIANO) and I asked her to dance and she laughed (SS LAUGHTER, SPANISH) and then I was coming in to try to kick a field goal from the 45 yard line with one second left on the clock --- (QB CADENCE, CHARGE OF LINEMEN, KICK, FLIGHT OF BALL, CROWD BOO) and I missed it and then I wrote a book and it was a dog (TR CRITIC: ...raises pretentious self-indulgence to a new height...) and then I was talking to a neurologist.
SS (SULTRY): Hi. I'm Heather your neurologist. Mind if I just tap you here?
GK: No, not at all. (TWO TAPS)
SS (SULTRY): You have beautiful reflexes. How about I tap you lightly here (TAP TAP) -- that feel good?
GK: That feels wonderful.
SS (SULTRY): That's good. The foul ball has filled you with self-loathing and regret --
GK: Yes, it has.
SS (SULTRY): And yet you have the reflexes of a much younger man. You don't mind me leaning up against you this way, do you?
GK: Not at all.
SS: You don't mind me brushing up against you, do you?
GK: My pleasure.
SS: I'm not crowding in too close?
GK: No. You could crowd closer if you'd like.
SS: Even though you have beautiful reflexes, I want to make sure you've suffered no head injury whatsoever and so I'm sending you to a treatment center in Ohio, Mr. Noir.
GK: Oh.
SS: It's called the Blossom Center and it's a place where men can grow and mature and open up emotionally and--and-- blossom.
GK: I see. But who's going to pay for this? I have no health insurance.
SS: Well, as it so happens, there's a man from the stadium here to see you. -- COME IN, SIR. (DOOR OPEN, FOOTSTEPS)
TR (GROWLY): Mr. Noir, I'm Mr. Felder from the ballclub and I came to extend our sympathies for your injury and to show our respect I'd like you to have a couple of box seats at the next game.
GK: Are there three of you? Are you triplets? Why are you covered with little white lights?
TR (GROWLY): Plus a thousand dollars in cash for your trouble, Mr. Noir. You look terrific by the way -- how are you doing?
GK: I'm okay except that I can't seem to come up with the, ah'with the--
SS: Words--
GK: Right. And because I can't think of words I am unable to uh. To. You know. The thing you do during the day--
SS: Work.
GK: Yes. Work.
TR (JOWLY): Who are you?
SS: His neurologist.
TR (JOWLY): How about ten thousand dollars, Mr. Noir, and we'll just have you sign this--
GK: I'd like to but I'm unable to, uh. You know. Where you hold the thing and then there's a dark line--
SS: Write.
GK: My name. Yes. Write my name.
TR (JOWLY): You know something? I'm going to make that twenty-thousand and I'll sign your name for you, okay. (SCRIBBLE) There you go. (BRIDGE)
GK: And that's how I got to come to the Blossom Center, doing a group exercise called "Feelings in Focus" with a couple of hard-looking characters.
TR: Howdy.
FN: Mornin.
GK: Hello.
TR: Well-- it's like this. We just got off that freight train out yonder.
GK: You're hoboes?
FN: We're writer-hoboes.
TR: We're writing a book.
FN: Been doing research for thirty-seven years.
TR: Travelling around on trains and sleeping in hobo camps.
GK: That's a long time to be working on a book.
FN: You're telling me.
GK: Book almost done?
TR: It was almost done until about six months ago.
GK: What happened?
TR: I was looking at the manuscript and he opened the box car door and it blew the whole thing right out the door. Thirty-seven years of work, scattered all across Montana.
GK: You could go back and find it.
FN: It was dark out. We didn't know where we were.
GK: You should've jumped off the train.
TR: We thought about it.
GK: So you lost your life work in one gust of wind---
FN: Yeah. Hoboes don't use laptops so-- out the door it went.
GK: That's the saddest story I ever heard.
TR: Actually it's not so bad. Him and me-- we met in a doctor's office.
FN: We'd just finished chemo and radiation and --
TR: Basically the doctor gave us a year, a year and a half, to live.
FN: So we decided-- hey, what do we have to lose? We're dying. Might as well see the world.
GK: And that was thirty-seven years ago.
TR: That's exactly right.
GK: So what was the book about--
FN: It was about dying.
TR: It started out to be about dying and then after a few years it started to be a jokebook.
FN: Jokes about dying.
TR: Like the man who was dying and he said to his son, "I'm not ready to go. I'm only seventy. I can't believe this is happening to me." And the son said, "Well, tell me-- where do you want to be buried?" And the man said, "Surprise me."
FN: So the man is dying and his wife is sitting up all night by the deathbed and he says, "Honey, I want to make love one last time" and she says, Look, I've got to get up in the morning; you don't!"
TR: So the man is dying and his wife is there and his children and his relatives and the dying man looks around and he says, "It's nice that you're all here but how come the light is on in the kitchen?"
FN: So the man is dying and he smells fresh rhubarb pie downstairs and he crawls down to the kitchen and there it is on the counter and he reaches up to get a piece and his wife comes in and says, "Hey. I baked that for the funeral."
GK: Well, this would've been a good book. It's a shame that you lost it.
FN: We're thinking about writing another one though.
GK: Another book about dying?
TR: No, a book about misdiagnosis.
FN: Either that or a book of cartoons.
TR: Hobo cartoons.
TR: Haven't decided yet.
(BRIDGE)
GK: So that night I went back to my cabin and was paging through a manual called "Let it Out, Let it Go", when (SOFT KNOCKING, DOOR OPENS, FOOSTEPS) Heather my neurologist came by with a bottle of wine.
(WINE UNCORKS, POURS)
SS (SEDUCTIVE): I came to see how you were doing.
GK: I'm doing all right.
SS (SEDUCTIVE): Let me put a record on. (SCRATCH OF PHONOGRAPH NEEDLE, DANCE TUNE STARTS)
GK: What are we doing?
SS: Dancing.
GK: But I can't dance.
SS: Not yet you can't, but eventually. So do you know why you shouldn't have sex with birds? You might get a bad case of chirpies. And you know, it's untweetable.
GK: Oh.
SS: Do you smoke after sex?
GK: I don't know. I've never looked.
SS: If you can guess what's in my hand, you can have sex with me tonight.
GK: An elephant.
SS: Close enough.
GK: I'm sorry but I don't believe in premarital sex with
doctors.
SS: It's only premarital sex if you're planning on getting married.
GK: You don't want to marry me?
SS: Getting married for the sex is like taking a flight to London for the salted peanuts.
GK: You're a very smooth dancer.
SS: You're not so bad yourself.
GK: You dance with all your patients?
SS: Depends on the treatment plan.
GK: This why you went into neurology?
SS: No, but it's why I stayed in neurology. I once did a study of people and their sex lives and some had sex a lot and others once or twice a month and one man said he had sex once a year. I felt so bad for him, I said, "I'm really sorry for you," and he said, "Yes, but tonight's the night."
GK: I like that.
SS: So did he.
GK: So what you're trying to say is--
SS: Put the past behind you. Everything you can't do anything about. Let go of it. (DANCE TUNE IS COMING TO AN END)
GK: I can't do it.
SS: You didn't used to be able to do it. Today you can do it.
GK: I already tried.
SS: Tomorrow you'll do it.
GK: We'll see.
SS: Thanks for the dance.
GK: My pleasure. (DANCE TUNE ENDS)
(THEME)
TR: A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets but one man is still trying to find the answers to life's persistent questions...Guy Noir, Private Eye.
(THEME OUT)