<MSTing> Pt5/8 "Windmills"
the...@my-dejanews.com
SOL Bridge. Crow and Tom are alone.
CROW: Hey Tom, let's have a mental spat.
TOM: Duuuuuuuuuh, OK.
TOM growls and shakes in concentration, transmitting his thoughts to Crow.
We hear Observer-like sound effects.
CROW: WHAT?! Why you...
CROW growls and shakes and transmits his thoughts back to Tom.
TOM: Hey, I can't help that, I'm big boned! Why you...
Mike, clutching his head in agony, comes in to break it up.
MIKE: Whoa, guys! C'mon! What'd I tell you about psionics in enclosed
spaces? Your negative feedback is giving me migraines!
TOM: Oh, you want a piece of this, buster? Plenty to go around! Grr...
TOM transmits thoughts to Mike.
MIKE (as he receives thoughts): What? Oh. You feel that strongly? Well,
I don't know. Gosh. OK, I suppose... really? I never...
MIKE shakes his head, tries not to cry, and turns away from Tom. Planet
sign flashes. Mike is too emotionally hurt to notice.
CROW: Uh, Mike, the planet's calling. Mike? Augh, I'll get it.
TOM: Wussy.
Planet surface. Observer is holding a mallet, Pearl has a staked "For
Sale" sign ready to drive into the ground. The bottom of the two-mile
high sign can be seen in the background.
PEARL: All right, Nel-sonambulist, we're ready to go here. Bobo is
painting my picture up there on the two-mile high sign. (calls up) How ya
doin' Bobo?
We hear Bobo's voice from above, two miles distant.
BOBO: OK, just gettin' my safety harness on. Say, that
reminds me. Does this job come with medical insurance?
PEARL: Oh, well I'd be happy to talk with you about medical insurance,
Bobo, but to be honest, and this is the truth, I can't hear a word you're
saying, OK? (turns to Observer and job at hand) Now, as we officially
christen this two-fisted money grab, I think it only appropriate
that Observer lead us in prayer.
OBSERVER: Do you? Oh. Well. Um...Dear lord... I know that... normally,
a non-corporal atheist requesting your blessing for an underhanded real
estate swindle... (breaks down) aw hell, just end it now! Send the
lightning, the earthquakes, a plague of locusts up my butt, just get it
over with, damn you!
PEARL gets sign into position.
PEARL: You should be so lucky. All righty then, Brain Guy, if you would.
Brain Guy mutters himself into position, then raises his hammer and drives
the sign into the ground. Immediately the ground shakes like it was San
Andreas' fault, and we hear a deafening angry roar from somewhere. Pearl
and Observer hit the ground.
PEARL: What the hell?
OBSERVER: I do believe in spooks, I do believe in spooks, I do I do I do I
do I DO believe in spooks!
PEARL: You do not! Wait, where's Bobo?
We hear Bobo plummeting to his death.
BOBO: AAAAAAAAAAAUGH!
PEARL: Bobo! NO!
BOBO (suddenly not falling): Hee hee! Fooled ya didn't I Lawgiver!
PEARL (annoyed): Bobo, you're not plummeting to your wretched little
death?
BOBO: You wish! Of course not, silly, I've got my safety harness on!
Jiggled the paint a bit though, made Lawgiver's mustache a little too
pronounced, if you know what I mean.
PEARL (exasperated with Bobo, turns to Observer): Brain Pan, you got some
'splainin to do! You told me this planet was uninhabited.
OBSERVER: Well it is! There are no life forms on the planet!
PEARL: Well something roared, and it sounded pretty darned alive to me!
OBSERVER: Perhaps the situation calls for a reconstructive experiment.
Let's see, you were holding a stake sign like that.
PEARL (takes a second stake sign, places it on the ground): Yeah, and then
you drove it forcefully into the ground with a mallet.
OBSERVER: Right, like this. (hits sign with mallet)
The ground once again shakes with the violence of a Sam Peckinpah film,
and a roar resounds deafeningly amid the knobs and valleys of the planet.
We hear Bobo plummeting to his death again.
BOBO: YIIIEEEEEEEEE!!!
OBSERVER: Bobo!
BOBO: PSYCHE! Hee hee! You sillies, I keep telling you, I've got my
safety harness on! Well I ain't gettin' any work done here, I may as well
jump safely down to the ground now. Hup!
We hear Bobo falling throughout the remaining exchange. Pearl grabs
Observer by the collar.
PEARL (threateningly): You! You landed us on one of them living planet
deals, didn't you?
OBSERVER: Well, in retrospect it would appear that the reason there are no
living organisms on the planet is because the living organism that IS the
planet, ate them.
PEARL: And by inflicting injury on the planet with these stakes?
OBSERVER: Well, my guess would be the planet now considers us a harmful
infection, is generating antibodies to eliminate the infection, and they
should be here to kill us in about twenty minutes, making us dead... oh,
in a half hour or so. Enough time for fajita wrap?
PEARL: I can think of someone who'll be dead a lot sooner. C'mon, you
Caped Cru-sadist, let's head for the van and blow this biological freak-
dump while we can.
OBSERVER: I'm sure, I'm sure you're right, yes. (Pearl exits. Just
before exiting, Observer stops to listen to the falling of Bobo, and comes
back to look up at the falling ape. He considers this for a bit.) I
don't suppose Bobo recalled to secure the other end of the safety harness
to anything?
PEARL (off screen): You'll know soon enough.
OBSERVER exits, shaking his head. We still hear Bobo falling and
screaming. Camera pans up a bit to focus on the horizon, then the ape
falls through the shot and hits the ground with a calamitous thud. We
hear a huge roar from the planet, the biggest earthquake yet. Pan back
down, Bobo is at the bottom of a one-foot imprint of himself, a safety
harness on his back.
BOBO (in agony, barely conscious): Mmph... pfft... oooh... thank god for
my safety harness. Otherwise, I could have been hurt.
BOBO collapses.
Cut back to SOL. Mike and Tom are crying and hugging.
MIKE: Why didn't you tell me?
TOM (sobs): I thought you'd think I was being mean and petty.
MIKE: Oh, Tom! I do!
Buzzers sound.
All: We've got fiction sign!
| 6 |... ( 5 )... [ 4 ]... > 3 <... = 2 =... / * \
Theater- Mike and the bots take their seats
CROW: That was good guys, I think we made a real breakthrough that
session.
>4
>
> "I disagree, Professor Ashley," Barry Dylan,
TOM: The tragic result of Bob Dylan and Barry Bostwick's marriage.
> -the brightest and youngest of the students in Mary Ashley's political
>science seminar, looked around defiantly.
MIKE (whining): I'm a prince! I'm a Grimwold warrior!
>"Alexandru Ionescu is worse than Ceausescu ever was."
> "Can you give us some facts to back up that statement?" Mary Ashley
>asked.
CROW: Well, Ionescu has 400 calories, and 26 grams of fat!
> There were twelve graduate students in the seminar being held in a
>classroom at Kansas State University's Dykstra Hall. The students were
>seated in a semicircle facing Mary. The waiting lists to get into her
>classes were longer than any other professor's at the university.
MIKE: Wha- but it's not the size of the list, it's how you use it!
TOM: Jeez, since when does Freud do poli-sci?
>She was a superb teacher, with an easy sense of humor and a warmth that
> made being around her a pleasure. She had an oval face that changed
> from interesting to beautiful, depending on her mood.
CROW: Oh, a mood face. They were real popular in the seventies, you know.
>She had the high cheekbones of a model and almond-shaped hazel eyes. Her
>hair was dark and thick. She had a figure that made her female students
>envious, and the males fantasize, yet she was unaware of how beautiful
> she was.
MIKE: Yeah, that's likely.
TOM: This role has Cindy Crawford written all over it, and it's making my
skin crawl.
>Barry was wondering if she was happy with her husband. He reluctantly
>brought his attention back to the problem at hand.
CROW: Panties!
> "Well, when Ionescu took over Romania, he cracked down on all the
> pro-Groza elements-
TOM: Hydrogen, lithium, sodium...
CROW: I think the alkali metals are all pro-Groza.
>-and reestablished a hard-line, pro-Soviet position. Even Ceausescu
> wasn't that bad."
> Another student spoke up. "Then why is President Ellison so anxious
> to establish diplomatic relations with him?"
MIKE: Because he's two wheels short of a go-kart?
> "Because we want to woo him into the Western orbit."
TOM (like Curly): Woo-woo-woo-woo-woo-woo!
> "Remember," Marty said, "Nicolae Ceausescu also had a foot in both
>camps. What year did that start?"
> Barry again.
ALL (groaning, fed up): Barry again.
CROW: Finnegan, begin again!
> "In 1963, when Romania took sides in the dispute between Russia
> and China to show its independence in international affairs."
> "What about Romania's current relationship with the other Warsaw
> Pact countries, and Russia in particular?" Mary asked.
MIKE (as gossip): Well Romania won't talk to Poland since he showed up
drunk at Czechoslavakia's wedding, but Cambodia's still trying to get into
Yugoslavia's pants.
> "I'd say it's stronger now."
> Another voice.
CROW: Voices! Make'm stop! Please make the voices stop!
>"I don't agree. Romania criticized Russia's invasion of Afghanistan, and
>they criticized the Russians' arrangement with the EEC. Also, Professor
>Ashley-"
> The bell sounded.
TOM: Whup, another poli-sci professor got their wings.
>The time was up.
> Mary said, "Monday we'll talk about the basic factors that affect
> the Soviet attitude toward Eastern Europe, and we'll discuss the
> possible consequences of President Ellison's plan to penetrate the
> Eastern bloc.
MIKE: She is the most phallic professor ever.
>Have a good weekend."
> Mary watched the students rise and head for the door.
MIKE: The most ever.
> "You too Professor."
> Mary Ashley loved the give-and-take of the seminar. History and
> geography came alive in the heated discussion among the bright young
> graduate students. Foreign names became real, and historical events
> took on flesh and blood. This was her fifth year on the faculty of
> Kansas State University, and teaching still excited her.
TOM: Oh, "excited her"? Sheldon, you are one twisted pretzel piece.
>She taught five political science classes a year in addition to the
> graduate seminars,
MIKE: Oh, so she just can't get enough? She's gotta have it, is that
what you're saying?
CROW: She could teach all night and beg for-
MIKE: Crow!
CROW: What?
>-and each of them dealt with the Soviet Union and its satellite
> countries. At times she felt like a fraud. I've never been to any of
> the countries I teach about, she thought. I've never been outside the
> United States.
MIKE (Minniwegian): Oh, I've been to paradise, but I've just never been to
me, ya know?
> Mary Ashley had been born in Junction City, as had her parents. The
>only member of the family who had known Europe was her grandfather, who
> had come form the small Romanian village of Voronet.
TOM (sings): Extra value is what you get...
MIKE (to Tom): OK. No! Do you hear me?
> Mary had planned a trip abroad when she received her master's
> degree, but that summer she met Edward Ashley, and the European trip
> turned into a three-day honeymoon at Waterville, fifty-five miles from
> Junction City, where Edward was taking care of a critical heart patient.
MIKE: Oh, well wasn't that just popely of them?
TOM: Never characterize where you can canonize!
> "We really must travel next year," Mary said to Edward shortly after
>they were married. "I'm dying to see Rome and Paris and Romania."
> "So am I. It's a date. Next summer."
CROW: (as Gene Rayburn) Next Summers! What was your response to, "BLANK, a-
doodle-doo"?
MIKE (laughing): I think you know that was Brett Sommers, Crow.
> But the following summer Beth was born, and Edward was caught up in
> his work at the Geary Community Hospital.
TOM: Honey, I can see the dumb baby any ol' time. Changing bedpans is
forever!
>Two years later, Tim was born. Mary had gotten her Ph.D. and gone back
> to teaching at Kansas State University, and somehow the year had melted
> away. Except for brief trips to Chicago, Atlanta, and Denver, Mary had
> never been out of the state of Kansas.
CROW: Or the state of denial.
> One day, she promised herself. One day...
>
> Mary gathered her notes together and glanced out the window. Frost
> had painted the window a winter gray,
TOM: Boy, David Frost's career sure bottomed out.
>and it was beginning to snow again. She put on her lined leather coat
> and red woolen scarf and headed toward the Vattier Street entrance,
> where she had parked the car.
> The campus was huge, 315 acres dotted with eighty-seven buildings,
>including laboratories, theaters, and chapels,
MIKE: And an authentic Native American gambling casino!
>-amid a rustic setting of trees and grass. From a distance, the brown
>limestone buildings of the university, with their turrets,
CROW: The university has Touret's?
TOM: When I c-c-call your name, c-c-c-come get your dip-p-ploma.
>-resembled ancient castles ready to repel enemy hordes.
MIKE: Or Caucasian male students with affirmative action lawsuits.
> As Mary passed Denison Hall, a stranger with a Nikon camera was
> walking toward her. He aimed the camera at the building and pressed the
> shutter. Mary was in the foreground of the picture. I should have got
> out of his way,she thought. I've spoiled his picture.
CROW (squeaky Kathy Ireland voice): Because I'm so unaware of how
beautiful I am, don't you see?
> One hour later, the photograph was on its way to Washington, D.C.
MIKE: Which was weird since they mailed it to Boise.
>
> Every town has its own distinctive rhythm, a life pulse that springs
>from the people and the land. Junction City, in Geary County, is a farm
>community, population 20,381, 130 miles west of Kansas City, priding itself on
>being the geographical center of the continental United States
TOM: But "The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes" said that was Lebanon!
CROW: Either Walt Disney or Sidney Sheldon is telling us a great big fib.
>It has a newspaper- The Daily Union- a radio station, and a television
>station. The downtown shopping area consists of a series of scattered
> stores and gas stations along Sixth Street and on Washington. There is a
> J.C. Penny's, the First National Bank, a Domino Pizza, Flower Jeweler's,
> and a Woolworth's.
MIKE: Sidney Sheldon: King of Product Placement.
>There are fast-food chains,
CROW: I guess McDonald's and Burger King wouldn't fork over any dough.
>a bus station, a menswear shop, and a liquor store- the types of
>establishments that are duplicated in hundreds of small towns across the
>United States. But the residents of Junction City love it for its
> bucolic peace and tranquility.
TOM: Hey, that's not funny, bucolic peace killed millions of people in the
Middle Ages!
>On weekdays, at least. Weekends, Junction City becomes the rest-and-
>recreation center for the soldiers at the nearby Fort Riley.
CROW (laughs like Charles Nelson Riley): Hn-hn-hn!
>Mary Ashley stopped to shop for dinner at Dillon's Market on her way home
> and then headed north toward Old Milford Road, a lovely residential area
>overlooking a lake. Oak and elm trees lined the left side of the road,
> while on the right side were beautiful houses variously made of stone,
> brick, or wood.
TOM (as Bob Dole): You kids get off of Bob Dole's lawn!
> The Ashleys lived in a two-story stone house set in the middle of
>gently rolling hills. It had been bought by Dr. Edward Ashley and his
> bride thirteen years earlier. It consisted of a large living room,
> dining room, library, breakfast room, and kitchen downstairs, and a
> master suite and two additional bedrooms upstairs.
MIKE (Mary): Honey, where's the bathroom?
TOM (Edward): Bathroom?
> "It's awfully large for just two people," Mary Ashley had protested.
> Edward had taken her into his arms and held her close. "Who said
> it's going to be only for two people?"
CROW: The next day, longtime companion Felipe settled into the attic.
> When Mary arrived home from the university, Tim and Beth were
> waiting to greet her.
> "Guess what?" Tim said. "We're going to have our pictures in the
> paper!"
> "Help me put away the groceries," Mary said. "What paper?"
TOM (as Tim): The Cincinnati Enquirer. They're going to squeeze us in
between apologies!
> "The man didn't say, but he took our pictures and he said we'd hear
>from him."
MIKE (as Beth): And he gave us these cool tattoos, and things went all
swimmy and I became the lizard queen!
> Mary stopped and turned to look at her son. "Did the man say why?"
> "No," Tim said, "but he sure had a nifty Nikon."
MIKE: Not a word, Crow.
> On Sunday, Mary celebrated- although that was not the word that
> sprang to mind- her thirty-fifth birthday. Edward had arranged a
> surprise party for her at the country club.
CROW (whispering): OK, everybody keep out of sight, and don't point out
how beautiful she is!
>Their neighbors, Florence and Douglas Schiffer, and four other couples
> were waiting for her. Edward was as delighted as a small child at the
> look of amazement on Mary's face
>
ALL: SURPRISE! (sing to Happy Birthday) Welcome to middle age, when your
life is half gone, your best years are behind you, and you soon will be
dead!
>when she walked into the club and saw the festive table and the happy
>birthday banner. She did not have the heart to tell him that she had
> known about the party for the past two weeks. She adored Edward. And
> why not? Who wouldn't? He was attractive and intelligent and caring.
TOM: And as fluffy as cloud in springtime!
>His grandfather and father had been doctors, and it had been doctors, and
> it had never occurred to Edward to be anything else. He was the best
> surgeon in Junction City,
MIKE: Sounds like being the best songwriter in Marilyn Manson.
>-a good father, and a wonderful husband.
> As Mary blew out the candles on her birthday cake, she looked across
> at Edward and thought: How lucky can a lady be?
CROW (as nerdy scientist): Here at Bell Labs, we measure luck in
microChers,a unit equal to one-millionth the luck Cher needed to win an
Academy Award.
> Monday morning, Mary awoke with a hangover. There had been a lot of
>champagne toasts the night before, and she was not used to drinking
>alcohol.
MIKE (Mary): It has less kick than Sterno.
>It took an effort to get out of bed. That champagne done me in.
TOM: Wow, this is just like "Porgy and Bess", except it's really quite
awful.
>Never again, she promised herself.
> She eased her way downstairs and gingerly set about preparing
> breakfast for the children, trying to ignore the pounding in her head.
> "Champagne," Mary groaned, "is France's vengeance against us."
CROW: For what, unimaginative bon mots?
> Beth walked into the room carrying an armful of books. "Who are you
>talking to, Mother?"
> "Myself."
> "That's weird."
> "When you're right, you're right."
MIKE: It's nice that Sheldon added these quiet, humdrum moments to break
up the non-stop inertia of the plot.
> Mary put a box of cereal on the table.
CROW: Wow, this breakfast already has more action than the whole Ellison
presidency!
>"I bought a new cereal for you. You're going to like it."
> Beth sat down at the kitchen table and studied the label on the
> cereal box.
TOM (Beth): Mueslix is Switzerland's vengeance against us.
> "I can't eat this. You're trying to kill me."
MIKE: Not the box, the cereal inside it, sweetie.
> "Don't put any ideas in my head," her mother cautioned. "Would you
>please eat your breakfast?"
> Tim, her ten-year-old, ran into the kitchen. He slid into a chair
> at the table and said, "I'll have bacon and eggs."
> "Whatever happened to good morning?" Mary asked.
CROW: Hey, why did all the male characters get full names and the female
lead doesn't?
> "Good morning. I'll have bacon and eggs."
MIKE: I'll have chocolate cake for breakfast!
TOM (as Bill Cosby): It has eggs! And milk!
> "Please."
> "Aw, c'mon, Mom. I'm going to be late for school."
> "I'm glad you mentioned that. Mrs. Reynolds called me. You're
> failing math. What do you say to that?"
> "It figures."
> "Tim, is that supposed to be a joke?"
CROW: No, but ABC bought the rights anyway.
MIKE (announcer): TGIF, after Sabrina, this fall!
> "I personally don't think it's funny," Beth sniffed.
> He made a face at his sister. "If you want funny, look in the
> mirror."
TOM (sighing): Do you remember in "The Piano" when Holly Hunter watched
her piano fall from her boat into the ocean and it dragged her down to the
bottom with it? That was SO much funnier than this.
> "That's enough," Mary said. "Behave yourselves."
> Her headache was getting worse.
> Tim asked, "Can I go to the skating rink after school, Mom?"
> "You're already skating on thin ice.
MIKE: I think this what the Algonquin round table would have been like if
"The New Yorker" were staffed by the Sioux Falls Parent Teacher
Association.
>You're to come right home and study. How do you think it looks for a
> college professor to have a son who's failing math?"
CROW (Tim): That's right, I forgot my academic performance was all about
YOUR needs.
> "It looks okay. You don't teach math."
> They talk about the terrible twos, Mary thought grimly. What about
> the terrible nines, tens, elevens, and twelves?
TOM: Oh yeah, well what about the terrible first chapter? The terrible
second chapter? That festering cold sore of a prologue?
> Beth said, "Did Tim tell you he got a D in spelling?"
MIKE (Beth): He stuck it between the two l's.
> He glared at his sister. "Haven't you ever heard of Mark Twain?"
> "What does Mark Twain have to do with this?" Mary asked.
> "Mark Twain said he has no respect for a man who can only spell a
> word one way."
TOM: Great, the kid's got Stephen Ratliff for English.
> We can't win, Mary thought. They're smarter than we are.
MIKE: I think we'll just let that one go by.
CROW: Oh, but it's soooo tempting.
> She packed a lunch for each of them, but she was concerned about
> Beth, who was on some kind of crazy new diet.
MIKE (Mary): Three hamburgers patties, no bun? What planet is this Atkins
guy from anyway?
> "Please, Beth, eat your lunch today."
> "If it has no artificial preservatives. I'm not going to let the
> greed of the food industry ruin my health."
TOM (gruffly): Now I gotta pick up a pack of Camels before school.
> Whatever happened to the good old days of junk food, Mary wondered.
>Tim plucked a loose paper from one of Beth's notebooks. "Look at this!"
> he yelled. "'Dear Beth, let's sit together during study period. I
> thought of you all day yesterday and-"
> "Give that back to me!" Beth screamed.
CROW: Oh, for the love of...
MIKE (laughing): Sheldon clearly viewed an entire season of "Step By Step"
in preparation for this scene.
>"That's mine." She made a grab for Tim, and he jumped out of her reach.
> He read the signature at the bottom of the note. "Hey! It's signed
>'Virgil'. I thought you were in love with Arnold."
CROW: No, Helga's in love with Arnold. Catch up on your Nicktoons.
> Beth snatched the note away from him. "What would you know about
>love?" Mary's twelve-year-old daughter demanded. "You're a child."
TOM (Tim): Well, in peace Love tunes the shepherd's reed, in war he mounts
the warrior's steed.
> The pounding in Mary's head was becoming unbearable.
> "Kids- give me a break."
MIKE: You're driving me to the edge of realizing how beautiful I am!
> She heard the horn of the school bus outside. Tim and Beth started
>toward the door.
> "Wait! You haven't eaten your breakfasts," Mary said.
> She followed them out into the hallway.
> "No time. Mother. Got to go."
> "Bye, Mom."
> "It's freezing outside. Put on your coats and scarves."
CROW: And don't shoot up without asking the school nurse for clean
needles!
> "I can't. I lost my scarf," Tim said.
> And they were gone. Mary felt drained. Motherhood is living in the
>eye of a hurricane.
MIKE: Mother's just another word for nothing left to lose.
> She looked up as Edward came down the stairs, and she felt a glow.
TOM: Yup, nothing cures a hangover like seeing the man responsible for it.
>Even after all these years, Mary thought, he's still the most attractive
> man I've ever known. It was his gentleness that had first caught Mary's
>interest.
CROW (Mary): Wow, you're sure eating that sandwich gently.
MIKE (Mary): Look at him gently cross the street. He's barely touching
the pavement!
TOM (Mary): What's this? Oh, a gentle restraining order! I have to stay
fifty gentle feet away from him.
>His eyes were a soft gray, reflecting a warm intelligence, but they could
>turn into twin blazes when he became impassioned about something.
MIKE (impassioned): I hate blue M&M's!
> "Morning, darling." He gave her a kiss. They walked into the
> kitchen.
> "Sweetheart- would you do me a favor?'
> "Sure, beautiful. Anything."
> "I want to sell the children."
TOM (calls): Boy for sale!
> "Both of them?"
> "Both of them."
> "When?"
> "Today."
> "Who'd buy them?"
> "Strangers.
MIKE: Honey, we're upper-class working professionals. To the kids, we
are strangers.
>They've reached the age where I can't do anything right. Beth has became
> a health-food freak,
TOM (Mary): The kind you don't take home to me.
>-and your son is turning into a world-class dunce."
> Edward said thoughtfully, "Maybe they're not our kids."
> "I hope not.
MIKE: Kids suck!
>I'm making oatmeal for you."
> He looked at his watch. "Sorry, darling. No time. I'm due in
> surgery in half an hour.
CROW: They're removing my pituitary. I should be a nine-foot freak by
dinner.
>Hank Cates got tangled up in some machinery. He may lose a few fingers."
TOM: He may not- depends if he pays his outstanding balance.
> "Isn't he too old to still be farming?"
> "Don't let him hear you say that."
> Mary knew that Hank Cates had not paid her husband's bills in three
>years.
MIKE: Hank's husband Trevor?
>Like most of the farmers in the community, he was suffering from the low
> farm prices and the Farm Credit Administration's indifferent attitude
> toward them.
CROW: Until three Christmas spirits showed them the true meaning of
agriculture.
>Many were losing farms they had worked on all their lives. Edward never
>pressed any of his patients for money, and many of them paid him with
> crops. The Ashleys had a cellar full of corn, potatoes, and wheat.
MIKE (hits a bell): Pit!
>One farmer had offered to give Edward a cow in payment,
TOM: Just don't include the gratuity, 'cuz that's (snickering) cow
tipping! Ha! Cow tipping! Get it?
MIKE (beginning to unscrew the top of Tom's head): Oh, Tommy, me boy,
you're just not going to survive this novel in one piece, are ya son?
TOM (whimpering): Forgive me, father. I'll stop.
MIKE (stopping for now): I wish I could believe that, son. I want to.
>-but when Edward told Mary about it, she said, "For heaven's sake, tell
> him the treatment is on the house."
> Mary looked at her husband now and thought again: how lucky I am.
CROW (Mary): Well, better turn the gas on now. I'm coming, Mrs. Plath!
> "Okay," she said. "I may decide to keep the kids. I like their
> father a lot."
> "To tell you the truth, I'm rather fond of their mother." He took
> her in his arms and held her close. "Happy birthday, plus one."
TOM (Mary): Oh, so I'm supposed to do algebra with a hangover now? Don't
talk to me!
> "Do you still love me now that I'm an older woman?"
> "I like older women."
Tom and Crow whoop and buzz like a battle stations siren.
MIKE (like battle computer): Wrong answer. Danger. Wife is now armed and
ticking.
> "Thanks." Mary suddenly remembered something.
CROW: Repressed memory. Her father left the toilet seat up when she was
four.
>"I've got to get home early today and prepare dinner. It's our turn to
> have the Schiffers over."
> Bridge with their neighbors was a Monday night ritual.
MIKE (sings/caterwauls): Are you ready for some BID WHIST?!
>The fact that Douglas Schiffer was a doctor and worked with Edward at the
>hospital made them even closer.
TOM: Plus their daughter Claudia was one hot German potato salad!
RrrrrOWrrrr!
Logo, Commercial - Subliminal Ad: Dodge trucks are REM tough.
<<End Part V>>
I'd like to be, under the sea, with an Octopus's e-mail, near a cave.
peasporr...@hotmail.com
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