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CHARACTERS:

Christianus, a satisfactionist
Tim, a physics professor

The scene throughout is at
a park bench in London.
It's noon, Thursday, March 22, 2007.

SCENE I. Fruitarian Foreplay

1 CHRISTIANUS. Tim! Over here!

2 TIM. Hi, Chris. Sorry I am late!

3 CHRISTIANUS. What happened? Another Thursday university bomb to defuse? [1]

4 TIM. Goodness, no! I am not at an American university, am I? Or in Beirut?

5 CHRISTIANUS. Not right now, at least.

6 TIM. I just had to talk to a student.

7 CHRISTIANUS. Ah! Caught in one of those sneaky time warps, I gather? [2]

8 TIM. Unfortunately, yes.

9 CHRISTIANUS. No problem! It’s nice to see you!

10 TIM. Likewise!

11 CHRISTIANUS. Take a seat!

12 TIM. Is the bench dry?

13 CHRISTIANUS. Almost. But I have an extra plastic bag that you can sit on, if you are worried about your fancy gabardine trousers.

14 TIM. No, no — I’m fine.

15 CHRISTIANUS. Would you care for some raisins? I have a whole bag here!

16 TIM. Thanks, but I just had a very nice burger for lunch.

17 CHRISTIANUS. Oh, you already ate? Wasn’t our meeting supposed to be a brown bag, as we usually do it? [3]

18 TIM. Well, that was the plan! But I couldn’t wait. I just had to get some real food immediately. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have made it to this meeting at all!

19 CHRISTIANUS. Fair enough. And real men need real food, I guess?

20 TIM. Absolutely! They must have something substantial!

21 CHRISTIANUS. I see. But what about some dessert? These raisins are packed with vitamins and minerals! [4]

22 TIM. They look very packed, indeed. But I don’t want to be stuffed with raisins. I am not one of those fruitcakes, you know!

23 CHRISTIANUS. But these are very nice and sweet!

24 TIM. Thanks, but no thanks. Actually, I try to avoid sugar as much as possible.

25 CHRISTIANUS. Even fruit sugar?

26 TIM. Yes. It’s my teeth.

27 CHRISTIANUS. But didn’t you eat lots of candy last time we met?

28 TIM. Sure I did. But it’s not just about the sugar either. I am also not the fruity type; and I particularly dislike raisins.

29 CHRISTIANUS. Even black, seedless, sun-dried ones like these from California?

30 TIM. Yes.

31 CHRISTIANUS. Very well.

32 TIM. So what’s our topic this week?

33 CHRISTIANUS. Good Lord! I wrote it down somewhere, on a tiny piece of paper. Where did I put it?

34 TIM. Paper? Aren’t you using one of those modern, handheld electronic organizers?

35 CHRISTIANUS. No.

36 TIM. Why not? They are very efficient!

37 CHRISTIANUS. It’s not my style.

38 TIM. Not your style?

39 CHRISTIANUS. No. I am more like Strindberg’s Starck. [5]

40 TIM. Who’s that?

41 CHRISTIANUS. He’s a pastry cook.

42 TIM. But you aren’t, are you?

43 CHRISTIANUS. No. But I like his style.

44 TIM. Which is . . . ?

45 CHRISTIANUS. Well, he doesn’t have a phone.

46 TIM. He doesn’t have a phone?

47 CHRISTIANUS. No.

48 TIM. How come?

49 CHRISTIANUS. He thinks it is sometimes good not to get messages: it’s less disturbing, more peaceful.

50 TIM. So?

51 CHRISTIANUS. So why not follow in his footsteps? Why not un-complicate our lives?

52 TIM. By trashing our phones? Come on!

53 CHRISTIANUS. Well, it’s just a thought. And I am also not a busy university professor, as you are.

54 TIM. No, you’re not.

55 CHRISTIANUS. You must have an overwhelming number of important meetings and phone calls to administer with all those courses you’re teaching?

56 TIM. Yes.

57 CHRISTIANUS. How many courses do you teach this semester?

58 TIM. Three.

59 CHRISTIANUS. Ah, yes! Here it is!

60 TIM. What?

61 CHRISTIANUS. My naughty note!

62 TIM. You found your microscopic topic sentence?

63 CHRISTIANUS. Yes, I resurrected it from the nether regions. It was buried under all those rascal raisins. It must have been there for days! What a timely revelation!

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Notes (SCENE I)

[1] I:3, university bomb: According to Reuters, Lebanese police stated on Thursday, 22 May 2007 that they ‘defused a small bomb found in the American University of Beirut’ (Reuters 2007).

REUTERS (2007), ‘Small bomb defused at American University of Beirut’. Reuters [http://uk.reuters.com], 22 March 2007, 10:15 am GMT.

[2] I:7, time warps: The DK Illustrated Oxford Dictionary defines ‘time warp’ as ‘an imaginary distortion of space in relation to time, whereby persons or objects of one age can be moved to another’ (Abate 1998, p. 868), while Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language suggests that it is ‘the condition or process of being displaced from one point in time to another, as in science fiction’ (Guralnik 1978, p. 1490). Perhaps even more relevant to the present point, the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English suggests not only that a time warp may be ‘an imaginary situation in which the past or future becomes the present’ but also that to ‘be (caught/locked/stuck) in a time warp’ is ‘to have not changed even though everyone or everything else has. The house seemed to be stuck in a 19th-century time warp’ (Fox 2008).

FRANK ABATE, ed. (1998), The DK Illustrated Oxford Dictionary. New York: Dorling Kindersley and Oxford University Press.

CHRIS FOX, ed. (2008), Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English. Updated online version of the fourth edition CD-ROM. Available at http://www.ldoceonline.com. Harlow: Longman.

DAVID B. GURALNIK, ed. (1978), Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language. Second college edition. Cleveland, OH: William Collins and World Publishing Co, Inc.

[3] I:17, brown bag: Although ‘brown bagging’ sometimes may refer to the practice of ‘taking one’s own wine etc., into a restaurant that is not licensed to serve alcohol’ (Abate 1998, p. 109; ref. supra, note 2 ‘time warps’ at I:7), it is perhaps more likely that it, in this context, should be understood as the practice of ‘taking one’s lunch to work, etc., in a brown paper bag’ (Abate 1998, p. 109; my italics).

[4] I:21, raisins: Judging from various comments by Christianus, these seem to be seedless California raisins, presumably not sulphur-dioxide processed into some ‘golden’ variety, but just naturally sun-dried and therefore dark brown. According to USDA (2008), there are many minerals and vitamins in 100 grams of some such seedless raisins (vitis vinifera): Calcium (Ca): 50 mg; Iron (Fe): 1.88 mg; Magnesium (Mg): 32 mg; Phosphorus (P): 101 mg; Potassium (K): 749 mg; Sodium (Na): 11 mg; Zinc (Zn): 0.22 mg; Copper (Cu): 0.318 mg; Manganese (Mn): 0.299 mg; Fluoride (F): 233.9 mcg; Selenium (Se): 0.6 mg; Vitamin B1 (Thiamin): 0.106 mg; Vitamin B2 (Riboflavin): 0.125 mg; Vitamin B3 (Niacin): 0.766 mg; Vitamin B5 (Pantothenic acid): 0.095 mg; Vitamin B6: 0.174 mg; Folate: 5 mcg; Choline: 11.1 mg; Betaine: 0.3 mg; Vitamin C (total ascorbic acid): 2.3 mg; Vitamin E (Alpha Tocopherol): 0.12 mg; Gamma Tocopherol: 0.04 mg; Vitamin K (phylloquinone): 3.5 mcg.

USDA (2008), USDA National Nutrient Database. Available at the United States Department of Agriculture website [http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search].

[5] I:39, Strindberg’s Starck: Mr. Starck is a pastry cook in Strindberg’s play Oväder [Bad Weather or The Storm]. He doesn’t have a phone (Strindberg 1921, p. 61).

AUGUST STRINDBERG (1921), Samlade skrifter [Collected works]. Fyrtiofemte delen [Forty-fifth part]. Kammarspel: Oväder, Brända tomten, Spöksonaten, Pelikanen, Svarta handsken [Chamber plays: Bad Weather (or The Storm), The Burned House (or The Burned Site), The Ghost Sonata, The Pelican, The Black Glove]. Stockholm: Albert Bonniers.

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HOW TO CITE: Bo C. Klintberg (2008), ‘Fruitarian Foreplay’ in Tim's Sexy Girl-Goddess and the Tale of the British Raisin. Online edition of Philosophical Plays, 29 Dec. 2008. Retrieved [today’s date] from http://www.philosophicalplays.com/pgTSGv1sc01.htm.

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