Thursday, April 26, 2007

A tradegy in three acts

Act I

Our heroine receives the Energy Library monthly update. Which contains the following:

Bizarre building materials

Researchers at Michigan State University have proposed that cow manure be used to replace sawdust in the manufacture of fibreboard.

A German architect has filed a patent application for a new type of cement made of dog droppings. The best breed for this has got to be the setter.

In Australia one man is building an energy-saving house from used wine bottles.

To be in the draw to win a king-size bar of energy chocolate email ... any unusual building material you’ve heard about by 4pm Friday 6th April.

She replies:

For the competition mammoth bones are my building material of choice although availability these days is bit of a problem.

Act II

Our heroine receives an email announcing her victory. She is delighted.

We see an inter-office envelope with a block of chocolate shaped bulge deliver to her empty desk.

We watch her franctic typing and the envelope becoming buried, unnoticed under floods of papers.

We watch her work late into the evening, pausing only to stalk the floor ravenously, desperate for sustenance. The scene repeats itself a second night but this time her pathetic moans lure a colleague to share his last muesli bar.

The next day later she finds the envelope. She shares most of the bar with her workmates, perhaps it is the guilt that make her do this? The act ends as she puts the last four squares into her desk drawer.

Act III

A week later. She works through lunch, sustained only by a tiny roll. She takes out the packet, wolfs down the chocolate and peers disappointed into the empty packet, a substantial amount of chocolate crumbs remain. She lifts the packet in triumph, tilts it toward her open mouth and ...

... the crumbs pour into the crevasses of her keyboard.

The lights slowly fade out on the final scene - our heroine staring in despair, past the pile of mixed chocolate crumbs and crud of the ages she has shaken onto her desk, at the brown goodness still caught between the keys.

1 comment:

JK said...

I hate it when I run out of chocolate!