Snow Nomenclature Ocular Widget

(SNOW)

A play for stage

By Graham

Cast

         Brian

(A dash - indicates a pause, while BRIAN listens) 

(Apologies for the lack of proper indentation for the dialogue. It does not seem to be supported in this form)

A Walkers’ hut: isolated, somewhere in Wales. There is a door upstage right, and a single window stage left. We can see the window, but not the view through it. Some tatty curtains loosely frame the window, and partially hide a telephone number scrawled large on the wall, above which is written, ‘RESCUE’. The hut is sparsely furnished: a small table and two chairs, a broken hat/cloak stand, perhaps a solid-fuel stove of some sorts. A broom is leant against the wall by the window. Incongruously, tacked high up on the back wall are two ‘door characters’: a 2, and to its right and slightly below, an E.

BRIAN is obviously very cold. He is well wrapped up and has a thick coat, wooly hat, scarf and walking boots. He is agitated, pacing, occasionally looking through the window, and talking into his mobile.

BRIAN:     I don’t understand.

                   -

                   I do. I do need to understand. I’ll have you know I…

                   -

                   No. No of course not. Why would I phone up for an argument?

                   -

                   That’s right. I just said that, when I first phoned. Look, I do have the right number? Because if I have not got…

                   -

                   Well, that’s right. That’s what I assumed. I mean if I had misdialed. Look, I’ll read you the number…

BRIAN pulls back the curtain, preparing to read the number, but he is interrupted again. He drops it back.

                   -

                   Well, yes, of course. Yes, obviously I couldn’t, or we would not be having this conversation, would we?

                   -

                   Yes, yes, I do appreciate that. I don’t mean to be ungrateful, but I am very, very cold, I am very, very lost, and the weather seems to be getting worse. It will be dark soon, there is no electricity, nothing to burn in the stove. Not that I have any boy scouts to rub together to light it.

                   -

                   Boy scouts. It was a joke.

                   -

                   No, perhaps not. Look, I do. I do want you to come and rescue me.

                   -

                   Yes, it was. It was silly. But it was not snowing when I came out. Not like this.

                   -

                   Not like this.

                   -

                   Yes, I suppose so. Snow is snow, yes. Look, sorry, but… Well, I have to say that I no more phoned for a lecture than I did an argument.

                   -

                   Yes, yes, yes, sorry. – Sorry. So this… app. About this app.

                   -

                   Widget. Okay, widget. – It is an app though, isn’t it?

                   -

                   Okay, okay, okay. Sorry. About this… widget.

                   -

                   So, I download it, from where?

                   -

                   The app store. I download it from the app store. - Not the widget store?

                   -

                   No, I am not being… It was a joke.

                   -

                   Poor taste, yes. Like the boy scouts, yes. Sorry. Once again, I am truly sorry. Please, just come and get me. As quick as you can. If you could. I would appreciate it. My girlfriend would appreciate it.

                   -

                   Yes, it’s her birthday.

                   -

                   I am, yes.

                   -

                   A concert. To a concert.

                   -

                   Oh, well, actually it’s… it’s… Well, as you ask, it’s… It’s Wet Life.

                   -

                   No, Wet Life. I did not mean to say…

                   -

                   No, I didn’t. – They are a tribute band.

                   -

                   Yes, that probably would have been worse, yes. Lucky the real ones have disbanded yes. Look, I think we need to…

                   -

                   That’s right. Yes, I will. I will. I’ll type it in. The app store, yes. Just a minute. Hold on.

BRIAN taps instructions into his phone. He eventually seems to get what he wants.

                   I am, yes, I am downloading it. Nearly there

It downloads. He is bemused.

                  

                   This is not right. It’s snow.

                   -

During the next, BRIAN gets more and more agitated. He is near breaking point.

                   I know you did. And I did, but this is snow. It is just snow. It puts snow… on your phone. It just puts snow on your phone. I have snow on my phone. I do not need snow on my phone. There is snow outside. There is lots of snow outside. There is too much snow outside. I don’t want snow on my phone too. What’s that going to do? For God’s sake, what is that going to do?

                   -

                   Yes, yes, sorry. Once again, I am sorry. But you said it would be at the top. Of the search…

                   -

                   Snow. I typed in snow. S, n, o, w. How else would I type in snow?

                   -

                   Really? Okay, okay. Just a minute. Look, are you sure you can’t find me by this number on the wall? You said you know all the main huts.

                   -

                   I told you. Two E.

                   -

                   No, I know you did, yes.  I will forget about the number on the wall. Yes, right, just a minute.

BRIAN tries again, and appears to find the right thing this time. As he reads out the next, he has to keep taking the phone from his ear to check.

                   Snow – nomenclature – ocular – widget. Oh, I see, widget. And tell me, what does this do, exactly?

                   -

                   No, I am not starting all that over again. I am just curious, that is all. Nothing wrong with that, surely? I mean, I need to know what to do with it.

                   -

                   I see. – I see. – Yes. – Right. – Right. So, let me repeat that. To you. I download the app, I take a photo, of the snow by the hut, and that tells you where I am. – Really?

                   -

                   Nomenclature? No I don’t. I didn’t even know snow had that much of a taxonomy associate with it.

                   -

                   Taxonomy. It’s like…

                   -

                   Fair enough, yes. I will stick to your…

                   -

                   Yes, I will. In future, yes. It is nomenclature, yes. And widget, not app.

                   -

                   I will. Now. I’ll download it, straight away. Bear with.

                   -

                   Miranda, yes. Do you? And me, yes. Bear with.

                   -

                   It is, I agree. Much funnier than my two attempts, yes, the one about the boy scouts, and the other one. Just a minute.

BRIAN is about to start the download when he notices something that really angers him. He is apoplectic.

                  

                   How much? Good God. Is the man off his trolley? Is he out of his tiny little, pedantic, stupid mind? Where have I phoned him? In a mental institution? Some sort of criminalized mental institution?

                  

                   Hello, are you still there?

                   -

                   I am quite aware you could hear everything I was saying. I am very happy for you to hear everything I am saying. Do you know how much apps are? They are sixty-nine pence, that’s what they are. Maybe a pound, maybe two. The first snow one was free. I have seen one for a fiver, I’ll give you that. But…

                   -

                   I know. I hear you. Okay it’s a widget… But it’s still an app. When all is said and done it’s an app. It is not a string of passwords for a Bank of England computer, it is not a list of access codes for the Crown Jewels. It’s a sodding app.

                   -

                   But three hundred quid? Three hundred of our English pounds? No widget, whatsit, wanking, sodding phone app costs three hundred pounds.

                   -

                   Yes, yours does. Yours does. I’ll give you that. Yours does. But what does it do? You won’t, or you can’t, even tell me what it does.

                   -

                   But will it? Will it get me out of here? I don’t think so. I don’t think it will.

                   -

                   Well I’ll ring someone else.

                   -

                   Of course I can.

                   -

                   What?

BRIAN checks his screen

                  

                   How have you done that? How the…? How have you done that? (realisation) The first one. It was that first one wasn’t it? That first… snow thing, it was yours too wasn’t it. You’ve blocked my phone. You have blocked my phone with snow.

                   -

                   Yes it is. It is getting dark.

                   -

                   Wet Life? Yes they are. Well, to my girlfriend anyway.

                   -

                   Yes, the snow is getting… Okay, okay, okay.

BRIAN punches some more instructions into the phone. He waits while it downloads.

                   Right. I have it. I have to say it doesn’t look much. Not for three hundred…

                   -

                   I know it’s what it does that’s important, not how it looks. But I still don’t know what it does. You have not told me what it does.

                   -

                   No, that is not what it does, it is what I do. That is what you told me I do. Take a photo. But what does this very expensive app… Widget. What does this widget do with it?

                   -

                   Right, that’s better. Thank you. I’m listening.

                   -

                   So, let me get this right. I take a photo of the snow. The… widget analyses the snow from the picture and, using snow nomenclature, works out where I am. This all seems rather far-fetched.

                   -

                   What, before I take a picture of the snow?

                   -

                   Instead of the picture of the snow? But you said you couldn’t identify this hut’s location by the two and the E on the wall. How will me taking a picture of them help?

                   -

                   Okay, okay. In for a penny.

                   -

                   It’s a saying.

                   -

                   No, it is not another joke… Oh… I’ll just take the photo.

BRIAN takes a photo of the 2 and E. He waits while it sends.

                   Got it?

                   -

                   What? Do what?

                   -

BRIAN, now totally deflated, puts the phone on the table. Taking the broom, he uses it to push up the E, which swings up, falling against the 2. It is 23, not 2E. He takes the phone up again. He walks to the window.

                   I take it you don’t need me to take another photo? That’s you isn’t it? Coming down the hill. You’ve been there ever since…

                   You f….

BLACKOUT