Philosophy Shop Sketch

Harry (originally ZCM): Good morning, sir.
Mouseguy (originally DAA): Good morning. I was sitting in the B"Hai temple in Winetka just now, skimming through Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig, when suddenly I got a craving for metaphysics.
Harry: Metaphysics, sir?
Mouseguy: Philosophy
Harry: Eh?
Mouseguy: Like, I wanted to think, man.
Harry: Oh, thinking, eh?
Mouseguy: In a nutshell. So I thought to myself, a new set of beliefs would do the trick. So I curtailed my motorcycling activities, sallied forth and infiltrated your place of purveyance to negotiate the vending of some cheesy philosophies.
Harry: Come again?
Mouseguy: I want to buy a philosophy.
Harry: Oh, I thought you were posing a koan.
Mouseguy: A what?
Harry: A zen koan. A philosophical puzzle, if you will.
Mouseguy: Oh, do you have any of those?
Harry: Try this one on for size: Say a tree falls in the forest, but no one's around to hear it..... What color is the tree?
Mouseguy: Brown.
Harry: <<<absolutely amazed>>> You're good.
Mouseguy: Philosophy, please.
Harry: Yes, certainly, sir. What wouyld you like?
Mouseguy: How about a little optimism?
Harry: I'm afraid we're fresh out of optimism, sir.
Mouseguy: Oh, never mind. How are you on cynicism?
Harry: Never at the end of the week, sir. Always get it fresh first thing on Monday.
Mouseguy: Tsk, tsk.. No matter. Four volumes of procrastination then, if you please, stout yeoman.
Harry: Ah, well, i've been meaning to order it for the past few weeks, but you know.....
Mouseguy: Yes, it's just not my day, is it? Uh..... Social Darwinism?
Harry: Sorry.
Mouseguy: Murphyism?
Harry: Normally, sir, yes, but the van broke down.
Mouseguy: Ahhhh.... Judeo-Christianity?
Harry: Sorry.
Mouseguy: Idealism?
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Autonomy?
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Any atheism?
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Satanism?
Harry: Why yes, I think we have some of that.
Mouseguy: Ah, good. What does that entail?
Harry: Well, we start off with a few pints of lamb's blood, some basic corruption, introduce you to hedonism, evil, and unwavering loyalty to the dark master, AND, if you act now, you get your own virgin-slaying sacrificial dagger upon receipt of your immortal soul.
Mouseguy: <<<the great paws>>> Subjectivism.
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Rationalism.
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Utilitarianism?
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Communism!!!
Harry: ........Mmmmmmmmmmmmm......... No.
Mouseguy: Any absolutism?
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Nietzche, Hagel, Heidigger, Hume, Locke, Lichenshtein, Marx, Confuscious, Emerson, Descartes.
Harry: Ah! We do have some Descartes!!
Mouseguy: You do. Excellent.
Harry: It's a bit dry.
Mouseguy: Oh, I like it dry.
Harry: Well, as a matter of fact, it's very dry, sir.
Mouseguy: No matter, no matter. Hand over the thoughts of the wise from the vendor of the foolish to the consumer of the intellectual.
Harry: I think it's a bit more dry than you'd like, sir.
Mouseguy: I don't care how excrementally dry it is. Hand it over with all speed.
Harry: Yes, sir. <<<looks under counter>>> Oh......
Mouseguy: What?
Harry: The cat's eaten it.
Mouseguy: .............What the bloody blue blazes does that mean?!?!?!?!?!!?!
Harry: Uh, I'm not exactly sure. I think it's just an error in translation.
Mouseguy: I see.
Mouseguy: Buddhism?
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Hinduism.
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Materialism.
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Existentialism.
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Dogmatism.
Harry: No, sir.
Mouseguy: You do have some philosophy, don't you?
Harry: Of course, sir. It's a philosophy shop. We've got--
Mouseguy: No, no, no, don't tell me. I'm keen to guess.
Harry: Fair enough.
Mouseguy: Hare Krsna?
Harry: Yes sir?
Mouseguy: Oh, splendid. Well, I'll have some of that then, please.
Harry: Oh, I'm sorry, sir. I thought you were referring to me. That's my name. Harold Krsna.
Mouseguy: Reductionism?
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Transcendentalism.
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Parallelism.
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Philistinism?
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Diontylogical ehics!
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: George Carlinism.
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Waffy Peruvian Interactionist Babbelism
Harry: Not today, sir.
Mouseguy: Well, let's keep it simple. How about some good, old-fashioned Realism.
Harry: Well I'm afraid we don't get much call for it around these parts.
Mouseguy: NO CALL FOR IT?! IT'S THE SINGLE MOST POPULAR PHILOSOPHY IN THE WORLD!!!!!
Harry: Not 'round these parts, sir.
Mouseguy: And pray tell, what is the most popular philosophy " 'round these parts"?
Harry: Apathy, sir.
Mouseguy: I see.
Harry: Yes, sir, it's quite staggeringly popular in this ....community.
Mouseguy: Is it?
Harry: Yes, sir. It's our number one best seller.
Mouseguy: Is it?
Harry: Yes sir.
Mouseguy: Apathy, eh?
Harry: Right
Mouseguy: OK, I'm game. Have you got any, dear sir?
Harry: Oh, I could care less.
Mouseguy: It's not much of a philosophy shop, is it?
Harry: FInest in the community, sir.
Mouseguy: Explain the logic underlying that conclusion!!
Harry: It's so lucid, clear, understandable!!!
Mouseguy: It's certainly uncontaminated by ideas.
Harry: You haven't asked me about Fascism, sir.
Mouseguy: Is it worth it.
Harry: Could be.
Mouseguy: OK have you got any Fascism.
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: No, that figures. It was pretty predictable, really. It would have been an act of purest optimism to have simply posed that question in the first place -- but, you're fresh out of that as well. Tell me something. Do you have any philosophy at all?
Harry: Yes.
Mouseguy: Really?
Harry: ......No.
Mouseguy: You haven't.
Harry: No, I was deliberately wasting your time. We haven't a single axiom.
Mouseguy: Oh, I'm sorry. You realize then, I'm going to have to shoot you.
Harry: Very well.
Mouseguy: All right.. BANG.
<<<Wensleydale falls>>>
Mouseguy: What a senseless waste of human life.
Harry: I'm not quite dead yet.
Mouseguy: You're not?
Harry: No.
Mouseguy: Well then..... what a senseless MORTAL WOUNDING of human life.
Harry: I'm getting quite better.... In fact, I think I might pull through. <<<stands up>>>
Mouseguy: Well.... I'm feeling a bit peckish, really. Would you like to go to dinner?
Harry: Dinner?
Mouseguy: Well, it's only polite. I mean, I shot you and all.
Harry: Oh, of course.
<<<walk over and sit>>>
Harry: You know, I bet you're wondering how philosophy is made and why it's so incredibly rare in my philosophy shop.

{AD LIB A REASON}

Harry: ....but it makes a good story.
Mouseguy: I wonder when we're gonna get some service around here.

{AD LIB WAITER BIT. (waiter originally RLO}

Mouseguy: This is the stupidest skit I have ever been in.. <<<Flips Table>>>
Harry: You're right...shall we end it?
Mouseguy: Very well
<<<They walk off. It Ends>>>

Copyright 1993, Zachary Miller (wolfgang@imsa.edu), Don Alsafi, and Robb Olson