Paul stands outside his house 

PAUL:	Taxi item, take 1.  St. John’s while very much the village is 
	North America’s oldest city.  We are painfully parochial and yet 
	surprisingly urbane.  Among our more cosmopolitan attributes is our 
	extensive use of taxis as a means of  ...

SFX:	Muffled shouts.

PAUL:	Arggggh!  Mom, for the love of God, I’m recording a bit 
	for the show.

SFX:	Muffled shouts.

PAUL:	I’m buying my lunch today.  I’m an adult.  I’m allowed.

SFX:	Muffled shouts.

PAUL:	No, I am not made of money.  (under his breath) Stop 
	hounding me.  Taxi piece pick-up.  Among our more cosmo ...

SFX:	Car horn.  Paul walks.

PAUL:	Here’s my cab.  On a dirty day like this one, a singularly 
	mauzy affair, I call a Shea’s taxi to take me into work.

SFX:	Paul into cab.

PAUL:	Wilbur, my man.

WIL:	What’s all this?

PAUL:	I’m doing a piece for the show on taxis in St. John’s.

WIL:	I don’t know about this...

PAUL:	Come on, it’s nothing.

WIL:	Ok, Ok.  Where to?

PAUL:	The BCN.

SFX:	Car starts off.

WIL:	I thought the government layed all you guys off.

PAUL:	That’s the CBC.

WIL:	Too bad.

PAUL:	Geez, some weather, heh?  Must make driving tough.

WIL:	Oh, great, let’s talk about the weather -- that’s one thing 
	about driving cab, Paul boy, you’re always dying to have a little chat 
	about the weather and you just never get the chance.

PAUL:	Well, anyway, it’s supposed to clear up by this afternoon.  
	Gonna be gorgeous, they say.

WIL:	Great.  Another sunny day.  Death for the cab business. 
	Gonna clear up later on.  That makes my day.  A lovely summer like we 
	has this year and you’ld be up to the stand, nothing doing and a bunch 
	of grown men standing around, stripped to the waist, getting sun-
	burned, watching what little is left of their desperate lives slip away.  
	Sunny day, sunny sunny sunny day.  Ain’t nothing better in the world 
	you know than lieing 

PAUL:	I guess congratulations are in order, Wilbur.

WIL:	Why?

PAUL:	For guessing what was in the Tetley Tea Pot ... jeez $85,000 
	dollars, must be a record jackpot ... how did you ever get The 
	Schrodinger Wave Equation?

WIL:	Winning that money was the worst thing that happened to 
	me this year.

PAUL:	How so?

WIL:	The taxes, half the southern shore showing up at this 
	house, and then there’s this g.d. car.

PAUL:	It is a swank new vehicle.

WIL:	Front wheel drive?  And the workmanship today. Give it 
	up.

PAUL:	Wooow! Watch out for the youngster!

WIL:	You hit a youngster these days and, my christ, the hulla-
	baloo.  Before if you nailed a youngster you’ld drag him off to the 
	hospital, and when the old man showed up he’d put the boots to the 
	child for being out in the road.  You smack into one now and you’re 
	likely to end up in the dock.

	Wilbur groans in pain.

PAUL:	You ok.

WIL:	I can’t eat anything at all Paul.  Even a bit of toast and I 
	bloats up.  A cooked dinner, or a bottle of beer, just a simple bottle of 
	beer and .... well ... it all repeats on me.  

PAUL:	You should see a Doctor.

WIL:	Have some chinaman in me up to the elbow!  Not likely.

PAUL:	Back door please Wilbur. What do think of that new 
	television sitcom about the St. John’s taxi trade?

WIL:	(ignore punctuation-a steady belt screed) Some big shot 
	producer comes down from New Brunswick, hires all these glamourous 
	movie stars to depict a way of life that is, in fact, mean, dirty, crude, 
	ultimately unsatisfying, personally humiliating,  and never, ever, ever 
	worth the effort.  I don’t like it.  What’s the hidden agenda?  Did 
	anybody bother to ask me?  NO!  Where’s all the money coming from? 
	You and me that’s who!  I don’t think they should be at it. And if 
	they’re not stopped I don’t want to think what will become of the 
	province.  But then again, could things get any worse. 

PAUL:	Ahhh here we are the old BCN building.  Can you believe 
	they’re considering tearing this down.

WIL:	Excellent idea.  The thing’s an eyesore.

PAUL:	I love this building.

WIL:	You would. Four-sixty, we’ll call it five bucks.

PAUL:	Here you go.  Back to the grind.

WIL:	I don’t know how you do it Paul.  Ten to four. Four days a 
	week.  Seven months of the year.  It must be brutal.

PAUL:	It takes the good right out of me Wilbur.  

WIL:	Ya you look a wreck.