Jim gapes, but Pawn is soon to give him a knowing nod that the stage directions stipulate should be "an accentless nod, if that makes any sense." Jim lowers the blinds, and we cut to him walking into the dining room of Martha's Quirk 'n' Go, having again chosen the beige suit because we've repeatly been told that he was a youth in a trunk in 1955, so that would make him a full-fledged adult in the very, very mid-1970s. Proving that his reflexes are still sharp despite a cresting river of dull in practically every other facet of this show, Jim reaches his arms up without thought and catches an object that's flying at him from just off-camera. "What's this for?" he asks all incredulously. Pawn, sitting at the dining room table with Martha, an excessively elderly man to whom Martha is feeding breakfast, and another old dude with a beard, is back in Accent Mode when she announces, "So cars don't hit you as you're ridding Americas highways and byways of litter." Jim opens it up to reveal a loud orange safety vest that's going to make him look like the construction worker from the Village People when he puts it on over that suit, and he stands in continued passivity as Dawn asks Martha how much she owes for the coffee. Martha assures her, "It's on me, Deputy," and Pawn vamps out of the room in a confusingly you've-been-a-great-crowd-and-remember-folks-be-good-to-your-parents-they've-been-good-to-you kind of way, explaining to the two infirm men at the table, "I offered to pay. You boys were witnesses." And how! Jim and Pawn leave via what I'm pretty sure is practically the only door that hasn't switched locations (set strike sure can be a bitch, eh, LivePlanet?), and Martha busybodies to no one in particular (which would be a true statement even if this were a damn aside to the audience), "A little early for trash collection, don't you think?" Well. I don't think this is the last time I'll point out that they're kind of running out of available slots.













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