(PENNY and JOE are at the farm. They are pigs. Actual pigs.)
PENNY: ...Mostly the turnips.
JOE: You like turnips?
PENNY: I love the turnips.
JOE: I've never cared for them.
PENNY: You need to eat them with the coffee grounds.
JOE: Is that the secret?
PENNY: That's the secret.
JOE: I'll have to try that.
PENNY: Gives it a nice kick.
JOE: Do they throw out a lot of coffee grounds here?
PENNY: Pretty regularly, yeah.
JOE: Good to hear.
PENNY: Are you a fan of rotten cabbage?
JOE: I don't mind it.
PENNY: You know, I never liked it, but something about the rotten cabbage here is just--
JOE: It depends on where you get it.
PENNY: I don't know what they do to this rotten cabbage, but it is delicious.
JOE: My last farm had great rotten cabbage, but the rotten carrots--
PENNY: It's hard to get a good rotten carrot.
JOE: You have to get it the minute it turns rotten or--
PENNY: --Or it's no good. Yeah.
JOE: Do they ever throw out birthday cake?
PENNY: Sometimes.
JOE: Yeah?
PENNY: Yeah, sometimes. Like when there's a birthday.
JOE: Right.
PENNY: There's four people in the family so that's about...four birthdays a year.
JOE: Yeah.
PENNY: Unless they have someone over whose birthday it is--
JOE: Yeah.
PENNY: --But that doesn't happen too often.
JOE: Right.
PENNY: I'm more of a pie girl, myself, but they don't tend to throw out a lot of pie.
JOE: You ever had a half-eaten donut?
PENNY: No, you know, I never have.
JOE: I had half a jelly donut once--best thing I've ever had.
PENNY: Really?
JOE: Can't say enough nice things about it.
PENNY: They don't really eat a lot of donuts.
JOE: That's too bad.
PENNY: They love turnips.
JOE: Yeah, you mentioned that.
PENNY: But not big on donuts.
JOE: Got it.
PENNY: I've been trying to watch what I eat anyway. I don't want to gain too much weight before the spring.
JOE: Good to stay healthy.
PENNY: And alive.
(A beat.)
JOE: What?
PENNY: If you eat too much, you get too fat, and then--boom.
JOE: Right.
(A beat.)
What's 'boom?'
PENNY: Boom, you're dead.
JOE: Of a heart attack?
PENNY: ...No.
JOE: Diabetes?
PENNY: No.
JOE: Blood pres--
PENNY: They kill you, Joe.
(A beat.)
JOE: Excuse me?
PENNY: You didn't know about this?
JOE: No.
PENNY: Really?
JOE: Are you messing with me?
PENNY: No.
JOE: They KILL us?
PENNY: What did you--
JOE: I was a pet pig before this.
PENNY: Ohhh...
JOE: This is my first time in a sty. I didn't know--
PENNY: Yeah, you gotta stay skinny. Or look sickly.
JOE: I've never been sick a day in my life.
PENNY: Oof, don't let the farmer hear you say that.
JOE: So what do I do?
PENNY: Just watch your diet.
JOE: No more birthday cake?
PENNY: Well, no, but they've already had three birthdays this year so--
JOE: Penny!
PENNY: --There'd only be one left anyway and I think that's a ways off and--
JOE: --I can't just stop eating!
PENNY: It's all about moderation.
JOE: I don't know what that is.
PENNY: You only eat the green stuff in the garbage.
JOE: But most of it is rotten and most rotten stuff is green.
PENNY: That's why I only eat the stuff that smells really, really bad. That means at one point it was a vegetable.
JOE: This is unbearable.
PENNY: If it makes you feel better, every three days I eat one of the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches the son throws out. That's my cheat day.
JOE: Can every day be cheat day?
PENNY: That's not really how cheat day works.
JOE: Can I cheat with cake?
PENNY: You can cheat with whatever you want.
JOE: Okay, that makes me feel a little better.
PENNY: But you're already pretty big so I'd suggest making your cheat day, um, maybe, every...other...year?
(JOE wails.)
JOE: I want to go home!
PENNY: Why did you leave?
JOE: I ate the kitchen table.
PENNY: Oh.
JOE: And then my owner started having second thoughts about owning a pig as a pet.
PENNY: Ah.
JOE: Then I ate the couch, and then his thoughts turned into decisions and now here I am.
PENNY: You shouldn't have eaten that couch.
JOE: It looked so good though.
PENNY: Okay.
JOE: It looked just like a birthday cake.
PENNY: Oh.
JOE: If my owner had just made me a birthday cake, I would have eaten that instead.
PENNY: It probably wasn't his birthday.
JOE: No, I don't think it was. That's the problem with birthday cakes. They only make them when it's somebody's birthday. And even though every day is somebody's birthday, you have to know the person whose birthday it is and you wouldn't believe how many days go by where I don't know someone with a birthday. I mean, it's very frustrating.
PENNY: I'm sure it is.
JOE: Can you help me with my diet?
PENNY: Sure. I'll just have you eat the same stuff I eat, but not all of it, because I want to lose weight, but I don't want to starve to death.
JOE: Will I have to eat turnips?
PENNY: Not if you don't want to.
JOE: What will I want to eat when I can't eat what I want?
PENNY: Crackers.
JOE: Do they throw out crackers?
PENNY: All the time.
JOE: Really?
PENNY: Sometimes the box isn't even open and then I have to eat the box to get to the crackers.
JOE: Then why do they keep buying them?
PENNY: I don't know, but every few weeks like clockwork--nothing but crackers.
JOE: Well, that's great. I love crackers.
PENNY: Everybody loves crackers except farmers and their families.
JOE: So we'll stick to the crackers.
PENNY: Stick to the crackers and you'll be fine.
(They both breathe a sign of relief.)
JOE: Penny?
PENNY: Yes Joe?
JOE: Can I ask you something?
PENNY: It's not my birthday, Joe.
JOE: Oh.
(JOE feels a little less happier than he was a second ago.)
End of Play
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