Mrs. Claus and Santa are at the door of...

Mrs. Claus and Santa are at the door of the stable.

MRS. CLAUS

I’ll give a little tinkle, so they’ll know we’re here.

(Rings her bell.)

Ringaling! Ringaling!

(They wait.)

SANTA

Dasher? Dancer?

(Santa takes a step. There’s a crunch.)

MRS. CLAUS

Prancer? Vixen?

(Mrs. Claus takes a step. There’s a crunch.)

SANTA

Comet? Cupid?

(Santa takes a step. There’s a crunch.)

MRS. CLAUS

Donner? Blitzen?

(Mrs. Claus takes a step. There’s a crunch.)

SANTA

Sshh! I hear something.

MRS. CLAUS

What does it sound like?

SANTA

It sounds like a crunch. Don’t move. Just listen.

(Santa and Mrs. Claus freeze where they are.)

MRS. CLAUS

I don’t hear anything.

SANTA

I don’t hear anything either.

MRS. CLAUS

Let’s keep going.

(More crunching is heard as they both walk again.)

SANTA

Freeze!

(Mrs. Claus and Santa stop where they are.)

MRS. CLAUS

What?

SANTA

I heard it again.

MRS. CLAUS

I still don’t hear anything.

SANTA

I could have sworn . . .

MRS. CLAUS

(Mrs. Claus takes another step then lifts up her shoe)

I think I’m stepping on something.

SANTA

What is it?

MRS. CLAUS

Crumbs?

SANTA

From what?

MRS. CLAUS

I don’t know.

SANTA

Let me have a smell of it.

MRS. CLAUS

What?

SANTA

I’ll tell you what it is.

(Santa sniffs.)

MRS. CLAUS

Well?

SANTA

Sour cream and onion.

MRS. CLAUS

Junk food?

SANTA

Sour cream and onion flavored potato chips. Definitely.

MRS. CLAUS

The reindeer should not be eating that.

SANTA

Look! There’s a whole trail of crumbs.

MRS. CLAUS

Where does it lead?

SANTA

Behind the haystack!

MRS. CLAUS

Let’s have a look.

(Santa and Mrs. Claus creep up to the haystack. The reindeer sit behind it eating chips and playing video games.)

SANTA

There you are. We’ve been looking everywhere for you.

MRS. CLAUS

Have you been sitting around eating chips and playing video games all day?

SANTA

(The reindeer do not respond.)

That’s what it looks like to me.

MRS. CLAUS

What are these reindeer doing eating chips and playing video games? They’re supposed to be getting fit for the season.

SANTA

Looks like the only working out they’re doing is with a joystick.

MRS. CLAUS

Joystick? Joystick? Think of the children who will miss out if these reindeer can’t pull the sleigh. Where will their joy be?

SANTA

Dasher? Dancer?

MRS. CLAUS

Prancer? Vixen?

SANTA

Comet? Cupid?

MRS. CLAUS

Donner? Blitzen?

SANTA

Hello? Earth to reindeer.

MRS. CLAUS

It’s like they’ve all been hypnotized.

SANTA

They don’t even seem to know we’re standing right behind them.

MRS. CLAUS

This just will not do!

SANTA

How can we get their attention?

MRS. CLAUS

I have an idea.

(Mrs. Claus pulls the electrical cord out of the socket, and the video screen goes black.)

SANTA

Brilliant! That’s why I married you.

REINDEER

Hey! What happened to our game?

REINDEER

Yeah.

(The reindeer look around and see Santa and Mrs. Claus.)

REINDEER

Santa?

REINDEER

Mrs. Claus?

REINDEER

How long have you been standing there?

MRS. CLAUS

Long enough.

SANTA

We found the trail of potato chips.

MRS. CLAUS

How many times have we told you to only eat food in the trough?

REINDEER

Oops!

REINDEER

We forgot.

SANTA

Ho! Ho! Ho! I don’t believe that.

MRS. CLAUS

You better watch out, or you’re going to end up on our Naughty list this year.

REINDEER

Oh, no!

REINDEER

Not the Naughty list!

REINDEER

We’ll clean up the mess.

MRS. CLAUS

And junk food no less!

REINDEER

Our bad.

MRS. CLAUS

It doesn’t look like you’ve shoveled the pathway either.

REINDEER

We were going to get to that.

SANTA

You’ve been slacking off on doing your chores.

MRS. CLAUS

When was the last time you went outside to play?

REINDEER

Umm . . .

REINDEER

It’s too cold to be outside.

SANTA

What?

MRS. CLAUS

You’re reindeer!

SANTA

You’re made for cold weather.

MRS. CLAUS

That’s why you live here in the North Pole.

REINDEER

We’re waiting for global warming to kick in a bit more.

MRS. CLAUS

My word!

SANTA

All of you need to go outside right now and practice your flying.

MRS. CLAUS

You heard Santa!

REINDEER

(Standing up slowly):

Aww . . . Just when we were having fun.

REINDEER

Yeah. We made a lot of progress on that level.

REINDEER

We’d never gotten that far before.

MRS. CLAUS

I’m sure you’ll be able to do it again.

REINDEER

But we’ve left our online teammates in the lurch!

MRS. CLAUS

I’m sure they’ll survive just fine without you.

SANTA

Believe it or not, there was life before the advent of the internet, you know.

(The reindeer shuffle out the door.)

REINDEER

It’s hard to imagine.

REINDEER

Life must have been so boring back then.

REINDEER

Yeah. What did they do for fun without the internet?

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