The audio drama Expecting Gidi returns for its third act, titled Twenty-Eight Days, framing the realities of Israeli coalition politics as an ongoing vigil outside a shuttered café. Although sixty-seven members recommended candidate Gidi to the President, transforming sixty-seven theoretical recommendations into a governing majority of sixty-one seats proves far more complicated than basic arithmetic suggests. Meanwhile, the incumbent caretaker Prime Minister commands twenty-seven seats in the largest single party, leaving television commentators to debate pathways ranging from narrow minority rule to fragile power rotations. Complicating negotiations further, an uncompromising kingmaker wielding seven crucial seats demands rigid vetoes against both rivals and Arab lists, leaving another stalemate—and another spring election—looming on the horizon.
Episode 6537 manual-script
Expecting Gidi, Act Three: Twenty-Eight Days
A candidate receives sixty-seven recommendations for prime minister, but assembling sixty-one coalition seats requires impossible compromises.
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Expecting Gidi, Act Three: Twenty-Eight Days. A one-act sequel to Herman Poppleberry's Beckett-inspired audio drama Expecting Gidi. Avi and Shlomi are back at the shuttered café two weeks after Israel's 2026 election. Avi's Gidi now holds the President's mandate, and the two men wait for him to find sixty-one chairs before the deadline runs out. Everything offstage is factual as of 11 November 2026.
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New to the show? Start here#6537: Expecting Gidi, Act Three: Twenty-Eight Days
Hello, and welcome back to a rather unusual corner of My Weird Prompts. I'm Herman Poppleberry. A little over a week ago we brought you Expecting Gidi, my audio drama about two men at a shuttered café on the evening after Israel's election, waiting for a man named Gidi who was going to make everything better. He didn't come.
Beckett wrote Waiting for Godot in two acts, and he was wise enough never to write a third. I'm not that wise. So tonight, the third act of Expecting Gidi, which goes by the name Twenty-Eight Days. It's shorter than the original, and there is one important difference. Everything that happens offstage in this act really happened. The seat counts, the recommendations, the deadlines and the swearing-in are as they stood on the eleventh of November. The café, the tree and the men at the table are invented. Think of it as the news, read aloud by people who have been sitting outside for too long.
The rules from last time still hold. The parties are real, no real politicians are named, and nobody is spared. I play Avi, the man from the left, and my brother Corn plays Shlomi, the man from the right. Hilbert returns as the pundit Zvika Bar-On, with Dorothy as his Pollster. Jasper is the campaign boy, Ivan the kingmaker, Squeaks the yeshiva student, Ezra plays Samir, Vex plays the livestreamer, and Nadia comes in from the south. Raz, the curtain, please.
Expecting Gidi. Act Three. Twenty-eight days.
Nothing to be done.
Wrong. Everything to be done. He got it.
Got what?
The mandate!
Ah. Is it heavy?
It's a letter. The President handed it to him on Sunday. A ceremony. Flags. A glass of water nobody drank.
And he came here with it?
Not yet.
Then what's changed?
Before, we were waiting for Gidi to be chosen. Now he's chosen. Now we're waiting for him to arrive.
That sounds exactly like before.
It's completely different. Before, it was hope. Now it's procedure.
You brought a third chair.
For Gidi. The old chair was for Gidi the candidate. This one is for Gidi the man with the mandate.
It's the same chair. You took it from the bakery.
The bakery's closed. They won't notice until the coalition is sworn in.
So they'll never notice.
Sit, Shlomi. Have some coffee from the thermos.
It's cold.
It's from last week. It's been waiting too.
Explain to me again. How many people recommended your Gidi to the President?
Sixty-seven.
Out of a hundred and twenty.
Out of a hundred and twenty.
And you need sixty-one.
Sixty-one.
Sixty-seven is more than sixty-one.
In arithmetic.
And in politics?
In politics a recommendation is not a chair. If I recommend you a dentist, it doesn't mean I'm going to sit in his chair.
Nobody wants to sit in a dentist's chair.
That's why it's a good comparison.
And my Gidi?
Forty-six.
My Gidi has the biggest party. Twenty-seven seats.
Your Gidi's camp has fifty-three.
Fifty-three is more than forty-eight.
That's why yours recommended forty-six. The Rabbi's people kept their seven in the drawer.
Who did the Rabbi recommend?
Nobody.
Very wise. Nobody is the only candidate everybody can live with.
And nineteen of my sixty-seven are the two Arab lists.
So really you have forty-eight.
Really I have sixty-seven. On paper.
And on chairs?
On chairs I have three. One is from the bakery.
So. Twenty-eight days.
Twenty-eight days. Until the sixth of December. Then the President can give him fourteen more. Until the twentieth.
And then?
There won't be a then. He'll have it by then.
But if.
If. Then the President gives somebody else a turn.
Mine.
Probably yours. And if he fails, then anybody who can get sixty-one signatures on one piece of paper.
Nobody can get sixty-one signatures on one piece of paper. They can't even agree on the pen.
And then, if nobody, we vote again.
When?
Spring. Maybe.
Spring is beautiful for an election. The anemones. The leaflets.
So you're waiting too.
Of course I'm waiting.
For what?
For your twenty-eight days to finish.
So we're waiting for the same date.
For opposite reasons. It's the only thing this country agrees on. The date.
Look at the tree.
Still resting?
There's a new poster. Under the old one. It says Only Gidi. And somebody's put a sticker on it. Mandate!
And under that, smaller. Stolen.
Your people.
Not my people. People adjacent to my people.
Your party said the election was stolen.
Said, said. They said a lot of things. It was late. Everyone was tired. They were being dramatic.
There was an investigation.
There's always an investigation. You don't have a country, you have an investigation with a flag.
Ah! Somebody's coming.
Is it him?
It's the boy.
Mister Avi! Mister Shlomi! You're still here.
We're always here.
I know. I put it in the group.
Did he read it?
He reacted. A thumb.
A thumb! From Gidi!
From his coalition team. Now he has a team. Before, he left me on read. Now a team leaves me on read. It's much more professional.
And the message? Is he coming?
Mister Gidi says thank you for your patience. He has the mandate. He will come when he has sixty-one.
Tonight?
Not tonight. The security situation. And the arithmetic situation.
When, then?
Maybe the sixth. Surely by the twentieth.
Of December?
He didn't say of which.
And your brother? In the other campaign?
My brother says his Gidi is still Prime Minister.
You see?
Caretaker. He stays until there's a new government. That's the law.
He takes very good care.
My brother says if the other Gidi builds a government with the Arab lists, it will be the end of the state.
And what does Mister Gidi say?
Mister Gidi says he wants a national emergency government. Everyone together. Even them.
Even mine?
Even yours. In principle.
And mine said yesterday he wants a national unity government. Everyone together. Jewish parties.
So they both want everyone together.
Yes, Mister. Just not with each other.
Tell Mister Gidi we're here. Tell him we've got three chairs.
He needs sixty-one.
Tell him it's a start.
I'll put it in the group, Mister. With a chair emoji.
Is there a chair emoji?
There is now. I asked for one. Bye!
There goes the future of the country.
Fourteen years old and already in coalition talks.
He'll go far.
He'll go to Berlin.
Listen.
What?
Lights. A camera. Someone's setting up a studio.
Here?
Where else? It's the only place in the country where nothing's happening.
Lower the light! Higher! Perfect. And we're live. Good evening, and welcome back to the studio!
Bar-On. Zvika Bar-On. With Bar-On, It's On. Gentlemen, I'm broadcasting from the street tonight. The people demanded it. Also the channel cut the studio budget.
We're not on television.
Everyone's on television. Some of us are just better lit. Pollster! The clock!
Twenty-five days, seven hours, eleven minutes.
The countdown clock! The country's favourite new show. Every night until the sixth of December, we sit here and we watch time pass.
We do that for free.
Then you're amateurs. Tonight on the panel, the big question. How does Gidi get to sixty-one? We have four paths. Path one! A minority government.
What's a minority government?
You don't need sixty-one to be sworn in. You need more hands for you than against you. He has forty-eight, they have forty-six, and everyone else goes to the toilet during the vote.
Everyone?
The Rabbi's people and the Arab lists. Forty-eight against forty-six. A government of people who happen to be in the room.
That's democracy.
That's a waiting room. Path two! Bring in the two Rabbi parties. Seven and six. Thirteen. Forty-eight plus thirteen. Pollster?
Sixty-one.
Sixty-one! Exactly! Not sixty-two. Not sixty-three. One man with a cold and the government falls. Path three! A unity government with the other Gidi's party.
With mine?
Plenty of seats. Only one small problem. The whole reason most of them ran was to get rid of him.
So they'd have to give that up.
A small thing. Their entire campaign. Path four! Rotation!
What's rotation?
It's when two men who can't stand each other agree to take turns standing. One sits for two years, then the other. Sources tell me it's still on the table.
Which sources?
The table. Pollster! Tell them which path.
According to our latest survey, if the election were held today, the result would be.
Yes?
The same.
The same?
The same, within four seats.
Wonderful! Do you know what that means? We can do it all again and nothing will change! A ratings bonanza! Pack up, Pollster. Two hundred and forty days of reserve duty for the soldiers, and two hundred and forty days of panels for me. Everybody serves.
Wait. Before you go. Is Gidi coming?
My friend. If he comes, the show's over. Nobody wants the show to be over. Good night, parliament!
He's right, you know.
About what?
If Gidi comes, what would we do in the evenings?
Complain about Gidi.
Ah. True. That's a lot of evenings.
Shh. Someone's coming. Carrying something.
Chairs. A whole stack of plastic chairs.
Good evening.
The kingmaker!
Don't call me that. I'm a man walking home with seven chairs.
Seven. Exactly seven.
I counted them myself. Nobody else can be trusted to count.
Put them down! Sit! Join us! With seven we'd have ten.
First, my conditions.
Of course.
I don't sit with him.
With who?
With your Gidi. Never. I've sat with him. I know how long the meetings are.
Good. And?
And I don't sit with them.
With who?
With the Arab lists. Not with the one, and not with the other. I don't sit with him and I don't sit with them. It rhymes in the original.
Fine. Nobody's asking them to sit.
And I don't stand next to a table that only stands up because they are holding it.
So no minority government.
A minority government is a government that falls in six months and gives you his Gidi back. With interest.
And rotation?
No rotation. A rotation is a minority government that falls in two years.
Then who's left?
The yeshiva boys.
You! You hate the yeshiva boys! Thirty-five years standing and paying! You wanted them all in the army!
I still want them in the army.
So?
Eventually. With a transition.
A transition?
On Monday I sat with your Gidi. We agreed. We open talks with the two Rabbi parties. On the draft. Everything is open.
You've changed.
I haven't changed. The arithmetic changed. I'm a man of principle. My principle is sixty-one.
And if they don't come to you?
Then we'll have another election, and I'll come back with seven chairs. I always come back with seven chairs. It's what I do.
Put them down, at least, while you wait.
If I put them down, somebody sits on them. Then they're not my chairs. Then they're seats. Good night.
He'll be back.
How do you know?
He left one chair. On purpose. So we'd have to call him.
That's very clever.
That's why they call him what you called him.
Here's another.
Peace be upon you. Whose are the seven chairs?
A kingmaker's. Well, six now. Don't touch them.
I wouldn't. I'm waiting for my own.
You again! Last time you said the Rabbi was never on the ballot.
He still isn't. But now he's in the negotiations.
Who did the Rabbi recommend? For Prime Minister?
Nobody.
Why nobody?
Because once you recommend somebody, you've spent it. If you recommend nobody, everybody comes to visit.
And did they?
All of them. Yours in the afternoon. His in the evening. The kingmaker sent a message, very quietly, from a borrowed phone.
And what does the Rabbi want?
The same as before. The law. The budgets.
Twice?
Only once now. It's a time of national emergency. We all have to sacrifice.
Which law?
A draft law. A very good draft law.
What's in it?
A transition. A year. Maybe a year and a half.
And after the transition?
Without sanctions.
No sanctions?
How can you have sanctions during a transition? It's unkind.
And after the transition?
Then we'll see. Maybe another transition.
My son did two hundred and forty days this year.
Thank God, he came back.
He'd like you to come with him next time.
Next time. After the transition.
Could you just not vote against? The night of the swearing-in. Go and get a coffee. Sit it out.
Abstain?
Abstain.
No, no. We don't abstain. Abstaining is also a position.
And you don't take positions?
We take ministries.
How many seats now? Last time it was thirteen.
Seven and six.
Thirteen.
Thirteen. You see? It's always exactly enough. Forty-eight and thirteen. Sixty-one. Not one more. Somebody up there is very good at arithmetic.
The kingmaker's chairs. If he sits with you, and you sit with him, that's sixty-one.
Then why are we all standing?
Because if one of you sits down first, he's the one who gave in.
So we'll stand.
For how long?
Until the twentieth of December. Then everybody sits down very quickly. Like musical chairs.
And if the music stops before?
Then we learn. It's what we do when the music stops.
Who's that? Walking slowly.
Samir!
Good evening.
Good evening! Good evening! How are you? How's the family? Sit! Please! Have some coffee! It's cold, but it's ours!
Thirty years I walked past this café, and nobody said good evening. Last time, three people. Tonight, everybody wants to know how my family is.
We've always cared about your family.
Since when?
Since about the twenty-seventh of October.
Nineteen.
What's nineteen?
The number of people from my lists who went to the President and said, him. Your Gidi.
And we're very grateful.
Good. Then we'll sit.
Ah.
Ah?
The thing is.
Yes?
Gidi is very grateful. In principle. But he's ruled out the Arab lists inside the government.
So we recommend him, and he can't sit with us.
He could stand near you. Supportively.
And what would you like me to do?
Could you stand behind the chairs? Not sitting. Holding them up. From outside.
Thirty years I've stood behind the chairs. Now you're asking me to do it officially.
My Gidi says your support would be the end of the state.
Your Gidi has talked with my people before, when he needed them. In those days I was a partner.
That was different.
Yes. That time he needed it. This time somebody else does.
And the kingmaker won't stand next to the table if you're holding it.
So I'm too dangerous to sit and too dangerous to stand. Where should I put myself?
In the newspaper. You're in every newspaper this week.
In one paper I'm the danger. In the other I'm the opportunity. In both I'm a number. Nineteen. It's the most I've ever been talked about, and nobody's talked to me.
I'm talking to you.
You're talking to the nineteen.
That's not fair.
No. But it's accurate. That's worse.
Excuse me. Samir. You also wait for the government to do something for you?
I wait for the government to stop doing things to me. It's a different queue.
Ours is shorter.
Yours has a Rabbi at the front.
Samir. Honestly. If Gidi asks. Would you hold up the chairs?
Ask me when he comes. Not the boy. Not the thumb. Him.
He's coming.
Good evening, Avi. Good evening, Shlomi. It was nice to be asked how the family is. Next time, ask before the election.
He's got a point.
He's got nineteen points.
That's the trouble. Nobody can see the point for the nineteen.
Not on camera! Not on camera!
You again.
Citizens! Live! Everybody share! They're stealing it!
Who's stealing what?
The government! From the people!
Last time you said they stole the election.
Last time it was the other side's audience. The algorithm moved me. Same video, different flag.
Who are you streaming for now?
Whoever's losing. Losers watch to the end. Winners switch off and go to a restaurant.
And who's losing tonight?
Everyone! Which is fantastic for engagement!
Say something true. Just once. Live.
The Knesset was sworn in yesterday.
That's true.
Very boring. Nobody shared it. A hundred and twenty people swore allegiance. Then they shouted at each other for an hour. Someone shouted something about Qatar.
Who's Speaker now?
The old one.
Still?
Until they vote for a new one. They're waiting for that too.
So the Prime Minister's a caretaker, the Speaker's a leftover, and the government's a letter.
And I'm the only thing in this country that's fully operational. Smash that like! Freedom!
Is everything in this country waiting for something?
The tree isn't.
The tree's resting.
That's the same thing with better posture.
Listen.
A plane.
Ours?
Who else's? They're all ours, or we'd have heard the phone.
It's quiet, at least. The sky.
The sky's quiet because the talks are stuck. When the talks are stuck, the sky's quiet. When the talks move, we go to the stairwell.
Which talks?
Any of them. Iran. The coalition. They have the same rhythm now.
Who's that? With the bag?
Don't get up. I'm not staying.
You came last time. From the south.
I come up every week. A hospital appointment. The bus stops here because the café's closed.
That's not a reason.
It's the only reason anything stops here.
Did you hear? My Gidi has the mandate.
I heard.
And?
I've got an appointment at nine. My neighbours have appointments too. The kindergarten's still in a container. The man with the mandate and the man with the job can argue about chairs. Wake me when one of them has a government.
He's going to set up an inquiry. Into the seventh. A proper one. He's put it in a bill already.
Already?
Already. The first week.
Good. Tell him to come and see us before he gets his sixty-one. Afterwards they're busy.
Everyone says afterwards.
That's why I come up before. The bus. Good night, gentlemen. Keep a chair.
For you?
For whoever finally does something.
She didn't wait.
She can't afford to.
And we can?
We're the only ones who can. That's why we're the ones waiting.
Avi.
Yes.
I've been thinking.
Careful.
Your Gidi has a mandate and no chairs. My Gidi has chairs and no mandate.
Yes.
Then what if we do it ourselves? Here. The two of us. A national unity government at this table.
A rotation?
Why not? Everyone's talking about it.
Who goes first?
You go first. You've got the letter.
Very generous.
Two years. Then me.
Fine. I accept.
Then sit.
Which chair?
The bakery chair. That one's the Prime Minister's.
Why me? You've got the biggest party.
You've got the mandate.
You've got the caretaker.
You've got sixty-seven.
Recommendations.
Then I'll go first.
Wait. If you go first, I'll never get my turn. It's well known.
And if you go first, my side will say it was stolen.
They already say it was stolen.
Then they'll say it twice.
So nobody sits.
Nobody sits.
Then the chair stays empty.
It's safest. An empty chair can't be voted out.
Is that our government?
Better than most. No ministries, no scandals, and it's always available for photographs.
Ah! The boy again.
Mister Avi! Mister Shlomi!
Well? Is he coming?
Mister Gidi won't come this evening.
Of course he won't.
He's very busy. He cancelled a meeting today with the other Gidi's people. Because of a speech.
My Gidi's speech?
Mister Gidi said it was very divisive. Your brother's Gidi said Mister Gidi was very dependent.
On who?
On people. Mister Gidi says that's how governments work.
And when will he come?
Maybe the sixth. Surely by the twentieth.
And if not by the twentieth?
Then my brother's Gidi gets a turn.
And if not him?
Then we have an election in the spring, and I'll be fifteen, and I'll be in charge of a whole group.
You'll go far.
Mister?
Yes?
What should I tell him? About you?
Tell him there are two of us. One from each side. Tell him we've got three chairs, one of them from the bakery, and six on loan from a kingmaker, and nineteen people who'll hold them up if he asks them himself.
That's twenty-eight.
Twenty-eight what?
Chairs, Mister. Not days. I'll put it in the group.
Did you hear that?
Twenty-eight chairs.
And twenty-five days.
Tomorrow it'll be twenty-four.
And the chairs?
The chairs will still be twenty-eight. Chairs don't count down. Only days.
Then the days are going to lose.
The days always lose. Then they start again.
Avi.
Yes.
Do you really think he'll come? With sixty-one?
I think he'll come with sixty-one, or with sixty, or with forty-eight and a lot of people in the toilet. Or not at all. And then yours will try, with fifty-three and the same toilet.
And then?
And then the spring. And then we're back at this table, and the tree's covered in new posters, and the boy's got a beard.
He'll grow one.
Or shave it off. They're testing both.
The wind's picking up.
Put on your coat.
In November? It's twenty-three degrees.
Then put it on for the symbolism.
Well. Shall we go?
Yes. Let's go.
We're not moving.
We're waiting for the mandate to expire.
Or to be fulfilled.
Same date.
Same table.
Same time tomorrow?
Bring the thermos.
And the chair?
Leave it. Somebody's bound to sit in it eventually.
Well? Shall we form a government?
Yes. Let's form a government.
Curtain.
And that was Expecting Gidi, Act Three. Thank you for sitting through it. As promised, here is where things actually stand, in plain words, as of the eleventh of November. Israel voted on the twenty-seventh of October. The Likud-led bloc won fifty-three seats, the opposition bloc forty-eight, and the two Arab-led lists nineteen. Sixty-seven members recommended the opposition leader to the President, forty-six recommended the Prime Minister, and the seven from United Torah Judaism recommended nobody. The President gave the opposition leader the mandate on Sunday the eighth of November. He has twenty-eight days, until the sixth of December, and can be given fourteen more, to the twentieth. The new Knesset was sworn in on the tenth, and the Prime Minister stays on as caretaker until a new government is sworn in. If no one can form one, Israel goes back to the polls, probably in the spring. When there's more news, Avi and Shlomi will hear about it. Probably from the boy. Thanks to Corn, to the company, and to the bakery, which still hasn't noticed. Good night.
This episode was generated with AI assistance. Hosts Herman and Corn are AI personalities. It may contain errors: disclaimer · report an error