Tuesday, 28 August 2012

A Big Hand For Jamie


Hedli Niklaus (Kathy Perks)

It's not often that I compliment Jamie (other than on the volume and frequency of his sighing) but a gold star for him this week for agreeing to go back to college, thus sparing us months of Kathy's whining and pleading. Mind you, Kathy did leave herself open to abuse when she said to Jamie "If we can't talk about important things, then what am I here for?" Bloody good question, Kathy – damned if I know the answer.

Jamie seems to be getting over being dumped by Natalie by getting closer to Rosa. Kathy describes Rosa as "hardly an academic" and this is borne out when Rosa tells Jamie that she wouldn't want to do A Levels (not that she had the opportunity) "because I can still be rich and happy." Sadly, she didn't share the secret of exactly how she is going to achieve this. Ah! The eternal optimism of youth!

Of course, not all optimists are young – Eddie is given a chance to talk about the Beast of Ambridge on Radio Borsetshire in conversation with broadcaster Wayne Foley. Joe warns Eddie to be careful, but it falls on deaf ears and his account of seeing the beast gets ever more fanciful and he has just delivered his sales pitch for his statues of said beast when Wayne interrupts him. Wayne has a photo of the beast statue and also of the other three animals that Eddie sells (pig, dog and lion) and he accuses Eddie of pulling a fast one, combining bits from all three for the beast statue and saying "we've all had a laugh – isn't it time now to come clean?"

Eddie's not laughing and, when he returns home, Joe tells him that there's been two calls; one a customer wanting his money back and the other (in a strong Scottish accent) from the Loch Ness Monster, asking if the Beast wanted to join him for a drink. "It's Jazzer!" wails Eddie, adding: "I'm done for – I can never show my face in the village again." Yes! Result! And when you leave, please take Joe with you.

While you're at it, take Tracy as well – she berates Susan for not going with her to see Keith at the Magistrates' Court, saying that they should support him for having done the right thing (i.e. grassing up his mates; obviously it's OK to inform on friends, it's just dobbing on family members that's unacceptable, apparently).

Tracy also tells Susan that she has always been there for Keith and she has made sacrifices to support him. Susan asks like what? and Tracy replies that her relationship with Iftikar is over. What relationship is this? Tracy said that she asked him out and he made excuses. It must be because of her family – what else could it be? Well, taking a wild stab in the dark, it might be that Ifti doesn't want a relationship with a delusional slapper, perhaps? Then again, perhaps he's looking for someone whose intelligence is slightly higher than that of a retarded nematode? Mind you, being a Horrobin certainly isn't a plus point.

Anyway, Keith won promotion to the Crown Court and is out on bail, but not allowed to come near Ambridge. Perhaps we could frame a list of characters with minor crimes so that a similar punishment is imposed? Imagine a village with, say, no Will (shotgun licence irregularity) and no Vicky (contrived excuse to follow) to mention only two. While on the subject of criminals, there is unconfined joy at Brookfield when David learns that the felons have pleaded guilty, so he won't have to give evidence at their trial.

Someone else who might be on trial if they're not careful is Darrell, who still seems unable to grasp that Matt wants Joyce and Arthur to move out of the house they are renting and would Darrell stop making repairs so quickly and efficiently, please? Matt sends Darrell off on other jobs and keeps him hanging around doing nothing, so that he can't get back to Arthur and Joyce. Darrell, showing a level of sensitivity on a par with Kathy, complains to Matt, who takes him to one side and tells him that there are cash flow problems (Matt told Brenda earlier to shred a final demand from the gas company) and Joyce and Arthur's house is a prime site and "a house we need to sell". Just in case this isn't clear enough, he tells Darrell to do something – "intervene". I thought this might still be too subtle for Darrell and that he would only cotton on if Matt said "take the bloody roof off" or similar, but it seems I misjudged him, as on Friday, Matt asks him if "that extra job" has been done? Darrell says "yes". Let's hope for the sake of Matt's blood pressure that Darrell hasn't misunderstood and just repaired the central heating.

My blood pressure rose steadily as the "will she, won't she?" saga of whether or not Vicky should have an amniocentesis test, with much worrying about the one per cent chance of causing a miscarriage. In the end Vicky agrees to it, after the midwife (or doctor – I'd lost the will to live by then) said that they had fully trained staff. I wanted her to say "we've carried this out successfully scores of times" and, when Vicky asked "how many?" to reply "ninety-nine", but sadly it didn't happen. Poor Mike is knackered (still no replacement for Harry) and Vicky, who has been told to rest, moans at him: "at least you've got your work – I'll be sitting here for the next few days on my own." Tell you what Mike, teach the woman a lesson – tell her she's doing the milk round for the rest of the week.

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