Episode Report Card Sars: F | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Baby blues
By Sars | Season 4 | Episode 19 | Aired on 04.24.2001
Gretchen comes up the lawn. Dawson tells her that he bought a copy of CM, and he waxes supportive, and Gretchen waxes apprehensive about the interview, and then Gale blusters past with more sandwiches and blah blah, and Joey comes up behind Gretchen as Dawson takes the sandwiches and Gale clomps back into the house. Gretchen asks how she's doing, and Joey says tightly that she's fine, but Gretchen keeps trying to let her know that she's there if Joey needs her; before Joey can respond one way or the other, Bessie barges up and says to Gretchen, "Would you please tell my sister to get a life of her own -- your brother goes fishing and I swear she doesn't know what to do with herself." YEAH you did, Bessie! Gretchen and Joey exchange a "yeah, ha ha -- not" look just as Gale comes out again and greets Joey warmly, and after they hug, Joey gives Gale's distended womb an unhappy look. Get it? No? Okay, here's the deal: Joey thinks she's pregnant, and that's bad, and Gale -- oh, you do get it? Okay. Grams claps her hands and calls out that it's time to get started, and the menfolk get kicked out. The Flash cracks a really terrible joke about The Vagina Monologues and makes a "women -- can't live with 'em, can't get a ride" face. Ladies and gentlemen, Flashy Youngman! Try the fish, it's delicious.
Jack arrives at the tutoring center to find utter chaos; Will is peaceably reading a book, but the rest of the kids are running around and throwing spit-wads and whatnot. Jack asks Will, "Where's Tobey?" but Will doesn't know.
Back to the shower, where Grams is holding a thread with a needle at the end of it over Gale's womb. The rest of the girls laugh in disbelief as Grams intones that "generations of women have done this -- it was the ultrasound of the Middle Ages." In case anyone wondered, if the needle swings back and forth, it's a girl, and if it swings in a circle, it's a boy, so according to Grams's needle, Gale is having a girl...but you suspend the needle over the mother's hand, not her womb, and you use a strand of your own hair, not thread. Yeah, I can hear you all sighing with relief that I cleared that up, but let's move it along, shall we? Gale asks if it's a girl or a boy, and Grams says slyly, "It's just what you want." Gale giggles to herself and strokes her pregnancy pad. Joey broods. An ovary presides over the party. The naming fun begins. Bessie suggests "Sophie" or "Satchel," both names I like, and I especially like that Bodie chipped in with "Satchel" after Satchel Paige. Much laughter and squawking.