Could these episode titles be any cheesier? "Forget Me Not" is all about Alzheimer's Disease (geddit?) and has a couple of annoying "educational" subplots about Y2K and honouring one's commitments. Well, much like just talking about cleaning my rabbits' litter boxes won't get the job done, my just talking about this episode won't get the recap written, so let's plug our noses and dive right in, shall we?
Ugh, I kind of wish I could clean litter boxes instead. The show opens with Dopey and Chickenhead sitting in his apartment, making out. And they're sitting right in front of Dopey's roommate, John. Like, directly in front of him. Like, two feet in front of his face. John can't take it anymore, and he tells them that it's "worse than watching a chick movie." At least John can leave for the library, which he does. Chickenhead's having such a grand old time kissing Dopey that she questions whether she should be going to New York for the weekend. Dopey's all supportive of her going to NYU, which causes her to crown him "the best boyfriend ever!" Aw, shucks! It's obvious Shana doesn't have very high standards, or much dating experience.
Okay, this is the point in the recap where the picture tube in our TV decided to stop working. Not that I blame it. That scene with Dopey and Chickenhead made me feel a little ill myself. I just can't get over the fact that this show really and truly is cursed (see Gwen's first recap). Between mangled tapes, malfunctioning VCRs, stupid thieving postal workers, wacky network time-slot switching and now the death of my boyfriend's big, expensive TV, it's obvious someone doesn't want us mocking this show. So I'll apologize in advance for any details I may miss, since I'm now watching a tinny-sounding 13-inch TV from all the way across the apartment. On the upside, it does ease my pain a little, not being able to see it all in vivid detail.
Anyway, Dopey encourages Chickenhead to go to NYC for the weekend so she can find an apartment for when she moves there in January. Chickenhead says she knows it will be hard, but they can make their long-distance relationship work. Then she gets up and leaves without saying goodbye. In fact, she leaves without even saying that she's leaving. It always cracks me up when TV writers do this. I figure they leave out details like that so you won't be distracted from the drama, but if I were talking to somebody who just got up and left in the middle of our conversation, without even saying goodbye, I'd be pissed. And confused, which is how Matt looks right about now. Or else he's concentrating really hard, trying to remember if he has any more lines in this scene. I'm really not sure.
Over at the CamPound, the elders have summoned Mary to congratulate her on passing the thirty-day evaluation of her diversion program. Golly, what exactly would "passing" this evaluation entail anyway? All she has to do is show up, pick up trash, and not mouth off to her supervisor -- hardly cause to break out the sparkling non-alcoholic grape juice, is it? Mary credits her stunning success to The Amazing Robbie. She says having someone to talk to who knows exactly what she's going through is the only way she could have come this far. Mary, dear, you've been picking up garbage after school for a month, not working on a chain gang for the last twenty years. And speaking of punishment, my eyes hurt from having to look at your horrendously ugly black-and-grey fitted baseball shirt with the bizarre cutouts in the shoulder area. Mary points out how helpful it is that Robbie also knows what it's like to be arrested, at which point SuperMom laughs nervously. After Mary leaves, RevCam says, "They're still on separate work shifts down at the program, aren't they?" SuperMom responds, "Yes, but we said Robbie could call her," except she's over-enunciating weirdly and has a look on her face that suggests Robbie is an ax murderer or the Antichrist. Away with ye, Satan!
Down in the kitchen, Mary is checking the fridge, I guess to see if Dopey left behind a few crumbs of food during his daily forage. Lucy comes in, and I see that there must've been a sale on ugly fitted baseball shirts down at the Biway, although Lucy has the good sense to have bought hers sans shoulder cutouts. She's all excited because someone named Brad Landers asked her out for a burger. Even Mary agrees that this Landers fellow is hunkalicious. The only problem is that Lucy is supposed to be installing toilets at something called the "Habitat House" at the time of the proposed date, and she doesn't think it's right to skip out on that for a guy. Well, duh, but I don't understand why she didn't just tell Brad she couldn't make it that day but that she'd like to go out with him some other time. Mary suggests that the only way the Habitat people will know she's canceling out on toilet-installing to go on a date is if she tells them directly. Oh, Mary, repent! You're a shame to the Camden name! Have you learned nothing from picking up trash with your fellow diversion-program criminals? And now you're trying to corrupt sweet, innocent Lucy? Tell me, is it Robbie who's teaching you to say such bad, unwholesome things?
Simon's playing fetch with Happy in the upstairs hallway. He tosses a ball, but RevCam catches it instead. Good boy! Simon starts talking about how excited he is to be spending the night at Dopey's apartment. He says he misses Dopey, and even though Dopey's "here all the time, eating and stuff," it's just not the same. Jeez, Simon, you guys aren't supposed to be making fun of Matt. That's Gwen's job, and mine. So don't be horning in on our fun. He says, "Tomorrow night's gonna be just like it used to be." RevCam leaves. Uh-oh -- Ruthie arrives, and she's nattering on about "the millennium." It also looks like she's stockpiling blankets or something. She starts cataloguing the things that will go wrong come January 1st: cars not starting, people getting trapped in elevators, credit cards not working. "It'll be bed time[sic]." Aw, how cute, someone tell Bill Cosby we've got some material for his Damned Brats show! (While you're at it, tell him Cate says he and all his shows are a blight on humanity.) Simon tells the Demon Spawn, "I think you mean 'bedlam.'" But we've all stopped caring about this scene, right?
The doorbell rings, so we know it's time for the central plot to kick in. Okay, let's see who's been chosen to annoy us in tonight's lame excuse for a plot? Looks like it's Annie's stepmother, Ginger. And Ginger doesn't know where Annie's father is. Roll the opening credits and cue the fake suspense!
RevCam's on the phone, no doubt discussing important RevBusiness, while Ginger paces. The camera spends a lot of time on Annie, who's tottering down the hallway with a huge tray of what looks like tea. Ginger hopes the news that she's misplaced their grandfather wasn't too upsetting to the kids. No problem, Annie just lied to them (!) and said Gramps would be coming by the day. RevCam has informed the local police that Gramps, a.k.a. Charles, is missing, and he says that the police sergeant has even called in some off-duty police officers for the search. Must be nice to have connections like that, eh? I hope that devoting all that energy to finding Charles means there are still enough officers to patrol the high-school gym. I'd certainly hate to see someone "trash" it by flinging toilet paper around again. SuperMom asks Ginger, "Why do you think Dad is heading toward Glenoak?" Ginger replies, "Ever since the diagnosis, I mean, he's been talking a lot about you and the kids." Whoa, back up, what diagnosis? Ginger gives us some background info on the changes she'd noticed in Charles's behaviour recently, including the fact that he's been feeling "lost in familiar places." Dragging eeevvverrrry word out for maximum dramatic value, Ginger tells us that Charles has been "diagnosed as being in the very early stages of Alzheimer's." The kicker is that Ginger had forgotten to tell them about Charles's diagnosis before. Is it possible she's the one who has Alzheimer's and is confused? Well, you'll just have to keep reading to find out. (See, I can do suspense badly too!) Needless to say, Annie is pretty upset by Ginger's news.
Cut to the high school, where Lucy is hanging with some of the dorkiest actors I've ever seen. They're giggling about how cool Habitat for Humanity is when Lucy drops the news that she won't be able to join them after school. She follows Mary's advice by not telling them why. They say they'll cover for her, no problem. As they walk away in an exceedingly dorky manner, Lucy guiltily looks at the mirror inside her locker and tells it to shut up. It's not like the mirror has been talking or anything, though. Weird.
Mary's walking down the hall when Robbie saunters up to her. She asks him how he got into her school, to which he replies, "I have my ways." Do you think he means he made a pact with Satan? We'd better ask Annie. Robbie blames the CamRents for not letting him "work" with Mary; thus, it is implied, he must skip his own classes and drive across town to see her at her school. Hmm, obviously that diversion program is working wonders on everyone in it. Mary tells him that because of her positive program review, she thinks it's time to ask her parents to let her and Robbie go on a real date. Robbie is skeptical and disses the CamRents again. Then he kisses Mary and leaves. He doesn't say goodbye or anything either.
Simon and his little friends are discussing their wild weekend plans. One friend is going camping with his father so he can earn another merit badge toward becoming an Eagle Scout. Wow. He invites Simon along, but Simon is inexplicably looking forward to doing "guy stuff" with Matt. Just as inexplicably, the other boys are impressed with this plan.
Cocoa Puffs must be a big sponsor of this show, since this is at least the second time I've noticed them do a really obvious product placement. The Puffs even get a mention this time, as John asks Dopey what he's doing sitting around in a darkened room in the middle of the afternoon, eating -- what's that he's eating? Ah, yes, Cocoa Puffs. That's C-o-c-o-a P-u-f-f-s. Got it? Dopey says it's finally sinking in that Chickenhead is going away. Poor John has the worst lines on the show, and he always has to play straight man to Dopey's unfunny wacky guy. John says, very sensibly, that Dopey and Chicken will just have to have a long-distance relationship. Dopey says -- aah, life's too short to care what he says. Suffice it to say that he's pessimistic and depressed. And stupid. Let's not forget that.
Hey, it's more Y2Kraziness, as Ruthie tells Mary there will be no more toilet paper after January 1st. Mary just laughs and laughs as if this were amusing, rather than dull and annoying. We learn that Ruthie is getting all her Y2K info from her friend Ben, who "has a computer, and he surfs it." Oh-ho, stop with the gut-busting "Family Circus"-style jokes, writers, you're killing me! No, really, please stop. Please? Mary delivers a short PSA disguised as dialogue when she asks whether Ben's parents monitor what he looks at on his computer. Then she tells Ruthie that what she needs to do to prepare for the millennium is to stay away from Ben. ["Anyone else get the feeling Ben's older sister is giving him the same speech about Ruthie?" -- Sars]
Lucy's on her date with dreamy Brad Landers, who's got the kind of clichéd teen heartthrob looks that wouldn't be out of place on the cover of a teen romance novel, or in that pink board game where you try to win a date with the hunky guy who "talks" to you on the fake telephone. Brad's telling Lucy that he's had a crush on her since ninth grade, but that she was always dating someone. Sigh! She points out that she's single now. Brad flashes his blindingly white teeth and says, "I know." Uh-oh, the cutesy love talk is interrupted because Lucy's dorky Habitat friends are staring at them from across the room. Lucy excuses herself and goes over to talk to them, saying, "Hi, this is not what you think it is." One of the Dorks says, "You blew off the project to have burgers with some guy?" Another Dork chimes in with, "What kind of woman are you?" I'd laugh much harder at that if the writers weren't always stomping all over anything that carries even a whiff of liberalism. The Dorks storm off, and Lucy is sad.
RevCam is in his home office, doing some important RevWork, when Mary comes in to ask a favour. Hmm, could it possibly have something to do with Robbie? She says that since she's doing so well at the diversion program, she was hoping the CamRents would let them go on a date to the pool hall. I'm starting to suspect that's the only restaurant-type set the show has. RevCam says, "If you go out with Robbie and something bad happens, you could get kicked out of the diversion program and face sentencing." Mary pleads a little, but RevCam says he won't change his mind. Then Mary whines a little and leaves, slamming the door. I imagine she's going to her room to sulk and dream about The Amazing Robbie some more.
SuperMom and Ginger are in the kitchen when the phone rings. Annie answers it with, "Hello, Dad, is that you?" I hope that the caller turns out to be a telemarketer who will play a prank on her by saying, "Why, yes, sweetheart, it is your daddy." Instead, it just turns out to really be her father -- damn! He's calling from a phone booth on the road to Glenoak. He claims that when he saw a sign for the motel he used to stay at with Annie's mother during their fishing trips, he "couldn't resist the impulse to take a little trip down memory lane." When he got to the motel, he was tired, so he just stayed the night. When Annie asks him where he is now, he says he doesn't know, so Annie says she'll send Eric to retrieve him. I don't know how Eric's going to find him if Charles doesn't even know where he is, but never mind that now. Charles says that while he doesn't know what city he's in, he does know how to get to Glenoak from there. Then he just hangs up the phone -- without saying goodbye, of course, but at least he has the courtesy to say he'll see her soon. Ginger is relieved, but Annie looks disturbed. She's disconcerted by the fact that Charles sounded "so normal, like he always does." Well, Alzheimer's aside, he seemed a little weird and eccentric to me, but then, I don't know him. Ginger and Annie hug.
When we return from our commercial break, Charles is walking through the front door of the CamPound. After the requisite group hug, SuperMom asks to speak to Charles alone. She says that Ginger has told her about the Alzheimer's. Charles says, "I'm surprised she said anything. I mean, she's had a hard time even accepting the fact that she had it!" At this point, I was starting to think that maybe they both have Alzheimer's, but then I realized that plot would have been way too funny. Not that there's anything even remotely humorous about a real person having Alzheimer's, mind you. But these are the Camdens, c'mon! So Charles is going on about how Ginger's been forgetting things and misplacing stuff. Annie looks a little skeptical as she say, "You just up and left Phoenix. Ginger didn't misplace you, did she?" Charles argues that he'd told Ginger about the trip two weeks ago and "she just forgot." He clinches the deal by saying that he was able to find the sentimental motel he'd stayed at last night: "Now, could a man with Alzheimer's do that? I don't think so." Sorry, Charlie, he could. But you can tell Annie really wants to believe him, so she does.
Simon's over at Dopey's place, doing the "guy stuff" he was talking about earlier, except in this case, the "guy stuff" turns out to be Dopey morosely staring into space, thinking about Chickenhead. He can't go out in case she calls; he won't watch TV because it reminds him of her. I think this is all supposed to be funny, but trust me, it's not. John makes a brief appearance, gets creeped out by Dopey, and leaves again. Let's take a cue from John, shall we?
Back at the bunker -- er, the CamPound, RevCam notices that Lucy seems "a little low." Lucy says, "I kinda lied to my Habitat friends so I could go out with this really cute guy." No, Lucy, you didn't lie to them; you just said, "Something came up." That's not very ethical, but it's not a lie, either. Man, you'd think with all the high-calibre moralizing the Camdens do, they'd have figured out these distinctions by now. Lucy explains that her friends saw her and now they know that she lied. "Not 'kinda lied' but 'lied,' right?" asks RevCam. Wait a second, Eric, I thought we just established that -- oh, never mind. What's the use? Lucy's sorry she did it, and RevCam says, "Don't tell me; tell your friends." Lucy thanks him (for what, exactly?) and leaves.
RevCam moves on to help Mary . He asks her if they can talk, but she just rolls her eyes and turns her head away. Rude git. RevCam tells her that if Robbie visits her at the house, so the CamRents can get to know him better, they will "revisit the dating issue." Mary agrees that that's fair, and the background music swells happily as another problem gets resolved through Eric's special RevMagic.
Oh, lovely, it's comic relief time. Ruthie's pulling canned goods out of the cupboard, and Ginger asks, "What am I supposed to be helping you with?" It's Ruthie's millennium project, which has something to do with canned goods and learning to cook over a fire, since "Ben says after the millennium, there won't be any more stoves." Ginger says, "Ah, who's Ben?" Ruthie just looks at her rudely, and I take it to mean she's already explained about Ben at least once. Hmm, is this supposed to mean Ginger does have Alzheimer's? Or has she just stopped listening to the little troglodyte? I often do that, and I don't have Alzheimer's, despite the fact that I've been developing quite a talent for completely forgetting most of these episodes once I'm done recapping them. I just call that an efficient use of my brain cells, though.
A telephone rings. A Dork answers it. Lucy says, "Susan, don't hang up. Carol and Lisa already did." She apologizes, which leads Susan to give a prissy little lecture on how Lucy has to prioritize her time. Man, if one of my friends talked to me like that, she'd be hearing the dial tone halfway through that speech. But Lucy just takes it. Ugh.
RevCam and SuperMom argue about who has Alzheimer's. Apparently Ginger is upset because Annie accused her of having the disease. Annie's just a little too vehement that her father is all right. I know, that's a sure sign that he's not. Well, I'm glad we finalized the end of that plot. Too bad we're only twenty-three minutes into the show.
Dopey's phone rings, but he isn't gonna answer it. If it's Chickenhead, he doesn't want her to think he's just sitting around waiting for her call. How refreshing! Somebody still does The Rules, and it's a man! His "light and breezy" act flies out the window, though, when Chickenhead leaves him a message and is about to hang up. After he leaps across the room to answer the phone, Chickenhead starts telling him how she's at a party being thrown by her new roommate, Brett. I'm just glad Shana is finally getting out a little. She's telling Dopey all about her three new guy roommates when he just hangs up the phone, right in the middle of her story. I've met some pretty rude people in my time, but as a group, these people take the cake. Dopey starts bitching to Simon that Shana has "moved into a frat house." Okaaay.
Mary is talking on the phone with The Amazing Robbie. Sigh! She's all excited as she tells him that her parents have agreed to let him come over for what she calls a "home date." At this point, I'm not even surprised when Robbie cuts her off to say it'll never work: "When your parents look at me, all they see is trouble." He believes the CamRents are stalling until Mary and Robbie give up on this romance. Mary claims she'll "never give up. [Robbie] means too much to [her]." When Robbie claims that Mary is "stronger" than he is, she asks, "What is that supposed to mean?" Yeah, really. Robbie is thoughtful enough to translate for us: it means he doesn't want to hang out at the CamPound. Mary tries to convey that she's upset by weirdly spacing out her words: "I'm -- getting a really -- bad feeling -- here. Are we breaking up?" Silence -- well, except for me cackling wickedly.
Charlie's helping Ruthie build a fire in the barbecue. Yes, it's that stupid Y2K crap again. Grandpa has to light the barbecue, since Ruthie's not allowed to use matches. That doesn't stop her from having a creepy gleam in her eye as she proclaims the fire "excellent." Ah, Ruthie, you mischievous imp! She goes inside to get some food, but first she instructs Charlie to watch the fire. He does, until his attention is caught by a shiny red bike that's sitting a few yards from the barbecue. The background music reminds me of a bad horror flick, and for a few seconds I wonder if the bicycle will turn out to be possessed by demons. Charlie wanders over to the bike, while the fire gets bigger and bigger.
Upstairs, everyone smells smoke, and they go outside to investigate. RevCam grabs a fire extinguisher and sprays the hell out of that fire, which makes Ruthie sad. Annie goes over to her father. He takes a few seconds to recognize her and then starts rambling about the time he taught her to ride her "first two-wheeler." She asks him about the fire, but he stands there looking confused. Ginger is trying to appear sad, but you can see her looking over at Annie, and I just know she's thinking, "So you didn't believe me before, did you, beeotch?" Finally Charles asks, "What's all the commotion?"
After another blessed commercial respite, we join the Camdens in their big family meeting. Ruthie's asking what's wrong with Grandpa, and RevCam explains about the Alzheimer's. I tell you, those writers have some self-control. I don't know how they were able to resist having Ruthie ask, "What's Old-Timer's?" But somehow they restrained themselves. While the other family members make their escape, RevCam lectures Ruthie on setting fires, but she's not in real trouble because she did ask an adult for help. When he asks her why she wanted the fire in the first place, she starts in on the Y2Krap and says that information about the millennium is everywhere. RevCam launches into a speech about Orson Welles's "War of the Worlds" radio broadcast. I've heard that example used about 722 times before, so I allow my mind to wander to Ruthie's stupid survivalist project. Wouldn't it be cool if, instead of having her bother everyone with her pointless millennium announcements, the writers just blindfolded her and took her to a cabin in the Montana wilderness? She could eat grubs and forage for roots and berries, although she probably wouldn't know which ones were poisonous. And they could give her lots and lots of matches! Oh, wait, RevCam's story is winding down. The point? Don't believe everything you read, duh. Golly, thanks for that pearl of wisdom, Eric.
Annie and Charles argue about Alzheimer's again. He's still in denial, and Annie's mad. Actually, Charlie's pretty pissed too, and he says he and Ginger will be leaving in the morning.
Then Mary and RevCam argue about Robbie. Mary accuses RevCam of wanting Robbie gone, to which RevCam replies that if that were the case, he "never would have invited him over to the house." I buy that, but Mary doesn't. She says, "What matters is that Robbie doesn't want to come over here." Well, honestly, who would, you know?
RevCam wanders down to the kitchen to ask SuperMom, "How's your father?" She answers, "In denial, just like I was." See, the man of the house was right again. Because that's the natural order of things, you know. (If you are reading this and you are a cretin, please don't bother sending an e-mail agreeing with me there, because I was being sarcastic, okay?) RevCam and SuperMom spew some pointless drivel about Ruthie and the millennium, and then SuperMom informs RevCam that Simon wants to come home from Dopey's. RevCam leaves to pick him up.
This scene is pretty odd, even by 7th Heaven standards. Lucy is on the phone with that hunky Landers boy, and she's telling him she can't see him anymore because, um, she likes him too much? She likens herself to Superman and says that Brad is like Kryptonite. Okay, I still don't get it. For the record, neither does Brad. Lucy says that when Brad's around, she feels "powerless" and wants to blow off all her other commitments to be with him. Oh, here's another gem: "Doing stuff like that is the old me, not the new me." The fuck? I swear, this stuff is weird enough to frighten me. What's the message we're supposed to take away from this? And make no mistake, there's always a message. Is it that one should only date people one finds boring? Should one not date at all? I mean, wouldn't it be more valuable for Lucy to learn how to manage her time efficiently? After saying, "I'm sorry, but it's just the way it's gotta be," Lucy hangs up. Okay, but does she at least say goodbye first? Come on, did you even need to ask?
RevCam's in the parking lot of the grocery store, where The Amazing Robbie is gathering shopping carts. Oh, I suppose I should mention that he works at the grocery store. I know, you were probably thinking he was just doing some impromptu charity work. Robbie's got a pretty big chip on his shoulder, though, and he throws RevCam a bunch of attitude. He brags about his job, his grades, and the fact that he may be released early from the diversion program, and he caps it all off by saying, "Guess you don't know me as well as you thought you did." RevCam says he's willing to get to know him better, though, and asks why Robbie doesn't want to come over to the house. Robbie looks like he's having a bit of a moral dilemma. If he says that going to the CamPound would scare the bejesus out of anybody, he might have a harder time getting down Mary's pants. Hmm, what to do, what to do? Wisely, he says nothing.
Dopey is wandering around his room looking for Simon. He finds him sitting on the balcony. Simon informs Dopey that he is going home, which appears to confuse the big ol' lunkhead. Simon's pretty disappointed with the way the evening has turned out, because he'd been hoping it would be "like old times." Matt says he's sorry. Simon's sorry too -- sorry he came over, that is. Hee hee. RevCam drives up, and Simon leaves. John comes in and asks, "What's going on?" Dopey reaches for the Cocoa Puffs again. John says that Dopey's way out of control and that "it's time for some tough love." Or maybe he just has a hankering for some Cocoa Puffy goodness, as he grabs the cereal box from Matt.
Simon is bitching to RevCam about Matt, and wishing things could be the way they used to be. "Change is a part of life," says RevCam. Gee, thanks for that platitude, Eric. Bitch, moan, complain (that's Simon). Here comes Platitude #2 from RevCam: "You have to keep changing to really keep living." This is followed by Platitude #3: "Relationships are like school -- there's a new lesson every day." Then RevCam takes a little detour from cliché, but what he comes up with is mondo bizarre. He says, "Brothers, sisters, uncle, aunts, fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, friends, teachers, boyfriends, girlfriends -- they're all relationships, and they're constantly changing." Mmmm, maybe you should stick to clichés, Eric. That ad-libbed stuff isn't exactly working for you. Simon says, "At what point in this conversation do you start making me feel better?" I know it's not a very funny comment, but I included it because it's the closest thing to funny that this episode gets. Well, intentionally, anyway.
Annie and Ginger are discussing Charles's illness, and Ginger is saying that the hardest part for her is the fact that Charles is still denying that he has Alzheimer's. Until he's ready to admit it, Ginger won't be able to make him accept that he should have someone caring for him during the times when she isn't around. She starts to cry as she worries about him wandering off again and possibly not coming back. Charles has been eavesdropping (and he's not even a Camden!) from outside the door. He joins Annie and Ginger in the kitchen and apologizes because he hadn't realized everyone was so worried about him. He doesn't know if he can face the situation. Annie goes over to hug him and says, "We're gonna get through this." I wonder if the writers have a special macro programmed into their word processing applications for that particular phrase. show, I think I'll start keeping a tally of how many times it gets used.
The day, Matt comes over to the CamPound to apologize to Simon, which is an uphill battle because Simon is so damn rude about it all. He complains about having to sleep in Ruthie's room "on Pokémon sheets, surrounded by Hello Kitty merchandise." Okay, a Pokémon aversion I could understand, but what's wrong with Hello Kitty? Finally Simon accepts Dopey's apology, as well as an invitation to a football game. John pokes his head in the door to deliver one of the two lines he's allowed in each scene. When Simon and Dopey hug, John delivers his second line: "If you guys are gonna start getting mushy, I'm outta here."
The doorbell rings, and Lucy answers the door. Why, it's Brad! And he's such a dreamboat! Because he wants to spend time with Lucy, he's volunteered to help out with Habitat for Humanity. He claims the only problem is that he almost failed shop class. To illustrate his point, he holds up a hammer and asks, "Which end of this thing do I use?" Oh, it's the metal end, you dolt, and why don't you just use it on my head to put me out of my freakin' misery at having to type out stupid crap like your lame-ass hammer joke?
RevCam pays a visit to Ruthie's little millennium friend's parents. When he tries to blame Ben for the fact that Ruthie almost set fire to the house, Ben's dad proceeds to roll the welcome mat back up. But that's okay, because Ben's parents are wacky survivalists -- complete with a back-up generator, sat phones and extra blankets. The way the parents are played for laughs tells us it's okay to make fun of survivalists. Thanks for clearing that up, writers, because I wasn't sure.
Robbie comes over to the house to make up (and make out) with Mary.
RevCam and SuperMom have brought Charles to see Nancy, the friendly and sensitive gerontologist, because she sees a lot of patients with Alzheimer's. Like, I'm so sure Glenoak has better doctors than Phoenix does. Nancy gives a long, and fairly detailed, account of what Charles can expect when his disease progresses. While the writers do a pretty good job with this, I won't transcribe it here. If you can navigate the Internet well enough to be reading this sentence, I'm sure you can find good information on Alzheimer's, should you require it.
I'm not ashamed to admit, however, that all that Alzheimer's information made me a trifle weepy. In fact, I'm so down right now that I almost don't feel like making fun of the show anymore -- almost. Annie and Charles are looking through a photo album. Annie holds up a picture of her mother and comments on how beautiful she was. Charles says that he used to call her "The Pink Clown." Unfortunately, I was having a sip of my "yay, we're almost at the end of the episode!" glass of wine when I heard that, and now I'm hacking up a lung while trying to wipe Verdicchio off my computer monitor. I rewind the tape (remember, I'm watching this one under less-than-ideal conditions) and listen again. Oh, he's saying "Pink Cloud!" You know, that's just as bad, though, because it has something to do with her wearing a big, floofy pink dress to dances and twirling around like a, um, pink cloud. Okay, it's mean, but I'm still laughing pretty hard, and I can't even blame the wine, because it's my first glass. Then Charles talks about how nervous he was when Annie was born, and how, when the nurse put her in his arms, all his fears just evaporated. He says, "You did that. You made everything better." Okay, that was pretty sweet. He tells her he'd like to "rest" his eyes for a bit before dinner. Annie kisses him on the cheek and leaves. Charles does close his eyes, and we see a montage of old family photos, which is quite nicely done, provided you hit the mute button to block out the treacly background song.
And so ends another episode. I won't be recapping again until "the millennium," as Ruthie would say. But thanks to her little friend Ben, I now know what to expect. Since the stoves will stop working, I'll be the one toasting marshmallows over my hard drive when all the computers spontaneously combust at 12:00 AM on January 1st. Cheers!