Props and thanks to: greeblygreebly, Neurogirl, Grammaeryn, Firefly Fan, and LibbySarah.
Joan and Adam are walking down the street. She's regaling him with tales of the wackiness to which her visiting relative is subjecting her family: "Last night my mom's aunt made us chant an Indian nature prayer she learned in New Mexico." Adam, wearing a camo hoodie (that I just know Frink wants for his collection of unusual camo items, including an unbelievably durable pair of Joe Boxer pixilated camo print pyjama pants, and an enormous camo sweater his mom knitted him in high school), shrugs and thinks that sounds cool. Joan sneers, "Yeah, until you have to pose like a deer while she dances around you waving snake teeth. My dad was really happy about that." Heh. How much do you wish they'd included that scene? Adam contributes, "My aunt has this big thing on her neck. Used to freak me out, like she was growing another head." Joan wants to know what that has to do with anything. Adam says they were talking about aunts. Joan: "No, we were talking about me." As usual. She rolls her eyes and gives her head a little shake. Adam takes it completely in stride. As usual. I feel like we could use a little bit of Joan being good or sweet or sensitive to Adam, instead of just being totally all about her and her problems, or being extra-sweet only while begging him for something. Anyway, Joan says her aunt will only be there two more days: "My mom has this permanent serial killer smile glued to her face. I hope she makes it."
They come upon a bunch of cages piled on crates on the sidewalk. The cages contain several mangy-looking feral cats. Hey, is that Little Joe? And Hobey? Aw, did Sars finally lose it and drive you to Maryland and leave you on the street? (Just kidding, Sars.) ["Don't tempt me. Hobey threw up on my printer today. ON MY PRINTER." -- Sars] Adam: "Whoa…intense." The woman with the cats is HITG! Allyce Beasley. Many viewers seemed to have recognized her instantly from her days as Agnes diPesto on Moonlighting, but since I never watched that show and have apparently never seen anything else she was in either, it all just washed over me. Joan's comment: "Ew." And: "Gross." The cat lady says they'll be put to sleep if they're not adopted. Joan: "Looks like they could use the sleep." Cat Lady, who's a little mangy herself: "You could adopt one, Joan." I could not tell you what Adam is doing right now, or why he doesn't seem to hear this exchange at all. I think he's looking at some cats in cages on the ground nearby. Joan, who's already turned her back on Agnes DeiPesto (tm greeblygreebly), informs her, "I hate cats. This, you know." Agnes DeiPesto pleads that they were born on the streets and they need a home. Joan bargains: "How 'bout I get a puppy?" Agnes DeiPesto shakes her head. Joan: "Hamster?" Nein. "Sea Monkeys?" No dice. Joan folds, and crouches reluctantly to look at the cat in front of her, which promptly hisses at her aggressively. Joan glares at Agnes DeiPesto. Say, when do we get to see an Arab avatar? Or see Joan consult an imam? Just wondering.
Helen, Kevin and Luke are standing in the Girardi kitchen, looking weary and annoyed. Aunt Olive (Cloris Leachman, who looks pretty good for seventy-eight) is bent over the oven, dressed like Frida Kahlo. You know, if Frida Kahlo were a crabby old white woman. In a chartreuse do-rag. She pulls out a cookie sheet of hot snacks, exulting, "I love the smell! Oh, the salt and paprika bring out the flavour." She starts messing around with a spatula while Helen inquires, "Are you sure crickets are edible?" Olive says, "Mmm. In the Kanchanaburi province in Thailand, they're a delicacy." Helen: "Well, in Arcadia they're exterminated." Olive admonishes her to "live a little." Professor Frink can't resist bragging a bit: "I've eaten 'em raw! And they weren't spiced or nothin'." And he did, too. He competed last year in a thing that was sort of a local Amazing Race/Fear Factor-type deal. He had to eat two live crickets. Actually, his spin of the wheel in that part of the contest originally dictated that he eat some dog food, but since he couldn't be sure it was halal, and since he'd mentioned on his application form that he's Muslim, he got to spin again. Hence the crickets. Two live, wiggly, crunchy crickets. Are those halal? Actually, now that I look it up, it seems that the only halal insects are grasshoppers and locusts. (Mmm, locust biryani…) I guess he didn't know that at the time. Not like the dog food would have been any better. Frink also had to use his mouth to fish his instructions out of a cream pie full of maggots and worms. And people ask me why I didn't want to be his partner for these festivities. I made him use about half a bottle of mouthwash afterward. Olive brings the tray over to the island, explaining, "I learned this recipe from a Thai chef who said crickets kept him vital. Over ninety! Still having sex like a rabbit." Kevin and Luke consider that. Luke: "I'll try one." Kevin: "Me too." They each pop one in. Helen: "Oh, God." Olive can't understand the sheltered life Helen leads. Helen bristles a little: "Not eating bugs makes me sheltered?" Olive: "I always told my sister not to coddle you so much!" Helen: "Was that before or after she had to send you money to get you out of Burma?" Kevin interrupts: "Can I, uh, have another one? I think I might feel a rustling down there…" Maybe a stray live cricket crawled up your pants. Helen laughs. Luke eats another one.
Just then, Adam and Joan come in with a cage full of feral cat. Adam puts it on the counter. Joan introduces "Larry the cat" as the newest Girardi. Helen: "You got a cat?" Man, the Girardis sure are easygoing. I spent most of my childhood pleading for a cat. If I'd brought one home without permission both of us would have been sent to the pound. Olive peers at it: "It's wild, isn't it?" Joan admits it is. Olive tells her to get rid of it: "They can't be tamed." Joan: "No, the pamphlet tells you how to domesticate them." Kevin: "Tell that to Siegfried." Luke: "I think it was Roy." And once again, Rocket Boy is right. Olive says, "In central China, they would cook it in a nice spicy Szechuan sauce." (For the record, cats aren't halal either.) Luke invites them, "Have a cricket. Good for sex." Helen whines, "Luke…" Olive offers some crickets to Adam, who decides, "I'm going in." Olive: "Oh! Good for you." Joan, predictably, is grossed out: "Ew! This is like Arcadia Fear Factor." As Olive lifts the cookie sheet off the cat's cage, she suddenly falters, grabbing the island for balance with one hand and dropping the cricket snacks out of the other. Helen: "Catch her!" Joan's already halfway there; she and Helen manage to get hold of her before she hits the ground. Helen tells the boys to call 911. Kevin's got his cell phone on his belt and makes the call as Helen and Joan try to rouse her from her sprawl on the floor, surrounded by spicy crickets. Theme song.
Will and Helen are waiting are the hospital, probably wondering just how much of their life together is going to be spent at hospitals with family members. Helen comments, "She was supposed to go to the Canary Islands week for a Silbo language class. Will: "A what?" Helen explains that it's a language composed entirely of whistling sounds: "Apparently there are over 40,000 words." Will's already lost interest: "Forget it. There's nothing about her that's ever gonna make any sense to me." Luke: "Speaking of which, why would someone who has repeatedly claimed that she hates cats get a cat?" Joan, who's using Kevin's lap as a footstool, says they were going to kill it. Kevin: "But a cat?" Joan: "I'm a puzzle, okay?" Hee. A doctor (not Doctor God) comes out to tell them what's going on. He says she's stable and resting: "The stroke involved the middle cerebral artery." Helen: "Oh, no!" The doctor says, "The good news is that this kind of stroke doesn't affect mental acuity or speech. And she has certainly been talking. But she's temporarily paralyzed from the waist down." Kevin: "Temporarily? That is good news." The doctor continues, saying there may also be some right arm motor impairment, and that they're looking into nearby temporary care facilities "because, well, she doesn't seem too happy here."
Before we go on, I have to point out that some TWoP readers objected strenuously to the faulty portrayal of this stroke. Neurogirl wrote, "A middle cerebral artery stroke that caused right arm weakness likely would affect your speech (speech center on L, L strokes cause R weakness). Unless you have had a large bleed in your brain, a seizure, or a weird heart rhythm, you would not lose consciousness and drop to the ground from the type of stroke that was implied. And unless you had strokes in both sides of the front of the brain (totally different artery) or the brainstem you would NEVER be paraplegic. And if you had that you aren't waking up an hour later." And Grammaeryn added, "Just chiming in on the medical inconsistencies of this episode. I had a stroke four years ago and you can't be paralyzed from the waist down. There's no special lobe for waist down movement. There are motor centers on each side of the brain for motion on the opposite side. For instance, if someone is paralyzed on their right side, you can assume they had a left-sided stroke and probably suffer from aphasia or some other speech/memory problem (since speech and memory are left-sided). I had my stroke on my right side so I was paralyzed on my left side. I can't believe Olive opted out of rehab hospital treatment. That's the place where you can get stronger and how to go about your activities of daily living. Hell, I would never be able to put on my bra if it hadn't been for rehab! Yeah, the writers need a medical consultant STAT for this show." I don't have any particularly deep knowledge in this area so I'm just going to defer to them and agree here. It does seem that they wanted Olive's disability to mirror Kevin's, but I'm not sure that was necessary for the plot. Olive could have been disabled in any way that caused her to become more dependent.
Anyway. The doctor's led the Girardis to the door of Olive's hospital room. As they enter, a nurse is doing something with the tube in Olive's arm. Olive tells them not to look at her, complaining that the nurses won't give her a brush or her own clothes. Helen says gently that they don't care. Olive snaps, "I do! I care!" Then the nurse sticks her, causing her to complain and wonder aloud why the hell they don't just stick her in her legs, where she's paralyzed. Kevin volunteers, "It's a blood flow issue. I -- I used to ask the same thing." As the nurse silently leaves Olive's bedside, Olive snipes, "Nice chatting with you…Mrs. Mengele!" No one says anything. Olive regards the small container on her bed tray: "Processed juice drink…how do they expect anybody to get healthy drinking chemicals?" She chortles a bit. Me: "Damn straight." Frink: "Yeah, yeah." Joan offers to get Olive some magazines. Like, say, Curmudgeon Life, The Food Insects Newsletter, and Amateur Anthropology Digest? Olive declines, saying she just wants to get the hell out of there. Helen: "Soon…they said they're looking for a care facility." Olive: "Stick me with some drooling old people? Why don't they just shoot me? Give me some water. At least they can't ruin that." Helen pours some water and Olive struggles to take it with her right hand. Helen: "Why don't you use the other…" Olive insists she's fine. She lifts the cup to her mouth with some difficulty, but fumbles it just as she's about to drink. Helen tries to help but Olive barks, "Get out!" Kevin starts to say that things like that happen all the time, but Olive just barks again: "All of you!" They leave as she keeps telling them to get out.
Nighttime at the Girardis'. Joan's got Larry in her room in her attempt to domesticate him. She's wearing oven mitts. Larry's meowing angrily and swiping at her when Helen comes in with a bowl of something for the cat. Joan puts it in the cage. Her mother suggests putting the cat in the garage, but Joan says the pamphlet says he needs "nighttime sleep companionship." ["What he 'needs' is a flea dip. When you adopt a feral cat, you get a whole biosphere. Truuuuust me." -- Sars] Joan asks if there's any news on the Aunt Olive front. Helen says she threw pudding at the doctor. Joan puts something that looks like a dark purple doll dress with a white collar on it into the cage; Larry paws it. Joan says it's his "comfort object," comparing it to a "little blankie." Helen asks if she can do anything: "This seems like a lot of work." Joan declines, saying she's going to read to him: "He needs to get used to a friendly human voice. [The] Cat in the Hat: good choice, huh?" Joan sits down and starts to read to Larry as Helen wanders out: "'The sun did not shine. It was too wet to play…'" Helen stops and turns, pausing to listen and smile as she remembers the joys of reading to her children when they were young. She closes the door gently behind her.
At work, Chewy and Will are waiting in "Internal Affairs Interview Room D." Chewy's scarfing some potato chips as Will watches silently. Chewy dumps the empty bag and pulls another package out of his jacket in the same gesture. Will: "Are you kidding? You're a walking pantry." Chewy: "Chimichanga. I need something more substantial when I'm nervous." I don't know, maybe I should stop commenting on this character's eating habits. I feel like maybe I'm encouraging an eating disorder. He must have the metabolism of a hummingbird, though: the nonstop eating doesn't really show. Anyway, let's get the rest of this over with: Annie Potts comes in, and introduces herself as Lucy Preston. She declines to shake Chewy's greasy hand. Lucy tries to make understanding noises in their general direction but Will wants to get right to it; he's got all the files she wants on Duncan and Simmons, the suspected dirty cops, and the Wallace case. He asks if there's anything else. She says there always is. They leave. She's very affable for an IA type.
Luke and Grace are walking through the hall at school as Luke describes watching Olive's stroke. He says he "kind of shut down, like it wasn't real." Grace: "Dude, weird." Luke can't believe that's all she has to say about his aunt almost dying. Grace: "Okay, Bruce Banner, relax." Luke: "Is it totally impossible for us to share things that are important to us?" Just then Joan, Judith, Adam, and Friedman catch up with them, so that's the end of that discussion. Joan: "You two look deep into something." Grace: "Madam Curie's just trying to recruit me for the science fair again." Luke lies: "It's just that the competition's fierce, you know, and…" Joan: "Nod-ding off…" She starts walking again as Judith asks if they're all "into ridiculing mall-heads tonight." Friedman's right behind her with some pitifully bad French accent, "But of course," and then makes an even more pitiful sound that I think is supposed to be a meow. Me? Ow. Judith: "By 'all,' I didn't actually mean all." Joan says, "Sorry. Can't. Have to tame the beast with literature." Adam: "Mm. Sounds dirty. I can help." Joan barely titters, and thanks him, but says she doesn't want her boyfriend getting scratched to death. Judith declares, "You don't want to be a cat person, Jo-Jo. They're antisocial, sexually frustrated introverts --" I think I'll let Sars field that one. ["I'll take 'Shut up, Judith' for $200, Deborah." -- Sars] Joan tells her, "Stow the shrinkisms! I'm taking care of one of God's creatures." Grace: "Dude, we eat most of his creatures." Judith: "And your aunt eats the rest of them from what I hear." Friedman laughs in a kind of forced way, and tells Judith, "You're a cat on a hot tin roof, all hot and tin roofy." She stops short and turns around: "Friedman: you and me -- it's never gonna happen." Friedman, unfazed: "I'm a scientist, my sweet. We toil in unsolvable equations for years." He wanders off, wiggling his fingers weirdly and drawing out the phrase, "We l-i-i-i-i-ke…" Frink expounds on some flimsy theory he has about how Adam either is or should be a vegetarian. I humour him in case he comes out with something interesting or funny, but no. Nothing but flimsy theory. Sorry, guys.
Will arrives home. Helen's sitting on the couch writing something and listening to music. He announces, "I did something horrible today." He explains that it was work-related. "Believe me, I'd rather have eaten the crickets." He starts fixing himself a drink and offers one to Helen. She accepts. He brings the drinks over and sits down. Helen says, "I've been thinking." Will: "Oh, that's when I get concerned…" He puts his drink down. Helen says she thinks they have to take Olive in, at least until she's able to function on her own again. Will: "Helen, this is a woman who stays in a motel when she visits because she doesn't approve of how we live." She stays in motels? What, there are no yurts for rent in Arcadia? Will: "Let her yell at the people at the rehab place -- they get paid for that." Hmm. I hear a chorus of people who work in "rehab places" shouting, "Not nearly enough, bub!" Helen tries to say something in defense of her idea but Will wants to know, "How could you possibly think this could ever work out?" Helen: "I don't know, I saw Joan with that horrible cat --" Will: "Okay, fine, if we keep her in a cage." Helen points out their house is already adapted for wheelchair use, and they already know how to take care of a disabled person. She adds, "She sat with my mother when she was dying…transformed the hospital room, made it look just like her bedroom at home. She's family." Will blinks. Frink: "Oooh. Hit the Italian with the 'family' brickbat." Helen: "Don't we have to?" Will reaches for his drink.
Joan's in her room reading Cyrano de Bergerac to Larry. "'A kiss, when all is said and done, what is it? A rosy dot on the I in "loving"; a secret that to the mouth, not ear, is whispered.'" She closes the book: "That's sad. She loved Cyrano but never knew. The nose really was gross, so maybe it was for the best." Joan looks at Larry and notices he's purring. She can't believe it. He's prowling around his cage purring. She bends down near his cage: "Larry, we're friends now, right? 'Speak to me of love, o sweet one…'" Larry reaches out and speaks to her nose with a sharp claw. She cries out and falls backward, covering her nose.
Kevin's at the kitchen table doing a crossword when Luke comes down the stairs. Kevin: "Five-letter word for 'Spenser's fire.'" Luke suggests "flame." Kevin: "Nope." Joan comes downstairs with a purple bandage across her nose. Kevin smirks: "Tough day at the zoo?" Joan: "My stupid English teacher assigned Cyrano." Kevin: "Uh…I need more." Helen and Will come down the stairs, smiling: "Good morning!" Kevin: "Morning smiles. Never good." Helen decides not to waste any time: she announces they're inviting Aunt Olive to live with them. Joan practically does a spit-take with her juice: "Here?" Will asks what happened to her nose. Luke: "Her cat has a problem with Edmond Rostand." Will: "Why do I ask?" Joan: "Aunt Olive is going to use the bathroom and everything?" I suspect she'll prefer that someone digs her a hole in the ground, actually. Helen says it's only until she recovers enough to be on her own. She adds, "Oh, and Joan, honey…" Joan: "No, no, no, no…no 'Joan, honey.'" Helen tells her she has to get rid of the cat. Joan: "What? Larry? If I give him back, they'll kill him!" Will thinks they can find someone else for Larry to attack. Joan says it has to be her. Helen: "Why?" Joan: "It just does." No doubt her parents are thinking that Mental Acres bill was money well-spent. Helen says Olive hates cats and it will be hard enough as it is. I don't get this: the cat's in Joan's room. Olive probably will hardly ever be on the second floor. How does it even affect her? Helen claims they all have to give up something. Joan: "But he started purring!" Helen: "I'm sorry, honey." Joan jerks around in frustration: "I hate her!" She grabs her bag and storms out, complaining, "Hate Aunt Olive!" The kettle whistles as the answer to Kevin's crossword clue comes to Luke: "Wrath." Kevin: "Yo."
Commercials. Um…an estimated one in five Canadians has genital herpes? Really? Frink and I can't quite believe it. That seems incredibly high. I wonder if the statistics are the same for the U.S. ["Afraid so." -- Sars] While I'm pondering this, some blipvert (tm Strega, I think) comes on informing us of some…ungodly merger, some unholy union between Celine Dion and Anne Geddes, some goopy multimedia project celebrating babies or birth or whatever and the prospect is so saccharine my teeth instantly start falling out. May God have mercy on our souls. Frink, looking at the case of green cradle cap on the little pod-baby: "Apparently the bond between mother and baby is based on chlorophyll."
Joan's walking past a fenced-in area where some guys are playing basketball to the tune of some tinny hip-hop. The ball flies over the fence and Joan manages to grab it. One player runs over to the fence and says, "Sorry about that, Joan." Joan tosses the ball back over the fence to him peevishly, remarking, "Getting a little exercise, huh?" Basketball God says, "Everyone needs exercise." Okay, now that God's confirmed it, will we get our asses to the gym? Someone yells to "Mike" to throw the ball back; he does. Joan: "'Mike'?" Is this the first God who has a regular name? I can't remember another one. And good choice: Michael means "who is like God." She says she's angry with him. He admits, "I get a lot of that." Joan: "Pawning off cats on people who can't keep them? That's nice." Basketball God agrees: "It's a bummer when we have to give up things we care about." Joan says Larry could die. Basketball God says Larry's her responsibility. Joan: "What am I supposed to do?" He just spreads his hands in a "don't ask me" gesture and walks away with a Godwave.
At school, Joan's trying to convince Judith or Grace to take him: "He's the most lovable little kitten guy!" Judith, wearing a black and red outfit I like on her, points out, "Yesterday you said he was like a Section 8 demented chainsaw killer." Grace: "And I gotta say, the nose is not a good sales tool." Joan says that was her fault: "I was using the pamphlet. But he is so sweet and furry…" Judith: "I can't even take care of myself." True enough. She splits as Friedman spots her and starts yoo-hooing her. Okay, he doesn't actually say "yoo-hoo" but you know what I mean. He takes off after her as Joan turns to Grace, who reminds her, "I can barely tolerate people." She takes off too, as Joan wanders down the hallway, bummed. We hear Adam's voice, objecting, "But I don't do pop art!" He and Helen have just emerged from her classroom, as she harangues him, "How do you know if you won't even try? You need to explore different styles and techniques." Adam: "But I know what I like. I mean, why should I have to sacrifice my artistic integrity?" Helen tells him the only thing he's sacrificing is his grade: "Just do the assignment." She walks toward Joan, saying, "Hi honey -- did you find someone to take Larry?" Joan pouts, "No," so Helen takes off before they can get into another argument about it. Joan: "Look who cares." Adam's leaning against the wall, exasperated. As Joan walks toward him, he complains, "Your mom's driving me nuts with this pop art assignment. This is…" Joan: "Try sharing the same DNA with her." Adam -- sweet, lovely Adam, so cute in his toque -- instantly puts aside his own problems and attends to Joan's: "You know…come here…if you haven't found anyone to take Larry, I can." Joan reminds him that his dad's allergic. Adam will keep him in the shed. Joan: "Thanks, but the pamphlet says he has to sleep with someone in the same room at night." Adam: "I fall asleep working out there all the time anyway." Joan: "Really?" Adam confirms it. Joan takes his arm and kisses his cheek, thanking him and assuring him: "He's so sweet. That's -- a lie, but thank you."
Helen brings Olive, who's wearing some stuff she picked up at Margaret Mead's yard sale, home in a wheelchair. Olive makes for the stairlift, saying she can take it from here. Which I very much doubt. Helen explains that Olive will be in the den, steering the chair there as she mentions that they're used to taking care of Kevin: "So we can help you out of bed, getting dressed…" Olive declares she'll find a way of getting herself dressed. Helen wisely lets that go for now. They're in the den, and Helen gestures to the bed, saying, "I know you like Africa, so I found the -- the blanket at a craft store. It's from Nigeria." A flash of awareness of Helen's kindness and effort crosses Olive's face, and she mutters, "Well, I guess it's better than the hospital. At least you people aren't trying to kill me." Well, not yet, but there's still more than half an episode left. Helen says they weren't trying to kill her. Olive's pulling stuff out of her bag as she complains, "The doctors parading in and out of my room, no one talking to each other…look at all the pills they gave me!" She hauls out a huge plastic bag full of pill bottles. "Look! Blood thinners, painkillers, antidepressants…insanity." She dumps them in the garbage. Helen: "You can't just throw them away! Your neurologist said that you have to --" She grabs them up. Olive: "He is twelve. I need an herbalist. I'm going to call Dr. Chin in San Francisco." Me: "You go, lady!" Frink tells me to settle down. Helen thinks she might want to discuss that with her neurologist. As she puts the bag of pills into the bedside drawer, Olive says, "Always afraid of doing the wrong thing, aren't you, Helen? Why are you so scared? Sometimes don't you want to just shove some stuff in a bag and take off?" Helen patiently reminds her that she has a family. Olive doesn't know what to say to that. Helen leaves.
Adam's shed. He sits at his workbench, listlessly playing with a paddleball thing as Joan prattles on with various instructions about how to deal with the cat. He seems good and bored. Joan tells him to leave the radio on when he's not there; Larry likes oldies. Adam: "Jane, it's all in the pamphlet. I promise I'll take really good care of him." Joan knows: "I've only had him for a few days and we were making really good progress, right, Larry? Larry: pss-pss-pss-pss!" He hisses at her. Joan turns to Adam saying, "His scratching has become less violent." Adam: "Cool." She looks at the sketch on his table, and a jar full of pickle juice and one pickle: "Pickle jar?" Adam: "Does it say 'pop art' to you?" Joan: "Definitely." Adam goes to Larry's cage, muttering, "I'm just gonna take an F." That's what he's really irritated about, not Joan's feline-related micromanagement. He opens the cage door and Joan's all over him, telling him not to do that because Larry will scratch him. But Adam reaches in and Larry plops himself down and allows Adam to pet him. Joan wants to know why Larry's not scratching. Adam: "He likes me." Joan: "Why?" Frink: "'Cause you're awesome." I dunno, Joan, maybe because he's so gentle and sweet? Honestly. If I weren't with someone just as wonderful, Joan's inability to appreciate Adam would make me hate her. As it is, I can afford to find her merely clueless. Adam: "I don't know." He keeps petting Larry, who's relaxed and purring. Joan huffs, annoyed.
Will crosses a large room at the police station to where Lucy is speaking to Roebuck. She finishes talking, shakes his hand, and leaves as Will approaches Roebuck, telling him he didn't really think Roebuck had any part in that fire. Roebuck says he had to check out an accusation that was made. Will says it was just procedure. Roebuck: "But don't say you didn't think it could be me. Otherwise you would have given me a heads-up that you were going to IA." Will: "Roy --" Roebuck: "Let's just all support this investigation." He takes off.
Olive's looking through a Girardi family scrapbook in the den when Joan comes in and asks her what's up. Olive says she was bored and there was nothing on TV: "Just some woman who had her face lifted so high her lips are on her forehead." So she pulled the album off the shelf. Joan picks it up and flips through it, commenting, "I haven't seen these in forever. Luke, fat. Me, fat. Kevin…fat. What's with babies?" They're fat little parasites? Olive: "What do you want?" Joan is a little stunned by Olive's bluntness, and hesitates before telling her that her mother asked her to see if she needs anything. Olive crabs: "Legs. And a plane ticket." Joan doesn't know how to respond to that, so she doesn't. She comes across a large, loose photo of Will and Helen, circa 1972, I'd say. Hee! Will's wearing a dark blue paisley shirt and plenty of facial hair. Frink: "Dude…it's Serpico." Helen's sitting on his lap, wearing a rusty red miniskirt and a light-coloured blouse buttoned to the neck, with a sleeveless tan vest over it. There's some body of water in the background. They look quite in love. It's an awesome picture. Great job on the photo, prop people. Joan: "Mom and Dad…they were so young and happy…" Olive: "I've seen it." Joan, floundering around for conversational material: "So Mom said you were married once." Olive: "Yeah. He drowned. On our honeymoon." Man, that's harsh. But the way she says it, you can't be 100 percent sure she didn't do it to him. But I really don't think so. Joan, startled: "I'm sorry." Olive: "Oh, don't be. I never went home after that. I just took off. Lived my life." Joan: "Were you gonna have kids?" Olive looks at her like she just announced she was going to have her lips moved to her forehead: "No." Then: "You think I'm odd, not having kids?" Joan, quite convincingly: "No." Olive: "You need to…discover the world on your own terms. Every choice…your own." It seems like she wants to say more but decides not to. Joan fidgets with the picture of her parents. Olive announces, "I'm tired." Joan, only too glad to have an opportunity to escape: "Sure." She leaves with the picture of her parents. Olive sits there, depressed, allowing herself a glance toward the scrapbook.
She goes up to Luke's room, where he's working on his computer. Luke: "Yes?" Joan: "Mom and Dad were really in love when they met." Luke's not paying much attention, because an IM window's just popped up: it's Grace, who's using the ID "BLACKWIDOW-4-U." Heh. He types, "Hey Grace" as he says to Joan, "Excuse me?" Joan paces and blathers, "Love love. I mean, Mom and Dad. Do you think we'll ever find love like that? Or will we just end up like Aunt Olive?" BLACKWIDOW-4-U chastises GRAVITY_BOY: "Don't use my name on line, DUDE!!!" Luke tells Joan this isn't a good time. He types, "Right, sorry. I can't do anything right" to Grace. His IM screens are lurid yellows and greens. Joan: "Luke, you're my brother. I'm trying to talk to you about something important." Luke: "I know, but…" "If we can't have a real conversation, then what kind of relationship do we have?" Luke: "Why is this happening now?" Joan: "Because I have feelings! I'm not just some high school cyborg like you…" Way to score on the "feelings" meter there, Joanie. Luke stares at what BLACKWIDOW-4-U just typed: "Look, sometimes I'm a jerk. It's just there are things I don't tell people. I can't." She adds another line: "It's why I don't let anyone come to my house." Joan, who's gotten no response from her completely distracted brother, suddenly becomes suspicious and says, "Hey." She walks around Luke's desk to see what's so intensely distracting: "Porn? Are you looking at porn?" Luke says no and quickly closes the window and it goes back to a page about Bernoulli's principle. She sees what's on the screen and slaps him on the back of the head and goes out. I can't tell if she slapped him because she thinks he quickly closed a window on a porn site or because he's such a predictable geek. Or maybe just because he doesn't find her concerns sufficiently riveting.
Over at Grace's house…she's looking at the message "GRAVITY_BOY has logged off!" She knits her brows, puzzled. She slowly closes the lid on her laptop, hurt and confused. Oh, no. My heart is breaking, even if they do both use Comic Sans for their IMing. Wish we could see more of Grace's room: it's full of all kinds of interesting stuff, including what looks to me like a photo of Amelia Earhart.
Dinnertime in the Girardi dining room. Olive's struggling a bit with her napkin. Kevin's looking at the photo of his parents, wondering aloud, "Why would you ever think this was a good look?" As his father sets down a plate in front of Kevin, he says, "I saved those shirts! Paisley will come back." As Joan enters the dining room, she remarks, "Maybe when everyone's blind." Hey! Back off the paisley. There are many worse sartorial crimes from the seventies. She sits down to Luke, saying about the picture, "I can't believe you're not interested in this, Luke!" She stage-whispers, "Maybe if they were naked!" Okay, that clarifies what the slap on the head was about: she definitely thought he was looking at porn. But it's pretty weird for a girl who can't even bear to think about her parents going to an ABBA concert together to summon the idea of her parents naked. Luke insists, "I was working." Helen smiles and reminisces as Olive looks at the picture: "We had just been at Navy Pier. It was the night we got engaged. It was…freezing, remember? You were shivering." Will comes in with a plate for Helen and one for Olive, saying, "Shivering? I was shaking. I didn't know if you'd say yes. I thought you were too pretty for me." Helen switches her plate with Olive's as Will bends down to kiss her, adding, "And you still are." Joan cringes: "Unnhh! Eating!" See what I mean? She's a puzzle, okay?
Olive is mightily displeased with her plate: "What is this?" Kevin: "Chicken. It happens a lot around here. The name Girardi causes fear and trembling in the chicken world." Olive gripes, "It's cut into little pieces!" Helen: "Oh, well, I thought --" Olive interjects, "What am I, some sort of helpless baby? Why don't you chew it up and spit it in my mouth like a little bird? I'm certainly capable of eating by myself!" She pushes the plate away, and grabs a drumstick off Kevin's plate and starts eating it: "See? I'm not dead yet." Everyone's uncomfortably silent except Helen, who tries to explain: "Olive, we just wanted to try to --" Olive interrupts again: "Call Dr. Chin. Tell him I can't live with you people hovering over me like this." She's trying to make herself ready to leave the table and Helen, still patient, offers to try to help her but Olive explodes, "Don't touch me!" Helen loses it: "You ungrateful bitch!" Will is wide-eyed. So's Olive. You go, lady! Helen: "If our turning our lives upside down to care for you is not enough for you, then fine. You can go to your Chinese doctor. But I'll tell you something: you'd better leave before he gets to know you." She walks out. No one speaks. Olive wipes her mouth haughtily and throws a defiant look at Will as she flings the napkin on the table. He gets up and goes after Helen. Olive tries to get away from the table but it's hard to work her wheelchair with only one strong arm. Kevin dares to help push her but she smacks his arm away and he brings his hand up to his mouth, giving his siblings a "yipes" glance. They're all silent until she's gone. Joan can't suppress a little smile, and she and Kevin briefly exchange looks. She leans over to Luke, who's already starting to smirk a bit, and says, "In the pamphlet, that's a big no-no." All three of them break up. Olive can overhear their quiet laughter from where she's sitting in the kitchen. Me: "God, even at his bitterest, Kevin was at least more entertaining than Olive." Frink: "Probably smelled better, too." I remind him he'll be old someday.
Will and Helen are getting ready for bed. Helen's raking herself over the coals for her outburst: "I asked her to stay with us. How could I talk to her like that?" Will says, "Doctor says the stroke wouldn't affect her mental acuity or speech. What'd you expect?" Helen: "Well, I expected to not yell at an old lady who just had a stroke. I called her a bitch!" Will: "I know. I almost cheered." She gives Will a little shove on the shoulder. He walks around and stands behind her at the mirror, and puts his arms around her waist. Helen: "I'm just so tired of hearing how great her life is." She picks up the photo Joan found, asking, "Do you remember what we talked about that night?" He says they were going to go to Paris for a year: "You were gonna paint during the day and take classes at night." Helen: "And you were gonna study cooking and learn French." Yeah, and Frink and I were going to live on a houseboat. Frink also wants to live in a yurt, but I wasn't so much for that. Anyway, shit happens. Or doesn't, as the case may be. Helen asks softly, "Would you change anything?" Will thinks for a good long moment -- enough to give the idea that he's really considering the question, not just giving the usual pat TV answer -- and says, "Just Kevin." Now I'm all teary.
Joan comes downstairs in her jammies and hears some vague grunting coming from the den. She goes to the doors of the den (beautiful, leaded glass doors, I must add) and slides one open. She sees Olive labouring to somehow get herself into bed by clutching at a sheet. That ain't gonna do it. Joan asks if she needs some help. Of course Olive insists she can do it. Joan comes in anyway, saying, "Well…since I'm here…I used to help Kevin, so...here, put your arms around me." Olive complies, but protests, "I'm not Kevin," as Joan lifts her into bed. Man, if she could lift Kevin into bed, she's stronger than she looks. Joan: "I know. Just…there you go." She pulls the covers up and asks, "Do you…do you need anything?" Olive: "Just sleep." Boy, I wouldn't want to be the person who has to help her with the bathroom. That's most likely poor Helen. Olive: "Good night." Joan leaves quietly, but before she's out the door, Olive starts crying into the sheets, trying to muffle her sobs with her good hand. Joan stops, unsure what to do. She goes out and closes the door gently.
Luke walks through the hall at school. Just behind him, Grace emerges from a classroom and sees him. She speeds up to catch him, but makes a great effort not to look as if that's what she's doing. Classic Grace. When she gets close enough to him, she says, "'GRAVITY_BOY has logged off'?" Luke: "Joan was trying to bust me for looking at porn." Grace (wearing a t-shirt that I think reads "Gum is fun but not on a cat") is alarmed: "You were looking at porn while we were on --" Luke: "No!" Then: "Do you -- do you want me to?" Ah, Luke. Almost as baffled by your girlfriend as Adam is by Joan, and still just as eager to please. Grace just shakes her head and suppresses a smirk. Luke: "Look, the Joan interruption was singular event, okay?" I very much doubt that, but let's move on. "If there's something you need to say…" But they've gotten too close to Adam and Joan. Adam's at his locker, and Joan's hanging affectionately on his back. Grace hustles past them, asking, "Checking your boyfriend for injuries, Girardi?" Adam: "No, Larry's been good…really." Joan calls after her, "Because I did such a good job of getting him ready to be good!" Hee. Adam's got his hood pulled up over his head. I don't think the hair people know exactly what to do with his hair, so they rely on hoodies and toques a lot. Fortunately, it totally works for him. Luke: "See, I find the 'loosen the cap' theory unsound. I mean, if it were loosened sufficiently…" Joan: "Bye."
He takes off as we hear Friedman intoning pretentiously, "'Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?'" There's Judith, saying, "Please don't," with Friedman hot on her heels. Friedman: "'Thou art more lovely and more temperate --'" Joan calls out to Luke at his locker: "Skipper! Your little buddy." Luke just glowers from his locker. Michael Welch has the glowering down, I'll tell you. That'll probably turn into smouldering once he's eighteen. Hurry up and turn eighteen, kid. Friedman: "'Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May --" Judith: "Forget it, Friedman." He's undeterred: "'And summer's lease hath all too short a date. / Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines --'" Judith: "I'm never, ever, ever going out with you!" He carries on with the sonnet: "'But thy eternal summer shall not fade / Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st; / Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, / When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st: / So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, / So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.'" On "this," he gestures to Judith's person. Judith glances at Joan, who gives her a sheepish look, and at Adam, who's fascinated with Friedman's display, and then turns to Friedman: "Memorize Hamlet, and it's a date." What? Has she taken complete leave of her senses? If you ever needed proof that Judith's a couplet short of a sonnet, there you have it. Picture me sitting on my couch, looking like this. Will we have to call her "The Judith"? Friedman, without missing a beat: "The part, or the whole play?" Judith: "The play." And it's Shakespeare's longest play, too. I get the impression Judith knows that, but who knows if Friedman does? Doesn't seem to matter. Friedman raises his fists and pulls them down again: "Yes!" He runs off, hooting in glee. Joan and Adam look at Judith, stunned.
At the police station, Duncan and Simmons are being frog-marched out by Annie Potts. Well, not really. It's just that the phrase frog-marched makes me laugh my ass off, and I never get to use it. They're just busted and cuffed -- over their objections -- and hustled out, followed by Annie. But it would have been great if she had frog-marched them outta there. Somebody frog-march somebody, please. Will glances at Roebuck, whose sad expression says, "Don't you feel like crap for doubting me?" Of Annie Potts, I tell Frink, "That's not a good hairdo." He replies, "Well, she's in IA, she's supposed to be hateable." Me: "Okay, it's not that bad."
Joan comes into Adam's shed and says, "Hey, boys…" Guess which one's happier to see her? She stops at Larry's cage, and his relatively friendly pawing through the wires is made to seem vicious by the cranky hissing and meowing on the soundtrack. If you turn down the sound, the cat seems perfectly nice. As he no doubt is. She admonishes him weakly and walks around to look at what Adam's working on: it's his pop art assignment for Helen's class. It's four cartoonish images of a cat like Larry, two over two in a grid, with "NEW!" written at the top and "CATS GONE WILD!" in one of those spiky balloons superimposed over the top two images. Underneath it all it says, "FEED YOUR FERAL SIDE." I don't really get it, other than that it seems like a riff on Warhol's style of portraiture. But it also seems like an ad, but for what I couldn't tell you. Anyway, Joan finds it amusing: "You're sick, but I like it." He laughs and thanks her, saying, "Yeah, Larry totally inspired me." Joan talks to the cat: "Are you a little feline inspiration? Hmm." I think the cat's pretty sick of being in that cage. Adam says he's been looking at Andy Warhol's paintings and they're amazing: "I was being such a thud about it and giving your mom a hard time." Joan: "Well, I don't know about the art, but please…don't stop giving my mom a hard time." She walks back to the cage again, and "Larry" emits another bad-tempered sound. Joan asks Adam, "What have you been telling him about me?" Adam comes over and opens his cage; Joan starts fretting about him putting the oven mitts on but Adam takes the cat out, saying it's okay. The cat is totally docile in his arms and Adam gives him a little kiss on the head before putting him on the floor, where he rubs against Adam's legs. Joan: "Wow. That is, like, so advanced. You're practically off the pamphlet." Adam smiles. You can tell Joan is fairly envious of her boyfriend, the cat whisperer (tm Firefly Fan).
Kevin wheels into the kitchen at night, finding Olive struggling to push herself away from the table with her one strong arm. He watches her for a moment and then says, "Try pulling back on both bars." She sits back in frustration. He adds, "Staying there for the rest of your life is another choice." She gives a kitchen chair a shove, and then manages to push herself away slightly, saying, "I didn't know where the…damn stupid light switch was. I just couldn't see." I think she's explaining how she came to be stuck near the table. Kevin turns on the lights as Olive wheels herself over the fridge, and places herself right in the way of the door, only to find that she can't open the door when her chair's right in front of it. Kevin asks what she's looking for. Olive: "Guava juice." Mmm, guava juice. Why is it I can almost never find just pure guava juice? I don't want it mixed with apple juice, grape juice, strawberry juice, and God knows what else. If you know where to get pure guava juice anywhere between Toronto and Burlington, Ontario, please email me. Kevin comes over to help and she gets out of the way, keeping her back to him so she doesn't have to learn how it's done. He comes to the counter with and pours her a cup, which she tries to take with her right hand. Kevin reminds her to use her left hand. She takes it and drinks some. Kevin pours himself a cup as she asks, "So how do you get used to it? Asking for help." Kevin: "Mm…you just…have to." That doesn't seem like the answer she was looking for. He continues, "When I got home from the hospital, my mom had to wash me and put me into bed. I hated it. I couldn't wait to do things for myself. But, uh…then I saw how much she was dealing with…and helping me, I don't know, connected us. Sometimes even after I could do things by myself, I'd pretend I still needed her. It was like giving her something." It's clearly never crossed Olive's mind to give up a little bit of herself for someone else. He adds, "You might just think that this happened to you, but it didn't." Olive: "I don't think I've ever wanted anything from anybody." Kevin is confident that that can't be true. Olive: "You don't know me." Kevin: "I know you visit us every few years. You travel thousands of miles to see us. You must want something." I almost expect her to slap him and call him impertinent, but it doesn't happen. Her expression weakens and she looks sad and tired and a little defeated.
The morning, the Girardi kitchen is replete with ingredients and cooking vessels. Helen -- wearing a yellow top and red skirt that look really good together, though I wouldn't have thought so -- comes down the kitchen stairs saying, "Family member cooking who is not me…I like it!" Man, I hope I'm half as hot as Mary Steenburgen when I'm fifty. She's quite surprised to find Olive madly chopping away at the table. She says, "Dr. Chin said I need spicy food." Helen says she would have helped. Olive says she's made it a million times: "I can manage." Helen says it smells good. Olive: "Of course. It's my paella." She's wheeled herself over to the garlic braid and is attempting to grasp a head that's just out of reach. Helen watches her efforts, unsure whether to try to help. She ventures, "Can I --" Olive: "Please." Helen breaks off one head and hands it to Olive, who takes Helen's hand and presses it to her cheek, and keeps it there. Helen is amazed, but puts her hand gently on the back of Olive's head. Before Helen can get too emotional, Olive says, "And the cast iron skillet." Helen scurries off for it as she mentions, "I thought no one was supposed to know this recipe." Olive: "Yeah, well, it can't die with me. It's too damn good." She starts firing garlic instructions at Helen and telling her to hurry it along before the onions burn. Helen eagerly complies. There's some fake-o Latin music tinkling in the background, but I can work with it.
Luke's in his room getting dressed, pulling his pants on (red boxers, if you didn't see the show), when his computer makes an important, IM-related bleep. One pant leg on, one off, he rolls over the bed, grabs his glasses, and goes to his computer in one fluid motion. He looks at the screen, which reads: "BLACKWIDOW-4-U says / My Mother drinks." I actually said, "Oh my God," out loud. Luke starts to type something but there's another message: "BLACKWIDOW has logged off." What happened to the "4-U"? And how come GRAVITY_BOY merited an exclamation mark when he logged off? He sits back, staring at the screen. Normally I would think there were a lot of things wrong with having Grace's secret revealed this way, but in this case, it works perfectly with the storyline and the development of Grace's character. She would never be able to face Luke and say this out loud.
Downstairs, Olive is pronouncing the paella muy bueno and ready to eat. Joan's setting the table, asking, "So if Mom gives up the recipe, we have to kill her?" Joan seems to be hoping her mom has loose lips. Olive: "Yeah. Trampled by bulls." Kevin wheels up with drinking glasses, and she instructs him to pour the guava juice: "It'll cut the spice and nobody has to get hurt." Will comes in, announcing, "I'm putting on my pants and my trusty garlic sensor starts going nuts." He keeps it in his pants? Whatever, dude. Olive: "We made paella!" Will: "'We'?" Olive tells him, "No cracks or you don't get any." Will asks Helen, "Do you really have the recipe?" Helen: "You can torture me all you want, I'm not giving it up!" She shouts for Luke to come to breakfast. Everyone sits down and Olive says, "I know one doesn't usually toast with guava juice, but…well, I don't care." Luke comes in with his jacket on, puzzled: "Someone cooked? In the morning?" Helen: "Olive's making a toast. Sit." He dashes out, saying, "SorryIcan'tbye!" Helen calls after him but lets it go, telling Olive lightly, "Sorry!" Olive continues her toast, which mostly consists of everyone holding their glasses up expectantly while Olive attempts to find words for her gratitude. She's unable to come up with anything more than "Salud!" Everyone clinks glasses and Will says, "Famiglia." He gets a few echoes of that. They start dishing everything up as the fake-o Latin music plays some more.
Grace is at her locker when she looks down the hall and the expression on her face turns very vulnerable. She puts her stuff in her locker and skulks away, but it's too late: Luke is barreling down the hallway toward her and grabs her arm. She stops and turns toward him, the expression on her face a mixture of defenselessness, with a little of the "Are people looking? What are they thinking?" anxiety that never leaves her. Luke doesn't say anything, he just looks concerned. She takes off into an empty classroom. Luke follows her. They're standing in front of a blackboard with a bunch of writing on it. The most readable phrase is "CAUSED BY TENSION." Grace stands in front of him shaking her head ever so slightly, as if she can't quite believe she told someone. She looks up at him with wet eyes. Luke gently puts one hand on her shoulder, probably expecting it to be smacked away, but Grace lets him pull her into an embrace and she holds him tightly, doing her very best not to cry on his shoulder. As I am trying not to do to Frink.
Helen's in a real good mood with her class, talking about Andy Warhol and how he "forced us to look at images that had become invisible in their familiarity, and proved that the potential for art exists everywhere." As the bell rings, and everyone tears out, she tells them all that they did well on their projects. She tells Adam in particular: "Great job. I -- I have never seen you do work that's so technically proficient. This shows a real mastery of craft." Adam, a little bewildered by the praise: "It was kind of fun in the end." Helen thinks that's good: "You could have a real future in commercial design. Magritte, Lichtenstein, Warhol -- they all worked commercially. You could make a good living, and -- and you could still do your own projects on the side. It's just something to consider." Adam, fortunately, doesn't seem to hear this as "you're not good enough to hope to make a living from fine art" but as I'm sure Helen intended it, which is "almost no one makes a living from fine art alone and you could definitely make a living doing commercial/graphic art instead of cleaning toilets." There might also be a little undercurrent of, "And my daughter will be better off, too." He thanks her and leaves.
Will's in Roebuck's office with Roebuck, and Annie. Will tells Roebuck he can't just resign. Roebuck already did. He gestures to Annie, saying, "Lieutenant Preston will be taking over for me." Will accuses her of planting doubt about Roy. But Roebuck says she's got nothing to do with it. The dirty cops were his guys and the buck has to stop somewhere. I just noticed something weird: there's a pen on Roy's desk, which, when viewed in conjunction with his tie clip behind it, makes it look like there's a gold cross on his solar plexus. It's in the shot where he says, "Duncan and Simmons were my guys." It's even more amusing if you note the shape of a sheriff's star. Not that I'm trying to generate all kinds of theories about secret messages here. I leave that sort of thing to the forum posters. Will crabs, "The buck stops wherever the person in charge decides it stops! That's the way it works nowadays!" Roebuck asks if he's all right with that. Will doesn't say anything. Roebuck says Will would do the same thing: "Lieutenant Preston has been on the force for fourteen years. Coming from IA…she's unimpeachable." She turns to Will and says, "I know how tough this must be." She tells them she'll leave them alone. As she leaves, she tells Will they should grab lunch sometime: "I might surprise you."
Once she's gone, Will tells Roebuck he'd like to stand with him when he makes the announcement. Roebuck nods. I really have police force character fatigue. Will's on his third partner and second boss in a year. It's just a bit much. It's hard to care about characters when they're constantly coming and going. At this point, I can't see why any long-time viewer would bother getting invested in any police force character. We know better. None of them sticks around. If the writers can't commit to characters, why should we? I went through this on The West Wing, but that didn't start in earnest (with the exception of Mandy, and they couldn't have gotten rid of her fast enough for me) until the third season, when the show went down the crapper anyway. I'm dismayed that it's starting so soon here, at least with the police force. I love this show largely because I love all the primary characters, and I want to see them explored deeply, and not just have an ever-expanding cast of people with superficial stories. Maybe they just don't feel they've found anyone who clicks sufficiently with Joe Mantegna yet, which I might agree with (though I thought Toni was okay), but I don't think the chemistry is the primary problem. I think it's just difficult to find the balance between the police plots and the rest of the show; it's a hard thing they're trying to do here. I don't know. I do know I can't devote any more thought to it at this moment or I won't have this done in time to watch Lost tonight. Also, I think they've finally heard our pleas: the blue in the police scenes in this episode isn't nearly so oppressive. So, yay! for that. Maybe Annie Potts's casting signals the dawning of a new age of multichromaticism at APD.
Joan comes into Adam's shed, saying in a singsong voice, "Larry…look what I have…" I don't know what she's got for Larry, but her hair's up in a complicated bun that's sort of got three big loops to it. It's a little Miss America Pageant circa 1967 for Joan, I think: I like her hair up, but this is way too fussy and "done." She finds Adam sitting at his table, looking sad. She doesn't see Larry anywhere. Adam tells her Larry's gone. She asks what happened. Adam gestures, saying he broke through the screen. Oh…I lost a cat that way once, many years ago. Almost lost two. Having just moved into a new rented house, I didn't realize the screen on the back door was torn around the bottom edge. It was just hanging there straight, looking like it had structural integrity. I thought it was safe for the cats to be roaming around in there. But both cats, freaked out about being in a new place, discovered the screen was actually just flapping there, and got and ran off before we could catch them. We looked all over for them. We never saw the little grey kitten again. I like to believe she got adopted by someone else and not hit by a car. The other one, much older, started appearing randomly around our house three weeks later. He didn't seem to even remember us at all; it was like we had to adopt him all over again, teach him to trust us and let us feed him. It was very weird, but eventually he settled back into old routines and it was like he'd never been gone. Sigh. Now I'm really depressed. Anyway. I know some viewers thought there's no way Larry could have "broken through" a screen, but not all of them are made out of tough materials -- some are very flimsy -- and if there was any breach in it at all, most cats I've known would be determined enough to work at making it big enough to escape through. ["It wouldn't have to be that big, either. Hobey Shawshanked himself through a hole the diameter of a tennis ball once." -- Sars] Joan assumes he must be around somewhere but Adam says he's been looking for him for hours: "He's just gone." Joan: "Well, where were you? How could you not have seen him?" Adam says, "The pamphlet said, take him out of the cage for longer periods, and he seemed really happy, so you know, I put on some music, I did some work, and...then I noticed the screen. I'm so sorry, Jane." She says it's okay: "Hey, we'll find him. We'll find him."
Adam hustles down the street, stapling up posters he's made with a colourful painting of Larry. It doesn't give any useful information: "LOST CAT / 'LARRY' / IF YOU HAVE ANY INFORMATION PLEASE CALL JOAN AT 555-3167." Given that there's no photograph either, I'm not sure how much this is going to help. Joan puts up posters, too. She staples one to a tree, then notices her mother sitting on a park bench. Frink comments, "Arcadia's a pretty small big town." The music playing is "Shaking the Tree" by Peter Gabriel and Youssou N'Dour. Joan calls out, "Mom?" Helen turns, surprised. Joan walks over, asking her what she's doing here. Helen smiles and explains that Aunt Olive made her stop here once to look at the birds. She points to some on a branch: "She said that one there, it's a blue grosbeak, and it migrates all the way to Costa Rica for the winter. Thousands of miles." Joan sighs, thinking of Larry. Helen suddenly wonders what Joan's doing there. She shows Helen the posters. Her mother says how sorry she is: "So did Aunt Olive." Joan: "What?" Helen says she left a note, and pulls it out and hands it to Joan, who reads it: "I know what you did / It makes me sick / I'm going to tell." No, I'm just fooling around. Hey, there's Agnes DeiPesto in the background. The note says, "'Tracked down Dr. Chin in Sedona. He said I'll walk once he unblocks the qi in my liver.'" Joan chortles over that. "'Not one for goodbyes so I'm off until time. Remember the garlic has to be finely chopped. Olive.'" Joan pauses, and then says, "She should have let us give her a hug." Helen: "time." Joan hears feral meowing and notices Agnes DeiPesto over by the tree. Joan decides to go tell her about Larry. She's reading the poster Joan stapled on the tree when Joan comes up behind her and says, "I lost him." Agnes DeiPesto turns around. Joan: "I tried everything. I swear...it was just my aunt -- he's probably under a bus somewhere and it's all my fault." Agnes DeiPesto explains, "Running away -- it's his nature." Joan: "But I thought I was supposed to change him." Agnes asks, "Why do you think he's the one who was supposed to change?" Well, probably because you gave her a pamphlet about domesticating him. Just a guess. Agnes takes off with a cart full of cats while Joan stands there trying to process things. Suddenly she hears Adam's voice yelling, "Jane, catch him! Oh, catch him, Jane!" Adam's tearing after the cat, which runs up the tree at top speed. The camera draws back so we can see all the terrified birds flying out of the treetop. Adam's doubled over down below as Joan and her mother run over. They watch the birds -- about three dozen -- fly around the treetop and off into the sky, probably thinking now's as good a time as any to get to Costa Rica.