So here's how it went down at Über HQ the morning (and by "morning, I mean "2 PM") after this episode of Once and Again aired. Niki and I were both enthusing about the episode and nitpicking particular details about the way webzines are actually financed and run as opposed to the way they're portrayed on TV, and I told her that I'd been talking to my TV the whole time the episode was on and that I wished I could recap it. And Niki was like, "No way, bitch." And I was like, "Oh no you di-in't." And she was like, "You heard me." And I was like, "I will house you, a-ight?" And she was like, "Come over here and say that." And I was like, "This can go down one of two ways. Either I recap this episode, or I fire your ass." And she was like, "You can't fire me, I quit. Oh, wait. That means I'd get the week off? Oh, all right." Then we went to the mall. True story! ["Oh, so that's how you're selling it, huh? People, I still have the bruises and I'm typing this with my nose because my wrists are tied to my chair." -- Niki] So that's why I'm your guest recapper this week. Thanks, Niki, for letting this control freak commandeer your gig, just this once. ["No problem, but could you just loosen the ropes a bit? They really chafe." -- Niki] (For those of you looking for a Niki fix this week, she wrote a short article about Mark Feuerstein -- O&A's Leo -- for Fametracker, so look out for that.)
Hey, is Peter Jennings a Special Guest Star in this episode or something? Oh, no, wait -- it's just a news break pre-empting a few seconds of the opening credits as (for once) it pays to be Canadian; CTV, the network that carries Once and Again for those Canadians who want to watch the show but don't have even the most basic cable, is still showing the episode. Wahoo! The episode opens with Zoe "Half-Pint" Manning trucking up to the PC in the family room. She checks her watch and tells Grace "Pouty Balboa" Manning that it's twenty after eight, and is thus Zoe's turn on the computer. Cut to the screen, and we see that Grace is on the MBTV boards, commenting on Felicity's hair. She is. They don't actually show the MBTV, but I'm sure that was for legal purposes. Zoe nags Grace to relinquish the computer, and Grace tells her not to stand over her. Frustrated, Zoe reaches onto the keyboard and -- one-handed, no less -- logs her off. Zoe anticipates a fight and takes off running; Grace gives chase as Lily "Idle" Manning appears at the door and calls out to them that she's home. Grace screeches that she was in the middle of an email, and in response, Zoe calls her "a big, fat hog." I think that refers more to the fact that Grace was hogging the computer, rather than her physiognomy. At least, I hope so. Lily, holding a bag of groceries and a handful of mail, tries to break it up by telling them "how ridiculous [they] sound." Zoe yelps, "I'm not the one hogging the computer to talk about Felicity's hair!" See? And step off, Zoe; that's a perfectly legitimate use of a computer. Lily asks whether it was Zoe's turn, and Grace dodges, "I was finishing up a conversation!" Zoe mimics, "I was just using up all the air on the planet!" Heh. Lily says that they need another computer. Uh. They have another computer -- at least they did, last year, in Grace's room; I'm pretty sure it was an iMac. So, okay, I guess that doesn't really count. I'm sure that when some of y'all see this episode, you'll think that buying another computer is a poor solution to their problem, but seriously, when Glark and I only had one computer at home, we would scratch each other's eyes out to get on it, and I can see Lily's point. Although, why a ten-year-old requires that much time on a computer, and what she's doing on it, I'm sure I don't know. Anyway, Grace whines that she needs her life back, and Lily allows, "Grace, honey, I know it's been hard with me working so late..." Zoe objects that Grace isn't the only who's had it hard, and Lily protests that she just meant Grace had been very agreeable about baby-sitting Zoe recently. Zoe pouts that she's not staying with Grace anymore, and Lily whatevers, "Okay." Zoe races back to the computer, where Grace had, as soon as Lily'd turned her back, resumed her post. Lily shoos them both off to do homework and tells them that it's her turn to use the computer. Lily, I should think you get plenty of that at the office. When I was an editor's assistant, I know I did. Zoe sounds like she's about to claim her turn, but Lily tells her she has to prepare for a meeting in the morning, and that she'll make it up to Zoe. Zoe crosses her arms and pouts, and Lily orders her back upstairs. She removes a sheaf of files from her backpack, and exhales. The folders all have big PagesAlive.com stickers on them. Because putting stickers on all your company's file folders is a smart use of your office-supply resources. Not. I know it's a minor thing, but in light of what happens later, I think it's worth mentioning.
We get a shot of a full-page Booklovers review, which Judy "Literaryenta" Brooks reads in voice-over: "'Booklovers is a community of readers and seekers that's making the bookstore of the same name a favourite hangout'!" She and Lily are at the store; over Judy's shoulder, we can see that the bulletin board is crowded with ten times as many Polaroids and favourite-book cards as it was the last time we saw it. Lily distractedly tells Judy, "Oh, that is so great!" and then tells Judy she forgot to sign one page of the document in her hand. The papers selling out Lily's stake in the store? I guess. Judy asks, "Aren't you impressed? I am!" She walks over to a shelf, from which more Polaroids and cards hang. Judy adds, "I mean, look at all this, Lil! The cards? I mean, people are buying books! They're coming back!" Lily says, "I know, sweetie! I've read them all." I assume she means all the cards, and not all the books in the store, because I know she's a superwoman, but no one has that kind of time, particularly since we know that as soon as Grace got off the computer, Lily got on to goof off and about the new Queer as Folk. Lily goes on, "I think it's a great idea. I'm really proud of you." Judy thanks her, and Lily can't resist mooching around for a little positive reinforcement herself: "And all it took was for me to leave." Judy scoffs that Lily has "a great job" (yeah, a great job getting Crusty's coffee), and Lily dismissively agrees that her job is great, then looks at her watch and books.
Over at PagesAlive.com (to which I would link, except that the short-sighted producers of O&A reserved the domain but haven't posted anything there yet...although, if I were Ed Zwick and Marshall Herscovitz, and my first show on ABC had been murdered, I might hesitate to pour any of my budget into building a fake companion site that might turn out to be obsolete in a matter of weeks, too), Lily strolls into the office, which is very sombre, indeed. People are whispering to each other that it's going to be okay; others carry banker's boxes and eye Lily suspiciously. Lily approaches a young woman we've never seen before, who's putting personal effects into a box. Lily calls her "Gwen" and asks her if something happened; Gwen haltingly says that Crusty laid off a whole bunch of people this morning, and asks Lily whether she knew about it. Lily says she didn't, and she really seems gobsmacked so for once I will give her the benefit of the doubt. Gwen tells Lily that Crusty sent interoffice emails to the unfortunate staff members who got the boot, and adds, "Good luck." Lily trepidatiously approaches her desk. Through the glass walls of Crusty's office, Lily sees a young, messy-haired dude angrily gesticulating at Christie "Crusty" Parker, telling her that he can guarantee her "a certain amount of output," blah blah. (Some other guy, whose back we can barely see around a post, and who doesn't seem to be doing much, is standing between Crusty and Messy Hair.) Crusty tolerantly but impatiently replies, "I understand that." Lily looks like she's going to vomit. We can hear the rest of Crusty's conversation as we watch Lily make for her desk; the guy asks how he can guarantee Crusty the same output now, and Crusty calls him Artie and says that they're "caught between a rock and a hard place." Oh, Crusty. Using a hoary cliché like that, and you call yourself an editor -- nay, a writer? Artie calls Crusty on her clumsy choice of words, and, after some more blah, asks Crusty how she can "compensate for [some unknown third party's] loss." Crusty apparently doesn't know. Lily opens her email and finds no new messages. Overnight? Not even spam? Oh, as if! As if. Internet employees communicate more by email than they do in person, even if they're sitting in the same room. Glark's sitting not twenty feet from me right now and I just sent him an ICQ. Anyway, Lily breathes a sigh of relief as Artie and the third guy stumble out of Crusty's office. Crusty sticks her head out behind them and, with an impatient head flick, asks Lily to come into her office. Lily braces herself.
In the office, Lily closes the door behind her. Crusty starts by telling Lily that she had to do something really difficult today, and Lily cuts her off by asking that, if she's fired, Crusty just tell her. Emphatically, Crusty says, "No, Lily, you're not! No! I need you!" Lily breathes another sigh of relief and squeals, "You do?" Crusty goes on to say that Lily's "turned into" a big help to Crusty, and that she purposely didn't involve Lily because people would be upset, and that she didn't want that reflecting unfairly on Lily. Lily says she appreciates that. Crusty very seriously tells Lily, "I need you to watch my back." Lily agrees, a little taken aback. Crusty figures that people will want to see her, and tells Lily to schedule appointments for her for the afternoon. Lily tentatively reminds Crusty that she'd told Lily that the presentation to the venture capitalists went well. Diffidently, Crusty says that it did, on one level: "We're not shut down, but...look, in order to protect our independence, I have to demonstrate that I can make the tough choices, so they give us money, without sending in a venture capitalist to oversee us. Do you know why they'd do that?" "Tell me," says Lily. "Because I'm a person with breasts," Crusty declares. "Oh," says Lily. "Oh," say I, only then I add "please." Crusty, first of all? No one told you to take your VC and open up a big, high-overhead office in the first place, did they? No, they didn't. You're not making a profit, so maybe you should work a little harder on your content and advertising, and worry a little less about sending out lavish press kits that Lily has to hand-tie with straw ribbon, and not buy as many black-and-white photo prints and fucking inflatable chairs for your reception area. Second of all, your breasts have nothing to do with whether your financial backers would send in a manager; I think that has more to do with your financial assets than those of your physiognomy. Third, if you really want to be independent, don't accept VC! I know of a very successful and solvent and, in fact, profitable site that started without a big VC infusion, only ran at a loss for two months, and has reaped public accolades without even sending out a single press kit. You know how that site did it? Bad-ass content, its only overhead expense. You know what that site is? You're soaking in it.
Lily goes to the kitchen and Artie, sitting at the table pouting, asks her if she's "alive or dead." Lily guesses she's alive. Artie offers her some bread with butter and sugar. Lily declines. Seriously? Her funeral. That shit is good. Artie complains about Crusty's working the staff for weeks on the VC presentation, to save her own ass, knowing all the while that she'd planned to fire said staff when she was through. Lily tells him that if he's pumping her for information, she doesn't know anything. Artie marvels that "she fired Muhar," and wonders idly how Crusty expects him to keep the site up without any help. There's some more chat about Artie's snack choices, after which he apologizes for putting Lily on the spot about her boss. Lily says it's okay, and that she feels bad about the situation because Crusty's been under a lot of pressure. Artie tells her that she has to be political, and that he understands. He's eating peanut butter. That's not a bad idea.
At lunch, Lily recaps the situation for "Block That" Rick Sammler, adding the detail that Artie is "the webmaster." I didn't realize sites still used that title; I thought the actual tech head of the site was the producer. Whatever. Rick and his heavy eye makeup muse, "I bet you that job pays nothing. I bet you people take that job just so they can say, 'I'm a webmaster. What do you do?'" Oh, Rick. Jealous? Lily brings it on home: "Can you believe I say words like 'sticky eyeballs' and 'webmaster'?" I can. Because you're lame. She adds, "I might as well go out and get my tongue pierced." I just typed that line and I'm trying to think of a way to express the way I'm sitting here, looking at my monitor, reading that line, and still rolling my eyes. Oh, I know: Shut up, Lily. She playfully sticks her tongue out at him to punctuate her lame remarks. He asks if they're still on for tonight: "I'll pick you up in my Webmastermobile." Lily flirtatiously asks, "Will you be wearing your webmaster cape?" Oh man, they are so old and lame! GOD! Rick jokes that he will be wearing said cape, and not much else, and they giggle, because the kids today are funny, and they're old fogies who don't get what the kids are blah blah webmaster blah whatever. She says she wants to go out, but... "The kids?" he asks, and she says that Zoe and Grace were fighting like three-year-olds the night before, and that they've totally regressed, and that it's because of her job, and that she's probably ruining their lives. Rick tells her she shouldn't think like that, "especially since it's true." She smacks him and says that she should be home to prevent... "Well, it's not fratricide -- what is it when sisters kill each other? Sistercide?" Yeah. "Sistercide." And you want to be an editor, too. Well, you're at least as good an example as Crusty. Lily dons her coat to go back to work, and remarks that she hopes no one's carrying automatic weapons. "Yeah, well," Rick intones, "we're in a world of pierced tongues and disgruntled employees on a rampage." Their server sets the cheque in front of them and wishes them a nice day; the camera cuts to her as she backs away, smiling and sticking out her (of course) pierced tongue at them. Rick laughs in delighted surprise. He's cute when he smiles. But he looks like Elizabeth Taylor with that eyeliner.
With Lily literally at her right hand, Crusty holds a staff meeting for the decimated staff. Some guy asks her, "So the financing was on the condition that you do all these layoffs?" "In effect," Crusty hedges. "'In effect'?" Artie repeats, clearly not buying it. Crusty moans, "This is the hardest thing I've done since we started. By far. I saved as many jobs as I could." Artie sarcastically raises a hand and snipes, "Sending stealth emails -- 'Thanks for all the hard work; you're history' -- that's not exactly being in it together." Crusty admonishes him not to bring up in the meeting what's obviously on everyone's minds; he argues that this is the appropriate forum to discuss it, and with a steely edge in her voice, Crusty tells him to come to her office after the meeting, and they can discuss it then. Artie smiles bitterly, and wanders off. Crusty asks the group for ideas for new features, and Lily pipes up that she has one. Crusty makes a face like she smells something bad, slowly turns toward Lily, and tolerantly says, "Okay." Lily says, "Well, the site needs to be stickier, right? We need sticky eyeballs." Ugh. Whatever. Some guy says, "Go, Lily," like, "Way to pick up on two jargon words we use and slap them together to produce a phrase no one uses." ,"Oh, come on Wing. You know you hate it because it hits so close to home. All we do all day is figure out how to get more 'sticky eyeballs.'" -- Niki] She chuckles modestly at his approval and goes on, "I've been thinking about what makes people hang out -- what builds a community. We have the discussion threads, which are good, but it's pretty random who shows up. So my idea is, we assign people to online families of about twenty people each. Has anyone read Kurt Vonnegut's book, Slapstick: [Or] Lonesome No More!?" Some blonde chick says she has. Crusty looks like she's sitting on a prickly pear. Lily explains, "In the book, on Earth, everyone gets assigned to about one of twenty families, so that people aren't so lonely." The camera pans around the faces in the meeting, including Crusty's; she seems to be warming up to the idea. Lily's on a roll: "So we say, 'Come to PagesAlive, and we'll put you in a family for a month.' And you'll get to know them, and argue, and do activities, and they're people you never would have gotten to know if we hadn't forced you to. Like a real family." The "go, Lily" guy asks how they'd match people up, and Lily suggests asking them a revealing question. Like, what's your favourite book? Huh. Where have I heard something like this before? Crusty suggests, "Like, what's the one thing you would save if your house was on fire." She chuckles at herself, and then quietly adds, "Right?" quickly glancing around for the approval of the room. Nice touch by Jennifer Crystal, there. Lily says, "Or something quirkier, like, 'if your soul was on fire.'" First of all, funny that you're talking about fire, because, BURN. Second, Lily, that didn't make any sense at all and is a stupid question. Sorry, Crusty's is better. Anyway, Lily, having blown her load, stops talking, and Crusty curtly says, "Wow. That's interesting. You spent a lot of time on that. Let's keep that in the file. Anybody else?" Stung, Lily fidgets with her pen. No one says anything. Crusty notes that it's been a tough day and suggests that they all get back to work. Because you know what I like to do in the middle of a tough day at work? More work. ["Right after she's finished whipping me, that is." -- Niki] Lily catches Artie's eye; he raises his eyebrows and smiles, as if to say, "Don't worry about it; Crusty sucks." Lily flicks her head slightly as if to say, "Word." The meeting disperses, and Crusty leans over to assure Lily that she liked her idea (despite all evidence to the contrary), and that "there will be a light at the end of the tunnel." Uh. Okay. Lily sits in her chair for a while, applying aloe to the burn Crusty left on 80% of her body.
Cut to the door to the office suite, as D.B. Sweeney wanders in, giving the place an appraising look. Lily notices him, glances around to see if anyone else is going to claim him, and then asks him if she can help him. He says, "You could say I'm here about a job." "Boy, did you pick the wrong day," she snorts. "I did?" he asks, and Lily announces -- rather indiscreetly for an editor's assistant, if you ask me -- that a lot of people just got laid off. "You're kidding!" D.B. Sweeney exclaims. "Parker did that?" Lily finally asks him whether he has an appointment with Crusty, and introduces herself, telling him she's Crusty's assistant. D.B. Sweeney says that he's "Graham Rympalski, of Pittsburgh." Lily stares catatonically into his face. To break the silence, he asks for something to drink. She is roused from her reverie and apologizes. He tells her he knows he has one green eye and one blue eye (you can't really tell on TV), and that everybody stares. She tells him she's never seen that before; he says that some people find it unnerving and don't know which eye to look into, which can be an advantage in business. Oh, WHATEVER.
Lily and her boobs usher D.B. Sweeney into the kitchen, and he asks for "anything with electrolytes." Leaning into the fridge, she asks whether he's Crusty's new trainer, and he tells her that he's a management consultant. Lily abruptly straightens up as D.B. Sweeney adds, "I'll be helping out here on the business side...I'm the guy she's been trying to avoid." He turns around to survey the office and adds, "I don't know why she went ahead and fired people; that was a bit pre-emptive." Lily doesn't say anything (probably still recovering from her dumb mistake, I'd imagine), and D.B. Sweeney quickly moves to her side to make sure Crusty didn't also fire Lily. Lily tells him she still has a job, and D.B. Sweeney breathes, "Good." Lily regards him warily for a moment, and then returns to the fridge and digs out a bottle of Gatorade. She asks whether he's an athlete, and he says he is: "Endurance sports." He notices that the bottle has a name on it, and reads, "Muhar." She peels off the tape and chucks it; no fool he, D.B. Sweeney guesses that Muhar was among those laid off. D.B. Sweeney probes, "Speaking of endurance, how long have you worked for Parker?" Lily says she doesn't think she should answer that. D.B. Sweeney protests that "it's a simple question," and Lily flirtatiously counters, "Not the way you phrased it." Off-camera, Crusty and Artie have resumed bickering; he's saying that his situation was difficult, but that now it's impossible, and Crusty trots after him, yipping that he can't just walk out, and that he's being unprofessional. I'm not saying Crusty is fat, or anything, but she should maybe go up a jeans size, because that shit is tight, and not in a good way. Quietly, D.B. Sweeney asks who Artie is; Lily tells him he's the webmaster. "She's firing him?" D.B. Sweeney asks, and Lily offers, "I think he's firing her." Cut back to Crusty, who's telling Artie he's being immature; in response, he spits a brief raspberry at her, and saunters out, smirking. Crusty looks like she's on the verge of stamping her little foot in frustration, and then turns around to spot D.B. Sweeney and Lily watching the entire tantrum. D.B. Sweeney strides toward her, holding out his hand and introducing himself as coming from "Clavan and Fosdick." She grins insincerely and chuckles ruefully, shaking his hand. He apologizes for the timing, adding, "They're springing me on you. They're heartless. They eat their young." Still smiling -- though now less insincerely -- Crusty indicates Artie's departed figure and jokes that if she knew D.B. Sweeney was coming, she'd have rescheduled her "disaster." She preens slightly and puts her hands on her hips. Um, Crusty? If you don't want your financial backers to displace you from your position because you are "a person with breasts," maybe you should be a bit more subtle about your apparent wish to press said breasts against their emissary. Just a thought. She officiously asks Lily to get D.B. Sweeney a drink, and both Lily and D.B. Sweeney assure Crusty that it's already done. Crusty invites him to her office. Lily watches them go, and below her crossed arms, Lily's breasts squeal, "Don't worry, boss: we'll get him back!"
Lily, at home, and Jake "The Snake" Manning, at the restaurant, talk on the phone about Zoe and Grace; she tells Jake to buy Grace a new computer, then backtracks and offers to pay for part of it. Jake correctly determines that with this gift, they're bribing Grace to baby-sit, thus killing two birds with one computer. Lily insists that the computer would be a thank-you, not a bribe. Whatever, Lily.
"So, this is like a bribe," says Grace, lying on her bed doing homework. Lily trots out the "reward/thank-you" argument, and, as Lily collects her laundry, Grace says that they can bribe her all they want, but that babysitting Zoe all the time still sucks: "I'm not her mother. I'm supposed to have my own life." Lily's all older-sister empathy: "I know." Grace adds that Zoe always seems one step too close. Lily whines that Zoe and Grace used to play and have pillow fights, and asks whether Grace remembers that. "No," mutters Grace. "I bet she misses her big sister," says Lily. "So you want me to go hit her with a pillow?" Grace asks. Hee! Lily asks her to remember that Zoe is the only sister Grace has, and that she worships Grace. "No way. She hates me. But she'll have Jesse soon," says Grace. Lily stops at the bedroom door and snaps, "I don't know even know where to start with that one." Grace scoffs at Lily not to bother with the incredulity, and then mimics Lily: "'That's getting ahead of ourselves. We don't know what'll happen. But even if Jesse does move in, there's no reason to think Zoe would glom on to her just to show you what a mean sister you are!' How was that?" As Grace takes off her socks, Lily asks, overly concerned, if that's what Grace thinks would happen. Grace tosses her socks into the basket and says she doesn't care: "I just want my own life."
Back at PagesAlive, Lily arrives to see the office much more populated than it was the day before, with Crusty introducing D.B. Sweeney to everyone. And Gwen is back. Lily moves toward the smiling Gwen, but before either of them can greet one another, Crusty spots Lily and smoothly tells D.B. Sweeney she's going to go "get Lily started on something." She's wearing an ugly patterned shirt and another pair of yeast-infection-inducingly tight stretch jeans. Crusty, for the love of god, go get you a pair of nice baggy corduroys! Give your action a break, just for a day!
After ushering Lily into her office and slamming the door, Crusty hisses, "Jackass!" She goes on to explain that "basically, [they're] under siege," and that Lily works with Crusty: "If Rympalski asks you to do anything more complicated than say 'good morning,' clear it with me." Lily affably says that she will, and gently asks whether D.B. Sweeney hired back all the people Crusty had fired the day before. Crusty says that he did, to undermine her with the staff: "Welcome to hardball." Lily quietly asks whether Crusty knew D.B. Sweeney was coming when she fired everyone, and Crusty says that it was a pre-emptive move, to prevent D.B. Sweeney from coming, but that she did it too late. Crusty seems to be enjoying all the biz intrigue (of her own imagination), and she beckons Lily closer to confide, "He wants to make it so unpleasant for me that I resign, and they don't have to pay off my contract...I have a secret weapon...I have a very high tolerance for people disliking me. I can just shut it out, and do what needs to be done. It kind of ruins my personal life, but...." ["I'm not so sure how 'secret' that weapon is..." -- Niki]
I'd imagine that Lily has the same tolerance, which would explain why she does the things she does, but as we cut to the Soliloquy Stool, she says the opposite: "Compared to Christie, I was raised to be a geisha. Not that I would want to be like her, but I thought all women were obsessed with being liked! How did she escape our common fate?" Lily, I don't think I have it, either, or else I wouldn't ban people from the forums every day for offenses as minor as misusing hyphens.
In another meeting, D.B. Sweeney is telling the staff that he knows it's unsettling to have a stranger show up and "stick his hands in the machinery," but that he and Crusty will work as a team -- she on content, he on "survival." She leans over to Lily and repeats, "[in falsetto] I'm the content! [in a deep, manly voice] He's survival." Okay. Again. No one is making this a man/woman issue but you. If you are an editor -- and after RockAndAHardPlaceGate, I'm not so sure you may even lay claim to that title -- you should be grateful to have the money guys send their own guy to handle the money! You should be relieved to have all the financial concerns out of your hands so that you can concentrate on building kick-ass content which, in case you hadn't noticed, is the engine that runs your business! Fucking chill, already! D.B. Sweeney tells a really rehearsed and boring story about a family of steelworkers and aspirations toward a baseball career and a detour to Wall Street. He winds it up: "I can't believe how lucky I've been: from steel that made the infrastructure, to Wall Street that made the prosperity, to the web, and you people who are making the new universe." Crusty rolls her eyes and sighs loudly. For once, we agree. Dial it down, Sincerity Guy.
Later, Lily's on her way out when D.B. Sweeney stops her by the elevator and tells her he heard about her "online families" idea. He asks her whether she has anything written down, and she says she doesn't. He asks if she could, and she says she will. He thanks her, dewy-eyed and breathless. Oh, please. If your bulletin boards don't already have the effect of throwing your users together to discuss and argue about subjects in which they have a common interest, you haven't built them properly. Anyway, Lily makes for the elevator, and D.B. Sweeney asks if she's going for lunch. She tells him she's going to meet her sister, and he dewily asks her to recommend a lunch place in the neighbourhood. She tells him about some dive on the corner with good soup, and books. He tells her to say hi to her sister, and she waves distractedly and takes off.
At Booklovers, Judy tells Lily that D.B. Sweeney is "obviously flirting," which he is, but Lily started it by staring into his different-coloured eyes like he was David from The Real World Seattle. Blah blah, Lily asks how she might use his interest in her to her advantage, and Judy gives her a couple of books on office politics. Judy asks what her big idea is, and Lily tells her that it's too complicated for her to go into at the moment. Yeah, Lily, she's only living in your idea right now. Except -- that's right -- it's her idea. The one you shat on. Remember? Because I think she does. Lily dismissively says that she's writing it up for D.B. Sweeney, and that she'll email it to Judy.
At the office, Crusty is demo-ing a Flash movie for D.B. Sweeney, while Lily sits behind them both and takes notes. At first, I thought it was a Flash intro to the PagesAlive site, but it's a movie prepared for venture capitalists. It's a long and crappily realized movie -- involving flying cows, and Mrs. O'Leary's cow kicking over a lantern to start the Chicago fire (because it's Chicago's hot site, geddit?) -- complete with a stentorian voice-over. After a while (just long enough to see how long and crappy the movie is), D.B. Sweeney asks her to stop it. God, WORD. Crusty prepares to get her nose out of joint and snips, "Sure." D.B. Sweeney quietly says, "This is fun. And it obviously took a lot of work. But it's, uh, counterproductive." Well, yes and no. It isn't fun. It did take a lot of work for someone with no talent to make it. And it is counterproductive. Crusty shirtily says that she thinks Clavan and Fosdick reacted positively, and D.B. Sweeney corrects her: "No, they didn't." Hey, is Mrs. O'Leary's cow somewhere in the office, because OH BURN! Crusty's brilliant retort is to stick her chin out, and D.B. Sweeney forges on, saying that they thought it was good "for what it was," but that "financial partners aren't dazzled by flying cows. They want red meat." "They prefer dead cows," Crusty intuits, clutching her keyboard as if she plans to break it over D.B. Sweeney's head. D.B. Sweeney busts out his own hoary cliché: "You're selling sizzle. You gotta concentrate on the steak." Crusty says that if steak is profit, they don't have steak, yet. D.B. Sweeney says that whether they're profitable or not, they still have to sell the steak, even if it's "steak of the future." D.B. Sweeney glances over at Lily's notepad and snickers. Crusty's all, "Do you have something you'd like to share with the whole class?" and Lily holds up her pad to show she wrote, "Moo," and then added, "Moo-oo-oo." Whoa, step back, Dorothy Parker: there's a new wit in town! D.B. Sweeney laughs again, because he thinks that if he laughs with Lily enough, she'll laugh her pants clean off, and Crusty pretends to laugh but doesn't quite pull it off.
On the Soliloquy Stool, Lily muses, "Why are we so pathetic? 'I wanna see it.' 'No, I wanna see it.' 'Well, I saw it first.' And that's our life? From the beginning to the end, and it never gets any better than that?" Well, that depends who you ask, I guess. I think it's better to be the person who does the thing that people fight over seeing, myself, and so does Crusty, I think.
Back at the office, D.B. Sweeney ponderously declares, "In two days, Clavan and Fosdick will be bringing a group of investors to see a revised presentation. We need something much simpler that articulates our goals." Crusty sniffs, "It's a piece. It can't be shortened." What? D.B. Sweeney snorts that "anything can be shortened." She pouts, and he says that he's trying to help her, and that she has to "let [him] into the process." She snaps, "No, you're not trying to help. You're digging my grave." Yes, Crusty. That's why the venture capitalists that employ D.B. Sweeney invested in your shit-ass site: because they want to dismantle it. Because that's a worthwhile use of their cash. It's not like you're fucking boo.com and there's even software underlying your crappy site that's worth buying. It's just content. They can find crappy content anywhere. It's not like Salon is that hard to find. They are trying to protect their investment. Stop acting like you're fucking Custer. D.B. Sweeney replies, "Why would I dig your grave when you're so willing to do it yourself? It's too much work!" Crusty regards him with parted lips, and he adds, "I'm trying to save what you created!" Tension crackles, and he says he's going to the kitchen and offers to get each of them something. Crusty watches him go, wild-eyed, and Lily leans forward and gently asks Crusty what she could do to help her. Crusty hisses, "You can help me by doing research on him. Not from these computers. Can you do it at home?" Lily asks what Crusty wants her to research, and Crusty says, "Everything: where he's been, what he's written, who he's screwed, how...Find out if those are his original eyes." Lily asks what Crusty's on about, and Crusty replies, as if it weren't painfully, embarrassingly obvious, "I don't trust him."
I used to have a little crush on Penélope Cruz. Then she went and kissed Matt Damon in All the Shitty Horses. Now it's over between us.
Lily sends a file containing her rip-off...I mean, "her idea," to D.B. Sweeney. She then sends the same thing to "Zooey25@bukbiz.com" (wow, that's the best fake domain they could come up with?). Zoe, watching over Lily's shoulder, asks who "ZO-ey twenty-five" is, and Lily says that it's Judy, and that it's "ZOO-ey," after the Salinger heroine. Niki and I both observed that, when they sit side by side, you can almost see a resemblance in Zoe and Lily; great casting job there. Lily leaves the computer, and Zoe climbs into the vacated chair. The phone rings, and as Lily goes to get it, Zoe asks, "Do you want me to look up his driver's license, too? I know how to find it." Finding the phone on the couch, Lily asks, "You do? Isn't that illegal? [into the phone] Hello?" "What's illegal?" asks Rick. Lily tells Rick about Zoe's hacking and Rick comments that they're becoming a crime family. Lily reads him a passage from What Would Machiavelli Do?, about inspiring loyalty in one's employees by setting them at each other and making them rip out each other's throats. Rick wonders what happened to "girls reading National Velvet." Well, Rick, maybe they grow up to be mothers in their forties who aren't so interested in Young Adult novels anymore. Whatever. He asks the follow-up question of whether D.B. Sweeney, "of the mesmerizing eyes," inspired Lily's research. Lily coyly asks whether Rick is jealous, and Rick protests that he isn't: "I just want to know what he looks like." Lily says that he looks like an older, fatter, more baggy-eyed version of that guy who was in The Cutting Edge, and adds that he's being silly. Rick asks if D.B. Sweeney is a billionaire, and Lily giggles that Bill Gates is a billionaire, and that she wouldn't leave Rick for Bill Gates. Rick says he's not so sure. (I would.) ["Dude, I have to say that Bill Gates just might be my Nealon." -- Niki]
But enough about me. Over breakfast, D.B. Sweeney thanks Lily for meeting him. She asks why she is meeting him, and he tells her that what she wrote "blew [him] away." Oh, puh-LEASE. She simpers, "Really?" and he asks if she doesn't have confidence in her abilities. She diffidently says, "Yeah," with an implied "but," and he tells her that he thinks she should be confident in her work. She seems about to thank him more graciously, and then leans forward and tells him that she's involved with "someone." He mumbles, "Of course you are. Well, no ring." She wrings her hands, and he adds that he's a venture capital guy, and that he's used to taking risks: "And I really do like your idea. And I like you! It gets a little tedious hanging around with twenty-two-year-olds all the time." She agrees, and then they both agree that they're glad they straightened that out. She asks him what he sees happening with the magazine, and he drops this pile of buzzword bullshit onto the nice clean breakfast table: "I see it being run by people with a profound understanding of the marketplace -- how fast it moves, how it eats new ideas for breakfast every day. PagesAlive is a stagnant little pool right now. Someone needs to churn up the water so all the little fishies can live." Lily swallows hard and says, "Right." "Stagnant little pool"? Now I'm sure this is a pseudo-Salon.
Lily brings a couple of coffees into the office, where Crusty -- her hair up in messy pigtails, still wearing the same outfit she had on the day before -- sits yawning in front of a terminal. Lily asks whether she'd been at the office all night, and Crusty bravely complains that with Artie gone, someone had to "run the magazine." Cut to a screen, where Crusty has just built the header of a single page. A big site like that with daily content and they don't use templated pages? Oh. Kay. Perhaps this is one reason they're losing money. Lily hands her a cup of coffee, and Crusty exhales her gratitude. Lily asks if she needs anything else, and Crusty says she's going to take a break. A break? She's seriously done about one percent of the work involved in posting a page of content -- all that HTML they show would do is create a single table cell in which would appear the words "PagesAlive Information." And she's been there all night. Yeah, she totally needs a break. Not. Whereas it's 5 AM as I write this and I just finished a can of Coke. That, my friends, is an all-nighter. (I'm sorry to get all Lily on your ass; I regarded this episode as one big shout-out, so I'm having a hard time remembering that it's not, in fact, all about me.)
Crusty follows Lily to the reception area, where several bubble-wrapped pieces of furniture are cluttering the floor. Lily asks what they are, and Crusty says that "they" have been delivering "his" furniture for two hours: "I guess he'll be staying a while." Lily takes a peek at a credenza (I think; it could be a desk), and Crusty asks her if she likes it. Lily appreciatively pronounces it "gorgeous." Crusty asks whether she thinks they're antiques, or reproductions. Lily doesn't know, and Crusty urgently commands her to find out if they're D.B. Sweeney's "personal things," or whether Clavan and Fosdick is furnishing the office for him. In the tone one uses to pacify people one suspects of being insane, Lily says she will, adding, "Christie, don't torture yourself. This is just furniture." Crusty, defeated, says that she's just tired. Lily suggests that they wouldn't send over "all this nice furniture" if they didn't believe in the magazine. Getting paranoid again, Crusty pronounces, "They believe in getting their money out as soon as they can. I'm the one who believes in this place." Crusty wanders off, muttering, "I'm the knife on the edge of the world! What they need's a damn good whacking!" under her breath.
Jake strides in the back door of Manning Manor carrying a big box containing Grace's new computer. Jake spins it to Zoe thus: "You and your sister get your very own computer! This one goes in Grace's room [where'll the iMac go?], and you can use the one downstairs any time you want. Well, as long as you let your mom use it every now and then." Zoe's wise to their scheming, though, and figures out that what he really means is that Grace is getting the new computer. She knowledgeably asks the new computer's specs and when it becomes clear that the new one is much better and faster than the old, she throws a hissyfit and storms off to her room. She ends by yelling at them never to come into her room again.
Naturally, Lily and Jake follow Zoe into her room, where she's pouting on her bed listening to some hip-hop song I don't identify. Zoe's all, "This isn't fair." Jake sighs heavily and tries to tell her that she can have her own computer when she's older, too. I sort of see where Zoe is coming from on this -- one of the thrusts of her argument is that she is better with computers than Grace is, and thus shouldn't be deprived -- but, come on. Zoe's ten. I think the teenager in high school should get the computer in her room. Well, actually, what they should have done is put the new computer downstairs, and let Grace have the old one to herself. But they didn't ask me. Zoe goes on to complain that she only ever gets Grace's hand-me-downs anyway, which Lily says isn't true. Zoe stomps (very cutely) into her closet and comes out with two sweaters that apparently were originally Grace's. Lily points out that the one in Zoe's right hand was the reindeer sweater Zoe loved, and that was why they gave it to her. Zoe regards it as if she'd forgotten that, as Jake points out that Zoe has a lot more sweaters than Grace did at Zoe's age. Zoe doesn't buy it, and Lily explains that Jake made a lot less money then. Zoe snits, "So I got an extra sweater. And she got five more years of a non-divorced family. I think that means you owe me a computer." Heh. No parent, naturally, should put up with this crap, and if I were Lily, I'd not only deny her the computer, but take back the reindeer sweater as well. However, this sort of emotional blackmail is very true to the behaviour of divorced kids, and judging by the expression on Jake's face, it almost works. ["Either that, or he was stricken by how much Zoe resembled her mother at that moment." -- Niki]
At Booklovers, Judy uses her product-placed blueberry iBook to read Lily's email. She has a stricken expression, and calls Lily, leaving a terse and loaded message for Lily to call her immediately. Ruh roh!
PagesAlive. D.B. Sweeney is telling a group of staffers to meet back later with suggestions on how each of their departments can bring in revenue. To get them started, he suggests that, since the site reviews restaurants, theatre, and the like, PagesAlive could charge a fee when users click through to a merchant's site. Uh. No. You can't do that. Because that would compromise the integrity of the review. What if a restaurant declined to participate in the revenue model? Would PagesAlive then give said restaurant a bad review -- or refuse to review the restaurant at all? The Man from F.U.N.K.L.E., my partner on Fametracker, used to work for Toronto Life, primarily a "service" magazine that was about 60% reviews and listings of events and stores in Toronto. They had to enact a very strict policy about advertising to make sure that no one could charge that the magazine was, in effect, taking bribes; even when various companies would send them free stuff with no apparent strings attached, if an item was worth more than (I believe) $5, they put it in a box and then auctioned it off in the office at the end of the year, giving all the revenue to charity. If PagesAlive -- or, indeed, any magazine, whether print or online -- expects to be taken seriously as a journalistic enterprise, they cannot endorse a revenue model like that. I see where D.B. Sweeney's going with that, but he's talking like a businessman, not an editor. he suggests looking for opportunities within articles to seek financial partnerships with online retailers, so that PagesAlive could link products mentioned to retailers that sell them. Okay, when you're talking about striking a strategic partnership with a given retailer -- like Amazon, which I think has such deals in place at every website in existence -- where a separate entity is providing the service, and the review is of a book and not of Amazon itself, that's a different story, and if this magazine were basically the Chicago version of Salon, I'm surprised they wouldn't have already done so. Crusty's body language is increasingly agitated, and when D.B. Sweeney describes his ideas for e-commerce opportunities within an article about religion in Chicago (such as links to sites selling books about the subject, religious jewellery, or trips to religious sites), she interrupts him to charge that he wants to turn the site into a shopping mall. D.B. Sweeney argues that PagesAlive would be offering a service to the user (and he's right -- I did it within this very recap, but I'm doing it the dumb way because I'm not getting paid for it). She leaps out of her chair and snarls, "Reviews for a fee? It's completely unethical." And...well, you already know she's right. Oh, and today she's wearing a black turtleneck (good), black tights (also good), and an extremely short and spangly brown mini-skirt with, I think, cargo pockets (baaaaaaad). D.B. Sweeney claims, "The web is the Wild West, not the editorial rooms of the New York Times. The same rules don't apply." Bullshit. "They do if we apply them," Crusty spits. Word. Online retailers already have in-house content on their own sites. If all your site is doing is acting as a middleman between users and third-party retailers, without any editorial integrity, why not just sell the products yourself? Dude, I'm a sellout, and even I know that. Crusty storms out, and D.B. Sweeney quietly says that the meeting is adjourned until later.
Okay, here's the scene where my allegiance swings back to D.B. Sweeney, and for that I commend the writers. D.B. Sweeney follows Crusty into her office, closes the door behind him, and reminds her, "You took money from Clavan and Fosdick Venture Partners. If you wanted to run a little hobby magazine that never had to pay for itself, you should have gone to daddy for money." Point to D.B. Sweeney. Crusty snaps, "Why do you assume my daddy has money?" Uh, because he was in Analyze This? And also because when you take the VC and then whine about the conditions attached to it, you're acting like there's a more palatable option that you regret not taking, and no-strings money from a parent would certainly fall into that category. D.B. Sweeney tells her again that he's trying to save the thing she created, and she shoots back that he's trying to "fatten up the pig and take it to market as quickly as possible." (Wouldn't that be "the cow"?) And, again, you run a fucking webzine. Check NASDAQ -- you have nothing to take to market! Slowly and menacingly walking toward him, she continues, "If you push me out, all you'll have is your little shopping mall -- no reason on earth for anybody to come to it. 'Cause if somebody wants a screwdriver, they'll go to screwdrivers.com, not PagesAlive. If somebody wants to get screwed, they'll go directly to you." D.B. Sweeney's like, "Are you coming on to me?" Just kidding. But he could. Because she looks like she is, however ineptly. She strolls past him looking like she thinks she got the last word, and he wheels around and yells, "Isn't it just a little arrogant for you to assume that you're the only one around here that can create quality, and that everyone else is the enemy?" The camera cuts to Crusty, standing in front of the glass wall, on the other side of which Lily busily putters around her desk. Crusty retorts that everyone else isn't the enemy, and before she gets a chance to zing (or rather, "zing") D.B. Sweeney by adding, "You are! You doodyhead!" he points toward Lily and says, "Your own assistant came up with a great community-building idea but you won't give her the time of day. I had to meet with her to hear about it." Oh, D.B. Sweeney -- no. Crusty is stunned silent for a long moment, and then spins around to burn a hole clean through the glass wall and into the back of Lily's head.
Mere seconds later, Lily is standing before Crusty, who's accusing her of taking her rip-off idea to D.B. Sweeney behind Crusty's back. Lily protests that D.B. Sweeney heard about it and asked her to write something. Crusty, doing the slow, threatening walk again, says, "I explicitly asked you to tell me what he....Don't you see what he's doing, Lily? I trusted you!" Lily, beginning to appreciate what's happening, murmurs, "I know." Crusty squeals, "And you met with him!" Lily says that he asked her to breakfast, and she didn't feel she could refuse: "But believe me, he doesn't care about my idea! He just wants to date me!" This wounds Crusty most of all; her face crumbling, she makes for the couch and starts to cry, explaining for the radio audience, "I can't believe I'm sitting in the office of this place that I created, crying, 'cause the guy who's trying to take it from me likes you better!" Lily kneels down to her and tries to soothe her. Crusty looks up and quietly says, "Lily?" Lily looks expectant. Crusty says, "You're fired." I wasn't shocked when that happened, because I saw it coming from the moment D.B. Sweeney spilled the beans. It still sucks for Lily, though. But she could probably get a job at another start-up now, just before it folds; lather, rinse, repeat until it's time to retire.
Lily stumbles into Booklovers, trying to maintain her composure. Judy braces for a fight at the sight of her. Lily stammers, "I can't breathe. I'm like, I can't -- I can't even believe it." Judy surmises, "You got my message." "Huh?" is Lily's witty rejoinder. Judy continues, "Because I know I sounded upset in my message, but I...am upset, so in a way I'm glad you're upset." Barely choking back tears, Lily says that she doesn't know what Judy's talking about. Judy explains, "I'm talking about your idea for the magazine, which is basically based on my idea for the book store, which you basically stole!" "What?" Lily exhales, and Judy amends, "Okay. Not 'stole.' You used my idea, which is fine. I mean, I should be flattered, considering how dumb you thought my idea was." They go on in this vein for a while; Lily denies that she ripped off the idea, and Judy allows that she doesn't think Lily did it consciously, which is fine, as long as Lily owns up to it. Lily huffs that she can't own up to it if it isn't true, and Judy snaps, "No, sweetie, you won't. That's why they call it subconscious." Lily's mouth weakens, and she abruptly turns her back and tells Judy that she "can't handle this right now." Judy quietly tells her that she just wants Lily to think about it. Lily tries to regain her balance, and focuses on the Booklovers board -- specifically, on the card of "Joey," whose favourite book is...well, you know. That one by Vonnegut. D'oh!
On the Soliloquy Stool, Lily tells a story about the week Judy was born, in which time Lily threw a hard plastic ball at a newborn Judy's head. Heh. When my sister was a baby, I once bit her finger so hard she had a mark on it for two months. I only confessed to that one about three years ago. (My sister is eighteen now).
Rick's office. Lily's just told him about her theft of Judy's intellectual property. Rick's trying to tell her she was just inspired by Judy, but Lily's having none of it. Hey, Lil? Maybe Judy is the one to whom you should be unburdening yourself right now. Rick suggests that Lily's focusing on the situation with Judy to avoid thinking about the fact that she's been fired.
Manning Manor, 5:37 AM. Apparently not having slept, Lily climbs out of bed and goes downstairs, where Zoe is sitting on the kitchen counter looking at a huge instruction card that came with the new computer. Lily asks what she's doing up, and Zoe says she doesn't "feel good." Lily asks whether her stomach hurts, and Zoe pouts, "Nothing hurts." Lily sits to her, and tells her a story about when Lily had Grace. Before she can get very far, Zoe interrupts, "I know. It was the first time you had a baby, and it was the most special, greatest thing. I understand." Lily says that what she was going to say was that she made a lot of mistakes with Grace -- that she was nervous and terrified half the time, and that maybe that's the reason Grace "is more afraid of things" than Zoe is. She adds that maybe Grace could say that's unfair. Zoe asks, "Does she?" Lily says she doesn't know, but that if Zoe and Grace go through life making lists and comparing notes, they're going to be very unhappy people. Because she's going through the same thing with her sister right now. Get it? I didn't either, but there was a note to that effect taped to the anvil that just fell through the skylight and onto my desk. Zoe says that she's unhappy now. Lily asks if that's because of the computer, and Zoe says, "Because I'm all alone. You're not here, and Grace hates me." Oh, all right. Aw! Lily insists that Grace doesn't hate Zoe, and Zoe philosophically adds that, in a couple of years, Grace will be gone, anyway, and that Zoe will be here, going through high school, without Grace. She starts sniffling, and Lily wraps her arm around her and tells Zoe that she'll be there. That was a sweet scene. And I really cannot get over how much Sela Ward and Meredith Deane look alike -- especially around the eyes and mouth.
At PagesAlive, Crusty's just had a flat-screen TV mounted to the wall in her office. Because that is a worthwhile expense when you're in the middle of a budget crunch. DAMN, woman! Okay, I'm not even going to start, because that is just so stupid. Lily walks in and greets Crusty cautiously, adding that she's not there to ask for her job back. Crusty curtly asks why she is there, then. Lily tells her that she's been thinking about the meeting Crusty's having with the investors that afternoon, and how important it is for Crusty to go into the meeting from a position of strength. She explains, closing the door, that one of the "marks" Clavan and Fosdick has against Crusty is her problems in working with the staff: "So if you go into that meeting today with those investors, having just fired your assistant, on top of your webmaster quitting...?" Lily spreads her hands, like, "Right?" and Crusty pouts, "I'm listening." Damn, people pout a lot in this episode. Lily stresses once more that she's not asking for her job back, but is rather offering to create the impression that she's still on Crusty's side by going to the meeting with her. "Like The Way We Were!" Crusty exclaims. Lily agrees, "Oh my God, you're right!" ["Congratulations, Lily. Another brilliant idea that is, in effect, a rip-off." -- Niki] Crusty reminisces, "When Streisand asks Hubbell to stick by her until the baby's born..." "...and they both know it's over. It's so sad!" Lily concludes, apparently relieved that they've found this common ground. Crusty blinks a few times, and then suspiciously asks, "That was his baby. This isn't your baby. Why are you going to do this?" Lily shrugs, "I don't know. Because I can. Because I should have told you that I was having breakfast with [D.B. Sweeney]." This seems to convince Crusty, and, heartened, Lily goes on to say that she's been thinking about the fact that D.B. Sweeney is also looking to replace Artie, but that since the webmaster job is so central to the operation of the site, if D.B. Sweeney hires a replacement, "he'll have his person in that powerful position." Okay, Crusty's outfit is okay today -- black slightly flared pants that fit her properly in the assal region and black tank top under a sheer purple-ish patterned blouse (though the blouse has a matching scarf that Crusty's tied like a choker -- I hate that), but she really shouldn't pull her hair off her forehead and temples like that; it makes her face look really weird and angular. Anyway, she seizes on what Lily's saying, but says that she doesn't think Artie is her person anymore. Lily offers to call Artie and see if she can help smooth things over. Crusty smiles, and asks where all this political savvy is coming from; Lily says that compared to the kids at home with sibling issues, this is nothing. Plus, the books.
Manning Manor. Grace arrives home, and Zoe, futzing with the PC, tells Grace that she assembled it for her. Zoe apparently read the recap over my shoulder because she assembled the new computer downstairs. Grace asks why, and Zoe offers to help Grace take it upstairs. Grace suspiciously asks whether this is a way to make Grace give Zoe the computer; wounded, Zoe mutters, "Forget it," and starts to walk away. Grace follows, asking, "Are you trying to make me feel guilty? It's a logical question, Zoe!" Zoe looks like she may cry any second. Grace reaches out to touch her on the arm, and Zoe screams, "Don't touch me!" and runs upstairs.
On the Stool, Grace says that, frequently this year, she's found herself "being a much more horrible person" than she actually is: "And since you know you didn't mean to be that horrible, you kind of hope that everybody else knows, too." She glances to the side, and the camera cuts to a black-and-white Zoe, who appears to hold Grace's gaze a moment, and then look away, bitterly. Cut back to Grace, who guiltily looks down at her hands.
Electra Woman and Dyna Girl...I mean, "Lily and Crusty" track Artie down at a bowling alley, where he's playing a videogame. Lily manages to broker a peace between them, and Artie agrees to take his job back. Artie smiles. He's kind of cute.
At the meeting, buzzwords are flying fast and furious. D.B. Sweeney runs the meeting using a very slick PowerPoint presentation. Apparently the strategy they've worked out in the past...day is to reposition PagesAlive as a portal for e-commerce affiliates. Wuh-huh? That makes no sense, but whatever. D.B. Sweeney winds it up by saying that the Clavan and Fosdick should be able to exit within nine to twelve months. Nine to twelve months to make this top-heavy webzine profitable? Even Amazon hasn't done that. Now I know PagesAlive isn't Salon. Crusty looks placid, and slightly tense. D.B. Sweeney adds, as an apparent afterthought, "Oh, and here's some cool graphics," launching a truncated version of the crappy Flash movie, "which is why people come to the site, after all: content." Oh, the flat-screen TV is displaying the presentation. They couldn't get an opaque projector? Why am I still complaining about this crap? This bastard recap is already too long as it is.
D.B. Sweeney and Crusty shake the investors' hands at the elevator; one of the venture capitalists remarks that Crusty and D.B. Sweeney "seem like a good fit." Not as good as Crusty would like, if you know what I'm saying, and I think you do. D.B. Sweeney tells Crusty that he has someone lined up for the webmaster job, but Crusty tells him that Artie wants to stay: "He's high-maintenance, but brilliant. No learning curve." D.B. Sweeney relents, and suggests that they all go out for drinks; Crusty agrees, and Lily -- political again -- begs off. D.B. Sweeney looks disappointed; Crusty can tell, but as we already know, she doesn't care when people dislike her.
Lily wanders out to the patio at Booklovers, where Judy is having a cigarette. Lily marvels at how nice the patio looks, and then nags that she wishes Judy would quit smoking. Judy curtly says she wishes she could, too. Lily confesses that, when Judy was born, she did a terrible thing. "You mean, when you tried to kill me with the ball?" Judy drawls, unimpressed. "You knew about that?" Lily gasps. Judy shrugs that their mother told her. Lily's disappointed at the theft of her thunder, and Judy jokes that the incident's not something she thinks about every day. Lily asks whether it's too late to apologize for it, and Judy says it isn't, but that she doesn't need Lily to do so. Lily pauses, and says, "I'm so sorry that I tried to kill you when you were a week old," and then adds that she wasn't really trying to kill her. Judy says that Lily was trying to kill her, but that she just has a weak arm: "You throw like a girl." "Thank God!" Lily exclaims. Judy snickers. There's a moment of silence, and then Lily quietly says that she can't believe she took Judy's idea without even realizing it: "I felt like I picked up that pink ball and threw it at you again. I obliterated you in my mind." Judy says that's exactly what she felt like. Lily apologizes again, very sincerely, and Judy says, "I know. I know." Lily tears up, and chokes, "Do you? Because I want us to be able to...I don't know, I want us --" Judy shuts her up by throwing her arms around her and murmuring, "I forgive you. Just keep those pink balls under lock and key from now on, okay?" Lily says she will, and laughs with relief, before asking, "Can I still use your idea?" "I thought you were fired!" Judy says. Perhaps this was the moment when Lily explained what happened with Crusty and Artie and the meeting. Perhaps we're to assume that Crusty reinstated Lily. Officially, we just don't know.
Grace trucks one of the computers...somewhere. From her bedroom, Zoe whines, "You can stop apologizing. I'm not always going to hate you." Grace asks why not, and Zoe says that it would be impractical, since Zoe might need something from Grace in the future: "Maybe I'm going to get my period." Grace opines that Zoe's kind of young for that. (These days? Not really.) Zoe asks her to confirm that the onset of her period would explain why she's been so emotional lately. Grace allows that it could be: "Or it could just be that I've been kind of mean." Zoe declares that, if she doesn't get her period by the day, "that's it! [Grace is] mean." Grace retorts that Zoe is annoying, and Zoe counters by saying that Grace is selfish and stupid. Grace picks up a pillow and creeps into Zoe's room, saying that Zoe is a "loud-mouthed little pest." "Oh yeah?" says Zoe, her back to the door. "Yeah!" squeals Grace, pelting her with the pillow.
Downstairs, the door opens, and Lily walks in to the sounds of Zoe and Grace playfighting upstairs. Lily grins, smug in the knowledge that she's a better mom than anyone, anywhere, ever.
week: well, for y'all in the U.S., you'll be seeing this. Ha! And since this is longer than any ER recap I've ever written, I now know better than to volunteer for O&A duty again. ["'Volunteer.' Ha. I just hope I can get my wrists untied in time for Christmas." -- Niki]