July 7, 2003

 

Greetings and welcome to another weekly update.

It’s time for Shelley’s hen night and the girls are out in force at a pub disco in The Weatherfield Arms. There’s Bev, Tracy, Maria, Eileen, Sunita, Angela and Hayley - who’s in bits as she’s had some bad news. Her Aunty Marge (of Aunty Marge and Uncle Bert) has had a stroke and is in a bad way. Back at the Rovers, Sally tells Roy that Hayley’s more upset than he seemed to think she was so off Roy goes to the hen night to comfort his wife.   Meanwhile at the disco there’s a couple of likely lads who want a bit of how’s your father but they’re not very cool, even for cats. (Sorry, couldn’t help but Squeeze that one in). One of the lads has a couple of tabs of rophynol which he plans to drop into Shelley’s drink and then rape her while she’s unconscious.  ITV is clearly scraping the barrel here and I’m having trouble with this storyline and where it will lead to in my favourite soap.  Anyway, Tracey spots the guy drugging Shelley’s drink but when she protests she ends up with all the girls thinking that she’s jealous that Shelley was getting chatted up and not her. A bit of a fight starts, the bouncers are called and then Ciaran walks in just in time to get a few punches thrown around his Irish eyes when he’d only popped by to see Sunita.   Anyway, Tracey ends up with the rophynol in her bag where in a later episode – and I can’t believe I’m going to say this - she’ll use it on Roy Cropper to win a one penny bet against Bev that she can get any man she likes into bed - and then ends up pregnant with his baby.  So there you have it, make of that what you will.  Date-rape as a storyline? Please, let’s leave that to Eastenders, The Bill, Holby City, News at 10.  

So anyway, Ciaran’s been beaten up and Sunita takes him to hospital where he spots a huge stomach underneath a familiar face checking into the maternity ward.  Ciaran’s straight on the phone to tell Peter that Lucy has just checked into the hatchery and Peter’s straight round there insisting to see his wife.  When the nurse tells him that Lucy doesn’t want to see him, you just know he’ll be there with hot water, towels and forceps helping her to deliver. Clearly her hormones are all over the place and are causing her to say one thing and do the complete other.  And when he returns the next day with presents and flowers and the nurse tells him again that Lucy doesn’t want to see him, he’s in there promising undying, lying, love and tells her he left Shelley ages ago. 

Curly and Emma agree to disagree and move to Newcastle together. Well, when I say agree to disagree what I really mean is that Curly agrees to compromise the truth, honesty and integrity that he’s always believed in to go and live with his lying, cheating policewoman of a wife because it’s better than being on his own. “Welcome to the real world, Norman” she says. Poor Curly. The For Sale sign goes up outside of their house and Curly visits Les in jail to tell him they’re moving.

Candice has a date with pizza boy Liam and meets him in the Rovers where she introduces him to Archie at the bar. “Six foot one, I’m not mistaken am I?” says Archie to the pizza boy.  “Ham, cheese and pineapple, I’m not mistaken either?” he replies. “I don’t know” says Archie. “I’ve never eaten pizza”  to which pizza boy replies: “And I’ve never been dead!”.  Excellent stuff.  Meanwhile, maneater Maria sets her sights on pizza boy’s 12” sausage supreme with extra cheese and Candice is not best pleased, as you’d expect.

Steve finds Karen this week, she’s holed up with her mate, a woman called Eva Briggs who has a hard face and a council flat. He begs her to come home and tells her he loves her and forgives her but she bursts into tears, hugs the wall then her mate and tells Steve to leave. Some blokes have no idea. If he’d said he loved her, forgiven her and gave her carte blanche with a visa gold card, now that would have swung it with Karen.

Rosie has an audition at school for a lead part in My Fair Lady and practises her singing by murdering  a range of Atomic Kitten songs. That’ll be why she gets offered a role backstage. “Backstage?” bellows Sally. “No daughter of mine is working backstage, I’ll see about this!”. Norris, however, makes no secret of the fact that he thinks backstage is all that an Atomic Kittenette deserves.

And Sunita continues to playfully string along both Dev and Ciaran in the most endearing way.

And that’s just about all for this week.

Glenda 

Greetings and welcome to another weekly update.

New father Peter has too much on his mind. He forgets his appointment with Shelley and the vicar, is late for the rehearsal at the church and even though Shelley’s getting irritated with him, she clearly still loves him.  Bev, on the other hand, has her suspicions about me-laddo and after giving a free whisky to a drunken Ciaran in the Rovers, (“Here, have this - it’s Irish” she tells him. “Noy terr’s a coincidensh” he replies), she gets a drunken confession that Peter has indeed got himself another woman. Realising what he’s admitted to, Ciaran tells Bev that Peter’s affair with this woman was months ago (nine months ago).  He tells her Peter only loves Shelley – and all this happens moments after Peter tells Ciaran he wants to be with Lucy (his wife) and Simon (his son) more than he wants to be with Shelley (his fianc*e). Ah, such is the stuff of soap. Anyway, new mother Lucy is still as simpering as ever. To Peter at her bedside at the hospital: “I’ve only let you in to tell you I don’t want to see you any more” and then when she’s been sent home, by the door of her flat:“I can’t let you in, Peter, just go away” while simultaneously opening the door to let Peter in.  What is it with this woman? She’s just had a bairn and Peter’s her only source of support? Where’s the health visitors, her mates and her family?  Peter shops, cooks, changes nappies and tries to act the family man while preparing for wedding number two.  Little does he know that Bev’s cottoned onto him now.

After a long chat and some tears, Steve and Karen are back together and he brings her home to the cobbles.  After Janice and then Baldwin let Karen know they’re not exactly pleased to see her back on the street, she takes to hiding in the flat wondering if she’s done the right thing. Steve tells her he wants the feisty, gobby Karen back and drags her off down the Rovers to prove to everyone she’s got nothing to be ashamed of. Mind you, if she’s stuck for company at the bar she can always try tuning into Weatherfield FM with those ear-rings, standing due north-west by the dartboard for the clearest reception.  Steve’s over the moon to have his missus back and tells her: “Let’s just me and you try to love each other properly” as Karen takes her wedding ring from the back pocket of her jeans, untangles the chewing gum and melted mint imperial from it and slips it back onto her finger.

Tracy steps up her campaign to get Roy into bed and flirts with him in the Rovers.  He’s fair put off reading his highway code as Tracy introduces a little mirror – signal - manoeuvre sequence of her own touching his arm, his leg and confusing him greatly.  Next day she pretends to lose an earring on the cobbles and when Roy finds it for her she drags him into the Rovers to buy a drink for her hero.  Too polite, too na*ve and too confused to understand what’s happening, Roy finds himself sat with Tracy in the bar when Hayley comes in.  Tracy makes it clear she’s flirting with Roy – as he’s trying to do the Guardian crossword too! clearly this is the mind of a depraved and dangerous woman  - and the locals look on and have a bit of a giggle. It’s too much for Hayley and she lunges at Tracy with the ice bucket, shouting the words the whole nation yelled at the same time: “Leave Roy alone!” . “I can have any man I want… .well, not you, obviously” Tracey yells at Hayley before being thrown out of the pub in a sad and desperate sort of state.   So things are uncomfortable for the Croppers at the moment and in the Rovers later when Tracy is there, Hayley tells Roy: “Don’t look at her, she’s pouting!”.  Not understanding Hayley’s jealousy and passion, all Roy can do is tell his wife to keep check of her emotions in future.   

After last week’s disappointment that her daughter’s backstage in the school play, Sally storms off to see Rosie’s teacher, Mrs. Crocker to give her a piece of her clearly deranged mind.  “My daughter will be a star one day! A star! Do you hear me?” says Sally, quite manically I thought.

Another week, another update, another disco.  This time it’s the Weatherfield hospital bash and Katy’s there, now she’s working in the canteen during the summer, with some young lad of a hospital porter that she’s started snogging.  Meanwhile in the Rovers Curly’s having a drink with Martin, Kev and Tommy but Martin leaves to go to the disco when Tommy says that’s where his Katy’s gone.  Martin spies Katy and the porter snogging and storms in to split them up, causing a bit of a scene. He tells Katy he was just protecting her but it’s clear he wanted to snog her himself and so they do.  Word gets out that Martin caused a scene and when Todd tells Sarah, she and Candice question Katy about it. Katy tells them that Martin was simply protecting her. And after Curly tells the lads that Martin’s got a girlfriend who works at the hospital, Tommy and Kev question Katy to ask her if she’d seen her at the disco, and what was she like?  Twos and twos are going to be put together soon, methinks.

And that’s just about that for this week.

Glenda

Greetings and welcome to another weekly wotsit. It's late because it's been a strange old week, did you find that too? Anyway, without any further ado here we go with this week's Coronation Street update.

There's little that can beat a Coronation Street wedding and this one lived up to every expectation.  There was a cheating groom, wife and baby of a cheating groom hovering at the church gate before baby started crying hand ad to be wheeled off home, an anxious bride, a knowing mother-in-law, and one of the bridesmaids trying to cop off with some bloke she'd just met.  Failing to get her claws into him, Tracy then turned her attention to Roy and dropped the rohypnol in his champagne.  Staggering out of the wedding reception, Tracey took Roy back to the Barlow's and up to her room. Yes! Tracey Barlow's bedroom where she'd been banished as a child to listen to tapes and never seen again till she was 21 while remaining as truculent as ever.  In the most sleazy of storylines for which ITV should be ashamed, Tracey gets Roy into her bed (although he calls out to her, assuming she's Hayley - who's gone away to look after Uncle Bert).  Roy is ashamed and thoroughly confused when he wakes the next morning alongside Tracey in her bed. Lifting her discarded bra from one of his shoes on the floor he gets dressed and tries to sneak out before Ken and Deirdre see him and offer him breakfast. Too late, he's spotted.  "Would you like a cup of tea, Roy?" asks Ken, also confused.   Roy gets back home to his flat and he showers, in tears, while back at the Barlow's Tracey confesses it was all done for a bet and a bit of a laugh - before Ken tells her to pack her bags and get out.   Ken calls to see Roy to try to figure out what's happened. The shame of it is too much for Roy, he's a destroyed man. He feels he has to take responsibility for his own actions, and thinks it was the glass of champagne that he drank at the wedding.  Being unused to alcohol, he's blaming himself, little knowing that he was drugged by the strumpet of the street for a one-penny bet and a tuppence-ha'penny plot.   

But anyway, back to the wedding. Bev and Shelley had already had a long chat in the back room of the Rovers when Bev told her daughter that she thought Peter was cheating on her. In denial and in wedding-mode, Shelley won't hear it but finally tells Bev that she'll confront Peter later, which she does, and he admits that there was someone else once, but it was months ago and it's all over now.  So the wedding's off but then in true Corrie style it's back on again and Rita turns up in a right sparkling cardi.  At the wedding disco Sally and her real-life pregnancy dance around to those standard disco classics: Superman, Hokey-Cokey and Angels while Harry gets a faraway look in his eye.  He tells Rita that 20 years ago he was married at the very same church but the marriage only lasted 6 years when his wife left him for someone else.  Rita shimmied in her cardi in sympathy.

Also at the wedding, Ciaran got down on one knee and proposed to Sunita. Not because he loves her and wants to marry her, no. It's to get one over on Dev who loves her and wants to marry her, yes.  Ciaran nips out to buy a cheap ring, intending to lie to his intended that it was his granny's wedding ring, so it was.  Well, at least if all those years of family tradition don't please her then she's free to return it to Argos at least.

And that's just about that for this week.  No really, it is. Not much else happened at all.  There was a one hour special that took in the wedding and I could be here all day telling you all about it but as I'm writing this in my lunch break it's all I can do to cover the major points where possible while, er,  making up the bits I forgot. 

Glenda

July 28, 2003

Greetings and welcome to another weekly update. Come in, close the door and pull up a chair. No, not that one, it's mine. Pull up the other chair, that red one in the corner and wipe those crumbs off the seat with your sleeve before you sit down.  There's some tea in the pot so just help yourself and you can have one of those biscuits as well if you like. I wouldn't, mind you, they've been in the cupboard since April last year. And now if you're comfy, I'll begin. So without any further ado, here we go with this week's Coronation Street update.

With nowhere to live and no-one who cares, Tracy's gone to stay with Bev at the Rovers while Roy tries to remember what happened in Tracy's bed.  Roy's unable to cope at first so Ken helps him open up the café and tells him about Tracy's one-penny bet.  Needless to say, gossip is rife and starts in the Kabin when Norris puts two and two together to make a very unlikely four. "Roy and Tracey?" he says, as his eyes twirl and his fingers twitch: "Tracey and Roy?". The Norris gossipometer goes off the scale.  Roy goes to see Tracy at the Rovers for an explanation but psycho-babe Barlow takes responsibility for nothing and is ashamed of nowt.  After Fiz visits Roy in the flat and sees a broken man, she's geared up for a punch up when she spies Tracy at the bar later. Giving her a good slap, Fiz tells Tracey "You mess with Roy again and I'll kill yer".  I don't know about you, but I cheered.  Clearly in no fit mental state to tackle a driving lesson, Roy tackles a driving lesson and gets a bit confused.  He stalls the car in the middle of the street, leaves it and walks off.  Coming around the corner is Todd and Tony in a car, brakes failing as they try to miss Roy's parked car and they smash into a wall.  Todd's arm is in plaster, Tony's on crutches and Tony's girl Merle dumps him off at Eileen's front door saying she's had enough before she knocks him off his crutches. Eileen finally agrees to let Tony into the house after he drops £10 notes through the letter box and tells her he'll pay his way on what they both agree will be a temporary arrangement and a storyline for Eileen.

Determined to show Sunita that he's not the workshy layabout good for nothing that we all know he is, Ciaran starts work - behind the bar at the Rovers.  Across a crowded shelf of Tunnocks Teacakes Dev's eyes meet Sunita's and he warns her that Ciaran doesn't love her and is just out for what he can get.  But, Sunita's in love and she moves out of the flat above the shop and in (where?) with Ciaran. Or at least she could be in love… either that or she's playing the long game and testing Ciaran to make sure he's as true as he says he is before finding out he's not, dumping him, and marrying Dev instead. I do hope so, it'd be an alliterative dream come true: Ciaran the corner shop cheat, Sunita the smashing shopkeeper and Dev with the deadly distracting drawl and de dangerous doughnuts in de back of de shop underneath de cash register.

It's Audrey's birthday and she's, well, she's a lady who's celebrating a certain age. Again.  Archie plans to take her to Delphines and Gail and the kids are sworn to secrecy. It's so much of a secret that Mike offers to dine her at Delphines too and she agrees to go with Mike, unbeknownst that Archie has arranged a date there already.  Anyway, after a bit of complication, Audrey gets there in the end, with the right fella, and over  Chicken Cacciatore and Black Forest Gateau or whatever it is they sell at Delphines (and I get the impression it's a Chicken Cacciatore and Black Forest Gateau kind of place) Archie asks Audrey to marry him.  Not wanting to upset him, she doesn't say no.  "So that's a yes then?" he says.  Audrey's face drops even further. "A maybe?" he hopes. "A maybe" she replies. "A definite maybe".  Anyway, next day over lunch Audrey gives Archie the nicest compliment ever when she tells him he reminds her of how Alfie used to be. Sadly, she adds, she never desired Alfie, not in that way, you know, well people like them don't do things like that round their way and she doesn't think she can marry him without feeling passionate toward him. Heaving himself out of his seat and leaving his moules marineres untouched, Archie leaves the restaurant and the street to find solace in the Far East (that's Burma, not Scarborough) with a tattered old copy of "I Do" magazine tucked under his arm.

Over on the other side of the street there's passion a-plenty but it's like, really weird? Martin and Katy spend the night together at his flat after Katy lies to Tommy and Angie that she's going to a party and staying overnight at the nurse's home.   She tells Angie she's going out with this porter bloke called Jimmy and once she's started lying, well, there's no stopping her. She gives Tyrone's phone number to Tommy and tells him it's Jimmy's. Tommy says he wants to meet this Jimmy boy who's stepping out with his daughter but Katy's not best pleased, as you can imagine. Meanwhile, Martin's gone camping with David, Sarah, Bethany and Todd - who has specially asked for a pink tent.

And that's just about all for this week.

Glenda