May 2, 2005

Greetings and welcome to another weekly update.   This week the  update is wearing magic pants and looks rather pert.  And so without  any further ado, here we go with this week's Coronation Street  update.

After Vera's fuss in the bingo last week when lost her golden bingo balls, Sean gets suspended from his job.  The poor love doesn't know what to do with himself but gets reinstated in time for Golden Pot night when nationwide Alhambras link up and play for  the big money prize of twenty-five thousand pounds. As he's calling out the numbers Sean camps it up in his sparkly lilac jacket  with Lallies 11 and Big Ben 10.  Vera's not happy and in front of a packed bingo hall she calls him a poofter.  Sean walks out in a  rage with his sparkles in a storm and resigns from the job.

Craig and granddad muddle along in the house as Angela has the murder charges dropped against her in jail.  But she pleads guilty to  perverting the course of justice and tells Craig he'll be without as she faces  four years within.  Where's Googie Withers when you need her?  Craig doesn't know what's hit him and granddad does his best to keep going what little family life Craig has left  but it's not easy for either of them and this is probably the strongest, best storyline that Corrie has at the moment.  When  Craig's goth music pounds through the walls to the Peacock's next door, Claire has  strong words with Craig, buys him some  headphones and tells him she knows a little of what he's going  through as her father died when she was his age.

Chesney's missing his mum so Roy decides to take him to Spain to  seek out Cilla and Les.  As they arrive at the airport, Cilla and  Les are on their way home but Cilla's well hidden behind a straw  donkey and a sombrero and none of them notice the other.  With  Cilla "Buenos Nachos!" and Les relaxing at the Cropper's flat, Hayley's upset at what's  happened, particularly that Cilla hasn't missed Chesney at all. Hayley wants  to call the airport to stop Roy and Chesney boarding the plane to Spain but   Cilla warns her that if she does, she'll call the rozzers and tell them Roy's abducted her son.  Anyway, Roy and Chesney miss their flight and return to the flat where Cilla pretends she's glad to be reunited with her son.  The Croppers are heavy-hearted  and say goodbye to Chesney after Cilla makes on that she called Roy  from Spain to tell him she'd be back to pick up Chesney.  Roy decides not to argue, thinking it far better for Chesney to believe his mother loves him than to know the truth.

And finally this week, Sir Ian McKellen joined the cast as Mel  Hutchwright, author of Hard Grinding, the book of choice for the  Weatherfield Book Club. At its meeting in the café, the book club  greet Mel after Blanche had written him a letter.  Ken sees through  Mel's tall-tales and  lecherous charm but the ladies of the book  club and indeed Norris are taken in by  the whiff of genius on the  cobbles and gasp in awe over Mel's stories: "So I said to Mr  Speilberg, if you're not going to set it in Lancashire, then  leave it." Rita, Blanche and Emily giggle like schoolgirls and who can blame them when he comes out with lines like: "Beautify  yourself, Emily, and escort  me to the pub. I require a muse." Mel's broke and has writer's block so  ends up staying in Emily's front room until his writing hand finds momentum.  Norris decides he'll write a book too and hangs onto Mel's every word for inspiration, there's nothing he won't do for the man so when Mel gives him a list of shopping he needs to get the  creative juice flowing, Norris  sets out to help although he has a  bit of trouble locating the absinthe.

And elsewhere on the street this week – at Davenport's garage things are tense for Sally and Ian. She's jealous he had an affair with the temp and he continues to be as creepy as ever.   Jack's pigeons go awol and Danny and Leanne come this close to  snogging. The two events could be related, who knows? And workmen  are spotted in the Hardware Store.

And that's just about that for this week.

Glenda


May 9, 2005

Greetings and welcome to another weekly update.  This week's update comes with an extra serving of chips and an apology that it's being sent out very late.  This is due to reasons both too complicated to explain and too difficult to spell.  But anyway, here I am at last and without any further ado here we go with this week's Coronation Street update.

Deciding to crack on with her media career, Candice applies to join a TV presenting course and it only takes three hundred of her earth pounds to join.  Trouble is, she's skint and Audrey sends her away with a flea in her ear after she goes there with the begging bowl.  Fortunately, Frankie offers to pay for the course which comes with A-list endorsement straight from the mouth of Claire Smilie, presenter, apparently, of Celebrities and Their Bins and you don't get more A-list than that. At least not round here.  Warren's footballer mate's wife gets Candice a trial at the local radio station so up she goes in the helicopter to be the eye in the sky.  Back on the cobbles everyone's tuned in to hear Candice on the radio doing her bit.  "There's a lot of traffic going this way" she says "But there's more traffic going the other way so if I were you, I wouldn't go that way" before the air turbulence wreaks its revenge on her belly and Candice throws up, live, down the airwaves.

Back on the street, Les and Cilla need work and Les starts back on the cabs, much to Steve's surprise.  Cilla goes back to the Weatherfield Arms and isn't best pleased to find Liz has been promoted to bar manageress who tells Cilla there's no job there for her.  She ends up taking a job at the chippy on the Street and Les and Chesney think they've died and gone to chip heaven.  Rocky, the owner, doesn't speak English and Cilla's mastery of Chinese isn't too hot either so they end up yelling and flinging stuff at each other before Rocky chases Cilla down the cobbles with a fish fryer.  The locals are in their element, making the most of Cilla's embarassment behind the fish shop counter and call her CodCilla, her face turning clarty-brown from the sunbed Les bought her from Charlie West to top up her tan.  Then things start to go wrong at the Battersby's - the fridge door falls off, the immersion's on the blink, only one ring on the cooker works and the toaster's on the fritz so Cilla decides Les has to ask her to marry him. That way they'll be sure to get loads of free gifts, household white goods preferred, from friends and neighbours.  With Les down on one knee Cilla accepts his proposal to be the 3rd Mrs. B.  Chesney tells Rita the truth behind the wedding and soon the news spreads so that wedding invitations get thrown back at the happy couple.

Angela's dad Keith Appleyard gets his feet well and truly under the table when he gets accepted onto the cobbles. He's got Emily doing his washing and baking him casseroles and pies as well as Audrey and Hayley popping in to to see if there's anything they can do. Sunita helps him out in the corner shop and even Martin's offered to take him on a fishing trip.  Keith's gentle charm seems to be working to soothe Craig who returned to school this week after the massacre of his father, the suicide of his sister and the incarceration of his mother.  Never mind bereavement counselling or being emotionally scarred for life, have one of Emily's pies, lad, that'll do the trick.

At Davenport Motors, Ian gives Sally demeaning tasks in order to get her to leave. He sends her on the sandwich run, has her washing cars and gives her his best suit to take to the dry cleaner.  Sally brings it back direct from the laundry, crumpled to bits and shrunken, but at least it were clean.  Ian threatens to tell Kevin about their affair but when he finds Kevin at home he can't bring himself to do it, yet. He tells him instead that he'll no longer be putting any garage work his way, a huge financial blow for the Websters.  Ian and Sally call a truce, for now, and Sally agrees to a move to another garage to work for one of Ian's mates in the trade.

Writer Mel Hutchwright blags his way around the street, getting a free lunch in the cafe after sweet talking Roy into becoming a researcher on his new book.  "Plenty of gravy, Royston" says Mel as Roy gets him the lunch,  "I lurve gravy".  Then to the Rovers where Fred  buys Mel a pint after he promises to put Fred into his new book as the hero of the hour, the sturdy coalminer who saves his fellow pit workers from certain death. When Norris finds out the hero isn't to be him, he's devestated until Mel tells him the character of Mr Cole in his book is  the union chief, an indefatiguable leader of men.  Norris is straight to the bar for another pint for Mel.

After Penny King's home is broken into, Mike asks her to move in with him at the flat.  "I'd like you to be the last woman in my life" he tells her.

If you cast your mind back to the last time the Weatherfield Trader's Assoication got a mention in the updates, there was a chap called Diggory Compton the baker who made an impression.  Well, it turns out that Sally's old hardware store is to be a baker's shop and this heralds the return of the rotund, bespectacled, square dealer to the street.  Fred and Roy aren't too happy that Diggory's setting up shop and fear loss of trade in pork pies and sandwiches.

And finally this week, the flat above the corner shop sprung a leak so serious that the ceiling of the shop came down on Fred's head.  It's bad workmanship from Charlie that's caused it but he refuses to acknowledge this when Sunita goes to ask for his help.  When she returns with Dev, Charlie's still refusing to accept the blame even though it's clearly his fault and he lashes out at Dev in the Rovers.

And that's just about that for this week.

Glenda



May 16, 2005

Here we go again with another weekly update coming at you through this interconnected surfer dude net thing.  I won't be here next week so I'm leaving the update in the safe and kindly hands of Richard Whitbread and I've told him to be gentle with you all.  But now, without any further ado, here we go with this week's Coronation Street update.

Betty, eh?  She's seen fellas get their feet under the table in the back room of the Rovers and she's seen them creep out at two in the morning with their shoes on the wrong feet and their pants on back to front. She's certainly seen enough to know that Charlie's a bad 'un after he lashed out at Dev last week, but when she warns Shelley, again, she's told to keep quiet and do the job that she's paid for.   When Charlie gets thumped by an enraged husband from Brunshaw Road, he tells everyone he's been beaten by Dev, only Jason knows the truth and he's scared to speak out incase he loses his job.  When the Alahan's walk into the Rovers for a drink Shelley ends up slapping Sunita after Sunita points out what a loser she's become since she got involved with Charlie, believing his lies.  As the women fight at the front of the bar, Betty stands at the back, arms crossed under her ample bosom, wearing a look on her face that says she's seen it all before.

Kev finds out about Sally and Ian's affair when he goes to the garage to find out why Sally's been sacked.  Ian tells him the truth but Kev decides to ignore it and believe Sally's lies.  Even Rosie lies to Kev and says her mum didn't have an affair with Gemma's dad, just to keep her parents from splitting up again. So Kevin really knows the truth but wife and daughter are doing their best to do his head in with lies.  Rosie's got problems of her own when Craig dumps her for getting on his nerves before flinging the final insult: "You're not even a proper goth!".  There's a bit of a to-do in the corner shop when Sally tells Rita to stop sticking her nose in where it's not wanted when she asks Sally if everything's alright.  All the old stuff is dragged up from the past and Sally accuses Rita of only wanting to get involved in her family life when she's lonely or ill or has a spare page left in the back of her cheque book and doesn't know who to spend the cash on this time. They make up eventually but Sally can't bring herself to tell Rita the truth about her affair with Ian.  And even when Justine storms round to talk to Sally, Kevin defends his adulterous missus.  Oooh, it's a veritable maelstrom of baked beans and big fibs.

Diggory the master baker makes his presence felt on the cobbles by tempting, nay, kidnapping customers from the Rovers, the corner shop and the cafe to taste his freshly baked products instead of the usual items they buy.  Mind you, nothing Diggory could offer would make me turn my nose up at a Tunnocks Snowball (www.tunnocks.co.uk).  Yum. (And any Brookside fans reading this might remember Diggory Compton as the Wrexham fan).

Sadly, this week marked the passing of a much loved Coronation Street character when Barney the rabbit died. Yes, a moment's silence is due. Next door neighbour Keith is blamed as he never liked the thing anyway and he'd already punctured David's football with his garden fork so was clearly capable of doing the deed, or so David thinks.  So when Barney's corpse disappears, everyone at the Platts is a little bit worried and then rather disturbed when Keith turns up with Barney stuck to a piece of wood, stuffed and mounted.  David doesn't know quite what to say, indeed everyone's quite lost for words. Especially Barney.

Mel continues to cut a swathe through the street and Norris is still in thrall, in fact he's sycophantic, bordering on hagiographic and that's not something I say every day. In fact I never say it at all. A porcelain figurine goes missing at Emily's and Mel asks if it was valuable. Emily replies it was worth two hundred pounds. "It was not!" he retorts, then "Really?". Clearly he's flogged it on the market as he's completely skint and cons Audrey out of a big lunch at The Clock.  Audrey's all of a flutter with the attention although Ken's less amused with Mel laughing at his column in the Gazette. "Ah, the angry young working class man" says Mel of Ken. "It's not so much Look Back in Anger but look back in a very bad mood and a cardigan".  Actually he didn't say the last bit about the cardi but I thought he should have done and was half expecting him to.  As Norris does the dusting, he's content to hear the tap tap tapping of the keyboard as Mel types away at his new novel in the front room.  But when the tapping stops and starts winding itself around the tape machine, he knows there's something up.  Mel isn't typing at all, it's all a con, although he tells Norris he couldn't have told him the truth because of his sensitivity.  The truth is, Mel says, the publishers have refused his new novel and he's thinking of self-publishing instead - the very last resort of a desperate author.  I know, I read all about it once in the back of Exchange & Mart.

Jamie seeks out and finds his real mum, Carol, in a Birmingham pub and they catch up on the last 14 years but he hasn't got the guts yet to tell Danny he's seen her.  Danny has other things on his mind when Leanne gives him the come-on (then the turn-off, all in one episode, she's so fickle that girl). And now that Adam's returned from his posh Scottish school this week to live with Mike and Penny, Danny under instruction from Baldwin senior to take him under his wing at the factory and give him a job.

And finally this week Hayley tells Fiz and Janice she's worried about Roy surfing the net on an evening.  He won't tell her what he's up to and every time she goes near the computer he flicks on the screensaver.  Fiz and Janice tell her it's probably porn but as this is Roy we're talking about, it's probably trains.

And that's just about that for this week.  Richard Whitbread will be here next week.

Glenda



May 23, 2005

This week's update written by Richard Whitbread, Glenda is away.

Good evening.  Glenda has left me in charge this week and seems to have  made the Wednesday episode disappear too - something to do with a  football match - the second one in a week where the right team won but  the losing team can rightly claim "We Wuz Robbed".

And talking of near robberies the visitation from Mel Hutchwright  reached a conclusion this week.  Norris had decided to assist the author  of "Hard Grinding" publish his new magnum opus and gatherer together the  book club to ask them each to dip into their pockets and cough up £200 a  piece to fund the publishing.  Ken as ever advised that Vanity  publishing has a very bad name and that the contributors would never see  a return on their investment.  Norris however managed to use his silver  tongue and the book club was convinced, most of them making cheques  payable to the alleged publisher - Mr Hipkis with one S.  Mel, the old  rogue made a speech saying how he was touched by their generosity - with  Ken making a late appearance at the meeting to reveal that Mel was a pseudonym and that as Mr Hipkis he was well known to Her Majesty having resided in at least one of her institutions and having in similar  fashion defrauded a number of book clubs up and down the country.  Mel  departed, not having refunded any money (and £400 came in cash from Roy and Hayley).

Jamie, the largely useless son of Danny and his first wife Carol, has  decided to find out about his mother and having tracked her down to
Birmingham decides that Leanne should be introduced.  So they spend an afternoon with the poor woman.  Jamie can see no problem - but Leanne
soon identifies Carol as being extremely keen on alcohol and living in a dirty dump (I think that describes much of Birmingham).  Jamie
cannot see it himself, until he makes another visit, without Leanne, during which the latter has to tell Danny that Jamie is seeing another woman - his mother, although Jamie had made it clear that he did not want anyone to know.  Following this visit Jamie realises that Carol is drinking fairly heavily or even more than that and is a liability after they row. He has made a mistake and asks Leanne once again to say nothing.  She is unable to confess her error and later Danny makes it clear that the price of his silence is her body.

Liz McDonald is just looking forward to 2006 and Jim's release - after all she has not had any nookie for a long time.  So she pops over to the Big House to see Jim and there is a bit of problem; Jim always keen on his fists has done over his cell mate and all of his parole has been cancelled.  He is not coming out in a hurry.  Anyway Liz returns to the Street and starts announcing to anyone who will listen (well Steve mainly) that she has waited for Jim long enough and she will not wait any longer.  Given some of the outfits she wears (in one of them I swear her bust was completely uncontained) I feel sorry for the menfolk of Weatherfield.  Steve - who has problems of his own - Tracy is moving the furniture around and leaving female type things in his bathroom and he does not remember asking her to move in - phones Jim in prison and breaks the news that Liz is not waiting.  No doubt more next week.

Violet returns from her holiday and pretends to Jason that she was not a good girl whilst on holiday.  He gets all worked up and throws a paddy until she finally admits (about 10 minutes later) that it was all made up.  Sadly I am not sure which story to believe and no doubt the truth will out (it always seems to happen in the end).

Jason's boss, Charlie got out of police care, unfortunately, and gave Betty and Norris a piece of his mind.  He also, publicly, pretended to see the funny side of events and mounted his "gun" on a board and put it on display so that everyone could enjoy the joke.  Betty is sent on a few days holiday as her punishment for talking to Norris in the first place.  But this man is seriously deranged remember and he has now managed to alienate just about all of Shelley's friends.  So the two of them retreat to the bedroom where they know that trouble cannot get to them.

Mike is having memory problems - he calls Penny "Alma" at one point and twice tries to arrange a family holiday with Adam in Spain, completely forgetting that Adam is keen to learn both his and Penny's business as he was thrown out of school.

The Duck Eggs arrange a caravan holiday in Formby.  No doubt with some humourous consequences.
--
K Richard W

May 30, 2005

Very many thanks to Richard Whitbread for the sterling update he wrote last week while I took a week off to swan around London and do
all sorts of wonderful stuff in this fantastic city that's now become home.  Anyway, gird your loins and shiver your timbers because without any further ado, here we go with this week's Coronation Street update.

Shelly's got a black eye and the side of her face is bashed in after she walks into the door in the back room of the Rovers.  Knowing that no-one's going to believe her bruises haven't been caused by him beating her up, Charlie locks Shelley away in the upstairs bedroom, tells everyone she's got chicken pox and she doesn't want to be disturbed - (clearly, she's disturbed enough already).  Shelly lies around and mopes while the staff downstairs enquire after her spots and say she's gonna need an ocean of calomine lotion.  With Shelly locked out of sight in the room at the top and Charlie keeping watch at the bedroom door, if they'd both been better looking it could have been a bit Hitchcock.

Jamie's in a quandary after meeting up with his real mother, Carol. The woman's clearly got problems – not only is she an alcoholic, she's also got terrible taste in net curtains.   As Jamie grapples with getting to know his real mother again, Leanne  grapples with Danny under the duvet while loving wife Frankie frets about her step-son.

Diggory lures Sarah away from the corner shop with the promise of an extra 50p an hour and all the jam tarts she can eat.  And he insists that she ties her hair up in the hygienic cap: "A hair in your pasty and things can get nasty".  Dev's incensed that his staff have been poached but Sarah's soon asking for her old job back after she's sacked by Diggory who accuses her of taking money from the till.  The money has in fact been eaten by rats and Diggory finds himself with an infestation on his hands and around his feet. Keith helps out with rat catching while Dev allows himself a snigger until Diggory pulls rank and reminds him of his position as Chair of Weatherfield Traders Association and therefore in a powerful position to wipe the smirk off Dev's face.

Liz visits Jim in prison and tells him she wants a divorce. She's sick of sitting in, night after night, waiting for him to come out of prison and now that he's beaten up his cell mate and got himself another couple of years in the big house, she's had enough. "Don't leave me Elizabeth, I love you!" he calls after her as she jiggles out of prison visiting and into speed dating.

Speed dating, ah yes, now there's a thing.  Norris, Rita, Blanche and her mate Lena think they'll try it too so off they all go to the Weatherfield Arms to win over the person of their dreams with 3 minutes of chat, a pie and a pint.  Norris fares well with a literary lady until Blanche tells her that Norris isn't the published author he likes to think he is.  Blanche does well too until Norris points out to the interested gentleman the similarities
between her and a black widow spider. But it's Rita that needs someone to watch out for her when a strange bloke called Glenn with a fetish for red-headed women called Rita "My first wife was called Rita, and my second." hones in on her with a strange look on his face.

Claire starts her new job on the buses but catastrophe strikes as she drives along the cobbles.  Little Josh rushes out onto the road at the same time as Schmeichel.  Swerving to avoid hitting Josh, the dog gets knocked over and things don't look good.  Chesney's in tears and even Cilla gets a lump in her throat but that could
have been Mr Wong's fish bone and batter.  After an operation at the vets', Schmeichel's kept in overnight and makes a full recovery next day.  Claire's not faring so well and says she'll never drive again so the last thing she needs is the whole  Battersby clan including Chesney, Fiz and Kirk, demanding that she pay the enormous vet bill for the enormous dog.

And finally this week, the ladies of the Street are helping out Keith look after grandson Craig.  Betty turns up with a hotpot,  Blanche with jam roly-poly and Emily with cock-a-leekie.  Unfortunately they all turn up at the same time and there's an embarrassment of riches in earthenware dishes for Keith to choose
from. The ladies aren't impressed and assume he's been playing them off against each other and taking their home cooked  goods for granted, which hasn't been the case.  Later in the Rovers he apologies to them all and offers his DIY skills around their houses in exchange for their home-cooked grub.  "I've a dripping tap at home." winks Lena. "Fix that and I could run to a lamb shank". 

And that's just about that for this week.

Glenda


By Glenda Young , writer of Coronation Street Weekly Updates for the internet since 1995.



  corrie.net
Back to Updates
index page

Back to corrie.net