Dec 5, 2005
Greetings and welcome to another weekly update. This week the update
comes to you wassailing for a figgy pudding and won’t go away empty handed.
This week we’ve put our Christmas tree up, the lights are on and the angel
on top has got a sparkle in her eye and a guitar in her hand (don’t ask,
we’re just a rock and roll sort of household). And so, without any further
ado, here we go with this week’s Coronation Street update.
Ashley mopes at home with his eye patch on, frustrated that his sight
shows no signs of returning. He loses his temper with Claire and sits in
tears on the sofa while Fred glares at Nathan across the bar of the Rovers,
swears retribution and makes comments on compensation to the car mechanic.
When Ashley finally stops feeling sorry for himself, he goes to the Rovers,
shakes Nathan’s hand and tells him there’s no hard feelings, just a sore
eye. Tracy had a great line this week when she called Claire and Ashley
‘Peters and Lee’.
Penny worries about Mike’s failing faculties after he finds a cheque in
his pocket that he should have paid into the bank. At home later in the
flat after they’ve all eaten Sunday lunch, Mike takes out the cutlery to
lay the table again. It’s the start of Alzheimers but nobody yet wants to
admit there’s a problem, especially Mike. Penny chats to Danny about
it but he brushes off her concerns and says Mike is as razor sharp as he
always was but Penny knows that one or two of those edges are starting to
turn a bit blunt.
Sally’s face is a picture when Sophie brings home Nicolette Seddon from
school. It turns out, much to Sally’s utter horror and disgust, that Nicolette
is Sophie’s cousin, from the wrong side of the family of course. She’s
the daughter of Aunty Valda, who we haven’t seen yet but I’m already scared.
Sally’s concerned that with her tattoos and short skirts, Nicolette is a
bad influence on Sophie. And this coming week Nicolette will lead Sophie
astray to the ashtray and in need of Nicorette patches when she shows young
Ms Webster how to smoke.
It’s the Weatherfied Traders Ball and everyone’s there in their best outfits,
especially Rita who was born to wear bling and sparkles in black. Audrey
is there on her own after Keith’s pride keeps him home when he finds out
the suit Audrey’s bought him is new and not from a charity-shop, as she’d
said it was. She spends a miserable night alone and when he turns up
later full of apology the two of them have a falling out. That is, until
they make up again when Keith starts work at the Kabin as a paperboy to earn
some cash.
Rita and Norris do a wonderful comic turn on the dance floor, just like
Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers his assistant (does he?).
Bev’s there in something strapless and gets smoochy with Fred on the dance
floor as he steals a peck on her cheek which neither of them can talk about
the following day, especially when Shelley tells Fred her mum didn’t enjoy
it (oh, but she did).
And Liz turns up wearing something off the shoulder and up the leg which
catches the eye of Vernon, the drummer with Vernon Tomlin’s Rock Rhythm Rascals.
She twiddles his drum sticks as the two of them flirt over his cymbals and
they end up going out together as a couple. Vernon meets Liz’s friends
and family in the Rovers and hasn’t been scared off, not yet anyway.
“My life’s an open book” Liz tells Vernon in the Rovers. What book
would that be, the Argos catalogue? Anyway, it turns out that
Vernon runs a market stall selling LPs (for our younger readers, LPs are
a bit like MP3s only bigger, blacker, flatter - and oh so much better). He
asks Liz if she wants to help him out there after Diggory sacks her from the
bread shop for turning up late, leaving early and mooching on her mobile to
her new fella like a love struck teenager.
Leanne begs Jamie for another try but when he knocks her back again she
ends up in bed with Danny, just as Frankie’s knocking on his front door
willing to forgive and forget until she spies Leanne in her frillies in
his bedroom. There’s a river of tears in the Baldwin house this
week as Frankie comes to terms with having to divorce Danny and Carol throws
herself down the stairs in an effort to get some sympathy with Jamie (what
is it with this woman? she’s nuts!). Leanne and Danny reckon they might
as well stick with each other seeing as how they’ve ruined their partner’s
lives and brazen it out for a trip to the Rovers together. He’s
45, she’s 24, that makes a total of 69 divided by 3 equals 23, turn round
three times with your finger on your nose, think of a carrot, and whatever
way you look at it, it’s just a nasty situation.
And a round of applause went up in our house (well, there was a lot of
us) when Nathan dumped Tracy this week. She’d been mouthing off about
this, that and t’other in that nasty way she has and he finally had enough,
especially after she’d been sticking up for Charlie Stubbs of all people.
“You’re a very ugly person” he told Tracy as he left her in the bar with
psycho builder Stubbs. These two are just going to be horrible together,
a perfectly putrid partnership.
And that’s just about that for this week.
Glenda
Dec 12, 2005
reetings and welcome to another weekly update. Before I start
the update this week I’m just going to open today’s door on the weekly update
advent calendar. Ooh lovely, it’s Teddy Sheringham. (Eagle-eyed
readers will notice I’m re-using last year’s advent calendar. That
way, the lovely Teddy never ages.) Apologies that the update is a bit
late this week, I was out for Christmas nibbles with the girls on the night
that I normally write the update. Well, I call us the girls but we’re
all at that stage of our lives that’s between being a carefree, groovy girl
and a woman of a certain age. We’re all hurtling towards middle age
on an express train on which the wheels keep coming off as we start to look
like a cross between our mothers and Eddie Izzard –without the headscarf
of the former and being less well dressed than the latter. But anyway,
without any further ado, here we go with this week’s Coronation Street update.
Danny and Leanne settle into some sort of routine at his flat (was this
Martin’s old flat? We weren’t quite sure in our house). Leanne wants
to make the flat a bit more homely so he gives her carte blanche on his flexible
friend. She lords it over the girls at the factory and Sally tells her she
should wear some of Underworld’s pants as they’ve good strong elastic so
she has a better chance of keeping them on. Janice defends her step-daughter
until there’s a bit of a fight and Mike throws Leanne out after Danny calls
them all Desperate Fishwives. And I don’t think he was codding. Danny’s
full of regret when he receives a letter from Frankie’s solicitor to say
she wants a divorce but he knows he’s made his bed and has to lie in it.
Preferably with strumpet Leanne in her frillies.
Steve also gets a letter from Karen’s solicitor to say she’s going after
half his goods and chattels, which sounds a bit painful to me. He’s wounded
and hurt when Ronnie moves out of his flat into one of her own in Rosamunde
Street. Well, she’s an independent woman. “I vant to be alone” she
should have said, but didn’t. “Why don't you come up sometime'n see me?”
she didn’t say either, but let’s face it, she really ought to have done.
With her 1979 hair and 1950s looks, she could get away with some classic
killer quotes.
Sally’s horrified when Sophie gets dolled up like prostitute Barbie in
crop-tops with Vicky Pollard attitude. Sally reckons that cousin Nicolette
is leading Sophie astray so marches Kev and Sophie round to see Nicolette’s
parents. Paul Seddon is Sally’s cousin and the street that he lives
in is not only very bay window, it’s corner bay, oooh! Paul
and his wife are University lecturers, look through their noses at Sally
and Kev and tell them that Sophie’s the common one and therefore to blame.
Sally storms out after cousin Paul calls her a bleach-blonde harpie and Kev
treats them all to a proper working-class supper of fish and chips.
Mind you, it’s only proper if it comes with sliced white broad the width
of a doorstep and slathered in butter with a pot of good, strong tea.
Ken and Deirdre almost choke on their toast when they find out Tracy’s
sleeping with bad boy builder Charlie Stubbs. Hang on a minute, I’m
going to have less of this bad boy thing - he’s really a piece of dirt.
And Tracy is welcome to him, they suit each other fine. “She’s horrible!”
says Deirdre to Ken when they talk about their daughter. Indeed she is, oh
yes. You just wait and see what she does to baby Amy in a couple of
weeks time!!
There’s been plenty of pensioner passion this week as Fred took Bev to
the annual brewery ball and they got dolled up in their best clobber. Audrey
spent the night with Keith and the two of them were subject of a lot of gossip
in the Rovers when Blanche spied Audrey leaving Keith’s house in the morning
wearing last night’s clothes (a lilac pullover, by all accounts).
They silence the gossip when they announce to all and sundry that they’ve
never been so happy in quite a few years although I reckon Audrey is going
to have to sharpen up some of Keith’s emotional blunt edges if she wants
a bit more romance. Yorkshiremen, eh?
Liz and her new fella Vernon are making sweet music together and she looks
after his market stall as he drums at an over-60s excuse me at Clitheroe.
Where else? Vernon tells Liz all about a premature paradiddle
(which I think was a drumming term but I could have been wrong) and the
importance of timing before putting his theory into practice by leaving
Liz alone to pay for the drinks at the bar.
Violet, Shelley and Sunita get their own back on their feckless fellas
after a night in the back room of the Rovers on cheap cocktails and OJ for
preggers Sunita. Dev gets delivered a host of family pizzas while
working at the shop, Charlie gets pestered by taxis he’s never ordered but
best of all is when Violet puts a note in the phone box offering gay massage
from builder Jason with the tagline – Can he fix it? Yes he can!
Eileen and Gail are doing their best to keep Jason and Sarah apart. Eileen
thinks that Sarah will ruin Jason’s life, get pregnant, have his baby and
she’ll be the sole reason he doesn’t get to go to Oxbridge. On the
other side of the Street, Gail thinks that Sarah’s too good for the Grimshaws
and there’s a doorstep ding-dong between Eileen and Gail as they battle it
out. Phil pulls Gail away from the heated argument but she won’t shut up
about it, keeps going on and on and it’s clear Phil the foot fella is feeling
fed up. Gail takes the moral high ground – from where the view is rather
nice but it’s also quite lonely.
At Underworld, cheques go missing to the tune of ten grand so Mike institutes
a bag check at the door. Janice is first out and pronounced a right old
bag but Hayley hangs onto her handbag in indignation at being searched,
so Mike sacks her. Back at the flat Mike can’t remember anything about the
missing money or any discord in the pants department when he chats to Penny
later.
And Tony Slattery (www.tonyslattery.com) joined the cast of Corrie this
week as Eric the bookie. Eric took Carol out for a meal at The Clock but she
ended up throwing their dinner on the floor after he sat looking at his soon
to be ex-wife all evening. Sounds fair enough to me.
And that’s just about for this week.
Glenda
Dec 19, 2005
Greetings and welcome to this week’s Coronation Street update.
I’ll not be here next week but Santa’s special elf helper Richard Whitbread
will be donning his green pixie boots and jingling hat to bring you the Christmas
weekly update from his big sack. I’d like to say Merry Christmas to
all the update readers and I hope you have a wonderful time, whatever you
do, and wherever you are (that’s apart from the fella who emails me demanding
that I write him into a Corrie weekly update as a brewery rep with a big thing
for Betty in the Rovers. No, I won’t. And can you stop bothering
me? You know who you are). And so, without any further ado, spicy or
figgy, here we go with this week’s Coronation Street update.
Kelly puts her lucky pants on and they turn up trumps when she wins big
on a scratchcard in the Kabin. Once upon a time I had lucky pants too, but
they’re known now as my ‘I should be so lucky’ thermal drawers. Anyway,
Kelly splashes the cash at the bar of the Rovers buying champagne for the
girls and treats Lloyd to a meal at The Clock. He’s feeling hard up
after taking out a loan to repay Tina and when he tells Kelly not to spend,
spend, spend on bling, bling, bling, the pair of them argue and he storms
out of their meal. Kelly walks home alone and gets mugged by a hooded hoodlum
in the precinct who takes her new phone, handbag and all her best bling.
Lloyd picks her up from the police station later, gives her a cuddle in the
cab, tells her he’ll run her home, run a bath and sit up all night to take
care of her. Ah bless.
Audrey and Keith spend more time together although she’s still struggling
with his frugal ways. Meanwhile, Craig and Rosie are left alone when
the oldies swanned off to Salford’s Christmas fair. Craig’s feeling
emotional after wrapping up presents for mum Angela in prison. He calls
Rosie on his moby and she pops across the road to cheer him up. The pair of
them cosy up on the sofa where he tells her he loves her before the two of
them head up the stairs to Bedfordshire where they give in to their hormones
and do, you know, it. Rosie rings Sally and tells her she’s staying
overnight at posh Imogen’s house so Sally’s made up and can’t possibly know
that her underage daughter has just been deflowered to the soundtrack of Goth
band Murderdolls. Now then, a very nice man who knows about such things tells
me that Murderdolls tracks include: Slit My Wrist, Twist My Sister, Dead
In Hollywood, Love At First Fright, People Hate Me, She Was A Teenage Zombie,
Die My Bride, Grave Robbing U.S.A., Dawn Of The Dead, Let's Go To War, Dressed
To Depress, Kill Miss America, B-Movie Scream Queen, Crash Crash & White
Wedding. He says he can't quite work out why that last one's in there, but
can only guess that it refers to the bride's face rather than her dress.
Audrey and Keith find Rosie creeping out the back door after spending the
night with Craig. Audrey keeps mum – even after Rosie calls her a stupid slapper
for getting pregnant at her age - and tells Rosie she ought to tell Sal and
Kev the truth.
Leanne and Danny could prove a conniving combination after Danny decides
to knock Adam off the top spot as golden boy in Underworld. He’s fed up with
Adam and frustrated with Mike, sees himself as Lord of the Lingerie (Gandalf
of the Gusset?) and Leanne’s only too keen to help him incur his inheritance.
As Alzheimer’s Disease starts to deteriorate Mike’s faculties, he reinstates
Hayley at the factory after he wonders what she’s doing drinking in the Rovers
when she should be at work. He can’t remember he sacked her last week
but a grateful Hayley rushes back to work - least said, soonest mended.
Mike decides he wants all of his family around him this Christmas and books
Christmas dinner at The Clock. And just what is so wrong with Delfine’s
these days? Mind you, I had heard that things were never the same since
that chef with the cold sores started work there.
Dev’s daughter Amber returned to the Street this week and I was mightily
pleased to see her back, she’s a cracking little actress. Being a typical
teenager, Amber played to her strengths by hanging around the corner shop
making a nuisance of herself with new shop assistant Craig before telling
dad Dev that she just, like, oh you know, just SO hates him. Amber’s a streetwise
Manchester kid who tries to order posh coffee in Roy’s Rolls but her requests
for a double frapuccino and an espresso are met with Vera’s own extensive
caffeine menu – milky or black. Roy’s Rolls is no place for latte-dah
coffees and that’s just the way most of the locals like it.
Fred took Bev to the brewery ball and tongues wagged in the back room the
next morning after Betty spied Fred leaving by the back door after giving
Bev a kiss on the welcome mat. Shelley’s not best pleased to think Fred’s
taken advantage of her mum but Bev puts things straight and says Fred slept
on the sofa after he forgot his key and didn’t want to wake Ashley, Claire
and little Josh. Betty tells Shelley there’s nowt to worry about, judging
by the kiss Fred gave Bev. “Passion’s weak, a peck on the cheek; kiss
on the gob, it’s a marriage job” she says and confirms Fred only pecked Bev
on the cheek but that doesn’t stop her predicting an April wedding and a December
divorce for the pair of them.
Phil moves himself into Gail’s house after the foot fella’s flat gets
flooded for the festive fortnight. David’s brought home in a cop car after
he’s caught trying to break into Phil’s flat. He says he was protecting
Gail and wanted to check that Phil was telling the truth about his flat being
flooded (he was). When Phil gets stroppy with Gail over the way she
treats David she tells him he can’t understand as he hasn’t got kids and can’t
know what it’s like (he can’t).
Elsewhere this week, Carol’s jealousy of Frankie makes her jump to conclusions
that she’s having an affair with Jamie. And as Liz helps Vernon load his car
with his drum kit, it’s clear she’s become Vernon’s roadie and groupie all
rolled into one. Following on from last week’s update when I mentioned
I didn’t know what a premature paradiddle was, a nice man wrote in to tell
me it’s a tap dance step. I plan to try it out myself on Christmas Day
afternoon after the usual pint of sherry and the Queen’s speech.
Right, I don’t know where you’re spending your Christmas dinner, but I’m
off to book a table at The Clock before all the seats go. I’ll see you
the week after next – thanks again to Richard for offering to do the update
next week. Merry Christmas!
Glenda
Dec 26, 2005
This week's update written by K
Richard Whitbread <richard.whitbread@whitbread.freeuk.com>
Rather late and apologies to everyone as well as very late Christmas
and New Year wishes. The best of intentions were sidetracked
by an unexpected need to go to work on Thursday and Friday last week
when I had rather hoped to write the update. Glenda will be back
any minute now with this week's slice of life in the Street.
There is something odd going on in the Carole / Frankie / Jamie household.
Carole keeps trying to suggest to Jamie that he fancies Frankie (his
step mother), because she wants her son to himself, suggesting that
he is jealous when Frankie has a platonic evening with Nathan in the
Rovers.
Now we all know that the Baldwin Barlow run ins were the best ever in the
Street, but now that Mike is losing his marbles they are soon to become
a fond memory. Mike is a little worried about events this week - after
all he gave Penny a road atlas, well he did mean to give her rather
more than that - but he left it in the office drawer and then booked
a table for six at the Clock - eventually Danny's mother joins the
party. Adam and Danny keep tearing slices off each other. After
losing a few more marbles - Mike forgets that Harry, his brother, died
a few months ago - Mike ends up sobbing outside Underworld where he
is found by Jamie. Then the vultures start circling. Penny and
Adam want Mike to see a doctor. Mike tells Danny that he wants Danny
and Adam to be joint partners - Danny paid for his 49% of Underworld and
now finds that he will inherit 1% and Adam will inherit 50%, so with prompting
from Leanne Danny wants a more equitable settlement in the will and tells
Mike not to go to the doctor. And Mike so forgets the first engagement
ring that he goes to the jewellers to buy another one!
During Xmas lunch a drunken Carole also launches a broadside at the Baldwin
family - Frankie and Jamie turn up to take her home. She calls them
selfish, sleazy and sick.
Claire has a special present for Ashley but every time she tries to deliver
it Fred interrupts, first he wants the presents opened, then Joshua has been
sick, then Fred wants to carve the turkey. Eventually over dinner she
tells Ashley and Fred that she is pregnant - so there will be a little baby
brother or sister. Ashley reckons it is the best present ever.
Ashley and Claire do not want anyone to know - but Bev arrives and is told
immediately.
At the Brown Battersbys (or is Battersby Browns) the one legged Turkey (don't
ask) is a problem the cooker does not work and the sun bed will take until
Easter to roast the bird. So the bird goes in the deep fat fryer at
the chippies and they then depart to the pub, reckoning that it will take
an hour to cook. Sadly the fire brigade have to work on Christmas Day
to put the fire out and the chippy is destroyed.
After earlier discussion Keith is spending Christmas with Audrey so Craig
decides to keep his own company (briefly) on Christmas day - a quick text
message to Rosie almost gets her across the Street in record time.
But Sally says NO - family comes first.
The Barlow household is the usual merry Christmas happy home. Blanche
is sniping at Dreary over her cooking, particularly basting the turkey, Ronnie
is moaning about getting stuck with Ken and Tracy decides to sit around and
watch the fall out (she would be good watching a car crash). Later they play
"Pass the Bomb", Ken reckons it is educational, Tracy picks holes in
it all. As with most family games it ends in an argument.
Tracy later brings Charlie into the house and being the season of goodwill
is not immediately thrown out.
There is a lovely set piece - Danny gets a present so that Frankie can give
it to Penny. But Frankie had already got one for her (they were two
for £5.99 - combined smellies presentation) and now she has to get
another proper present for Penny because she does not want to oblige Danny
by giving her the present. Eventually of course Penny actually gives
Frankie the same set - so she has ended up with four of them!
Jack spends most of one episode trying to get a job and fails dismally -
but Hilary Saunders wants to capture death and decay in her art and she
is willing to pay for it. He sells his body for art so that he could
buy her a present. Sounds great until Vera hears that there is a woman
chasing Jack. She does not like him being painted in the nuddy. However
when Vera eventually meets the artist the latter finds her exciting as well
and she wants to incorporate her ashes in the final production as well as
Jack's!
And Ronnie gives moaning Steve five grand from Jimmy's stash. Steve
suggests giving it back - after all Jimmy might miss it. Ronnie volunteers
to pop along to the Big House and sort it out with Jimmy - which she later
assures Steve she has done. However we saw the events
in prison and actual events bear no relation to what she claims!
And as a harbinger for the New Year Rita and Emily get a lift home from church
with a shady newcomer to the congregation. More anon no doubt.
Glenda - over to you.
--
K Richard W
By Glenda
Young , writer of
Coronation Street Weekly Updates
for the internet since 1995.
