One Foot in the Grave

[repeated line]

Victor Meldrew:
I don't believe it!

[repeated line]

Victor Meldrew:
What in the name of bloody hell?

Victor Meldrew:
What in the name of Sanity?

Nick:
Is it me or is it moist?

[last lines]

Margaret Meldrew:
You've got a whole new life ahead of you, Victor. I mean, huh, you've hardly started. You've got it all still to come.

Victor Meldrew:
Yes, that's what scares me.

[first lines]

Mrs Inglis:
Twenty-six years sitting behind a reception desk, what must that do to a man's brain?

Mrs Jellis:
I shouldn't think it does a lot of good, myself.

Mrs Inglis:
Mmm. I suppose it's a bit like one of those polar bears that just suddenly snap and ends up lumbering round its cage bellowing at everyone in a rather irrational manner.

Mrs Jellis:
Huh. Either way it'll be a merciful release. God, early retirement at sixty; you'd jump at the chance.

Mrs Inglis:
Anyone would.

Mrs Jellis:
How did he take it when you told him?

Mrs Inglis:
Oh, great, great. No problem. Well...

Mrs Jellis:
You have told him?

Mrs Warboys:
His hair always looks nice. I wonder what he washes it with.

Victor Meldrew:
His vest and his socks; what do you think he washes it with?

Mrs Warboys:
What are you saying? It's not real?

Margaret Meldrew:
Of course it's real; look at the parting.

Victor Meldrew:
That's not a parting. That's a crease where it's folded up in the box; are you blind?

Victor Meldrew:
[Victor comes in the house after picking up his car from the garage]

Margaret Meldrew:
Any luck?

Victor Meldrew:
Yes, at long last. They had to put in a new clutch, a complete new gearbox and four new tyres. I don't know why they didn't stick a new car on to the wing mirror and be done with it

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
[singing] People who need people are the luckiest people in the world. [doorbell rings] Yut-sun dah dah dah dah dah-di. [opens door]

Woman at Door:
Good morning!

Victor Meldrew:
Good-bye. [closes door]

Margaret Meldrew:
Dustmen still haven't been. I take it you were finished with those Sunday supplements.

Victor Meldrew:
Yes, I think so, yes; I think I've ingested all the fascinating details in a day in the life of Acker Bilk. And 'A Room of My Own' by Ken Russell. Wouldn't have thought there was much to say about a padded cell.

[last lines]

Nick Swainey:
Makes you wonder. Must be someone up there looking after us. Do you reckon, Mr Meldrew?

Victor Meldrew:
Yes. [sees Patrick storming towards him] Well, some of us.

Margaret Meldrew:
Well? Any joy?

Victor Meldrew:
I think it's safe to say I've had a very good day, all told. In the morning, I turned some water into wine, and then I healed a few lepers, and after lunch, I popped over and parted the waters of the Red Sea.

Margaret Meldrew:
Did the man come about the roof?

Victor Meldrew:
No, but you can't expect miracles.

[Mrs Warboys was meant to get Victor's dry-cleaning. But instead brought back a gorilla costume]

Victor Meldrew:
What's this!

Mrs Warboys:
Oh, yes. She said they got almost all the beetroot out if you didn't look too closely. Myself, I can hardly see a thing.

Victor Meldrew:
No! This! I mean... It... It isn't my suit!

Mrs Warboys:
Isn't it?

Victor Meldrew:
Of course it... Where in the name of sanity did it come from?

Mrs Warboys:
Oh, don't tell me they mixed up the tickets again.

Victor Meldrew:
Mixed up the... You must have seen it as a mistake when you brought it out!

Mrs Warboys:
Well, I don't know what your suit looks like, do I?

Victor Meldrew:
Well, it doesn't bloody well look like this! I mean where do you think I shop? King Kong at C&A's!

Margaret Meldrew:
That's it! Tomorrow morning, I'm going back to work. I'm going back to work for a bloody *rest*!

[first lines]

Margaret Meldrew:
Will you just leave that for tonight!

Victor Meldrew:
Here we go; look. Three... two... one... Look at that. Look! At! That! All the models on the market, we have to end up with a waste disposal unit that can't keep its food down.

[last lines]

Mrs Ashcroft:
I'm Mrs Ashcroft. It was our baby that was stolen the other day, and I gather it's thanks to your information the police managed to pick up that girl, just round the corner from here. And we just wanted to pop by and say... well, words can't express it, can they? Now that we've got him back it's just thank you very, very much, from me and my husband.

Victor Meldrew:
[about Margaret] Doctor says it's nervous exhaustion mainly. Been building up over the last thirty-five years. I don't know what he meant by that.

Margaret Meldrew:
"Why don't you take it easy for a couple of weeks? Let me look after you for a change." Take it easy! I'd get more peace of mind being nursed by the Evil Dead!

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
I'm really glad we arrived back to find this half-eaten double whopper with cheese lying in my front rose-bed. Some people put manure in theirs, but I'll have none of it. A double whopper with cheese is the thing. Harry Wheatcroft swears by them.

Margaret Meldrew:
I presume Nick Stacey gave you his verdict on that overflow pipe in the loft.

Victor Meldrew:
He did, yes.

Margaret Meldrew:
Told me the pipe was a complete write-off. "Corroded away to begorra," he said.

Victor Meldrew:
"Buggery" I think you'll find.

Margaret Meldrew:
Sorry?

Victor Meldrew:
Corroded away to buggery. It's a technical term they use in the plumbing industry.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Right. We're back, everyone. Who's for a double whopper?

[first lines]

Mrs Warboys:
As I say, Mrs Meldrew swore me to complete secrecy over the entire episode. I mean, there are some things too personal and too upsetting to be just blethered all round the houses as idle gossip. Well, as far as anyone can tell, the roots of it all started one morning last June. A few of us were round having a bit of a chin-wag over coffee, and somehow or other the subject had drifted onto weird dreams and nightmares.

Victor Meldrew:
Then I'm going up to town to buy that Noel Edmonds sweater.

Margaret Meldrew:
I see. Just to be obstinate you're going to pollute the environment with that eyesore, are you? Off a knitting pattern from hell. It's a wonder the girls who handle them aren't given safety goggles.

[last lines]

Mrs Warboys:
I'd better dash. As I say, I'd rather all this didn't go any further if you would. Because a lot of it was told to me in the strictest confidence, so... All the best to you both, then. Bye.

Lady in Tea Shop:
Bye.

Lady in Tea Shop:
Bye.

Lady in Tea Shop:
Nice woman.

Lady in Tea Shop:
Yes. Wonder who she was.

Victor Meldrew:
What language are you talking in now? It appears to be Bollocks.

Nick Swainey:
Wakey, wakey, everyone! It's quite nice out here now! I've just been watching two frogs having sex!

[last lines]

Official:
There's certainly evidence of some shocking mistreatment, no question about that. Biggest question of all is what happened to the staff. Where did they all vanish to suddenly? Can't get any sense out of the residents; just some story about a mystery man who appeared from nowhere in the middle of the night, like the Lone Ranger.

Official:
Tcha. I expect they all got the wind up. Decided to make a run for it before *we* got here.

Official:
Ah, I suppose that's it, yes. OK, sergeant, all yours for statements.

Victor Meldrew:
Oh, I very nearly forgot.

Miss Lander:
Nearly forgot what?

Victor Meldrew:
I very nearly forgot to call you an evil loathesome bastard. I wouldn't treat a sewer rat the way you treat these people and I shall be talking to the social services department first thing in the morning, to tell them about the sickening brutality that goes on around here in the name of geriatric care!

Miss Lander:
I have to look after the welfare of all my residents, not just one or two! You haven't the first understanding of the way their minds work, or the destructive behaviour they're capable of!

Victor Meldrew:
I'm sorry? Uh, what language are you talking in now? It appears to be BOLLOCKS!

[first lines]

Margaret Meldrew:
[answering phone] Four two nine one.

Margaret Meldrew:
Oh, hello, Jean.

Margaret Meldrew:
No, no, just out the back, putting Victor's spaghetti vongole through the incinerator.

Margaret Meldrew:
No, we've tried putting it in the bin; the dustmen won't touch it. Not after last Monday's episode with the lobster curry. Said it clogged up their crusher for a week. Not the effect it had on me, I can tell you. Oh, it's hideous Jean. Ever since he bought this seafood cookery book, every mealtime has been like a Quatermass Experiment; clams exploding in the microwave, God knows what. Oh, God, no! I've put a stop to it now, don't you worry about that!

Margaret Meldrew:
I've told you I am having no more of it.

Victor Meldrew:
I was just going to do a little bit of poached salmon for lunch. Nothing complicated; nothing that's going to smell.

Margaret Meldrew:
That's what you said about the squid in Stilton sauce, and they had half the road up outside looking for a gas leak,

[last lines]

Margaret Meldrew:
Victor! If you're opening up that hatch, he says be careful because they've just put a bag of plaster inside the counter...

Victor Meldrew:
Fine!

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
[singing] Oh Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling.

Margaret Meldrew:
You must be in a good mood.

Victor Meldrew:
Sunday morning, what is there to be miserable about? Sunday morning, the first day of a new week. I'm going to a nice little potter about in the garden where the insanities of life can't possibly upset me.

[last lines]

Margaret Meldrew:
Perhaps you should just have an early night tonight. You'll feel better in the morning.

Victor Meldrew:
Yes, I expect I will. Good night, then. Oh, if you should hear any sudden screams, it's just me smacking on some aftershave.

Victor Meldrew:
[Stuck in the shed due to infestation of bees] Oh god, I wish I was dead! Whose bloody bees are they?

Victor Meldrew:
Was it my imagination or have they just started building the worlds biggest sub-atomic particle accelerator to explain the very origins of the universe as we know it?

Margaret Meldrew:
What?

Victor Meldrew:
Strange then that they can't produce a toilet roll where the perforations are on the same place on either side of the paper.

Victor Meldrew:
Butterflies in the stomach, bees in the potting shed, loonies in the lavatory. I wonder what bounteous joys the rest of the week have in store? Bubonic plague? Nest of scorpions in the hoover bag? Late night shopping at Budgeons?

[first lines]

Margaret Meldrew:
That's the little caf? where we used to go for our breakfast. That was our last day in Athens, actually.

Mrs. Warboys:
Nice one of the ruins.

Margaret Meldrew:
I think that's the hotel. Oh! Your postcard. Which I gave to Victor to post.

Mrs. Warboys:
Thanks. [reads] "Arrived safe and sound. Plane trip fine apart from finding dead snake in the flight bag. Tell you all about that later."

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Twenty-five years it took to grow that apple tree. I planted it in the spring of 1965. Feeding it, spraying it, mulching the soil, watering it through the droughts, giving it an annual dressing of potash and hydrogen every January. Not one sodding apple.

Margaret Meldrew:
Come on, let's go plant another one.

Victor Meldrew:
[Looking through paper] Your fortune in the stars. Virgo. You will come back today from your holidays. Receive an extremely unpleasant rectal examination from three men in peaked caps. Your luggage will go missing in the other side of the world. Your house will be completely consumed by a hideous fire ball. You will end up tonight freezing to death on a demolition site dressed as the Sisco Kid. Absolutely uncanny. He's hit the nail right on the head and no mistake. I will never call Russell Grant a vacuous lump of whale blubber ever again.

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Unbelievable! Didn't you see what she was reading, at her age? Unbelievable!

Victor Meldrew:
What about her at her age?

Victor Meldrew:
'The Joy of Sex'. That old woman sitting next to me. I didn't know where to put my face.

Margaret Meldrew:
Well, it doesn't seem to have put you off finding words for this brain-teaser. Key word 'undemocratic'; what have you got? Mount, mate, moan, mound; ride, rude, crude, nude; rod, ram, nut; rat. Nice, cute, round, dome. And dormice. Very Freudian.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Should be home by seven, easily. I thought perhaps, uh, we might have an early night tonight.

Margaret Meldrew:
That'd be nice.

[repeated line]

April Bluett:
Here we are, my love!

April Bluett:
Here he is. Oh Victor, over here. We are at the captains table. Everything alright for you?

Victor Meldrew:
Generally speaking, no. I have just been into the bathroom in the top landing and discovered a dead seagull in the lavatory.

April Bluett:
[laughs] You see what I mean. It doesn't matter what he says. He's got that dry wit.

Victor Meldrew:
I'm not joking. It's in there. I lifted up the seat and there it was staring at me. One of its feet caught in that little lemon freshner thing.

April Bluett:
[April continues to laugh]

Victor Meldrew:
I'm being serious for god sake.

April Bluett:
Oh dear. What really? It must have flown through the window and fallen in the bowl

Victor Meldrew:
Well, I didn't imagine that it had come out of someones bottom. I just wanted to know what you were going to do about it - out of general academic interest.

Victor Meldrew:
Where have you been all day? Joyriding about the place?

Margaret Meldrew:
Here and there you know. Down the front, around the shops, bought a few cards. What about you?

Victor Meldrew:
Me? Nothing much, I was force fed Weetabix puree and sentenced to death, an average day really.

Vince Bluett:
[watering his cucumbers] Good morning my tasty greens!

[first lines]

Jack Aylesbury:
[watching TV] Oh, pass it up, for Christ's sake! Look at him. We're in for a bloody sight-seeing tour of Milan now. Get rid of it, man!

[the doorbell rings]

Pat Aylesbury:
Who's that, for goodness sake? [leaves the room]

Jack Aylesbury:
Oh, give me a break! Why don't you just gift-wrap the ball and tie a ribbon on it for him?

Sales Assistant:
We can have it delivered to you first thing Monday morning.

Margaret Meldrew:
Not until then?

Sales Assistant:
That all right for you?

Sales Assistant:
All right? I have just spent the most unutterably miserable week of my entire life coping with a husband deprived of his television set. If I have to prolong that agony for another hour, let alone another weekend, I may just do something very regrettable with a pair of razor-tipped salad tongs.

[last lines]

Sales Assistant:
You're in luck, Mrs Meldrew. We can have your new television set with you Saturday afternoon at three.

Margaret Meldrew:
No, that's all right. Monday morning will be fine.

Victor Meldrew:
Surely you can't change a lightbulb if you've only got one arm?

Mrs Warboys:
[Drunk] You can if you've still got the receipt.

Margaret Meldrew:
I wasn't that keen on coming to Portugal at first. But now that we're about to leave, I never want to see the bloody place again as long as I live.

Victor Meldrew:
Yes, that's the good thing about a bad holiday, is going home, which is a positive joy. I remember the last time we went on holiday, we came home to find that our house had been demolished.

Mrs Warboys:
[laughs] Yes, funny you can laugh about it now, right?

Margaret Meldrew, Victor Meldrew:
[They both stare at her angrily, not laughing]

Mrs Warboys:
I suppose you can't really.

[Margaret and Victor are in a morgue to identify a body and there is only a human foot]

Victor Meldrew:
What is this? A new version of Cinderella by David Lynch?

Hugo:
How do I feel? I just spent seven hours of total sensory deprivation throwing up and pulling live herrings out of my underpants.

Martin Trout:
[to Victor] Oi you! Superman's grandad!

[referring to his red and blue clothing]

Martin Trout:
I've travelled halfway through bloody Europe getting half killed, looking for a roll of film that all the time was in the lining of my own bleeding jacket!

Victor Meldrew:
Yes, everyone else maybe melting to death on the roads but not us! Because we have a car with hair conditionor! I mean what in the name of sanity did they thing we wanted it for? To make sure that the roof rack was more shining and managable?

Margaret Meldrew:
Perhaps you'd like to put her down, Victor? You've just saved the woman from choking, you don't want to kill her with the aftershave.

Old Man:
[Mistaking Mrs Warboys for a prostitute] You are a very hot lady!

Mrs Warboys:
Yes, I'm not used to your climate I'm afraid.

Margaret Meldrew:
[about Mrs Warboys] I just cannot believe she was left there like that, in that condition. Next to a complete sheer drop. In total darkness!

Victor Meldrew:
Yes, well there's no point blaming yourself.

[Margaret turns to him, stammering in anger and disbelief]

Margaret Meldrew:
I wouldn't put it past you to have thust her up in a sack and thrown her in!

Victor Meldrew:
Oh for goodness's sake!

Margaret Meldrew:
You have never liked the woman, as long as you've known her! To you, she was just a jibbering old bat, who popped round twice a week to polish off our digestive biscuits!

Mrs Warboys:
[eating a plate of spaghetti Margaret has just given her] This is nice. Not that I can taste it with my allergy of course; might be absolutely horrible.

Mrs Warboys:
[about the film they just watched] Why did those detectives ask David Dimbleby for his sperm?

Victor Meldrew:
To eliminate him from their inquiries.

Mrs Warboys:
Oh, I see.

Victor Meldrew:
The police can use sperm now as a way of fingerprinting people.

Mrs Warboys:
[with a long face] Don't see what was wrong with the old ink pads.

Mrs Warboys:
[cleaning Margaret's cupboards] Morning. Just thought I'd get some of the filth out of these cupboards for you.

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Well, that's that over for another year. The joyous ritual of our annual pilgrimage to see great-aunt Joyce. Gets more like entering a mummy's tomb every time we go there.

Margaret Meldrew:
Is it my imagination, or has it got cold in here?

Victor Meldrew:
Still, these'll be a real godsend, won't they! A pair of gloves with six fingers in each hand. Trying to tell me I'd grow into them. What's she going to knit for me next time, a balaclava with two heads?

[last lines]

Reporter:
Tonight, as the furore mounts over a local newspaper's unwarranted intrusion into the privacy of its MP, we give the paper's editor, Victor Meldrew, a taste of his own medicine. We ask the question, "You can dish it out to others, but can you take it yourself?"

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
One thousand five hundred and ninety... two.

Margaret Meldrew:
What?

Victor Meldrew:
Leaves on that plant. There was only one thousand five hundred and *three* when we came in.

Margaret Meldrew:
Don't talk such utter drivel.

Victor Meldrew:
I'm telling you!

Margaret Meldrew:
It's artificial.

Victor Meldrew:
Is it?

Victor Meldrew:
There's a spider in my flies. Look at that; there he goes, just struggling to get in through the buttonhole.

Margaret Meldrew:
You sure he's not struggling to get out?

Victor Meldrew:
There's nothing inside there that a spider wouldn't want to see.

Margaret Meldrew:
I expect. Be at home among the cobwebs.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
You were always my first choice.

Margaret Meldrew:
Was I? You've never said that before.

Victor Meldrew:
No, well.

Margaret Meldrew:
Oh, I suppose there's lots of things you never say. That you think about saying and something always crops up. Life goes on. Somehow you never quite get round to putting it into words.

Victor Meldrew:
I can only think of one thing worse than dying. And that's living forever. I mean, can you just imagine how terrible that would actually be?

Victor Meldrew:
One thing you can be sure about in life: just when you think that things are never ever going to get better, they suddenly get worse.

[first lines]

Radio Announcer:
So, on line two we have Patrick. Good evening to you, Patrick, and what's your question for Mimsy Berkovitz?

Patrick:
Well, it's a bit of a tricky one, but, uh, put simply my wife and I live next door to a man that... if I tell you a few weeks ago he put a specially trained crab up my shorts while I was a asleep in the garden, and that I had to be rushed to hospital with it hanging between my legs like a passenger on a tube train, uh, you'll get some idea of the problem; and what's tricky is that they've invited us round the house tomorrow for a meal to try and patch things up. I just wonder if we should risk it.

Fire Officer:
Now then, you've now idea who these pranksters are, then, that keep ringing us up.

Victor Meldrew:
No! Presumably somebody I've annoyed in the past who's trying to get their own back.

Margaret Meldrew:
We've drawn up a short list of five thousand names.

Margaret Meldrew:
Victor's been acting a very... odd way.

Nick Swainey:
How do you mean odd?

Margaret Meldrew:
Well I don't know how to explain it. Cheerful.

Nick Swainey:
Oh crikey!

[Patrick and Pippa are in Victor's house which is full of prosthetic body parts]

Patrick:
[picking up a ring box] So what do you suppose I'll find in this ring box?

Pippa:
A ring?

[he opens it to find a glass eye inside]

Patrick:
Not even warm.

[after accidently destroying Patrick's boss's new summer house while driving recklessly on a motomower]

Victor Meldrew:
It's alright! I think I've got the hang of it now!

Vagrant & Millichope:
[to Mrs Warboys] Someone should tell you, you're really tedious company!

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
[angrily on the phone] Oh is that right, Mr Blizzard? Well funnily enough, the fact that you've got it "firmly in hand" does not surprise me at all. It's something I would expect from a complete and utter wan...

[Mrs Warboys is seeing for the first time a waxwork likeness of herself]

Jean:
I must have been out of my tiny mind to think that anyone would want this in their house. Other than to scare away the rats. It's absolutely hideous.

Margaret:
Very good likeness, though.

Margaret:
In future, we'll be getting our potatoes from Sainsbury's!

Margaret:
It's called "trust", Millicent. You should try looking it up in the dictionary some time; it's next to "trollop".

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
The absolute limit that was. You wouldn't believe that anyone could pick their nose all the way through 'Dances with Wolves', would you? Three and a half hours I had to sit next to that. And always the right nostril; he never touched the left one. Always the one at *my* side! You'd think he was digging the channel tunnel. Really. Come on, what's the matter? I'm ruddy freezing out here.

Margaret Meldrew:
It won't turn! It's jammed again, bloody thing!

Victor Meldrew:
You're joking, surely. Here, give it here. I managed it this morning by jiggling slightly to the... Little bugger! Turn for God's sake!

Margaret Meldrew:
Two hundred and sixty pounds we paid for this. A complete set of new locks so secure that even we can't get in! Good old Yellow Pages.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
There aren't many wives who'd forgive me for going round to her house in the first place, even just to watch football.

Margaret Meldrew:
Wouldn't they?

Victor Meldrew:
I mean, at least we're a bit more mature than that.

Margaret Meldrew:
Yes.

[Victor screams in pain]

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Oh, God Al-mighty!

Margaret Meldrew:
Want a sucky sweet?

Victor Meldrew:
Sucky sweet! I'll be sucking on that exhaust pipe in a minute, much more of this.

[Victor is stuck in traffic - a man leans out and talks to him]

Salmon:
No! Recession, what recession? Not from where I'm sitting. And I've got two salons in North London both doing serious business. The way I look at it is, well, the economy may stop growing, but your hair doesn't, know what I'm saying? So I'm now looking at options for a third outlet in Pimlico. Probably opening next summer. So you just pop along, mention my name, and get a free shampoo and set on the house. Just say you're friends with Mr. Salmon.

[it is then noticed that Salmon is acually talking to two women in the car beside Victor's, but is doing so through Victors car window]

Lisa:
Oooh, I don't know.

Carol:
Sounds a bit fishy to me.

Lisa:
You could be anybody.

Salmon:
But you'll just have to trust me, won't you, my sweetheart. I'll tell you what, you can have a full perm for half price. What did you say your name was?

Lisa:
Lisa.

Salmon:
Lisa. And your friend?

Carol:
Carol.

Salmon:
Carol. You can have the full works. Cut, dyed and blow dried all at twenty percent discount. And I might even take you out for a drink afterwards; now I can't say fairer than that, can I?

Lisa:
How do you know I'm not a natural blonde?

Salmon:
Well, that's for you to prove otherwise, isn't it.

Victor Meldrew:
Oh, for God's sake! I think I may throw up!

Salmon:
Sorry, what's your problem, matey?

Victor Meldrew:
Why don't you just dangle your private parts out of the window?

Victor Meldrew:
There's a wasp in the middle of this ice cube.

Mrs Warboys:
I know. It was the only one left; I didn't think you were all that fussy.

Victor Meldrew:
Didn't think I was all that fussy! I'll have a slice of dead rat in it as well if you've got one, please, and a dog turd on a cocktail stick.

Victor Meldrew:
[complaining on being stuck for a long time in a traffic jam] I wish I was dead!

Margaret Meldrew:
I wish you were dead. Then we might get some peace.

Car Mechanic 1:
[singing on tape to the tune of the hymn 'Guide Me O Thou Great Redeemer'] There's a bloke we can't stand any longer/Always on the bleedin' moan/Every time we mend his bloody Honda/He starts grousing on the phone.

Car Mechanic 2:
First, we fixed his car's ignition/Checked his brakes and clutch and then/Overhauled his whole transmission

Car Mechanic 1, Car Mechanic 2:
He just brought it back again/Victor Meldrew, Victor Meldrew/He can stick it up his bum

Car Mechanic 2:
up his bum

Car Mechanic 1, Car Mechanic 2:
He can bugger off to kingdom come.

Victor Meldrew:
Mirror image of your life really, isn't it? Car journey on a bank holiday. First fifty-odd miles on the go all the way - a sense of direction - bowling along. Get past sixty, everything slows down to a sudden crawl and you realise you're not going anywhere any more. All the things you thought you were going to do that never came to anything. And you can't turn the clock back. One way traffic just gradually grinding to a complete halt.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Oh, God, I'm bloody ravenous now. I can't last a moment longer. It's no good. I'm afraid there's only one thing for it: we'll have to eat Mrs Warboys. I know she's a bit gristly but these are desperate times, and as a close friend of the family I'm sure she will agree to do the decent thing and shoot herself. It's either that, or...

Mrs Warboys:
Or what, Mr Meldrew?

Victor Meldrew:
Or... [sighs deeply] Where's the sucky sweets?

Victor Meldrew:
[staring at horse-box] Like watching a party political broadcast by Kenneth Clarke.

Victor Meldrew:
[turns off radio] God, bloody Derek Jameson. Rather listen to the back end of a horse, thank you very much.

Margaret Meldrew:
[doing crossword] What's another name for the dung-beetle?

Victor Meldrew:
Gyles Brandreth. Another one I can't stand for love nor money.

Margaret Meldrew:
She's dead!

Victor Meldrew:
She can't be dead! She's the bloody health and fitness instructor!

[first lines]

Margaret Meldrew:
Are you sure you don't want to have...

Window Cleaner:
I don't want anything. I want me four pound fifty, then I'm going straight back and reporting this to the police.

Margaret Meldrew:
Yes, well, look, I'm sure it's just a misunderstanding.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Here we are. Where are you hiding this morning? Bet you're thirsty, little thing.

Victor Meldrew:
Well that's another evening of rip roaring humdingery entertainment drawn to a close then!

[first lines]

Chinese Youth:
Two special fried rice and two sweet and sour chicken balls. Bye.

Victor Meldrew:
I noticed those women are still hanging about in there. Might as well hang a red light over the front door and be done with it.

Margaret Meldrew:
What? Prostitutes?

Victor Meldrew:
Prostitutes? I didn't know whose price list to ask for first. Skirts up to their nostrils; you know damn well they're not waiting for crispy duck.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Something the matter?

Patrick:
[looks at hose] There was one slight, small question that was bothering me, yes, but I don't suppose it really matters much, one way or the other.

Victor Meldrew:
What question's that?

Patrick:
I was just wondering how you're going to get the end of this hosepipe out of your bottom.

[first lines]

Art Teacher:
Now, you see, if you follow the actual curve of the thigh right the way up to the waist, you can see it's- Mr Meldrew.

Victor Meldrew:
[looking away] Mm?

Art Teacher:
You can see that it's actually a virtual right-angle. There, you see?

Victor Meldrew:
Yes.

Art Teacher:
Now, look at *her* thighs, and look at *your* thighs.

[Victor grunts]

Art Teacher:
Not at the floor, Mr Meldrew, at her thighs. There aren't any thighs on the floor, are there?

Victor Meldrew:
No.

Victor Meldrew:
I'm going down to the phone box to try and get through to someone helpful at British Telecom. I'm sorry, I seem to be uttering the demented gibberings of a madman.

Margaret Meldrew:
What time's your appointment with the dentist this morning?

Victor Meldrew:
11.30

Margaret Meldrew:
Thank God for that. I've seen enough of those temporary crowns to last me a lifetime. It's like being kissed good-night by Bugs Bunny.

Margaret Meldrew:
You haven't forgotten we're going to Ronnie and Mildred's tonight?

Victor Meldrew:
I try to forget we're going to Ronnie and Mildred's tonight, like you try to forget you're going to die, but it doesn't work. I wonder what hideous novelties they'll have brought back from their holidays this year? Another souvenir photograph printed on the back of a lavatory seat? I can't believe that pair sometimes.

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Unbelievable! I mean, look at that! Wandering about his bedroom without a stitch on. Naked as the day he was born; talk about being an exhibitionist. I thought he'd one of those balloon animals tied to his waist when he first walked in.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
I think this time we've been lucky, actually. I can't see any damage, can you?

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
[looking out of the bathroom window] There's a rat going up his front lawn, now.

Margaret Meldrew:
[cleaning the bath tub] I could stuff a mattress with your pubic hair!

[first lines]

Margaret's mother:
Hello? Margaret, this is your mum speaking. I'm 'prised I'm not here now, but that's because I'm somewhere else. I say, I'm somewhere else! But I bet you'll both be up here soon, won't you? The pair of you. So, I'll see you then. Hello? [beep sounds]

Margaret Meldrew:
Hello, mum. It's Wednesday at six o'clock. I'm just ringing to say that all being well we'll be up there Sunday afternoon about three, but I'll speak to you soon. Bye-bye.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
[to the grandfather clock] Not yet you don't, matey.

Margaret Meldrew:
Both been out somewhere?

Patrick:
Uh, yes, just around the hospital, yes. To have a hermit crab surgically removed from my testicles.

Victor Meldrew:
Get your bloody nose out of that bread bin!

[first lines]

Margaret Meldrew:
So, how's the food poisoning now?

Margaret Meldrew:
Oh, comes and goes when it thinks it will, you know. One minute I'm fine and the next minute... unh.

Margaret Meldrew:
Violently sick.

Mrs. Warboys:
Umh. This is nice; what is it?

Margaret Meldrew:
Well, I got the recipe from my- Oh, how was it?

Victor Meldrew:
Yes, very nice, very nice with my grey coat.

Margaret Meldrew:
Try it more at an angle. You've got it jammed on there like an aerosol cap. You need it more to one side. [she adjusts his hat] There. Makes you look more distinguished.

Mrs. Warboys:
Very smart. He looks like President Gorbachev.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
I suppose I am worrying about all this unduly, as usual. When you actually get to it, things often aren't as bad as you expect, are they? No, you're quite right, Margaret. I think I'm going to be all right on this plane trip after all.

Margaret Meldrew:
[sbout Victor] What was it he said last year? He'd rather have two weeks at a sea-side guest house run by Pol Pot. Than go up in an aeroplane.

Victor Meldrew:
OH MY GOD, NO!

Margaret Meldrew:
Whatever is it? What's happened?

Victor Meldrew:
Gloria Hunniford is on breakfast television.

[after the dustman spots a python slythering up Victor's stairs]

Dustman:
[in a strong Geordie accent] You sly old bugga you! You're not tellin' me you're keeping snakes like that in ea!

Victor Meldrew:
Y-y yes... well thank you very much for the...

Dustman:
When saw that going up the stairs I told the sly old bugga! I keep them meself ya kna! Oh yeah I got seven ya kna, I've fouwa tanks, fouwa tanks. I've got two upstairs and two doonstairs. I've got three wattlesnakes, two whipsnakes, a boomslang-a, a rear fang, an un, an un, listen to this! A rhombic night adder.

Victor Meldrew:
[not taking in a word he's saying] I see.

Dustman:
And by the luck of it mate, it's a cunny little sample an all, I'll tell ya. But if I was yu, I'd-a put it back in the tank ya kna, shoulda put it back in the tank. Cause they like to get in the hoos, ya kna! They wander aboot! They gaw all over the place if you let them! Ya kna what I mean?

Victor Meldrew:
I asked him if, for the time being, he'd put it in the downstairs toilet for me, and you know what he's done? He's only planted it in the pan! Yes, actually in the lavatory pan, with compost and everything! I mean, how anyone can be so utterly goofy just boggles the mind. [pause] A mistake anyone could have made? Are you stark, sta- I mean, what am I supposed to do, cock my leg against the trunk like a Yorkshire terrier?

Victor Meldrew:
[referring to Pepto-Bismol] Never know whether to drink this stuff or clean the windows with it.

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Tch. Switchboard operators, say they're going to put you through, then leave you here to rot to death. [pause] Speak to you like an insect into the bargain. [pause] If I've been cut o- Hello, yes. I don't know if you remember me, Victor Meldrew, the talking cockroach.

Victor Meldrew:
[yawns] What makes you yawn, apart from anything starring Robert Mitchum?

Victor Meldrew:
Now, where's my flannel got to? I leave it on the rail, and she has to put it away 'so we know where things are'. Well, it doesn't work, does it, cause I bloody well don't know where things are. The riddle of the Bermuda Triangle was finally solved today when it was revealed that Mrs Margaret Meldrew of 19 Riverbank had for the past fifty years been putting all the ships and planes away so we'd know where they were.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
[on phone, yelling] Hello! Yes, I'd like to speak to the manager, please, and quick about it!

Victor Meldrew:
Meldrew!

Victor Meldrew:
No, he doesn't but he bloody well will shortly.

Victor Meldrew:
I'll tell you exactly what the problem is! I have just bought a large loaf of your...

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
That's the last time I go out photographing badgers.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
What the hell can I smell by this sideboard?

Margaret Meldrew:
[after finding a dead cat in the freezer] I've come over all cold!

Victor Meldrew:
*You've* come over all cold?

Margaret Meldrew:
You know he can't smell a thing Jean, not since that accident up his left nostril last Summer.

Mrs. Warboys:
Ah well, that was asking for trouble wasn't it. You should never try and sniff a live wasp Mr Meldrew. It's a well known fact.

Victor Meldrew:
I was not sniffing a live wasp. What do you think I am, some sort of village idiot? I was smelling a Rhododendron. I didn't see the wasp until...

[first lines]

Mrs Warboys:
What's this? More paraphernalia?

Margaret Meldrew:
[reads] 'Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents'. Some survey or other. I thought I'd fill it in while we're waiting for the x-rays. [reads] 'Give a brief description of how the accident occurred.'

Mrs Warboys:
A garden shed fell on him.

Margaret Meldrew:
I put: Rotting timbers collapsed on head while dismantling old outhouse in rear garden. [reads] 'Was the accident unavoidable or due to the patient's carelessness?'

Mrs Warboys:
Carelessness. Put stupidity. That was asking for trouble in anyone's book, unscrewing all the nails in the building before you've taken the roof off.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Seventy-two hours of non-stop madness, misery, and mayhem, beyond all belief. [sighs] At least we've escaped from the worst horror of all.

[Victor opens the door and enters the living room]

Wilfred, Mildred:
Surprise, surprise!

Margaret Meldrew:
We'll be out tomorrow evening with Jean at the BBC.

Victor Meldrew:
Ye-es. I expect she's booked us into another real side-splitter, has she? Like the last show I went up there to see, it was supposed to be a glitter evening at Television Centre; the most exciting moment was urinating next to Peter Sissons.

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Oh, misery me.

Margaret Meldrew:
[the power comes back] At last!

Victor Meldrew:
The relief!

[the power goes back out again]

Victor Meldrew:
I do not believe it!

Margaret Meldrew:
False alarm.

[first lines]

[Victor is tossing and turning]

Margaret Meldrew:
Try counting something.

Victor Meldrew:
Yes. I'll try counting my blessings. [short pause] Well, that didn't take very long.

[last lines]

Margaret Meldrew:
You won't be able to have porridge for your breakfast tomorrow; we're out of milk.

Victor Meldrew:
Hmph. I'll have powered.

Margaret Meldrew:
We're also out of porridge.

Victor Meldrew:
Aaaah. Well, I'll have something different.

Margaret Meldrew:
What?

Victor Meldrew:
Hmmmmm. I think I might try worms and toast for a change.

Margaret Meldrew:
We'll open a new can in the morning.

Victor Meldrew:
Yes, we always seem to.

[after Victor has entered the room after going outside to turn the alarm off]

Margaret Meldrew:
Victor, what on earth's that you got on your foot?

Victor Meldrew:
Where?

[she turns the light on, then screams]

Margaret Meldrew:
You've got your foot in a rotting hedgehog!

Victor Meldrew:
When you think about it, nothing ever exists, in fact. I was working this out in the post office as I was waiting for that woman to finish twanging her elastic bands. The future doesn't exist because it hasn't happened yet; the past doesn't exist because it's already over. But the present doesn't exist, because as soon as you start to think about it it's already in the past. Which doesn't exist any more.

[first lines]

Patrick:
[keyed into his computer] Saturday, July 1st. The end to a week of perfect bliss: The Biggest Cretin in Christendom returns today from holiday. The man is goofy beyond belief, and seems to delight in making my life a complete misery. But for once I'm about to get my own back. Ha ha ha! Because what Meldrew doesn't know is that [he continues to type]

Pippa:
Are you nearly finished with that? I've got some letters to write. Hey! Listen to this. It's from Mr Hithercroft; you know, that old bloke with the monocle. Says: "Thank you so much for showing me round your house last Thursday. It is a truly delightful property and I should very much like to arrange a return visit to inspect it more closely." Mmmm. "I hope you will not mind if this time I bring along my camera, as I am very keen to take some photographs of you in the nude. I have a fine collection of World War II gas masks which, if you are agreeable, we..." Oh, dear! I think I feel sick.

Patrick:
Hmm, sounds quite promising, then.

Pippa:
Why... What... I beg your pardon!

Patrick:
Well, it's only a bit of fun, presumably. You never know, might be serious. We are desperate.

Pippa:
We're not *that* bloody desperate. In any case, it's addressed to *you*!

Margaret Meldrew:
You talk about being sensitive; I'm afraid that's Victor's trouble. He's the most sensitive person I've ever met. And that's why I love him and why I constantly want to ram his head through a television screen.

Margaret Meldrew:
Do you know what's actually worse than warm champagne?

Ben:
No.

Margaret Meldrew:
No, I really don't think you do.

[last lines]

Patrick:
What was that letter you said you typed up for him?

Pippa:
Oh, just a letter to the dairy, about compensation for that milk tanker going into his lamppost. It was only a couple of pages. You don't mind do you?

Patrick:
*Dairy*. [looks at computer screen] Oh my God, no. You, you didn't name the file Dairy?

Pippa:
Why? What was wrong with that? What's the matter now? What's happened? [looks at computer screen] Oh no.

Patrick:
Rather afraid you did.

[the computer screen shows 'File Printed - DIARY']

Victor Meldrew:
[sees a trolly on top of a chimney of a nearby house] Welcome back to suburbia.

Victor Meldrew:
[talking in his sleep] Not with the pastry... Not with the pastry!

Margaret Meldrew:
For God's sake, shut up!

Victor Meldrew:
[waking up] What's the matter?

Margaret Meldrew:
Will you stop going on about that bloody pastry every time you fall asleep?

Victor Meldrew:
Pastry? Why on earth would I talk about pastry in my sleep?

Margaret Meldrew:
I don't know.

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
[on the phone] Mel-drew!

Victor Meldrew:
Who? Well, put Mavis on, then.

Victor Meldrew:
I don't care is she is reproofing a yashmak; I want to speak to her. [to Margaret] Usual performance. She takes my ticket, disappears for half an hour, comes back. "Do you remember when you brought them in?" "Yes, last Thursday." Off she goes again, comes back. "What colour were they?" "Light grey." Off she goes again. still com- Hello!

Victor Meldrew:
Yes, I have got them here at home with me. I'm just wondering what idea of this rather offensive piece of paper I just found speared to the hook. [reads] "This garment was extremely badly soiled and bore stains of an unusually resilient nature."

Victor Meldrew:
What's it got to do with you? I bring my trousers in, I expect them to be dry cleaned, not reviewed in print by the laundry critic of the Sunday Times. You might as well get Bernard Levin to do an essay in my socks and be done with it.

Victor Meldrew:
Yeh! That's just the sort of remark I expected. I don't know why I bother.

[last lines]

Margaret Meldrew:
By the way, I meant to tell you, I got another tortoise. I took it round to them this afternoon. They don't suspect a thing, so don't you say anything, right? Let's just let sleeping dogs lie.

Victor Meldrew:
I rang her up this morning just after you'd gone. I told her it was dead.

Margaret Meldrew:
But she didn't... oh... No.

Victor Meldrew:
If that's another man that looks like Buddy Holly trying to sell us Sky Television tell him that we're both blind and deaf. We don't need one of his satellite dishes. I'll weld a bidet to the side of the house and it will be less of an eye sore

[first lines]

Victor Meldrew:
Who do you reckon did it, then?

Margaret Meldrew:
His nephew Basil.

Victor Meldrew:
Why?

Margaret Meldrew:
Because, when they found the old man's body in the herb garden, that's what he was clutching in his hand, a piece of basil.

Victor Meldrew:
Haaaah. Lucky he wasn't killed by his uncle *Dick*.

[last lines]

Victor Meldrew:
What would make an old man like that suddenly part with all the money he's got in the world?

Victor Meldrew:
"Well unless a very large jackdaw was carrying it back to its nest....."