Why Muck About with Yourself?

So the flats that Owen and Gary are building are actually called ‘The Mill’? And so, last night, someone actually got to say the immortal line, ‘There’s been some trouble at t’Mill?’

How did they manage to hold off that line for so long – or have I missed it?

The trouble was that evil Phelan had hired a very insidious individual called Clive to take over as foreman, and put even more pressure on the Windass men. Clive didn’t have many lines: he just smirked and smoked cigarettes not very realistically next to containers that had ‘NO NAKED FLAMES’ stencilled on their sides.

This must have been what gave Owen the idea. Owen’s near breaking point – his masculinity impugned, his occupation gone. He thought that he’d bring all their troubles to a head by burning the whole Mill down. This, while the rest of the family were out enjoying their youngest, mardiest daughter’s school play – ‘Fiddler on the Roof.’ (As opposed to ‘Potential Arsonist Upstairs in the Luxury Apartments.’)  Luckily, Anna was in time to stop him, grabbing the matches and shouting at him.

I’m looking forward to an end of the Windasses’ troubles just so that Anna can buy herself a new anorak. She always seems a bit tightly buttoned up in the one she’s got. Or maybe it’s just that we see her taking it off and putting it on a lot? She’s either getting ready to leave home, or leaving work at Roy’s Rolls. It’s soap shorthand for a busy, hard-working life – the rapid buttoning of an anorak.

On the other hand, shorthand for a leisurely life in Corrie is two visits to the Rover’s bar in one day. Audrey was doing a lot of propping up of said bar during bouts of hairdressing last night. When there was a kerfuffle over who was going to pick up Maria’s child, she hissed at Marcus that she would normally step in, but she’d already had three G&T’s. Later that night she was back for more. Is this just sloppy scripting, with Audrey required to be in the same place twice over an extended period of time, or are they turning her into a lush on purpose? I wouldn’t be averse to that idea, actually. I’d like to see Audrey behaving badly.

But maybe we have enough characters going off the deep end? The girl in the huge earrings looks like she’s out for revenge, glaring balefully from the bar at Peter and Carla as they (mystifyingly) spent the whole day getting a horrid, wrinkled, ginger-haired man as drunk as they could (I never understood why they were doing this. Was he more likely to make a jumbo purchase of fancy knickers from their factory?)

Also, Gary is reaching a dangerous point, too – and is set to go doo-lally. He was trembling at the bottom of the Windass garden and you could tell things were bad because when Anna went out to check on him, his point of view was all handheld camera-work. Which is a very bad sign.

Also, Maria is on the tipping point. I mean, I know she was betrayed by Marcus and she saw more than she bargained for in the Show Home, but I wonder if she isn’t taking it all too far? It seems a bit rough never to let Marcus ever again see the kid he’d been helping her bring up. Maria’s getting a bit bitter and twisted, up there in her flat. Even Audrey (who went round – after a good amount of gin) seems to be on the point of losing some sympathy for her.

Luckily, there was Kirk talking sense before the evening’s episodes were over. His girlfriend Beth Tinker is still sore over the ‘spaniel’s ears’ jibes in her local paper and last night she revealed her intention to blow her five grand reward money on having her boobs enlarged. She sat in the bosom of her family in a spangly top, unashamedly telling them where her nest egg was going. Kirk – bless him – told her that no woman’s value was down to mere appearance. He’s like an idiot savant – somehow hitting upon just the right thing to say. But no one is listening to him, usually, and the fools just plough on regardless.

Kirk is the hero of the street these days, I reckon – warning folk against ‘mucking about with themselves.’ He wants everything to stay calm and carry on, and nobody going daft or doing anything rash. He’s a very wise man, I’d say.