Good Neighbors (1975–1978): Season 1, Episode 1 - Plough Your Own Furrow - full transcript
Tom Good is celebrating his 40th birthday and reflects on life and the lack of satisfaction he's found. He realizes he is searching for 'it' but can't define what that actually means. In a flash of inspiration he discovers needs break the chains and attempt to become self sufficient from the rest of the world. Barbara his wife sees his infectious and agrees to be part of Tom's new world. The neighbor's reaction is far less positive and conflict appears on the horizon
Urgh.
(Chuckles)
(Chuckles)
“Mozart and Mendelssohn
were dead by 40.
"Why aren't you?"
How thoughtful.
You bitch!
- Did you call?
- Look...
when I get a birthday card from my Wife, I
expect a sentimental, loving, sickly verse,
not, "Another nail in
your coffin, you old wreck."
Blow your candle
out and eat your cake.
It's half-past eight
in the morning!
Still...
Yes. Well,
it is half-past eight, isn't it?
Hello, hello, hello!
What have you got
there? Come on, you!
Hand over my present.
Come on. Give it to me!
Agh! All right. I'll give it,
I'll give it.
What have we here? It's a book.
You got it!
- There's more. Listen.
- Not Vaughan Williams.
- Sophie Tucker.
- Sophie...
I ..that life begins at 40
J“ That's when love and living
start to become a gentle art
Funny old age, isn't it, 40?
- She was 78 when she made that.
- Not Sophie Tucker, me.
It's one of those
milestone ages, isn't it?
- Life begins at 40.
- That's a fallacy, for a start
Did you know that after the
age of 40, the body runs down?
Something like two million cells die per
day and they're not replaced, not ever.
What pan of the body do
these cells disappear from?
All over.
Eurgh!
I don't feel old. I don't feel any
older than yesterday when I was 39.
- It's just that I'm doing a review.
- Can I be in it?
I-E-W. Son of stocktaking.
I'm not getting bitter and twisted. I'm
not saying, “I've had a rotten life.“
Do you realise that Rachmaninov composed
his first piano concerto at the age of 19?
♪ Pom, pOm-Da-Pom
♪ Pom-pa-pom... - That's Grieg.
Is it'? Well, never mind. Grieg.
It's just a feeling I've got.
- Is it me'?
- See that'?
- Job, then.
- Ah, not especially. A job is a job is a job.
It wouldn't make it any better if
I was designing something useful.
I'd still be a grotty, little
cog in a whacking great machine.
No,
it's... I don't know. It's...
It's quality of life. That's what I'm
after. lfl could just get it right.
What's "it"?
"It"?
Well, "it" is...
“it!
If I see it lying about I shall say, "Now,
look here, it, my husband's had enough of you."
- I'm not being very specific, am I'?
- Borderline.
Don't worry. I'm not going broody.
I'm not doing an "if only".
No, I'll tackle it and get it
right, as soon as I know what it is.
- (Car horn toots)
- There's Jerry.
Here we go again.
Ta.
(Groans)
Commute! Commute!
Commute! Commute!
- (As Daleks) Goodbye, darling.
- Goodbye, darling.
- Have a nice day.
- Have a nice day.
- Keep your bowels open.
- Keep your bowels open.
- Kiss.
- Kiss.
BOTH: Zzz!
- Morning.
- I see the pills aren't having any effect.
- Car going yet?
- No.
Get in.
You look like an advert
for Gracious Living.
I am.
Tom Good riposted with his first
bon mot of the day. Shut your gob.
Morning, Mr Leadbetter.
Morning, Charles.
Morning, Mr er...
I've really made an impact with
you over the years, haven't I?
Well... I've got sciatica.
- Good.
- Charming.
No, no, no. That's my name. Cor blimey,
I've only been here eight years.
Morning,
morning! Lovely morning!
- Good morning! ALL:
(Half-heanedly) Good morning.
(Groans)
(Laughs evilly)
Here,
Phil. Phil! Come on! Come on!
To you. Come on! Hey, come on!
(Laughs) Come on, come on.
Phew!
- Are you phewing at this, Brian?
- I am, Mr Good. It really is something, isn't it?
Yes, it is.
It's a mould for a plastic hippopotamus that's
going to end up in a packet of breakfast cereal.
You gotta hand it to the
ideas men on the fifth floor.
Electric shock treatment,
preferably. Ideas men?
They sit up there like the
gargoyles on top of Notre Dame.
Every now and again, one puts
on his jester's cap and says,
“Eureka! Hippopotamus!"
I'm sorry, Mr Good. I didn't mean
to take any credit away from you.
Everybody knows it's you
Who brings their ideas to life.
That is guilt by association.
Oh, come, you wouldn't want
us to go back to the Dark Ages.
Breakfast cereals
Without little plastic gifts?
It would still taste the same.
That's hardly the point, surely?
I'm talking about
aesthetic values.
Your hippopotamus, for example.
My...'.7
Sit down, Brian.
Now, look, Why don't
you try to get out more?
- Pardon?
- Well...
Lusting after women,
playing sport.
I played cricket on Sunday.
Fine! Great! Let's talk about
cricket for a couple of hours.
(Phone rings)
Hello. Yes, Jerry.
- I'll be up. Sixth floor.
- Get a move on.
- Cricket!
- But that...
- Cricket. Who did you play for?
- Well, just the office.
Office, fine. That's
all I wanted to know.
- Which office?
- Well, this office here.
We played Accounts.
I'm in this office.
- Nobody asked me.
- We didn't need to. We got my dad to umpire.
I'm not talking about umpiring.
I would have liked to play.
- Play? You?
- Well, Why not me?
Well, you're... We didn't think
you'd still feel up to it at er...
- At my age, do you mean?
- Yes.
I might tell you
that Jack Hobbs scored more than half of his
first-class centuries when he was past 40.
Who's Jack Hobbs?
You bloody little swine!
Listen,
you lot! I am a run machine!
A run machine!
And I bowl!
Come in!
Oh, Tom. Good of you to pop up.
I just wondered if you could let me have
a mock-up of your hippo for... Friday'.7
- I can manage it by Thursday, actually.
- Better and better.
Listen...
You've seen me play cricket,
haven't you?
- Erm...
- Well, up at Flitwick, don't you remember?
- It was ten years ago.
- But I played, though.
If I'm not very much mistaken,
I made a few that day.
One.
Yes, yes. I got amongst
the Wickets, though, didn't I?
No, you didn't bowl. You strained
your back, getting your run.
I played, though, didn't I?
Yes.
Would you mind explaining to my
office that I still play cricket?
- Do you?
- Well, no, but I could if I was asked.
Still got the middle-aged blues,
have you?
Why are they all so young? Why should
I be lumbered with running a créche?
- Do you really want to know?
- Yes.
All right.
Well, I want gas if
I'm gonna have fillings.
We joined this company - What,
eight years ago, wasn't it?
And do you know something?
I was frightened of you then.
No, don't mess about.
I'll tell you Why.
You were a better draughtsman than I was
and you had better qualifications than mine.
I was going to have to rely on pure
cunning just to keep up with you.
Still, I needn't have bothered,
need I? Cos look at us.
I'm up here and
you're down there...
not getting picked
for cricket teams.
- Why?
- Because you use one tenth of your ability.
I have to use all mine and What I lack
I make up with sheer, bloody crawling.
Oh, come on, Jerry, look.
I cannot see the world as a giant plastic toy.
How can you seriously make it your life's work?
It isn't. It just brings
in the goodies.
I see, I see. All right,
all right.
So if I unleash all this dynamite
I'm carrying around with me,
- I'd be up on the old sixth floor, too, would I?
- Yes.
You might just as well because you're not going
to walk into another job at your age, are you?
- I'll hit you with my crutch in a minute.
- No, seriously, are you?
Listen, Birchinall at Glover's made me a
very attractive offer only just recently.
Not all that recently. He's
been dead for four years.
- Has he?
- You see?
Your business mind is just like plastic
before it goes into one of our moulds.
Formless. You just drift along.
“Isn't it all funny?
Isn't it all ridiculous?"
Yes, you do. “Grown men
getting ulcers over toy hippos."
- Well, it is funny, isn't it?
- Yes, of course it's funny, but not out loud.
- Miss Button, it is funny, but not out loud.
- Suit yourself.
Only, I'm warning you, Tom, unless you
start to take this job seriously...
Damn it all,
you're not Peter Pan.
Can you spare a minute, Jerry?
Yes, of course, sir.
I want to talk about our
Wildlife preservation line.
- Well, I'll...
- No, don't go, Tom.
I think perhaps Tom ought
to sit in on this one, sir.
Why?
- Where's he from?
- Fourth floor.
Oh, yes. Yes, I'm afraid I don't get down
to the fourth floor as often as I'd like.
In fact, Tom is our top draughtsman, sir.
He's working on the toy hippo at the moment.
Oh,
really? Oh! How's it er...'.7
- Going?
- Coming.
As you know, the problem
with these advance designs
- is surface area to weight ratio.
- Yes, quite.
In the case of the hippopotamus, I've stylised
the head somewhat to obviate overhang.
- Have you?
- So that at the mock-up stage...
Which I've laid on for Thursday,
incidentally, sir.
Yes, Thursday.
I'm working on a principal of a 3 by 1.5 base,
with a maximum height at the rump of 1 cm.
This gives us a box
mass of 5 grams,
which is in line with the cereal
manufacturer's packet specifications.
You know, there's a much better
view from the fifth floor...
...Tom.
I'd like you to sit in on
this one. Now, look here...
a bubble has just come
off the top of the think tank
and I don't mind telling you that this
is an absolute blockbuster of an idea.
It's going to put our Wildlife preservation
series in the vanguard of world...
and I do mean world... mouldings.
- (Snorts)
- Can you guess what it is?
No, you can't, can you?
Our next mould is going to be...
a giraffe!
- Are you all right?
- Mm.
And, Tom, I'm thinking
of putting this giraffe...
on your plate.
(Shorts)
(Laughs)
I Classical
(Giggles)
What?
I was... I was just thinking of
taking a spoonful of Cornflakes
and finding a
hippopotamus in your mouth.
(Giggles)
It's Choke A Child Week, folks.
Wait till they
get to the giraffe!
(Giggles)
You've should have heard sir. You'd think he'd
invented penicillin. I couldn't help laughing.
Did he call you to his study
and give you six of the best?
No, and Jerry told him
I had recurrent malaria.
- Did he believe him?
- I don't think so.
I saw him in the afternoon.
He called me Mr Erm... again.
- Oh, I know I blew it.
- Well, I should think so.
I mean, we do have
certain standards to keep up.
Sanity, little things like that.
I'd run off with you,
if you weren't married.
I even love your varicose veins.
I'll grow it in the
shape of your initial.
Mind you, it's our future
I'm blowing, you know.
In four years' time, Brian and all the Whiz kids
will be up on the fifth floor. Where Will I be?
Doing a Mr Chips
with a lot of infants.
Oh, I mean, the house
is paid for, fine, but, well...
when was the last time
you had a new coat?
Last week.
Oh.
Anyway,
that's... that's... things.
I mean,
we've never just wanted things.
We don't need things.
No, we're a spiritually
advanced couple, aren't we?
Yes.
Anyway, you don't make
enough for a lot of things.
No.
I'll tell you What's at the bottom of this. This
“it" business you were on about this morning.
I had a think in the
garden after you left.
You know, Why do you always
go into the garden to think?
You're not having an affair with
that gnome we haven't got, are you?
I don't know. I just think
best in the garden, I suppose.
Well,
did you come up with something?
- No.
- Ta.
That's all right.
Hey! I was brilliant at
algebra at school, wasn't I?
- I don't know.
- I was!
- Bighead!
- X, the unknown.
"It". In order to track “it" down, all you
have to do is those things you do in algebra.
- What are they?
- I can't remember.
We're both really firing on
all cylinders today, aren't we?
No, wait a minute,
wait a minute.
You erm... Oh,
What's it called, now?
You put all your
known factors down first.
Yes, that's it! That's it! Paper.
Paper! Quickly, woman, paper.
Paper, paper, paper.
Ah, right. Ta, ta, ta. Now...
Known... factors.
- One: - I've put One:
- JJM Limited... stinks.
- Right, get another job.
Two: Do not really want a job at
all. That's a lot of good, isn't it?
- No, no, come on.
- All right. Three:
Do not want to...
shuffle off mortal coil
Without... accomplishing
something.
Four: Do not want to feel...
the same way at 41.
- Ah, now you're getting somewhere.
- Right, now. JJM stinks.
We don't want... (Mutters)
You've heard of the "don't knows". I come
across as one of the "don't want to's".
- Let's get positive.
- All right, new page.
- File that.
- Right.
Right. One:
I want...
I want..."it“.
- Shall we go to bed?
- Yes.
Oh, no.
I'll be up in a minute.
All right. Happy birthday.
Big deal.
Oh!
(Clock chimes three times)
- Tom?
- Mm?
I thought you were coming
to bed. It's three o'clock.
Just a minute. Just a minute.
(Reads) Gobar gas.
Gobar is the Hindi for cow dung.
One cubic foot of gas may be
generated from one pound of cow dung.
NB. Check this figure for
animal droppings generally.
I haven't caught you in indulging
in some private fetish, have I?
And I know Where I can lay
my hands on a rotary cultivator.
I didn't get up at
all. It's a dream.
Here. Here. Come here.
Sit down.
Have some flat champagne.
Why not?
Listen,
you know that “it" business?
No more. I'm not strong enough.
No, no,
no. I've defined What it is.
- It's breaking the circle.
- What circle?
Going to work, to get money...
...to translate into things,
which you use up,
which makes you go to
work again etc, etc - the norm.
What we should be doing is
working at the job of life itself.
This isn't some son of
religious conversion, is it?
Yes. Now, you're going to ask me how
to put this into practical terms.
How to put this
into practical terms?
Right, here goes.
I quit work and we become as damned
near self-sufficient as possible.
We've got bags of garden.
We grow our own food.
We keep some animals,
chickens, a pig.
We produce our own energy,
recycle rubbish.
We design the things we need. I'll show you
What being a draughtsman is all about. Now...
some things we can't make,
right.
Some things we can't grow,
right.
So we flog our surplus and buy stuff, and
that's without good old Medieval barter.
It'll be damned hard work.
We won't have much
in the way of mod cons,
but we might enjoy discovering
What we can do Without.
We won't need the world
to give us the yea or nay.
It'll be just us...
doing it for us.
What do you think? Eh?
What do you think?
- I need to think.
- Garden?
- Yes.
- Right.
Here you are. Left.
Right.
- Wait a minute. Coat.
- Coat.
Right.
- A bit of cake?
- No, thank you.
You want to sell up and buy a
smallholding in the country to do this?
No, this isn't the full going back to nature bit.
We love this house too much to get rid of it.
- Self-sufficiency in Surbiton?
- Yes!
- I know it'll make the road look a bit unusual.
- No, no. No, no.
I couldn't kill chickens.
Right. I'll chop their heads off with my
Black
(Chuckles)
(Chuckles)
“Mozart and Mendelssohn
were dead by 40.
"Why aren't you?"
How thoughtful.
You bitch!
- Did you call?
- Look...
when I get a birthday card from my Wife, I
expect a sentimental, loving, sickly verse,
not, "Another nail in
your coffin, you old wreck."
Blow your candle
out and eat your cake.
It's half-past eight
in the morning!
Still...
Yes. Well,
it is half-past eight, isn't it?
Hello, hello, hello!
What have you got
there? Come on, you!
Hand over my present.
Come on. Give it to me!
Agh! All right. I'll give it,
I'll give it.
What have we here? It's a book.
You got it!
- There's more. Listen.
- Not Vaughan Williams.
- Sophie Tucker.
- Sophie...
I ..that life begins at 40
J“ That's when love and living
start to become a gentle art
Funny old age, isn't it, 40?
- She was 78 when she made that.
- Not Sophie Tucker, me.
It's one of those
milestone ages, isn't it?
- Life begins at 40.
- That's a fallacy, for a start
Did you know that after the
age of 40, the body runs down?
Something like two million cells die per
day and they're not replaced, not ever.
What pan of the body do
these cells disappear from?
All over.
Eurgh!
I don't feel old. I don't feel any
older than yesterday when I was 39.
- It's just that I'm doing a review.
- Can I be in it?
I-E-W. Son of stocktaking.
I'm not getting bitter and twisted. I'm
not saying, “I've had a rotten life.“
Do you realise that Rachmaninov composed
his first piano concerto at the age of 19?
♪ Pom, pOm-Da-Pom
♪ Pom-pa-pom... - That's Grieg.
Is it'? Well, never mind. Grieg.
It's just a feeling I've got.
- Is it me'?
- See that'?
- Job, then.
- Ah, not especially. A job is a job is a job.
It wouldn't make it any better if
I was designing something useful.
I'd still be a grotty, little
cog in a whacking great machine.
No,
it's... I don't know. It's...
It's quality of life. That's what I'm
after. lfl could just get it right.
What's "it"?
"It"?
Well, "it" is...
“it!
If I see it lying about I shall say, "Now,
look here, it, my husband's had enough of you."
- I'm not being very specific, am I'?
- Borderline.
Don't worry. I'm not going broody.
I'm not doing an "if only".
No, I'll tackle it and get it
right, as soon as I know what it is.
- (Car horn toots)
- There's Jerry.
Here we go again.
Ta.
(Groans)
Commute! Commute!
Commute! Commute!
- (As Daleks) Goodbye, darling.
- Goodbye, darling.
- Have a nice day.
- Have a nice day.
- Keep your bowels open.
- Keep your bowels open.
- Kiss.
- Kiss.
BOTH: Zzz!
- Morning.
- I see the pills aren't having any effect.
- Car going yet?
- No.
Get in.
You look like an advert
for Gracious Living.
I am.
Tom Good riposted with his first
bon mot of the day. Shut your gob.
Morning, Mr Leadbetter.
Morning, Charles.
Morning, Mr er...
I've really made an impact with
you over the years, haven't I?
Well... I've got sciatica.
- Good.
- Charming.
No, no, no. That's my name. Cor blimey,
I've only been here eight years.
Morning,
morning! Lovely morning!
- Good morning! ALL:
(Half-heanedly) Good morning.
(Groans)
(Laughs evilly)
Here,
Phil. Phil! Come on! Come on!
To you. Come on! Hey, come on!
(Laughs) Come on, come on.
Phew!
- Are you phewing at this, Brian?
- I am, Mr Good. It really is something, isn't it?
Yes, it is.
It's a mould for a plastic hippopotamus that's
going to end up in a packet of breakfast cereal.
You gotta hand it to the
ideas men on the fifth floor.
Electric shock treatment,
preferably. Ideas men?
They sit up there like the
gargoyles on top of Notre Dame.
Every now and again, one puts
on his jester's cap and says,
“Eureka! Hippopotamus!"
I'm sorry, Mr Good. I didn't mean
to take any credit away from you.
Everybody knows it's you
Who brings their ideas to life.
That is guilt by association.
Oh, come, you wouldn't want
us to go back to the Dark Ages.
Breakfast cereals
Without little plastic gifts?
It would still taste the same.
That's hardly the point, surely?
I'm talking about
aesthetic values.
Your hippopotamus, for example.
My...'.7
Sit down, Brian.
Now, look, Why don't
you try to get out more?
- Pardon?
- Well...
Lusting after women,
playing sport.
I played cricket on Sunday.
Fine! Great! Let's talk about
cricket for a couple of hours.
(Phone rings)
Hello. Yes, Jerry.
- I'll be up. Sixth floor.
- Get a move on.
- Cricket!
- But that...
- Cricket. Who did you play for?
- Well, just the office.
Office, fine. That's
all I wanted to know.
- Which office?
- Well, this office here.
We played Accounts.
I'm in this office.
- Nobody asked me.
- We didn't need to. We got my dad to umpire.
I'm not talking about umpiring.
I would have liked to play.
- Play? You?
- Well, Why not me?
Well, you're... We didn't think
you'd still feel up to it at er...
- At my age, do you mean?
- Yes.
I might tell you
that Jack Hobbs scored more than half of his
first-class centuries when he was past 40.
Who's Jack Hobbs?
You bloody little swine!
Listen,
you lot! I am a run machine!
A run machine!
And I bowl!
Come in!
Oh, Tom. Good of you to pop up.
I just wondered if you could let me have
a mock-up of your hippo for... Friday'.7
- I can manage it by Thursday, actually.
- Better and better.
Listen...
You've seen me play cricket,
haven't you?
- Erm...
- Well, up at Flitwick, don't you remember?
- It was ten years ago.
- But I played, though.
If I'm not very much mistaken,
I made a few that day.
One.
Yes, yes. I got amongst
the Wickets, though, didn't I?
No, you didn't bowl. You strained
your back, getting your run.
I played, though, didn't I?
Yes.
Would you mind explaining to my
office that I still play cricket?
- Do you?
- Well, no, but I could if I was asked.
Still got the middle-aged blues,
have you?
Why are they all so young? Why should
I be lumbered with running a créche?
- Do you really want to know?
- Yes.
All right.
Well, I want gas if
I'm gonna have fillings.
We joined this company - What,
eight years ago, wasn't it?
And do you know something?
I was frightened of you then.
No, don't mess about.
I'll tell you Why.
You were a better draughtsman than I was
and you had better qualifications than mine.
I was going to have to rely on pure
cunning just to keep up with you.
Still, I needn't have bothered,
need I? Cos look at us.
I'm up here and
you're down there...
not getting picked
for cricket teams.
- Why?
- Because you use one tenth of your ability.
I have to use all mine and What I lack
I make up with sheer, bloody crawling.
Oh, come on, Jerry, look.
I cannot see the world as a giant plastic toy.
How can you seriously make it your life's work?
It isn't. It just brings
in the goodies.
I see, I see. All right,
all right.
So if I unleash all this dynamite
I'm carrying around with me,
- I'd be up on the old sixth floor, too, would I?
- Yes.
You might just as well because you're not going
to walk into another job at your age, are you?
- I'll hit you with my crutch in a minute.
- No, seriously, are you?
Listen, Birchinall at Glover's made me a
very attractive offer only just recently.
Not all that recently. He's
been dead for four years.
- Has he?
- You see?
Your business mind is just like plastic
before it goes into one of our moulds.
Formless. You just drift along.
“Isn't it all funny?
Isn't it all ridiculous?"
Yes, you do. “Grown men
getting ulcers over toy hippos."
- Well, it is funny, isn't it?
- Yes, of course it's funny, but not out loud.
- Miss Button, it is funny, but not out loud.
- Suit yourself.
Only, I'm warning you, Tom, unless you
start to take this job seriously...
Damn it all,
you're not Peter Pan.
Can you spare a minute, Jerry?
Yes, of course, sir.
I want to talk about our
Wildlife preservation line.
- Well, I'll...
- No, don't go, Tom.
I think perhaps Tom ought
to sit in on this one, sir.
Why?
- Where's he from?
- Fourth floor.
Oh, yes. Yes, I'm afraid I don't get down
to the fourth floor as often as I'd like.
In fact, Tom is our top draughtsman, sir.
He's working on the toy hippo at the moment.
Oh,
really? Oh! How's it er...'.7
- Going?
- Coming.
As you know, the problem
with these advance designs
- is surface area to weight ratio.
- Yes, quite.
In the case of the hippopotamus, I've stylised
the head somewhat to obviate overhang.
- Have you?
- So that at the mock-up stage...
Which I've laid on for Thursday,
incidentally, sir.
Yes, Thursday.
I'm working on a principal of a 3 by 1.5 base,
with a maximum height at the rump of 1 cm.
This gives us a box
mass of 5 grams,
which is in line with the cereal
manufacturer's packet specifications.
You know, there's a much better
view from the fifth floor...
...Tom.
I'd like you to sit in on
this one. Now, look here...
a bubble has just come
off the top of the think tank
and I don't mind telling you that this
is an absolute blockbuster of an idea.
It's going to put our Wildlife preservation
series in the vanguard of world...
and I do mean world... mouldings.
- (Snorts)
- Can you guess what it is?
No, you can't, can you?
Our next mould is going to be...
a giraffe!
- Are you all right?
- Mm.
And, Tom, I'm thinking
of putting this giraffe...
on your plate.
(Shorts)
(Laughs)
I Classical
(Giggles)
What?
I was... I was just thinking of
taking a spoonful of Cornflakes
and finding a
hippopotamus in your mouth.
(Giggles)
It's Choke A Child Week, folks.
Wait till they
get to the giraffe!
(Giggles)
You've should have heard sir. You'd think he'd
invented penicillin. I couldn't help laughing.
Did he call you to his study
and give you six of the best?
No, and Jerry told him
I had recurrent malaria.
- Did he believe him?
- I don't think so.
I saw him in the afternoon.
He called me Mr Erm... again.
- Oh, I know I blew it.
- Well, I should think so.
I mean, we do have
certain standards to keep up.
Sanity, little things like that.
I'd run off with you,
if you weren't married.
I even love your varicose veins.
I'll grow it in the
shape of your initial.
Mind you, it's our future
I'm blowing, you know.
In four years' time, Brian and all the Whiz kids
will be up on the fifth floor. Where Will I be?
Doing a Mr Chips
with a lot of infants.
Oh, I mean, the house
is paid for, fine, but, well...
when was the last time
you had a new coat?
Last week.
Oh.
Anyway,
that's... that's... things.
I mean,
we've never just wanted things.
We don't need things.
No, we're a spiritually
advanced couple, aren't we?
Yes.
Anyway, you don't make
enough for a lot of things.
No.
I'll tell you What's at the bottom of this. This
“it" business you were on about this morning.
I had a think in the
garden after you left.
You know, Why do you always
go into the garden to think?
You're not having an affair with
that gnome we haven't got, are you?
I don't know. I just think
best in the garden, I suppose.
Well,
did you come up with something?
- No.
- Ta.
That's all right.
Hey! I was brilliant at
algebra at school, wasn't I?
- I don't know.
- I was!
- Bighead!
- X, the unknown.
"It". In order to track “it" down, all you
have to do is those things you do in algebra.
- What are they?
- I can't remember.
We're both really firing on
all cylinders today, aren't we?
No, wait a minute,
wait a minute.
You erm... Oh,
What's it called, now?
You put all your
known factors down first.
Yes, that's it! That's it! Paper.
Paper! Quickly, woman, paper.
Paper, paper, paper.
Ah, right. Ta, ta, ta. Now...
Known... factors.
- One: - I've put One:
- JJM Limited... stinks.
- Right, get another job.
Two: Do not really want a job at
all. That's a lot of good, isn't it?
- No, no, come on.
- All right. Three:
Do not want to...
shuffle off mortal coil
Without... accomplishing
something.
Four: Do not want to feel...
the same way at 41.
- Ah, now you're getting somewhere.
- Right, now. JJM stinks.
We don't want... (Mutters)
You've heard of the "don't knows". I come
across as one of the "don't want to's".
- Let's get positive.
- All right, new page.
- File that.
- Right.
Right. One:
I want...
I want..."it“.
- Shall we go to bed?
- Yes.
Oh, no.
I'll be up in a minute.
All right. Happy birthday.
Big deal.
Oh!
(Clock chimes three times)
- Tom?
- Mm?
I thought you were coming
to bed. It's three o'clock.
Just a minute. Just a minute.
(Reads) Gobar gas.
Gobar is the Hindi for cow dung.
One cubic foot of gas may be
generated from one pound of cow dung.
NB. Check this figure for
animal droppings generally.
I haven't caught you in indulging
in some private fetish, have I?
And I know Where I can lay
my hands on a rotary cultivator.
I didn't get up at
all. It's a dream.
Here. Here. Come here.
Sit down.
Have some flat champagne.
Why not?
Listen,
you know that “it" business?
No more. I'm not strong enough.
No, no,
no. I've defined What it is.
- It's breaking the circle.
- What circle?
Going to work, to get money...
...to translate into things,
which you use up,
which makes you go to
work again etc, etc - the norm.
What we should be doing is
working at the job of life itself.
This isn't some son of
religious conversion, is it?
Yes. Now, you're going to ask me how
to put this into practical terms.
How to put this
into practical terms?
Right, here goes.
I quit work and we become as damned
near self-sufficient as possible.
We've got bags of garden.
We grow our own food.
We keep some animals,
chickens, a pig.
We produce our own energy,
recycle rubbish.
We design the things we need. I'll show you
What being a draughtsman is all about. Now...
some things we can't make,
right.
Some things we can't grow,
right.
So we flog our surplus and buy stuff, and
that's without good old Medieval barter.
It'll be damned hard work.
We won't have much
in the way of mod cons,
but we might enjoy discovering
What we can do Without.
We won't need the world
to give us the yea or nay.
It'll be just us...
doing it for us.
What do you think? Eh?
What do you think?
- I need to think.
- Garden?
- Yes.
- Right.
Here you are. Left.
Right.
- Wait a minute. Coat.
- Coat.
Right.
- A bit of cake?
- No, thank you.
You want to sell up and buy a
smallholding in the country to do this?
No, this isn't the full going back to nature bit.
We love this house too much to get rid of it.
- Self-sufficiency in Surbiton?
- Yes!
- I know it'll make the road look a bit unusual.
- No, no. No, no.
I couldn't kill chickens.
Right. I'll chop their heads off with my
Black