One Foot in the Grave (1990–2001): Season 2, Episode 6 - Timeless Time - full transcript

Victor and Margaret are having a sleepless night. His car alarm goes off due to bird droppings, she suggests making a hot drink but this does not help,any more than Victor's bedside reading, the autobiography of Reg Varney. The conversation takes a more serious turn as they mention their son Stuart,who died young. Finally Victor is so frustrated that he considers opening Ronnie and Mildred's Christmas present from last year but things aren't that bad...yet.

# They say I might as well face the truth

# That I am just too long in the tooth

# So I'm an OAP and weak-kneed

# But I have not yet quite gone to seed

# I may be over the hill now that I have retired

# Fading away, but I'm not yet expired

# Clapped out, run down, too old to save

# One foot in the grave #

Try counting something.

Yes.

I'll try counting my blessings.



well, that didn't take very long.

Bloody fitted sheets. They never stay put.

Look at this. Three times I've wiped my nose
in this, thinking it was a handkerchief.

If make the bed tomorrow, I'll use a staple gun.

I've got a stomach ache now.

- whereabouts?
- whereabouts? In my left earlobe (!)

And I feel sick into the bargain.

I know what that is.

It'll be that dodgy pasta
we had at your mother's last night.

we knew we were in for a voyage of adventure

when she phoned up and told us
to bring a decent pair of secateurs.

She doesn't speak a word of Italian.

working from that old magazine cutting
with a list of ingredients.

Turned out to be the cast list
of ''The Godfather''.



I shudder to think what she must have put in it.

Parmesan cheese and a horse's head,
judging by the taste.

Spaghetti Al Pacino. Ugh!

Give your brain a rest

and then perhaps you might drift off.

Make your mind a complete blank.

I suppose.

what's that film where, when you go to sleep,

a man with spiky fingers comes through the wall
and starts slashing your face to bits?

''A Bridge Too Far''.

Is it?

- No, more recent than that.
- Hardy Kruger.

Oh.

(wHISPERS) Are you asleep?

Are you asleep?

Margaret!

I'll buy one of those sweaters
that Noel Edmonds wears.

You do, and I'll kill myself.

- (TwANG)
- what was that?

- Did you hear that?
- what?

That strange hooting sound.

Probably Mrs Stebbings down the corner.

No, it's that baby owl I told you about
the other night, perched on the telephone wires.

Look at him, perched right over my car roof.

You just dare, matey boy.

He's thinking about it. You can tell.

He will do if you keep staring at him.
You'll make him nervous.

why don't they spatter someone else's car?
why is it always mine?

He is going to, too. Look at him. He's getting
into position. He's shifting himself around.

Any second now he's definitely going to...

- There.
- (ALARM)

Oh!

I don't believe it!

They're supposed to have fixed this thing.

(ALARM OFF)

That's twice I've had to take that back now
because it was too sensitive.

Can't tell me there isn't
something wrong somewhere

when your car alarm's set off
by a bird dropping.

well, that's their rations finished with.

Any more stale pieces of toast
now go into the dustbin.

- what's this packet of Bisto doing in here?
- what?

what's this packet of Bisto
doing in the medicine cabinet?

How do I know what it's doing?
I can't even see it.

(FLUSHING)

Ring that garage in the morning.
That'll be the first job.

why is nothing in life ever simple?

what is it that makes that last teaspoon

cling for dear life to the bottom
of the washing-up bowl every night?

when you pour the water away,
even if you haven't used a bloody teaspoon,

there's always one appears from somewhere.

will you just...

go to sleep?

Mysteries of the universe.

Time and space.

Life and death.

Mike Hope and Albie Keen.
Never did hear any more about them.

Time.

when you think about it,

nothing ever exists, in fact.

I worked this out in the post office as I waited
for that woman to finish twanging elastic bands.

The future doesn't exist
because it hasn't happened yet.

The past doesn't exist
because it's already over.

The present doesn't exist because as soon as
you think about it, it's already in the past...

..which doesn't exist any more.

Like that moment just then when I said that.
That's already in the past. Gone for ever.

And so is that,
when I just said, ''Gone for ever.''

And so is that, when I said, ''And so is that.''
That's gone for ever now as well.

So is that. when I said, ''That's gone for ever
now as well, '' that's gone for ever now as well.

Oh, for God's sake!

will you shut up, Victor?

Jabbering on there all the while
like a rabid parrot!

Now I'm wide awake. Thank you very much (!)

what time is it?
Are we in the Single European Market yet?

Quarter past three.

Finish this crossword.
That usually sends me off.

Saw an old friend of yours today.
Came into the shop with a wilting hibiscus.

Charlie Masefield.

Oh, yes.

I haven't seen him in ages.
How's he getting on?

- He's fine.
- Did he ask how I was?

No.

well, not as such.

what do you mean, not as such?

well, he seemed to be under the impression
you were dead.

In fact, we had quite an argument about it.

He was absolutely convinced you died last year,
during wimbledon fortnight.

He said it was the same day Jimmy Connors
got knocked out, so he was doubly shocked.

I said, ''No, you must be getting him mixed up
with someone else.'' But he wouldn't have it.

People that age, they get something
into their head and they won't budge.

He remembered you'd asked to have your ashes
scattered across the floor in Allied Carpets.

Get your own back.

To be honest, I think he's going a bit...
You know.

So, just to keep the peace, I agreed with him.

I said, ''Now you come to mention it,
you're right, he IS dead.''

He went off then, happy as a sandboy.

Oh, and then...
Talk about an afternoon for characters.

we had Broad Maud come in just after lunch
with all her latest problems.

Broad Maud? Is she the one that always
carries her own toilet seat about with her?

In a Tesco's carrier bag.

Frightened stiff of public lavatories.

Frightened stiff of everything.

Takes it all to heart, everything she reads
in the papers and sees on the news.

Salmonella, listeria, poisonous algae,

the man-eating fungus
that comes up through the drains.

Man-eating fungus?

She says she saw it on the news,
but I reckon it was ''Doctor who''.

I think they all start to blur in her mind
in the end.

It was her late husband
had that morbid fear of giant spiders.

Every time he heard the cat flap go,
he used to break out into a cold sweat.

Can you imagine carrying your own toilet seat
about everywhere with you?

It must be a bit of a handicap.

what does she do when she's got two bags
of shopping? wear it round her neck?

well, that's that.

And I'm still wide awake.

Oh, perhaps I'll make a milky drink.

- Do you want one?
- Oh, I suppose so. Might as well. Try anything.

Put a drop of rum in it!

Oh, God.

Perhaps if I read something, that would help.

what have we got?

''A Brief History Of Time''.

Or the autobiography of Reg Varney.

Bloody book clubs.

I know what I could do.

I could open last year's Christmas present
from Ronnie and Mildred.

''To dearest Victor, just a little something
to wish you a merry Christmas

''and a prosperous 1990,
from Ronnie and Mildred.''

No, I'm not that bored yet.

Ohhhh...

No, still not straight.

That's got it. That's straight.

(PHONE)

4291.

what?

Yes, it IS straight.

what do you mean,
not from where you're standing?

You can't see from right across the road.

Anyway, what are you doing up
at this time of...?

Oh, can't you?

Yes, I'm sorry about that. They were supposed
to have fixed it, but you know garages.

Yes.

Yes. Yes, I hope you do, too.

Goodnight.

The rest of that milk was off,
so I had to use powdered, and we're out of rum.

God, this tastes revolting.

I know. It came through the front door.

There's several Olympic pole vaulters
supposed to swear by it.

That shampoo makes my hair all dry.
I won't use that again.

- which one's that?
- Another new one.

That came through the front door as well.

Just as well they don't have
a sales push on for motorcycles.

A Harley Davidson
coming through the front door,

mowing us all to the ground
when we came down for breakfast.

The man from the pet shop was coming around
this morning with free trial offer chihuahuas.

Hammering them through people's letter boxes
with a large mallet.

I expect we'll get ours tomorrow.

More than likely.

- Is it all right if I put the light out now?
- Yes.

Oh, God. My leg's started twitching now.

I wondered when that was going to happen.

Shaking about like a morris dancer. All you need
to do is put a couple of bells on the end of it.

Oh! I can't stop it. It's always the same
when my muscles get tense.

Here we go. Ministry of Silly walks.

It's no laughing matter
if you had to put up with it.

You don't take enough exercise,
that's your problem.

Too much sitting around all day.

Sitting around,
fretting about everything under the sun.

No wonder you end up all on edge.

(FLUSHING)

Can't so much as suck a Polo
without crunching it.

- who can't?
- Go right through the entire packet

like a beaver in one of those old cartoons.

I think if I stick it in the air...

Stretch it and stop the trembling.

(SIGHS)

That's better.

(SNORING)

(ALARM)

- Haven't you got your key ready?
- Bloody thing again! what the hell's going on?

It's that cat sitting on the front bonnet.

- Shoo! Go away! Haven't you found it yet?
- It won't switch it off. what's wrong with it?

- The battery's gone.
- we can't leave it.

- we'll wake the whole of the south of England.
- There's a key under the bonnet. My slippers.

(BEEPING CONTINUES)

(BEEPING STOPS)

I'll have words with that garage tomorrow.
You see if I don't.

Leave your car in for three days
and they do nothing.

Probably using it to go about joyriding in.

I swear I could smell seaweed
from that air filter.

Victor...

- what's that you've got on your foot?
- where?

Aaaaagh!

You've got your foot in a rotting hedgehog!

Oh, God!

It must have been when my slipper came off.

Ugh! I thought it was a bit soggy.

I thought it was just perspiration.

Steady, what are you doing? Give it to me.

- Ugh!
- Eugh!

Oh, there it is.

Oh, ruddy thing! where do they come from?

(MIAOw)

Serves you right for sitting on my car!

Come here.

Oh, look. You've got all these little needles
stuck in your foot.

Oh, I've had it for one night, Margaret. I have
straight. I was just getting off then, as well.

Just getting to sleep and dreaming.

Dreaming this really strange dream.

They'd emptied all the water out of Loch Ness
to see if there was any monsters.

when the lake was completely empty,
there, lying in the mud,

was this giant 60-foot-long teaspoon.

There.

I think that's got the worst of it out.

I should watch where you're treading
the next time.

Oh, God.

Am I not going to get any sleep tonight?

- why don't you just bring the lavatory in here?
- Sorry?

Go on like this,
you'll be as dehydrated as that hedgehog.

Remember what happened
to the wicked witch of the west.

(FLUSHING)

Up all bloody night long. I might as well
have taken that job as a night watchman.

I nearly did, if it hadn't been
for the pittance they were offering.

what do they reckon you'd live on?

I was thinking the other day that I might apply
for the job as the Duchess of York.

Seems to be a profession
with a certain amount of security.

Don't get made redundant.
Miners, steelworkers, you can do without.

But you know that York
will always need a Duchess

to stop it grinding to a complete standstill.

One of the few certainties in life.

I could always take
my City and Guilds in grinning.

Do you remember the first time
we slept together?

How could I forget?

That bloody dripping tap.

That kept us awake half the night, if you recall.

You hogged the bed.

- who did?
- You did, sleeping diagonally across the bed.

I used to think it was romantic in those days,
having your right elbow up my nose.

- why didn't you move me, then?
- I wasn't at the controls of a bulldozer.

I did contemplate jabbing you with a hatpin,

but I didn't want to wake the baby at No.43.

I wouldn't think twice about it today.

I don't remember ever hogging the bed.

And you used to suck your thumb in your sleep.

- when did I?
- For the first three years we were married.

Some nights you used to suck MY thumb.

- You've never told me about this before.
- Talk about a late developer. At the age of 26.

If you've ever wondered why you've got
stumpy thumbs, now you know.

And you used to cuddle the hot-water bottle,
pretending it was a teddy bear.

I did nothing of the sort.

- I remember it burst one night.
- You pressed it, trying to make it squeak.

Look, do we have to go on about this?
And I do not have stumpy thumbs.

And anyway, YOU used to talk in your sleep.

You used to SING in your sleep.

I'm lying there, just dozing off,
and what did I hear?

''Ladies and gentlemen,
the voice of David whitfield, ''

and then three minutes of ''Cara Mia Mine''.

If you'd had a lump of cheese for your supper,
we used to get a selection from Eddie Calvert.

''Cherry Blossom Pink''
being snored through a trumpet.

Look, can we just drop this subject, please?

- well, you brought it up.
- Yes, I'm sorry I did.

''Cherry Blossom Pink'' (!)

The lady next door came round one night to ask
if the cat had got his tail stuck in the mangle.

I said, can we drop it?

Oh, God...

There it is. Can you hear it?

The rattle of distant milk bottles.

That's the beginning of the end now.
we might as well get up and put the kettle on.

I saw that advert again today.

''Buy the 'Daily Mail' because you can read it
without getting ink on your fingers.''

By that token, you might as well have a cup
of bleach because it doesn't stain the teapot.

Some papers these days!
Especially the one your mother reads.

She says she likes it
because it's conservative with a small C.

Yes.

I believe Joseph Goebbels
was a Nazi with a small N.

Imagine if the history books had been written
the same way as the newspapers.

1215, King John signed the Magna Carta.

1216, King John showed a shapely ankle
when the wind blew up his cloak at Runnymede,

sparking off rumours that
he might be on a super new low-calorie diet.

Potty Pankhurst at it again.

The Slaughter of the Innocents -
no British babies believed to be involved.

- I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking.
- It's all right.

The first thing that came into my head.
You don't know what you're saying.

I know. I do it myself sometimes.

I was thinking about him just this morning,
funnily enough,

running into Glenys
outside the post office with Michael.

She had him just four days before. She was
coming out of hospital just as I was going in.

He's still working for that insurance company.

They're talking about moving him
to his own branch up north somewhere.

She'll miss him.

She never had any others.

He'd just bought his mum an ice cream,
then he was going to run her up the doctor's.

It doesn't seem five minutes
since it was the other way round.

I always think of Stuart when I see him.

God, he's enormous now.

His eldest girl's
just starting at the secondary.

I wonder what he would have gone into.

I wonder if he'd have gone into insurance.

Not if I'd had my way.

You make so many plans for your life
when you're young.

I don't know what I imagined I'd be doing
when I was 55.

Seemed like so far in the future,
it would never happen.

A year was an eternity when you were a child.

The time between one Christmas and the next.

Yes, about two months now.

They'll be draping tinsel over the Easter eggs
before long.

why can't they let you live your life
at your own speed?

Oh, God!

I knew it wouldn't be long before he started.

- who?
- That bloody sparrow.

what's he got to be up so early for? Shut up!

One day I'm going to sneak up to his nest
when he's asleep with a welsh male voice choir.

Three choruses of ''Men Of Harlech'' would
have him laughing the other side of his beak.

God! Hardly worth coming to bed,
for all the rest I've had.

I mean, what's the point of it?

Get in each night feeling as right as rain.
when I get up, I feel absolutely terrible.

Pure ritual.

It's like life, I suppose.

I wonder what the point is in living.

Doesn't seem to get you anywhere, does it?

Oh, I don't know.
Ask that sparrow. He seems happy enough.

All he ever does
is eat bits of burnt toast and worms.

He's still got plenty to sing about, obviously.

Yes.

I wonder what his secret is.

Perhaps it is his diet.

You won't be able to have porridge
for your breakfast. we're out of milk.

- I'll have powdered.
- we're also out of porridge.

Ah. well, I'll have something different.

what?

Hmm...

I think I might try

worms on toast for a change.

we'll open a new can in the morning.

Yes, we always seem to.

# They say I might as well face the truth

# That I am just too long in the tooth

# I've started to deteriorate

# And now I've passed my own sell-by date

# Oh, I am no spring chicken, it 's true

# I have to pop my teeth in to chew

# And my old knees have started to knock

# I've just got too many miles on the clock

# Oh, I'm a wrinkly, crinkly, set in my ways

# It's true that my body has seen better days

# But give me half a chance
and I can still misbehave

# One foot in the grave

# One foot in the grave

# One foot in the grave #