SUPERPOLINEMOOMINTASTICEXMEETSDADLEYDOCIOUS

Bradley is all packed up and ready to go and sleep under his desk in the Twilight Zone, Jim won’t let him back until he gets an honest job running a stall in the market or working at the bookies. Dadley finds out and asks NoAngel if Bradley can move in with them. NoAngel tells him to ask the girls.

Dadley: “Girls, can Bradley come and live with us?”
Girl 1: “Only if we can have a pony EACH, a Nintendo DS with that sappy game about growing tulips and stroking puppies EACH, all the Turkey Twizzlers we can eat, and a cashnolimit makeover session in Claire’s Accessories
Dadley: “OK”
Girl 2: “And I want my ears pierced.”

In the end, he doesn't need to bother because EE seems to be experimenting with the Para Plot Device – parachuting in an ex or long lost rellie for a week or two and building a crisis around it, before ex/ll rellie gets shipped back to jail or Brazil or in this case…Tring.

Jim flies in Bradley’s Mum, whose name is Rachel, but we’ll call her Mumley. Mumley is sooo totally over Dadley, even though she was abandoned in the prime of her life, and has since lived in a darkened room with only Bradley and her Kate Bush collection for company, occasionally shouting “Dadley is a BASTARD” at the void. Mumley decides to stick around and wreak revenge on NoAngel for ruining her life. This apparently means making snarky comments about marriage-wrecking whores every five minutes, getting drunk at NoAngel’s brown salon opening, starting a fight and then trying to cop off with Dadley by the arches. Dadley says he doesn’t want to hurt either Mumley or NoAngel, but Mumley runs off and pretends that she and Dadley had a minute of passion among the used carburettors, which is all the proof you need that Dadley is a BASTARD and Bradley should check out prices of season tickets from Hertfordshire. Bradley says no and packs Mumley off home on her own. That’s a pity. Mumley had potential as the bitch-from-hell ex living across the road with her father-in-law.

Minty runs around after SJ, fixing her shelves and making sucky noises on the phone, prompting much musing from his flatmates on the nature of love and what the Australians ever did for us. Naomi tries to cheer up Agarry, who says that he has lost all interest in women since Sullen left him. He perks up after Naomi offers to show him her baps, but then she runs off on a date before he can take her up on it. A “blind” (ie it’s dark) dating session with Lee sees AG pretending to be Michael Caine in Zulu, but the only woman who sticks around for longer than five seconds is Carly. Time for another tedious love triangle, methinks. I thought the point of going to these things was to meet new people…

Meanwhile, Minty finds SJ naked in a room with the Sid the SydneyBrother and stomps off in a great huff of hurtiness. SJ explains that Sid got mugged and had to strip naked and then suddenly all her clothes fell off. Minty believes her, the big stupid bear, but as soon as he goes, up jumps Sid from behind the sofa – or a pouffe or from under the kitchen table: how he manages to find somewhere to hide in a flat that tiny – and starts snogging SJ. So, are we talking incest? Sister-swapping? He’s her secret Aussie husband but she’s stringing Minty along on a sinister immigration marriage scam? Is this the end of Minty and his superfluous presence on the cast list?

Moominwars update. Oh boy. Poline invokes Mary Poppins, the Demon Queen of Childcare, and gets an extra seat at the theatre so that Moomin can’t babysit the Moominchild. Joe finds a picture that the Moominchild drew of her freakish family that shows Moomin the NotMummy, Mmartin the NotDaddy, NotGranny Poline the Empress of Evil, Straight Pike and AdoptoGran. But no sign of the dead AdoptoParents. Hmm… The picture is imbued with Active Moomin Powers, and in the end Poline says that Moomin isn’t allowed to set foot in the house, speak to her or Straight Pike, and can only communicate to MMartin using semaphore or French sign language, but she can have access to Moominchild, as long as Moominchild wears gloves at all times to prevent contamination by a Dirty Jackson.

In other news: Mrs Goggins bullies Chelski into getting a job at the salon. Little Ben runs about playing tricks on his dad, conning one of the Dadley children into sticking her head through the railings, and water bombing the other Dadley child, sparking off a riot in the market and messing up GADawn’s hair. Everybody seems to think this crime spree is cute, but I say slap an ASBO on the little bugger it’s too late. Chelski keeps chatting up some mystery blonde bloke who doesn't say much and is about as charming as a cervical smear test. I believe he may be Important For Later.