Last week on Mayberry Mondays, the whole gang (not necessarily in order of intelligence)—poor-but-honest-dirt-farmer-turned-city-council-head Sam Jones (Ken Berry), his idiot son Mike (Buddy Foster), twisted and evil housekeeper Beatrice “Aunt Bee” Taylor (Frances Bavier), village idiot Goober Pyle (George Lindsey), pedantic county clerk Howard Sprague (Jack Dodson), fix-it savant Emmett Clark (Paul Hartman) and cute-as-a-bug’s-ear bakery clerk Millie Swanson (Arlene Golonka)—managed to wangle a free vacation in Palm Springs from an old chum of Aunt Bee’s naïve enough to trust these bozos with keeping an eye on her palatial manse. Let’s pick up where we left off from last week; the plane carrying our cast is soaring high in the clouds…and while if this jet were to take a sudden nose dive and crash, killing all on board (and making it the best R.F.D. episode ever), I’m not sure I’d be willing to risk Millie’s life so perhaps I shouldn’t joke about it.
MIKE: Hey, there’s the Grand Canyon !
 |
| "I can see the Bradys from up here!" |
SAM: Yeah…I see it, Mike!
EMMETT: Hey, ain’t that somethin’?
GOOBER: Yeah…
MIKE: How much longer to Palm Springs , Pa
SAM: Oh, we have to change planes in L.A…another few hours, I guess…
GOOBER: Boy, I ain’t never seen nothin’ like that before…
AUNT BEE: Just another part of America
Why, Aunt Bee…how oddly poetic…
GOOBER (looking around): Hey, where’s Howard? He’s missin’ the Grand Canyon !
MILLIE: Oh, I-I don’t think he cares… (She gets Sam’s attention and points toward the back of the plane)
Now…admittedly, I had a really filthy and inappropriate joke penciled in here—but since I have some standards, let’s just say that Howard is macking on the plane’s flight attendant, played by character actress Sandra de Bruin. While not exactly what you would call a big name performer, Sandy has a lengthy resume of guest appearances in a number of shows, among them Emergency!, Barnaby Jones, The Rockford Files and many more. Her claim to fame was a recurring gig as one of the “Mighty Carson Art Players,” the repertory group who performed the sketches on The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson. This is her first of two appearances on R.F.D., and as you can see by the photograph to your left (courtesy of the IMDb) she is still quite the stone fox.
HOWARD: Ye-e-e-s…we’ll be staying right in the best section of Palm Springs
ATTENDANT: Oh really, Mr. Sprague?
HOWARD: Yeah… (Chuckling) Call me Howard…
That’s right, Howard…reel her in slowly…and then spring your coin collection on her!
GOOBER (butting in): Howard! Howard, you’re missin’ the HOWARD: All right, Goober…I’ll be there later… (To the attendant) Yes, we’ll…we’ll be living in a house right near the golf course…belongs to a very dear friend of mine, a millionaire industrialist from Chicago
ATTENDANT: Oh!
GOOBER: Well, you don’t know him—you just know Selma
While this is going on, Goober has picked something off one of the trays to eat (the attendant is preparing some coffee) and I’m sure a better quality video would reveal what it is…but it looked to me at first glance like a butter pat.
HOWARD (scowling at Goober and mouthing his name): Selma
GOOBER: Yeah, we all know her…she’s lettin’ us have her house for a coupla weeks…her and that lady down there, Aunt Bee…they went to school together ‘fore Selma got rich… (Howard again scowls at Goober and silently wishes he would walk out of one of the emergency exit doors) We’re gettin’ it free…all we have to do is scrape up air fare…you’re goin’ on the time plan, ain’t ya, Howard?
ATTENDANT (with two trays in her hands): Excuse me…
HOWARD: Oh… (Sotto voce to Goober) Do you always have to butt in?
On the ground and outside the airport, our Mayberry yokels react to their first taste of Palm Springs as if they were Robert Conway setting foot in Shangri-La:
SAM: Oh…this is really something, all right…look at it!
MILLIE: Oh, it’s gorgeous!
HOWARD: The purple hills of the desert in all their majesty…
Now I understand why Howard got chummy with the attendant…he’s obviously been throwing back a few. A king-size station wagon pulls up beside our excited travelers, and Emmett announces that the driver can take all of them to Casa del Selma. A dune buggy passes by, and Goober is very excited: “They go over the sand, the desert and everything…I’m gonna rent me one of them.”
They arrive at Selma ’s and marvel at the beauty of the place, with Howard pontificating in his usual fashion: “It’s an outstanding example of California ranch architecture.” Goober, on the other hand, demonstrates that you can take the boy out of Mayberry but you can’t take Mayberry out of the boy: “It’s even purtier than that bowling alley in Siler City
MIKE: Pa—can we go around back and look at the pool?
SAM: Yeah, just a second, Mike…oh…here, Emmett…you go on in…I’ll take care of this…
EMMETT: Oh, all right… (He exits in the direction of the house)
SAM (handing the driver several bills): Here you go, driver…just leave the bags by the front door, will ya?
Sam just did that guy a huge favor. If Emmett had been allowed to pay the driver, he would have been subjected to an hour-long lecture about the cost of taking a cab and how much he paid for his suit back in nineteen-ought-eleven and how the country’s been going to hell in a handbasket ever since Roosevelt left office…Teddy Roosevelt. Inside Selma ’s modest estate, which looks like the inside of a hotel I once worked at:
AUNT BEE: Oh, my…oh, this is more luxurious than Selma
MILLIE: It’s gorgeous!
HOWARD: Gee…it’s an authentic hacienda!
GOOBER: Musta cost a pretty penny…
EMMETT: You can say that again…look at this sofa here…bet that cost over a hunnerd dollars!
Sam and Mike survey the pool (which I have to admit, is pretty darn impressive):
SAM: Wow…isn’t that something…
MIKE: You think we could go in right away?
SAM: Well…maybe we ought to change our clothes first, huh?
MIKE: Oh…yeah…
It would have been so easy, Sam. (“Mike slipped and fell into the pool…I…I tried to save him, but it was too late…”) I can picture a Sunset Boulevard scenario with that little mook floating there like William Holden. (“He always wanted a pool.”) Sam and Mike go back toward the house, where Howard is in his element, bloviating about history while his friends mentally tune him out.
HOWARD: …and, uh…at that time the Spanish owned all of California California
AUNT BEE: Well, I must say the Spanish had excellent taste…
(There is a knock on one of the doors…)
MILLIE: Oh! Somebody’s at the door!
(Millie walks over to a set of glass doors in all her white-gloved glory and opens them, then Mike rushes in)
MIKE: Boy—you ought to see the pool!
SAM (surveying the house’s interior): Oh, wow! Huh!
EMMETT: A lot different than Mayberry, huh, Sam?
SAM: Yeah, I guess!
AUNT BEE: Well…now…I think before we get into any activities we should all get settled…Selma
SAM: Well, uh. Aunt Bee…I think you should have a room by yourself…
“In case you get lucky in town…”
SAM: …then Millie, you can take a room…and Mike and I will share one, so…the rest of you three guys can work it out for the other two bedrooms…okay?
EMMETT: Okay…let’s toss…
SAM (to Mike): Yeah…let’s get the bags…
GOOBER (reaching into his pocket for a coin): Okay…odd man gets a room by himself…
HOWARD: Now wait a minute, fellas…I’m not used to sleeping in a room with anyone…
There’s a surprise.
GOOBER: Well, I’m not either…
Another stunner.
EMMETT: Now…now, look…fellas…
HOWARD: Look…look…I can’t sleep with the window open…I’m very sensitive to pollen…
EMMETT: Howard, we’d all like to have a room by ourselves…so the only fair way is to toss…
GOOBER: Right!
HOWARD (resignedly): Oh, all right…
EMMETT: Ready? (All three men toss coins) Heads!
HOWARD: Tails…
GOOBER (looking at his coin): Tails… (Sarcastically to Howard) I get you, sweetheart…
Emmett smugly smiles and hurriedly walks away, hoping that Goober and Howard never catch on that he was using his double-headed nickel.
HOWARD: Boy…come three thousand miles clear across the country and I end up sleeping in the same room with you…
GOOBER: Yeah? Well, I’m warnin’ you, Howard Sprague…I brought my own readin’ material just for myself if I feel like readin’…you touch one of them comic books and you’re gonna get it!
Sam, Mike and Goober are engaged in a little pool activity—swimming, I mean…not the one involving colored balls and a cue stick. Mike manages to best his father in a race (Sam is clearly holding back, since he fears crushing the little cretin’s spirits) and Goober asks where everyone else is—“Ain’t they gonna get some of this sun?” Sam explains that Emmett drove Aunt Bee and Millie into town to do some shopping (he leaves out the part about where exactly Emmett got a car, unless he borrowed the Plunketts’ golf cart) and Mike, flush with his victory, challenges Goober to a few laps in the pool. Sam then walks over to where Howard is lounging and reading a book.
SAM: Whatcha readin’, Howard?
HOWARD: The Romance of Desert Rocks, by Artemus J. Foley…it’s fascinating…
SAM: Uh…
Howard seems like the kind of guy who would while away his vacation time with rock pornography. I think we’re going to have to find a new category of “sad.”
HOWARD: Boy, you know I can’t wait to go out there and do some rock-hounding in the desert…
SAM: Yeah, should be fun…
HOWARD: Yeah! Besides adding some important specimens to my collection… (An egg timer on the table next to Howard’s lounge chair goes off) Oh…I like to get my tan slowly…twenty minutes to a side… (He turns it off)
SAM: Well, that might even be too much to start with, Howard…right now I’d say you’re about medium rare…
And on that note, Millie comes streaking out of the house and starts to run towards Sam—apparently unaware of the rule that we do not run near the pool area.
MILLIE: Hey! Yoo-hoo!
SAM: Hey! How was the town?
MILLIE: Oh, great! It’s the most charming place you’ve ever seen…and guess who I saw?
SAM: Who?
MILLIE (squealing with delight): Ohhh…Rock Hudson!
SAM: No kidding?
HOWARD: Hey! Where did you see him?
MILLIE: Ohhh…right on the sidewalk! I was just…walking along, window shopping and…and suddenly, there he was! There he was standing right beside me! Rock Hudson
“…and gay…”
MILLIE: …as in the movies!
SAM: Well, did you talk to him?
MILLIE: Well, I…I just couldn’t stand there and stare so I said ‘Hi’…and do you know what he said? Do you know what he said?
SAM: What? What did he say? What did he say?
MILLIE: ‘Hi’…
Sam does a mock faint backwards into the swimming pool, and for some unexplained reason I needed to get another glass of the iced tea my Mom made. Millie and Howard get a king-sized kick out of Sam’s antics, and Emmett arrives on the scene to share in the joviality.
EMMETT: Howard, look… (He holds up an object) Genuine petrified wood…
HOWARD: No kidding?
EMMETT: Yeah, I wanna get somethin’ special for Martha…
(Mike and Goober also violate normal pool protocol by running up to the group)
MIKE: Hey, Pa—guess what? I beat Goober, too…
Hopefully with a large bat.
SAM: Oh, yeah?
GOOBER: Yeah—he’s another Johnny Weissmewlen…
HOWARD: That’s Muller…
GOOBER: Okay, Mr. Know-Everything…
Goober asks Millie if she wants to watch him do the famous “Goober Dive,” and she politely tells him she wouldn’t miss it for the world (though she’s secretly hoping he doesn’t come up from the bottom). Goober does some spastic moves—much like his dancing—off the diving board, and the resulting splash from his descent into the pool manages to drench Howard and his smutty rock book.
HOWARD: Hey! What do you think you’re doing?!! You got water all over me!
GOOBER: Well, I’m sorry…I didn’t see ya sittin’ there!
HOWARD: You’re rinsing off my suntan lotion!
GOOBER: Well, ain’t that too bad…I’m goin’ in!
Howard and Goober’s lovers quarrel continues as the two of them prepare for bed. Howard is already underneath the covers and perusing his rock porn while Goober unpacks his suitcase untidily, strewing comic books and clothes all over the floor. (He is also wearing the gayest pair of pajamas in the history of television.) As he slides underneath the covers, he turns on a transistor radio and begins to play that annoying generic rock ‘n’ roll music TV programs use when they don’t want to pony up any copyright money. He further exasperates Howard by turning the lamp between their beds off.
HOWARD: Goober, I’m trying to read!
GOOBER (unable to hear because of the loud music): What?
HOWARD (turning the light back on): I’m trying to read! I can’t read with the radio on!
GOOBER: Well, I can’t sleep with the light on! (He turns off the lamp)
HOWARD (turning it back on): Well, I can’t read with the light off! Sloppy…
GOOBER: Well, I can’t sleep with the radio off… (He turns the radio back on, pauses a beat, then turns it off) Whaddya mean, ‘sloppy’?
(Sam opens the door to the bedroom door, half-asleep)
SAM: Hey, you guys…knock it off, will ya? We’re trying to sleep…
HOWARD: I’m sorry, Sam…and I apologize for the appearance of the room…
GOOBER: Well, for your information, we’re supposed to be on vacation…we ain’t goin’ to West Point !
Sam does an eye roll, and I’m not certain if it’s out of exasperation or because he has no idea what the hell Goober meant by that last line. The scenario in this episode isn’t too hard to figure out—Howard and Goober are essentially a bucolic Felix Unger and Oscar Madison…the only difference being, of course, is that they are not funny. The next morning, Sam and Emmett are having a nosh at the dining room table when the always cheerful Millie arrives…
MILLIE: Well…what is everybody going to do today?
AUNT BEE: Well, I guess I’ll be busy in the kitchen all day…
SAM: Oh, Aunt Bee…you’re supposed to be on a vacation…
AUNT BEE: Well, it will be a vacation…cooking in that gorgeous kitchen…
“Nicer than that grease trap I have to putter around in back in Mayberry, I’ll tell you what!”
AUNT BEE: …and I’ve decided to have for dinner…something typically Palm Springs…
SAM: Oh?
AUNT BEE: Baked ham…with dates instead of raisins…
Oh, Aunt Bee. Life is your wild mistress. “I happen to be in the mood to venture into the unknown,” she tells all those assembled.
MILLIE: So what are you going to do, Emmett?
EMMETT: Oh, I thought I’d wander into town…
“…do a little panhandling…”
EMMETT: …drop into a fix-it shop…compare the operations here with back East…
I’m beginning to comprehend why these people rarely ever go beyond Mayberry. Sam, on the other hand, is going to plan his contentment “sitting around that beautiful pool.” And with that, a sleepy Howard and Goober both emerge from their love nest:
AUNT BEE: Breakfast, Howard?
HOWARD: No thanks, Aunt Bee…just some coffee for me…
EMMETT: How’d ya sleep?
HOWARD: Sleep? (Scoffing) What sleep? (Indicating Goober) He snored all night long…
GOOBER: Whaddya mean, snored? How I could be snorin’ if I was awake all the time listenin’ to you sniff that nose spray? (He pantomimes spraying each nostril) Sniff sniff…sniff sniff…
AUNT BEE (looking sad and concerned and handing Howard a cup): Here you are, Howard…
HOWARD: Oh, thank you, Aunt Bee…
AUNT BEE: Coffee, Goober?
GOOBER: No thanks, Aunt Bee… (Stretching) Nothin’ can make me feel any better…
HOWARD: Well, I’m going to take mine out to the pool where I can have some peace and quiet!
GOOBER: Well, I’m gonna go back in the room and get some sleep…I was gonna take one of them dune buggies out into the desert today and have us some fun but now I’m too tired…
HOWARD: Yeah, well…what a waste of time…racing around in the desert…
GOOBER: Well, that’s better than lookin’ for them sissy rocks you’re always talkin’ about…
HOWARD: Oh, yeah?
GOOBER: Yeah!
Hoo boy. Realizing that this vacation is going to continue to suck as long as Howard and Goober are engaged in their spat, Millie floats a suggestion: “Maybe if we rent Goober one of those dune buggies and send him out to the desert for a whole day…maybe forever?” (Girlfriend…you’ve clearly been hanging around Aunt Bee too long.)
EMMETT: And send Howard with him…
(Millie, Sam and Aunt Bee chuckle at this…then Sam stops to think)
SAM: Hey…you might have something there…I mean, if we could get the two of them together doing something they each like to do…now, Goober’s been dying to get out in the desert in one of those dune buggies…and Howard’s been itching to go out and look for rocks…maybe if a few of us went along and made it look like an outing, huh?
EMMETT: No desert for me—I’m a city man!
Funniest. Line. Ever. (Actually, it might also be the smartest…Emmett is clearly setting himself up with an alibi for when the sh*t goes down.)
SAM: How about you, Mill?
MILLIE: Well…if it’ll bring peace between Howard and Goober…
“And besides…no one would ever think to look in the desert for their remains…”
SAM: Yeah…I think it’ll bring them together and…maybe they’ll stop picking on each other…
AUNT BEE: Well, the desert does seem to have a calming influence on people…I remember in that picture The Sheik…everybody seemed so controlled…
I’m beginning to understand why “Aunt Bee” is so beloved among so many classic movie fans. The woman hasn’t seen a movie since World War II.
Returning from the General Foods break, Sam has rented a dune buggy and…check out Millie’s outfit here. (“I wanna be a cowboy/And you can be my cowgirl…”) Goober is most anxious to go racing around sand dunes but Sam tells him that they have to wait on Howard, much to Goober’s displeasure: “Oh, Sam—is he gonna go along? I wanna zoom around! I don’t wanna go pokin’ along lookin’ for rocks…”
Howard emerges from inside the house with Aunt Bee, and from the looks of his getup he appears to have joined the faculty of the Philosophy Department of the University of Woolamaloo
The next several minutes is basically a Palm Springs travelogue, with shots of Goober and his friends racing around in the desert, stopping every now and then so Howard can whine about Goober’s driving. After also stopping so that Howard can look for his precious rocks, we have this scenario, whereupon Howard awakes a napping Goober by throwing his bag of rocks down in the front seat…
GOOBER (awake with a start): You had to do that, didn’t ya? You just had to do it!
HOWARD (with mock politeness): Oh, I’m so sorry, sir…
MILLIE (sadly to Sam): I don’t think it’s working, Sam…
Yeah, I’m kind of surprised at Sam…he’s usually much smarter than that. Anyway, Sam tells Goober it’s “his turn” and Mayberry’s manchild goes racing around again…until the buggy comes to a complete stop in the middle of nowhere.
HOWARD: Now what?
GOOBER (after several cranks of the engine): I guess we run out of gas…
Maybe it’s just me—but I could swear I heard that car mumbling something to the effect of “Big race today…big race today…”
MILLIE: Oh, great…
HOWARD (to Sam): Are we lost?
SAM: No no no…we’re not lost… (Pointing to his left) I think the highway’s right over that way…
HOWARD: Yeah…about ten miles…
Well, Howard—you just asked if you were lost. You never asked if you were near.
SAM: Well…I should have checked the gas…
GOOBER: Well, it’s not your fault, Sam…it’s Howard’s…runnin’ all over the desert lookin’ for those dumb rocks…
HOWARD: Me? What about you, drivin’ around in circles for an hour-and-a-half?
You tell him, Mistah Sprague! It’s his chosen vocation to check people’s gas and oil in the first place! It looks as if our vacationing quartet will soon become buzzard bait, but fortunately a yellow dune buggy speeds over the horizon and stops where our stranded vacationers are bickering. The IMDb and closing credits identify the driver as Kirk Nyby…whose father, Christian, just so happens to be the director of this little Palm Springs escapade. Coinky-dink or rank nepotism? Ultimately, you must make the call.
DRIVER: Hey…trouble?
MILLIE: Oh boy! Are we glad to see you!
SAM (leaping out of the buggy): Yeah! We ran out of gas!
DRIVER: Oh, heck…I can take you in to get some gas…I can probably squeeze three of you in here…
SAM: Oh, that’s great…great…listen…why don’t the three of you go on in and I’ll stay here with the buggy, huh?
HOWARD (getting out of the buggy): No, Sam…I’ll stay…you take Millie and Goober can go with you…I can stand the heat…
GOOBER (angrily): Are you saying I can’t? I’ll stay…
SAM: Goob…
HOWARD: I’m staying…
GOOBER: Me too!
I’ll bet Sam is wishing that they had driven out to Palm Springs …because then he could have threatened to turn the car around when Howard and Goober started acting up, just my Dad always did. (Well, Howard and Goober weren’t in the back seat of his car…but you get what I mean.) “All right…all right,” says Sam in a resigned tone. “Both of you can stay here and have your snit where you won’t bother anybody.”
Sam, Millie and the Samaritan speed off and it’s not thirty seconds until Howard starts to feel the desert heat (but it’s a dry heat, as my Aunt Eleanor always argued).
GOOBER: Heat gettin’ ya, huh?
“S’hot enough to boil a monkey’s bum, Bruce…”
HOWARD: Not at all… (Goober gets out of the buggy and while fanning himself, sits down behind the vehicle in an attempt to get some shade) Hunh! I noticed you’re hogging the shade…
GOOBER (tipping his hat with mock politeness): Pardon me…it is all yours… (Looking around the inside of the buggy) I don’t suppose you brought any water…
HOWARD: Hah! Gettin’ thirsty now, huh?
GOOBER: Is that a crime?
HOWARD: No—but it strikes me as funny that a grown man, quote-unquote, can’t go five minutes without a drink of water…
GOOBER: We’ve been gone two hours…
HOWARD: Ohhhh…
I so much want to tell these two clowns to rent a room, but being stranded on the desert and all it’s not likely…Howard nearly trips over something in the sand, and uncovering it discovers the skull of a cow…
GOOBER: Well, what’s that?
HOWARD: Well, it probably was a cow…huh…must’ve died of thirst…
The look of terror on Goober’s face here is not the thought of slowly dying from thirst…it’s that he’s going to have to spend his final minutes listening to Howard discuss the migratory habits of California’s once great bovine population, something he wouldn’t wish on his worst enemy. Back at the House of Selma, Sam and Millie are explaining their predicament to Aunt Bee…who humorously devours bonbons while perusing a magazine in stereotypically wealthy dowager fashion.
AUNT BEE: Is it real desert out there?
SAM: Oh, yeah…just like in The Sheik…
AUNT BEE: Are they getting along any better?
MILLIE: Well, if they are they haven’t let us in on it…
AUNT BEE: Oh, dear…
SAM: Well…it was a try…
“And when I stop to think about it…I could always not find my way back there.” There is then a cut to Goober and Howard’s desert situation…
GOOBER: You know…a man can only last two days without water in heat like this…I saw that on TV…Errol Flynn in The Last of the Legionnaires…
That reminds me…I need to get ClassicBecky a birthday present…
HOWARD: Boy…first I gotta share the same room with ya, now I gotta share the same desert with ya…is there no mercy?
There is a cut to another dune buggy rented by Sam, as he and Millie scour the purple hills in all their majesty, looking for Frick and Frack…
GOOBER: I say Sam oughta be back by now…maybe we oughta start hikin’ toward the highway…
HOWARD (pointing to his left): Highway’s over here…
GOOBER (pointing in the opposite direction): No, it’s over there…
HOWARD (agitated): No, it isn’t, it’s… (He stops suddenly) We’d better stay right where we are…the less you move around, the less you dehydrate…
GOOBER: Howard…
HOWARD: Hmm?
GOOBER: I know ain’t nothin’ gonna happen to us, but… (Sighing) I want to get somethin’ off my chest…
If he says “I wish I knew how to quit you,” honest to my grandma—this will be the last R.F.D. episode I ever watch.
HOWARD: What’s that?
GOOBER: You remember in the ninth grade when somebody nailed your sneakers to the floor? (Howard registers surprise) That was me…
“Goob, I never even owned a pair of sneakers in high school…you must be thinking of someone else…”
HOWARD (laughing): Oh…
GOOBER: Yeah, I just…wanted to clear the record in case…I mean, I just wanted to clear the record…
HOWARD: Well…since this seems like a pretty good time to get things off our chest…do you remember that time in school when you said you were sick and you really went fishing? (Goober nods) I was the one who told the teacher on ya…
“I knew it was you, you #@$%ing stoolie!” I’d like to be able to say Goober whips out a pen knife and goes for Howard’s trachea, ending our misery after thirty-seven episodes—but we simply aren’t that lucky.
GOOBER (smiling): Really takes good friends to own up to these things, don’t it?
“Howls of derisive laughter, Bruce!”
HOWARD: Sure does…
GOOBER: Well, it’s been a real pleasure knowin’ you… (He stops to correct himself) I mean, it’s a real pleasure knowin’ you…
HOWARD (extending his hand): The feeling’s mutual…pal…
GOOBER: Best pals…
Oh, Kee-rist…fortunately for the viewers, Sam and Millie manage to locate their friends before this morphs into Brokeback Desert
I’m guessing Howard must have been responsible for spelling out “Help” with rocks because it’s spelled correctly… “The Lost Patrol,” cracks Sam, because this episode hasn’t had nearly enough movie references.
SAM: Well, how’d it go?
MILLIE: Boy—I betcha thought we’d never get back! (She hands Goober a canteen of water)
GOOBER: No…no…no problem…
HOWARD: Nah…time goes fast when you’ve with a good pal, huh? (He claps Goober on the back)
GOOBER: Ah… (He starts to take a sip of water, then hesitates) Oh…you go first, pal…
HOWARD: No, no…you go first…I insist…
GOOBER: Okay… (He takes a long slash, as Sam and Millie look at each other in bewilderment)
HOWARD: Hah—tastes good, huh?
GOOBER: Hey…I’ll fill the tank… (He grabs the gasoline container from Sam)
Howard is only too eager to give Goober a hand, and Millie is simply perplexed by the complete 180 in their behavior. As Sam observes: “I don’t know what caused it…but I’m sure not going to ask any questions.” I think that’s a wise course of action, my barely-farming friend.
We will now engage in what we like to call “the coda,” because I think we can all use something to cleanse the palate that is our minds after watching the previous display. Our cast of regulars is seated out by the pool, replete after polishing off Aunt Bee’s scrumptious Palm Springs Ham.
SAM (looking at his watch): Oh, Mike…it’s almost your bedtime…
MIKE: Oh, Pa…we’re on vacation…
SAM (sharply): Mike…
Look at Emmett there in the background. That’s the contentment of a man on vacation…vacation from what is what I’m still trying to figure out.
EMMETT: Look! A shooting star!
MIKE: Hey, Pa—can I make a wish?
SAM: Yeah…sure you can…wish for anything you want…it’s bound to come true…
MIKE: Okay…
The scene cuts back to Mayberry, with a startled Andy Taylor (Andy Griffith) wondering how the hell he got back in the sheriff’s office…? (Okay, I made that up—the little blockhead has made another wish. “I wish I could stay up till midnight !”)
Everyone looks at Sam sympathetically as if to say, “He won’t be on the plane when we fly back.” Sam then looks at his watch and says: “Okay…in five more minutes it’ll be
Aunt Bee gets a streak going with her second uninterrupted appearance on Mayberry R.F.D.—but calculating Thrilling Days of Yesteryear’s patented Bee-o-Meter™, the tally is five appearances in Season Two, with seventeen show-ups on the series in total. Next week, the nadir of the Palm Springs story arc in “Millie and the Golf Pro”…and while I’m sure it’s a mere coinky-dink, this also signals the last of the YouTube presentations of Mayberry R.F.D.—the gentleman who so generously put these episodes up for your viewing pleasure stopped at this one…I’ll bet dollars to donuts he went insane after watching next week’s show. Are you brave enough to join us? I hope so!
That’s right, Howard…reel her in slowly…and then spring your coin collection on her!
ReplyDeleteHahaha nice. There are some of us who would be enchanted by the talk of a coin collection, I'll have you know. My problem is that when I get macked on (very rarely) I get accidentally vapid, so I'd probably reply, "Oooh, I love round things! Especially when they're also flat!"
You know how much I like Howard, but Howard plus Goober equals sheer torture. It's just too forced.
Also, you can sing "rock porn" to the tune of "Rag Mop." You're welcome.