LORELAI: This is an uncontaminated area. I even cleaned the table using something other than the sleeve of my sweater and spit.
Although there are several jokes in the show about Lorelai’s poor housekeeping skills, their home never looks dirty, or even very messy – cosy clutter and a light layer of dust is about the worse we ever see. (It’s hard to make a television set, which is not lived in, really look like a dirty house).
It does make sense that Lorelai is not keen on housework – besides being a single parent working full-time (and until recently, studying part-time), which is reason enough. She worked as a maid for several years, and her job is to run the inn and keep it looking nice now, so it’s believable that she wouldn’t feel like taking care of the house as well when she gets home from work.
JESS: Plus, the two of you walking around the other day like some damn Andy Hardy movie.
Andy Hardy, previously discussed. This is the second time that Rory and Dean have been compared to an Andy Hardy movie – the first time it was by Lorelai, showing how spookily in tune Lorelai and Jess’ opinions are.
Jess gives away here that he was watching Rory with Dean just as hard as she was watching him with Shane. He’s angry with Rory, and hurt at how she has treated him, but by no means indifferent to her or over her.
JESS: I’m sorry, did I hear from you at all this summer? Did I just happen to miss the thousands of phone calls you made to me, or did the postman happen to lose all those letters you wrote to me? You kiss me, you tell me not to say anything . . . very flattering, by the way. You go off to Washington . . . then nothing. Then you come back here all put out because I didn’t just sit around and wait for you like Dean would’ve done? And yeah, what about Dean? Are you still with him? ‘Cause last time I checked, you were, and I haven’t heard anything to the contrary.
While popping into Doose’s Market to buy food for a second dinner after Friday Night Dinner (because the meal Emily provided was either insubstantial, or they were too upset to eat very much), Rory runs into Jess while shopping (he’s apparently buying one can of something). She lets him know she’s surprised and not exactly thrilled he found a girlfriend over the summer vacation, and Jess absolutely lets her have it.
Jess makes it clear he’s not going to put up with being badly treated, the way Dean often seems to allow. Rory kissed him, told him to keep quiet about it – as he says, not exactly flattering – then goes to Washington, not calling or writing to him in the interim (again, there seems to be some sort of fiction that Rory went straight to Washington from the wedding, which definitely didn’t happen, and couldn’t have happened). Then she comes back to Stars Hollow, clearly still with her boyfriend, Dean.
Jess doesn’t know that Rory tried to write to him while she was away, but didn’t know what to say, and that she tried to come to the festival in town without Dean, all dressed up, hoping to see him. But even if he did, I’m not sure it would radically alter his position. Rory still didn’t contact him, and she didn’t break up with her boyfriend – I think Jess is making it clear that he doesn’t want to keep flirting with Rory until she ditches Dean. Which is pretty honourable, considering how much cheating goes on in this show, with very little angst over committing it.
Note that Rory and Jess in this scene mirror Christopher and Lorelai earlier in the episode, with Rory taking the same position as her father – she wishes things could be different, but isn’t willing to do the work necessary to get there. Like Lorelai, Jess says that until things change, he’s not interested. Unfortunately, Rory resembles her father emotionally far too much at times.
When Rory comes out of the supermarket, Lorelai asks if she’s done (shopping), and Rory says angrily, “Oh, I’m done”. Needless to say, she is very far from being done with Jess!
JESS: Two weeks ago there was a run on snow cones. Machine broke, people went crazy, Taylor tried to call in the National Guard, but –
The National Guard is a state-based military force that is part of the reserve component of the US Army and Air Force when activated for federal missions – what would be called the Army Reserve in other countries. The idea of a local militia in the US goes back to the earliest English colonisation of the Americas, the first one formed in 1636. The title National Guard has been used nationally since 1903, and there are currently more than 400 000 people serving in the National Guard.
The National Guard may be activated in times of emergency, such as hurricanes, wildfires, riots, or terrorist attacks. Jess jokingly likens the snow cone machine breaking down to such disasters. This comment from Jess sounds as if he is beginning to fit in with the town better – the crack about Taylor and the snow cones sounds like something Luke would say, or even Lorelai. His summer in Stars Hollow, and perhaps dating a girl from the town, is helping him to feel more at home there.
I thought I had finally caught Christopher out in a direct lie, but when I went back and read through the script again, he never actually says that he sold his motorcycle – it’s all jokes and evasion to make Lorelai think that he has, that he has changed. But ta da! It’s the same old crummy, irresponsible Christopher as before. He’s such a weasel with his words that you can’t pin him down.
LORELAI: You know, you need a mask and a horse when you do that.
Lorelai refers to masked heroes who ride a horse, such as The Lone Ranger, previously discussed, who rides a white horse named Silver.
Emily redeems herself in this episode when she orders Christopher to leave her house. She may have been pushing Lorelai to get back with Christopher by any means, but when she sees that Lorelai and Rory really don’t want Christopher there, she does her best to protect them from him (she’s good at setting boundaries when she wants to, the way she wishes Lorelai had done for her when she needed rescuing from a man).
Lorelai doesn’t often call Emily her hero, but this is a rare example when she does.
LORELAI: Hey, have you ever met your daughter? She could get anywhere by herself! She could get to the third dimension by herself!
A joke – the third dimension is the one we all live in. We can all get there by ourselves. More seriously, it implies that Rory is capable of seeing reality for herself.
While Lorelai and Rory are having Friday Night Dinner with Emily, Christopher decides to show up – no doubt encouraged by Emily, who has had a cosy little chat with him over the phone, and tried to make Lorelai get back with him.
Christopher doesn’t actually have any ideas on how to change the situation – he just wants Lorelai (and to a lesser extent, Rory) back in his life. He makes it clear that he wants Lorelai, not Sherry, but isn’t willing to break up with Sherry. In fact, he tells Lorelai he plans to marry her. I feel as if Sherry deserves to know all this before she commits to marriage and motherhood with Christopher!
I’m not completely sure what Christopher hopes to gain by seeing Lorelai – presumably to make friends again, with the hopes of one day persuading Lorelai to become his mistress, bed buddy, or booty call.
Francie refers to the 19th century English fairy tale, Goldilocks and the Three Bears. It was first recorded by the English poet and writer Robert Southey and published anonymously as “The Story of the Three Bears”, in a volume of his writings called The Doctor.
The original story was about an ugly, rude old woman who enters a house and helps herself to the bear’s porridge and their beds, with tragic results for the interloper. Published twelve years later by English writer Joseph Cundall in his Treasury of Pleasure Books for Young Children, the nosy person was changed to a pretty little girl.
Many names were suggested for her over the years as the story was republished, from Silver Hair to Little Golden-Locks, before the name Goldilocks was hit on in 1904, in Nursery Rhymes and Tales (English author Flora Annie Steel is credited for choosing the ultimately successful name). The little girl’s fate has differed in various retellings, but she never ends up as badly as the old woman, usually learning her lesson and vowing never to wander off into the forest again.
Rory reacts with irritation at being compared to a silly little blonde-haired character (she’s extra sensitive about blondes, because of Jess’ girlfriend). However, Francie is most likely comparing Rory to Goldilocks as if she is a naïve little girl, poking her nose into things she doesn’t understand, meddling where she doesn’t belong, and unaware of the dangers she is in. You know, the dangers of all the … hemlines? While Rory has been compared to fairy tale and children’s characters before, this is the first time it’s done to insult her.
FRANCIE: I want you to go back to Margaret Thatcher and tell her to play ball.
Margaret Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, born Margaret Roberts (1925-1913), Prime Minister of the UK from 1979 to 1990, and leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. The longest-serving British prime minister of the 20th century, she was the first woman to hold that office. As prime minister, she implemented controversial conservative policies that became known as Thatcherism. A Soviet journalist dubbed her the “Iron Lady”, a nickname that became associated with her uncompromising politics and leadership style.
Francie is suggesting that Paris is likewise a tough and uncompromising female leader.
The Annotated Gilmore Girls 