Gilmore Girls Recap: That’s What You Get Folks for Makin’ Whoopee

What’s that expression about losing your head it it was glued on..or tied on…something like that, right? Well however the saying goes, I was an idiot yesterday and forgot to post Whirl’s Gilmore Girls recap.

I know it’s a day late, and I’m sorry to both YOU and Whirl for not getting this posted yesterday. Bad blogger…bad blogger. Better late than never I suppose.

Title: That’s What You Get Folks For Makin’ Whoopee
Original Airdate: 10/3/2006
It’s a few hours from where we left off last week and Luke’s driving down the road. From the squealing sounds his tires are making I’d say he’s mad. He stops in front of an apartment building, storms inside, rides the elevator to his destination and pounds on a door. Oh God, is he where I think he is? No he couldn’t be. He is! Suspicion confirmed when Christopher opens the door and Luke gives him a well placed right fist to the jaw. Chris only gets a chance to groan before Luke’s shaking out his hand and back in the elevator. You go on with your bad self Luke Danes.

Lorelai is lost in thought sitting at her kitchen table set for two, but she perks right up at the sound of Rory’s alarm. She’s waiting for her daughter with a cup of coffee and some homemade waffles fresh from the toaster. Rory’s surprised her Mom’s up so early and Lorelai passes it off as inability to sleep, and doesn’t mention Luke showing up wanting to elope. Rory shares that she won’t be seeing Logan until Christmas, but she’s okay with it since he’s trying to be a grown-up and she wants to support that. Therefore Rory will be a grown-up as well, so no pouting for her. The odds of that lasting are about a billion to one. Rory’s upset because if it wasn’t for London she’d be discovering Asia with Logan. She had planned it all out with books, highlighters and post-it notes. Lorelai cheers her up by letting her know that Lane is back in town and she sounded tired, which is a good way to sound after a honeymoon. Lane’s Korean, is that close enough Rory?

Luke’s back at the diner with supplies to fix the hole that used to be a wall. TJ’s there waiting to help him out with some wonderful coffee from the new diner across the street called “Kirk‘s“. It’s like another dimension, where it’s Kirk who wears the flannel and backwards baseball cap. Sorry Kirk but it doesn’t work for you like it does for Mr. Danes. Luke confronts this new competition and tries to explain the insanity of opening up a diner because the one you essentially totaled is closed for repairs. Talking to Kirk is like talking to Taylor, infuriating for Luke, amusing for us and completely pointless as Luke gets nowhere with him. Kirk even has the gall to hand Luke a job application, which Luke just crumbles up and drops at his feet.

Over at The Dragonfly Sookie is teaching Lorelai how to make sushi, well the traditional kind. Lorelai really wants to make it with meatloaf, or fried chicken or peanut butter and jelly. Sounds oddly appealing I must say. Lorelai confesses that she told him. Told who what? You know that guy Luke that I slept with that other guy Chris. Sookie can’t believe she spilled the beans but Lor explains about how he showed up that morning ready to elope, not willing to take no for an answer. He had to know, because it had to be no. Sookie doesn’t see why but even I can see it’s not right to marry someone after doing the horizontal mambo with your baby’s daddy two days earlier. Lorelai says it was one of the most horrible moments of her whole life and admits that she’s not fine but she has to be okay. So does that mean she is okay? Hard to tell with Lorelai’s lack of something I like to call emotions.

Rory runs into Zack on her way to see Lane. Seems the honeymoon sucked big time, mostly because Zach thought he was getting a great deal for accommodations online. Turns out that great accommodation was a room in the apartment of some guy named Pedro, which was no where near the beach or at all private. Not only that but Zach got a parasite from drinking the water and he doesn’t see why they don’t warn you about that. I want to live in Zach’s blissfully unaware world. He’s feeling better but poor Lane is now sick so he heads off to get his wife saltines and ginger ale. Rory finds the newlywed in bed and hears more about the horror that was Mexico. Lane’s feeling a bit better so she wants to go for a walk to discuss certain things in private. Rory worries she’s too sick but Lane promises she has a doctor’s appointment tomorrow, so it’s all okay. Is that the same as Lorelai okay? I’m already confused enough.

Luke’s working on the diner repairs and TJ’s just standing there gabbing away about stained glass windows and log cabins. Luke just wants to get to work and TJ calls him on his bad mood. Luke apologizes and thanks him for the help. Truth be told TJ’s glad to be out of the house, seems being pregnant makes Liz horny for her husband. Her brother isn’t too impressed about having this information. Neither am I. He even suggests Luke get his fiancée pregnant because he bet it would get Lorelai randy. Luke’s being pretty tolerant but once TJ starts talking about the two couples raising their families together he makes a hasty exit to get supplies.

Lane and Rory are sitting in the Stars Hollow gazebo, perfect setting to talk about one’s first time. Lane says she knows the truth now, and that Rory can stop pretending that woman like it. Like what? Wait…sex? Oh no. Lane thinks sex is horrible and she’s on to the huge charade that it’s fun, or sexy or enjoyable. Rory can’t believe it was horrible every time. I guess one time was enough for the young couple and Lane doesn’t believe her best friend when she says it gets better. Lane & Zach had decided that their first time should be romantic like in the movies, and therefore on the beach. This really means sand, cold salt water, sea weed, crabs and strangers in snorkel masks. Yeah it was horrible for poor Lane and she’s fine with living in a sexless marriage but Rory suggests trying again in an actual bed. Remember how I said I wanted to live in Zach’s world? Scratch that.

Lorelai is laden down with bags and sees Luke across the street. It’s always great to run into your ex in the middle of the street, trust me I know. Lorelai apologizes but Luke tells her he’s fine. She tells him it’s alright to not be okay with everything, that even she’s not okay with everything. Luke suggests punching out Christopher, since it made him feel better. Oh and he couldn’t care less who or what you date Lorelai because he’s over it. Maybe it’s just a bigger deal to you since you’re the one who proposed? I’ve never seen Luke so utterly mean (and fantastic) before, and as he walks away all Lorelai can do is watch him go, stunned at what he just said to her.

TJ’s drinking a beer from “Kirk’s” and helping Luke with the last of the painting on the diner. TJ loves drinking outside but more importantly loves drinking beer at a skating rink, something about the fumes from the zamboni and the alcohol mixing together. I think I spot a fellow Canadian! Speaking of which TJ’s got 4 tickets to an ice show and he wants to double date with Luke and Lor. Poor Luke tries to get out of it but finally admits that he and the fiancée are no more. Being a good brother-in-law TJ embraces him in a bear hug and invites him over for dinner.

Rory comes home and the house has become an Asian wonderland. We’ve got bathrobe kimonos, funky Japanese pop music, a shrine to Hello Kitty, and a poster of Sandra Oh. Gray’s Anatomy shout out! Lorelai has planned great things for Rory-son, including eating sushi, making origami cranes, acting out a Kabuki play and watching movies like “The Karate Kid” and “Enter the Dragon”. Lorelai may be pretty messed up right now but she sure is a damn good mother.

After their “Asia experience” the Gilmore Girls are stuffed full of sushi, which doesn’t stop Lor from wanting some fried ice cream. Mom extraordinaire realizes they are out of ice cream just as the phone rings, but they’re “out of the country” so they let the machine pick it up. Sure enough it’s Christopher saying he doesn’t care about Luke hitting him and even though Lorelai said it was a one time thing he still wants to talk about “it”, and him and her. Having heard all this Rory realizes her parents slept together and understandably gets really upset. She wants to know if this is the reason her Mom broke off the engagement. Lorelai promises it wasn’t but admits it happened the same night she broke up with Luke. Rory calls her Mom on how quickly she jumped in the sack with Christopher and Lor defends herself adamantly, she’s not perfect and it meant nothing. Rory lets her Mom have it, saying she can’t believe she didn’t tell her the truth and that if she’s heart broken she should have eaten ice cream, watched a sappy movie and had a good cry, not sleep with Chris. With that the daughter storms out and Mommy Lorelai is left again just watching someone go.

Luke’s over at Liz and TJ’s to have dinner and White Russians, an excellent drink of choice, and right away the conversation is on Luke’s busted up relationship. Liz wants to know what caused the break up but Luke makes it clear he doesn’t want to talk about it. Since when has that ever stopped family?

Rory walks into Lane’s house rambling a mile a minute about being mad at her mother, that is until she sees Lane sitting on the floor looking a bit worse for wear. Turns out what those after school specials tell you is true, one time is enough, because Lane is with parasite…I mean child. Lane’s pregnant! Rory can’t believe it and neither can the mother to be, who hasn’t told Zach about it yet. Lane is freaked out and doesn’t know what to do. She’s not ready to be a Mom, she has to be perfect first with her act all together. She doesn’t know how to change a diaper or stop a baby from crying. She can’t make mistakes and be a mother! Rory assures her that she doesn’t have to be perfect, that no one is perfect, especially not mothers. Looks like this daughter just realized she might have been wrong. Rory goes on to promise Lane will be a better Mom then the likes of Britney Spears, you know that is really hard to do. Like a good BFF Rory cheers Lane up, and it looks like we have a Little Lane to look forward to.

Back at Liz and TJ’s they’re waiting for the food to finish cooking and Liz turns the conversation to Luke and his ex and how not shocking their breakup was. Really? Yeah, she thought that as a couple they were never on the same “plane” together, since they never moved in together and Luke shutting out Lorelai when April came around. Luke explains that it wasn’t about planes or theories, but simply that they didn’t belong together, they wanted to but they just never did. God Luke’s got that look on his face again, and it’s killing me. Oh the dinner bell! Well, actually the stove is broken and the tuna loaf they were waiting for isn’t going to get made. Luke offers to run to the market to pick up some food.

Luke’s in the frozen food aisle grabbing for some peas when he looks up and there is Lorelai grabbing some ice cream. Yeah it’s awkward and Lorelai jokes about how avoiding Doosie’s market didn’t work so well. Luke denies avoiding her and Lor recounts bitterly that of course he’s not avoiding her, since he’s completely over it. Luke apologizes for being a jerk and that he was mad but isn’t anymore. Well, technically he’s still mad but it will pass. Lorelai apologizes for being a jerk as well and seems slightly hopeful of the possibility of them being okay, that is until Luke says this:

Luke: It’s not your fault. It’s not my fault. It’s just we’re just not right together. You’re you, I’m me. I just want to stop pretending we’re something else. You don’t belong with me. You belong with someone like Christopher and let’s just stop fighting it. And you go back to being Lorelai Gilmore and I’ll go back to being the guy in the diner who pours your coffee.

As he says it you can see Lorelai’s huge facade start to crumble and the emotion running across her face is heartbreaking. Still she fake smiles and makes a hasty exit, obviously not wanting to fall apart in front of the guy she still cares so much for. The parting is amicable but bittersweet.

Lorelai sits alone on her couch silently crying to herself, I guess the facade is all gone. Rory walks in and her Mom does her best to make it a little less obvious how upset she is. Rory says nothing, just sits beside her Mom and puts her head on her shoulder as we fade to black. Anyone have a kleenex out there? Anyone?