Back to Lance at the computer in his trailer. He types away at the keyboard. Is it just me or is it hilarious that Mr Lance Computer Whiz types with two fingers?
He needs to take some lessons from Billy 
[KC’s fabulous meme immediately comes to mind! Spellbound!… Found it! ]
The computer comes up with the following on the screen:
Lance: This is interesting. Hmm?
The ‘interesting music’ kicks in ding ding!
Next thing we are back at IFF, with Ms Walker still on patrol ( I guess she didn’t retire in The Pharaoh’s engineer!).
Somewhere in IFF, we hear a beeping alarm sound and see a computer screen inside a room flashing:
666 FILE ACCESSED
The computer is at the desk of the guy who presented the ‘Death by Beer Keg’ story earlier.. whooo he works at IFF? He also seems to like working in the dark. weird!
He types on the keyboard and receives the following message:
User code #238335
– USER LANCE DORN –
He hesitates, then types:
User Locked Out
Lance is confused- he seems to be locked out – lol his computer screen doesn’t look like it’s on either.. that’s confusing..
Lance is left with the previous screen about file 0666 that’s closed.. and a puzzled look on his face..
Back to IFF, Falkan makes a call..
Falkan: Yes, sir, I, I will keep my eye on it. Now Dorn’s job is to test our security. This could be harmless.
Unknown baddie: We don’t want him testing our security at all. Do we?
Falkan: No, sir. No, we don’t.
On to Amanda’s.. I guess this is the next day?
Amanda: Oh, mother, I don’t know if I want to go to this. It’s just gonna be a bunch a people pretending like they haven’t got any older or put on any weight. It’ll be a strain.
Dotty (as she joins Amanda on the couch): I don’t know why you say that, Amanda. A reunion is supposed to be fun. I mean, you get to see all your old friends.
[A reunion!!! Is this high school? or university? If it’s high school she can catch up with Connie Barnhill!!]
Whooo looks like Dotty is working on the Bananagram!
Amanda: Mother, but these people weren’t all my friends. I mean, some of them were my friends but some of them I didn’t even know and I’ve lost touch with them.
Dotty: Then that gives you a chance to catch up. Find out all the wonderful things they’ve been doing with their lives.
Amanda: Oh, I’m sure they’ve just been doing average things like we have. [Love how Amanda seems to look down as she says this.. hmm we all know you’ve been doing not so average things Amanda!! 
]
Dotty: Oh, no, not that skinny little kid, uh, Neil, uh…
Amanda: Drexler?
Dotty: Yes, he’s in there.
Amanda searches through the paperwork she’s been sent about her reunion.
Amanda: Uh-uh. Oh, wait, Drexler, Neil. Harvard? Peace Corps, law school, millionaire?
[wha?? you mean.. you get sent a little bio on everyone who was in your high school class or university class? ugh!!! I mean why do you need to show up then! I don’t like that!! I’d hate to sum up my life in 3 lines or something! And.. what would that letter have said about Amanda?!]
Dotty: Right.
Amanda: And he sailed to New Guinea to search for a lost tribe of head-
Dotty: Head hunters. He wrote a bestseller about it. I saw him on Merv. Oh, if he happens to come, why don’t you just…
Dotty and Amanda together: …ask him over for dinner?
Amanda: Uh-huh. Good. Ok
[LOL anyone think Dotty is matchmaking??]
Dotty: That’s right.
We see that Dotty is working on that Bananagram.
LOL that she’s doodled Drexler twice on the newspaper.. (Neil Drexler once? I think? I think Learjet – who transcribed this episode saw that too? – btw – HUGE thank you Learjet for transcribing this!!!!) Sorry I digress – it’s like she had rehearsed the conversation and planned to tell Amanda to invite him over for dinner ha!
I can’t see though how they find out if they have the right answer.. there doesn’t seem to be a number to call or anything? Man I think too much..
Dotty: Oh!!! I got it! O, for onion soup.
Amanda: No, that’s not right.
Dotty: How do you know?
Amanda: I don’t know. [love how Amanda says this so flat and deadpan.. I know nothing!!!]
Dotty: I mean, you’ve never played this before.
Amanda: You’re right.
Dotty: Amanda, this is worth $10,000.
Amanda: I’m wrong.
[lol I’ve missed seeing Amanda and Dotty together! have you?]
Dotty: O is definitely first.
Doorbell rings.
Amanda: That’s it, mother, I’ll get it.
Dotty: Onion soup.
Amanda goes to answer the door.. Uh oh it’s the Beer Keg truck driver/assassin!!! I guess this is ‘King’ or Code name King?
Amanda: Yes?
King: Amanda King?
Amanda: Yes.
King/Brown: My name is Brown. I’m with IFF. Are we secure?… The word is “top hat”. Counter?
Amanda: Diablo. Clearance? [Diablo.. as in 666! Uh oh.. this guy knows the agency codes?! uh oh!! what’s going on??!!! It’s quite scary that something could happen to Amanda here!]
King/Brown: Seven Bravo... (Amanda looks at his identity card) …I’m on an errand for accounting. I have written authorisation from Lance Dorn. He’s found the problem–I came to pick up the cheque.
[why would Lance Dorn be doing a written authorisation? Does he strike anyone as a follow the correct procedure and issue the paperwork kinda guy? He said he would call her.. and he said he was eliminating paperwork from his life! I guess since this guy knew the codes, and probably has a valid ID, Amanda has to comply]
King/Brown hands Amanda the letter which she reads.
Amanda: Great. Right, if you’ll just wait a just a second, I’ll get you a cheque.
Amanda fetches the cheque, comes back and gives it to “Brown”.
Amanda: OK. Here’s your cheque. Now I would appreciate it if you would give me my real cheque as quickly as possible; tomorrow is my grocery day. [LOL poor Amanda!]
King/Brown: Sure. Thank you. Sorry for the inconvenience.
They part ways. Hmm there seems to be no indication that Amanda thinks there is a problem here at all. Do you agree?
King/Brown gets in his car.. Falkan is in the driver seat.
Falkan: Got it?
King/Brown: No problem.
Falkan: OK. Now we take care of the bigger problem.
Off they drive looking all intense.. Uh oh.. what’s the bigger problem?! You know these are both bad dudes.. because both are too tough to put on their seatbelts! Guess there is trouble ahead.. and I need to put mine on!!
Looking forward to hearing your thoughts everyone! Do you remember seeing this episode for the first time? I’m not sure that I recognised King/Brown as the truck driver the first time.. how about you? can’t wait to hear from ya!!!
"Just walk with me.." 
I love Dotty/Amanda scenes. It’s interesting that Dotty read Amanda’s mail and Amanda seems to not be bothered by it. Their relationship amazes me! Maybe because my mother and I are like oil and water.
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This whole bananagram thing didn’t really capture my attention at first, but I’ve been playing Words With Friends on my phone recently and decided to have a go at this. I know that others have as well. I didn’t know that bananagrams were an actual game. It has elements of Scrabble and Boggle. The tiles actually come in a banana-shaped pouch. It also reminds of this newspaper game we have here called Jumble. A set of words are scrambled next to a cartoon. There are hints about the words and some letters are circled. Once you have all the words you unscramble the circled letters and it answers something about the cartoon.
I couldn’t come up with a real word, but did look up poison nou and found out it has some sort of connection to a computer virus. That makes it somewhat appropriate to what’s going on in this episode, but I think that’s it a recent thing and not connected to SMK at all. I’m wondering if they just randomly picked some letters or it actually is supposed to be onion soup. Maybe a computer genius was tripped up by a simple anagram and Dotty actually had it right. But then again if she did they would have ended up $10,000 richer.
I also like when Dotty and Amanda get to interact as mother/daughter and you also get to see a bit of friendship there. Whatever issues they may have had on-set it’s a testament to their abilities as actors to be able to pull of this great relationship onscreen.
This porch scene with the other King reminds me of Lee’s appearance at the beginning of “A Lovely Little Affair” with the pizza. Amanda quickly closes the door when she realizes her professional life might intersect with her private one. Amanda wouldn’t have any reason to question the situation as the only thing that seems amiss is a clerical error. We’re the ones who’ve seen the other goings on and might fear for her safety.
My high school has changed how it does reunions. Instead of trying to have a stuffy banquet somewhere the planners will actually reserve space at a local bar and then a range of years are invited. There is also an alumni picnic in the summer. So you actually get to see more than just your class. This has led to greater attendance and an atmosphere that’s relaxed and fun. It has also renewed friendships and created some that hadn’t occurred in high school. They are really even called reunions anymore as we have them at least twice a year now.
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So you can’t find the word either? I thought it was just li’l ol’ german me… For a moment I thought it was “poisonous”, but two N and no second S made that impossible. Other than onion soup, I found nothing!
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Two of my ex-boyfriends were software developers. Both did that two-finger typing and both worked in the dark. I never understood that.
I really like Amanda’s shirt and her hair style. She looks great! Agreeing with all that it’s nice to see the Amanda and Dottie interactions and banter again. And of course, Dottie has to push Mr. Millionaire. Amanda’s so used to the casual nudges about finding a man that she just shrugs them off.
What sort of bothers me is her giving that check away. Yes, she confirmed clearance. Amanda isn’t made to look bad, but we see it’s a set-up. It’s too bad Lee didn’t happen to be there. He would have sensed something was up.
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Ugh… I’ll sometimes type my thoughts into a document, check my spelling and copy and paste into here. I somehow missed copying the last line which was..
‘I wish Amanda had been the one to sense something was up.’
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I have a friend who’s really good with computers who always types with six fingers — the first two fingers and thumb of each hand, and she goes really fast. I don’t understand that, either, but she refuses to do normal touch typing.
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My husband works in the IT dept. first as a program and now as a data warehouse engineer. Although he types with all his fingers, most of the computer languages are codes and series of letters, numbers, and symbols. If you were to read their logic it would make absolutely no sense. So these computer wizs on SMK could type with only a couple of fingers. The dark thing I don’t know, maybe it helps with their eye strain. My husband works with full lighting. But programmers can be a challenging to relate with because they are analysts and they think through a whole scenario before they answer. By then most everyone else has moved on to another thought or topic. I’ve learnt over the last 21 years of marriage that when I’ve moved ahead in my thinking, my husband is two ideas back still analyzing why I said that, what I want, and what is all the possible out comes 🙂
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I’ve had to do programming for my thesis. For some, it’s easy. I think they have the right mindset (i.e., your husband and Jestress’s friend). But programming is my nemesis. One of those things I’ve tried to avoid, but can’t because it’s part of my research. One comma or letter out of place in pages and pages of code that I can’t find and the thing won’t work. Drives me mad. But I use both hands, lights on, etc. Then of course, cross fingers and hit compile (and pray it works!).
Your husband’s approach makes sense, because he probably doesn’t have comma issues like I do! The guys I dated were the same way, by the way.
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Melissa, I think your husband and mine are related. And I am a big geek, computer nerd but the way his mind works leaves me stunned at times. :-).
It is weird that King/Brown has such lovely sculpted eyebrows here.
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“lovely sculpted eyebrows” – hahaha, that got me to check out the blog this afternoon, Cindy 🙂 You’re right though, he does have nice brows. No one ever said the devil couldn’t be good looking!
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Ok, the sculpted eye brows made me spit my wine!!! ROFL
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Love the Amanda/Dotty action in this scene. I love Dotty. She can be very annoying, but most of the time I find her rather funny. She is always looking out for a man for Amanda!
I must agree with Amada on reunions. I’d rather have my nose hairs plucked out than go to one. The people I want to know about and that I want to know about me I’ve kept in touch with. Besides, in this day and age, I would think that people who want to catch up and stay in touch are already connected and getting all the info on Facebook? Alas, there is no Facebook for Amanda, but I still would not want to go to a reunion. The Connie Barnhill thing would just bring the conversation potentially too close to what Amanda does for a living. I can see Connie wanting to look puffed up by dropping hints and innuendoes about Amanda that really could cause her trouble.
LOL – as if the guy cares at all that tomorrow is Amanda’s grocery day!!! He does good not to roll his eyes too much or make a face or shake his head. Maybe that should have tipped Amanda off that something didn’t smell right. That or the Lance Dorn written authorization bit like you point out, iwsod – come on Amanda, what’s happened to your spidey sense?
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Oooooo! 666… 👿 Queue the scary music. These are really bad fairisle (or should that be, feral 😉 ) vest wearing baddies.
Didn’t Amanda think it was strange that this Agency business around the cheque was happening on her front doorstep? Codes or no codes, this approach is way off on a tangent. When she ducked inside to get the cheque, she should have put a quick call through to Lee. Maybe Dotty’s ditsy conversation about the reunion through her judgment off for a few moments.
Agree about Lance’s shirt looking like a table cloth.
Iwsod, I guess not many guys learned to touch type in those days.
Pleased to see Amanda has ditched the red plaid for a more restrained pattern (again, like a table cloth?). PS Iwsod, I’m coping with the red plaid in the header because it’s from one of our fave episodes, and I am sure we are all a lot more forgiving when there’s a good story to distract us from the plots holes and wardrobe fails.
And nice to see Amanda wearing jeans again. She has the figure we all wished we could’ve had in the 80’s for those jeans. 🙂
Dotty’s jersey is typical 80’s but the restrained colours make it a nice choice, especially with the rest of her outfit.
$10,000 for solving the puzzle – seriously?! That’s a lot of money, especially in the 1980’s.
Love how they slip in a Chevrolet ad just above the Bananagram. Is that where Lee get the ‘vette from? Great product placement SMK. 😉
Why is there an ashtray on the coffee table? No one smokes, and I’m sure Amanda and Dotty wouldn’t want visitors smoking in the house. ❓
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😉 Perhaps Dotty is a secret smoker? 😉
That ashtray on the coffee table is odd.
Hmmmm… maybe Karen left it? Did they film OOADP and DOA at the same time and just mix up the accessoires?
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Nooo, of course not. I was just kidding. 😉
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Ugh – the 80s when everyone still had ashtrays in their house and my dad, a non-smoker still always carried a lighter so he could light cigarettes for women – the height of politeness. These were the tipping point years though when I can remember my mother starting to complain about people who she couldn’t smoke around.
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That sounds so polite of your dad. I don’t think are like that any more (I do not mean in relation to cigarettes)
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I missed that when I first saw this scene and looked back, hoping it was just some clay art project from Phillip or Jamie. Now I see the crystal ash tray sitting there. Yes, times have changed.
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Haaaaa well the red plaid in the header will now be quickly replaced by a different header.. maybe one with an Amandaband! 🙂
Ashtray?! good catch!!! weird!!
I was thinking about the weird arrival of 666 on her doorstep.. if the agency codes are in order – I think Amanda has learned to accept really strange situations – they happen all the time at the agency 🙂 Which could mean you won’t notice something you should!
You know.. Amanda goes with the flow now.. she no longer gets swept away by the flow 😉
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It occurred to me that Amanda would have been a lot more enthusiastic, or at least interested, in the High School reunion two or three years ago. It would’ve been something for her to look forward too, a chance to get out of the house. I don’t think she would have been put off by the success or otherwise of her classmates, and probaby would have quite looked forwarding to catching up with some she hadn’t seen for years.
Her personal and professional growth of the last couple of years probably makes a school reunion seem a tedious evening of dwelling on the past instead of the here and now, and looking forward to the future. 😉 She may also have some concerns about keeping a low profile given her Agency work.
I don’t think she considers herself above and beyond her former friends and classmates, but I see her here carefully considering whether she wants to put herself in that scenario.
What do others think?
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Tedious and a whole room of people she’d have to lie to and not just her mother? Oh yes, I think that would bother her a lot.
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Yes, I think you’re right about “a whole room of people she’d have to lie to.” And of course it would be a whole night of people asking “So, what are you doing now?” That’s a whole heap of lying to be doing in one evening!
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Whoooo I love this Janet!!! 🙂
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I agree, Kiwismk, she does seem unusually unenthused and uninterested. I kind of miss that she doesn’t want to see Connie Barnhill (and other old friends) but apart from not wanting to lie (as Janet points out) I think she is having a lot of fun at the moment (between Lee and work) and is in that lovely content place at the beginning of a relationship when outside interests don’t attract that much
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I completely agree with you, kiwismh. I can see Connie trying to puff himself up by dropping hints or innuendos about Amanda being more than your average housewife. I don’t think he could help himself. He’d want to capitalize on his 15 minutes of fame he had the year before. I wonder why Dottie doesn’t mention him. Maybe after his 15 minutes he fell into disrepute.
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I am glad that you brought this up. Her “tedious” line always sticks out to me and I agree that going to that reunion would be fraught with difficulties for her. She would have so many questions asked of her that she couldn’t just come out and answer honestly. Everything from Joe, to her job, to “anybody in your life” type of questions. Plus she has seen a lot and experienced a lot and she would be able to read between the lines of so many other people’s comments and stories. It mus be hard to try to intersect with “normal” now after working with Lee and getting so drawn into the spy world.
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Morley, your last line made me laugh. It must be hard to try to intersect with “normal” now after working with Lee and getting so drawn into the spy world.” I think that’s a bit of an understatement – hahaha!
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I am afraid IWSOD I didn’t notice Lance’s typing skills (or lack thereof) because I was too busy contemplating his Von Trapp type clothing. It appears he has had someone make his shirt out of a table cloth…..and an ugly one at that!
Ah 666 was that the universal number for evil? Although I am sure I watched on QI the actual number was 611 or something……
Having a bio for a school reunion kinda negates the reason for having it doesn’t it…..? Not to mention a bit invasive. I love how Amanda keeps her head down when she says doing average things……don’t lies count when you don’t make eye contact LOL Dotty is definitely on matchmaking. I miss their little interactions.
So the agency does their top secret transactions in broad daylight on the front steps of Amanda’s house ROFL very slick operation. I am ROFL at your idea iwsod that they are really serious bad guys because they don’t wear seat belts!!!
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I always assumed the bios were written by the alumni themselves. We have a section like that in my college alum magazine. Its a place to update the rest about what you have been up to and it is always interesting to read. Of course I have never sent anything in, “Morley had a son… and two years later she had another and so on and so forth. Whatever. Tedious is a good word.
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Iwsod, I salute you because I’m not sure I could have resisted transcribing that doorstep conversation as King/Brown and King/Amanda.
Love that we know it’s a budget code for bad people because it’s 666!
It must be a high school reunion because otherwise why would it be a surprise that Neil-the-millionaire had gone to Harvard?
I always find it funny that for every story of how “tempermental” KJ and BG were reported to be, their scenes together are always the most fun because they seem to be genuinely amused by each other all the time.
And poor Amanda, why is there always a problem with her paycheque right before grocery day? First in YODT when her bank accounts get frozen and now this! In fact every time she has money troubles, that leads to problems too, like Joe King lookalikes framing her for murder!
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lol re King! 🙂
Oh yeah!! sounds good to me.. High school reunion it is!!!
I agree – their scenes are so wonderful.. I like to think it shows KJ’s professionalism.. that BG was not happy with her, but KJ managed to act so wonderfully with her anyway.
Yes that darn paycheque right before grocery day!
I like it – Joe King IS to blame for everything!!! 😉 The only reason Amanda got the money that was suppose to be for ‘King’ was because she had that last name.. you know.. the one she got off Joe King.. so yep it’s all his fault..
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Bwahahaha! It IS always Joe’s fault!
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