- Maps,
they're quite good things, really.
We use them to decide where we're going,
what's up ahead, where to turn,
when to stop.
All very useful when you're completely lost.
- If we double back along this road, and take this track.
- We're going to end up in the swamp.
We have to turn here.
- Then we'll end up in the sand dunes.
- You got us here, you get us out.
Unfortunately, it was another kind
of map I was needing right now.
Why couldn't we have maps for life?
Because somehow, Vicki and I had taken a wrong turn
and ended up in a bad place.
- Where do we go from here?
- Um.
- You have to decide, Lockie.
- Yep, we were well and truly lost.
So how did we get to be in such a bad place?
Some people are lucky.
They know where they are, and are happy to stay put.
Take Mum and Sarge, for example.
- Milk,
bread,
electrical tape,
cornflakes.
- Do we need more eggs?
- Our girls are laying them faster than we can eat them.
Can't get better than this, can it, Joy?
- Sure can't, Sarge.
Better write down ice cream.
- Mum and Sarge didn't need a life map.
They had reached their ultimate destination,
their comfort zone.
- Strawberry or chocolate?
- Morning.
- What's for breakfast, Mum?
- Deviled fried eggs, my new recipe.
- Excellent, I'm famished.
I've been up since the crack.
- You on the verge of a new breakthrough, son?
- I can't reveal too much,
but I've almost patented my powerless backscratcher.
I'm going to need need your support for tonight.
Mum, are you on board for snacks?
- I'll make some egg sandwiches
when you get home from school.
- I'm going to need extra pickles
to get this one across the finish line.
- I'll buy a new jar.
- Sarge, we need to do something about
that faulty power circuit in the shed.
I can't risk my work being compromised by
an unreliable power supply.
- I'll get on to an electrician,
he'll have it fixed by the end of the school day.
- Perfect.
Let's see, I finish school by 15:15,
home by 15:57.
And need to be in my shed by 16:02.
Shall we synchronise watches?
- Phillip thought
he'd reached his comfort zone, too.
But actually, he was heading towards
a great big danger zone.
He had become so interested in equations and experiments,
he didn't even realise
he topped the school's Most Wanted list.
- Hmmph.
- That kid
must have taken a wrong turn from Weirdsville.
He's on the approach, over and out.
- Sorry, Phillip, toilets are closed.
- It didn't mention anything like that in the newsletter.
- Breaking news.
You'll just have to hang on till you get home.
Or end up with your head down the toilet.
- It'll do me good to wait.
Challenging the bladder in your earlier years
will reduce the risk of incontinence later on.
Unfortunately, flushing heads down
toilets was a bit old school for Kirstina and her cronies.
They are a much more sophisticated operation.
And I fell right into their trap.
But Kirstina wouldn't give up.
And, so every afternoon, after school,
I'd have to step in and take the fall for Phillip.
So here's the problem,
if Mum and Sarge had reached their comfort zone,
and Phillip was heading towards a danger zone,
where did that leave Vicki and me?
- The Raleigh-Norman car rally is like the highlight
of my parents' social calendar.
It's a really big deal.
- You going away for the whole weekend?
- I go with them every year.
But I thought this year, you could come with us.
Isn't that a good idea?
- A weekend together?
Sounds perfect.
- My raging stomach bacteria
couldn't have picked a worse time to to tackle
Mum's deviled fried eggs.
- I knew the fallout
would be swift and extreme.
- That is so disgusting, Lockie Leonard.
- She needs oxygen.
- The rally is just like a big treasure hunt, but in a car.
We'll have so much fun.
- Okay, this was weird.
Vicki didn't seem to care
I'd just trumpeted Mum's latest egg recipe all over Angelus.
- Count me in, sounds good.
- Cool.
I guess she was happy
with where we were on our map.
Just like Sarge and Mum.
Yep, we'd reached our very own comfort zone.
- Kitten says you're a top gun navigator, Leonard.
- He's great with maps.
Aren't you, Lockie?
- I'm okay, I guess.
- I need more than okay, son.
I need someone who can read maps upside down,
and in their sleep.
Someone who has the hunger to win.
- Lockie loves winning, Daddy.
And he came first in map-reading at school.
- Okay, so that was a slight stretch
of the truth,
but the thing was, I could read maps.
And I did have a good sense of direction.
- Welcome aboard, Leonard.
And remember, winning is important.
Because punters like buying cars from a winner,
gives them someone to envy.
And envy's a wonderful thing.
It lubricates the purse strings.
- Barry, you're making it sound like
we're not going to have any fun at all.
We have great fun, don't we, Vicki?
- We sure do, Mum.
- Hope you like sing-alongs, Leonard.
- Okay, so being stuck in a car
with Vicki's parents would be like sticking bull ants
down my pants.
But I was determined to stay on track,
since it meant spending the whole weekend with Vicki.
- Sure, I love sing-alongs.
Egg, on the other hand,
was feeling hopelessly lost.
Ever since Sasha gave Egg a makeover,
he didn't know which way to run.
The more attention he got, the more uncomfortable he became.
- Why are you hiding?
- I'm not hiding.
- They're offering good stuff.
Baked goods, homework services, the whole lot.
- Take it, please.
- What would they want in return?
You don't get anything for nothing.
- Sometimes, a simple thank you can be enough.
For example, "Thanks for making me less of a loser, Sasha."
"No problem, Egg, my pleasure."
- You reckon?
- You never know until you try, Egg.
- Take mine.
- I'll have a word with Mr. Squasher.
Can't have Kirstina and her friends wasting good boxes.
- The box isn't the problem, Sarge.
You're the problem, you and Mum.
- Us?
- Stop pampering Phillip.
- We're encouraging him.
- Yeah, to be weird.
- Weird?
- His best friend's a teacher.
He pretty much lives in his shed.
- Hi, Sarge, hi Mum, nice box, Lockie.
- Extra pickles as promised.
- I got that power problem fixed in the shed, so you can
continue to invent extraordinary things, undisturbed.
- How was school?
- Tops, Mum.
- I devised an equation that even
Mr. Squasher couldn't understand.
- Phillip needs to get a life outside his shed.
New interests, new friends.
- He'll find interests when he's ready.
We can't rush him, it's none of our business.
- It's become my business.
You have to encourage him to take a different path.
Mum, Sarge.
It's time for some tough love.
I can't be around forever to take the fall for him.
- Why? Where are you going to be?
- Totally watertight.
The Sirocco 6000 was tested under
Amazonian monsoon conditions,
and not a single leak.
- Impressive.
- Envy, son.
Breathe it in, it's the stuff of ambition.
- The Sirocco 6000 has excellent acoustics,
isn't that right, Vicki?
- For the sing-alongs?
- Mum likes to perform the entire soundtrack
to The Sound of Music.
- Isn't that like, two hours?
- She's very good.
- She sings all the parts herself, and plays the guitar.
- But we get to join in the choruses.
Printed out the song sheets.
- And there are costumes, too.
Vicki's older brother wore these when he was a boy.
I'm sure you can squeeze into them.
- Now, Kitten. What do we need from the shops?
- Torches, batteries, mosquito coils, portable shower.
I think we've got everything.
- I don't see any playing cards here.
- Of course.
Thanks, Billy-Bob.
- Cards. Cards are fun.
Fish. 21.
52 Pick-up.
- Dad likes a good game of bridge
after a hard day's rallying.
- But isn't that what old ladies play?
It goes for, like, five hours?
- If it's a short game.
My nana loves her bridge.
She says it gives her reason to keep breathing.
- And after bridge, we sometimes stick cards
on our foreheads, and then we have to guess
which one we are.
- Are you okay?
- Fine, I'll just get the cards.
While I was trying to avoid
a danger zone, Mum and Sarge had taken my advice,
and were trying to steer Phillip in a new direction.
- One egg sandwich.
Keep that brain powering.
- There's no pickles.
I always have pickles.
- No, sorry, all gone.
I don't know how that could have happened.
Perhaps you could pop down the shop, and get some more.
- I'll grab an apple.
- Right.
Yes, well, that is your decision to make.
On your own.
Who am I to interfere?
But,
on second thought, and I'm sorry to have to say this,
we have no apples.
None.
- A banana, then?
- No, all gone.
Banana drought.
- Strawberries?
- Floods. Up north.
Wiped them all out, terrible tragedy.
- I'm really quite behind in my current affairs, aren't I?
- So, trip to the shop, then?
- I think I might stay here.
- Operation Pickle Jar had failed.
It was time for Plan B.
- Nooooooooo.
I've lost power at the most crucial moment.
- Really, Phillip?
I thought we'd fixed that short circuit.
Maybe you should take a break from the shed
until we get a chance to have a look at it again.
- It's okay, Sarge.
I had the foresight to instal a solar-powered battery
for just search emergencies.
- Time to bring out the heavy artillery.
- No, Sarge.
No, not yet.
- Desperate times call for desperate measures.
If there was one thing
Phillip loved more than pickles,
it was Jelly Babies.
("Maybe You Can Owe Me" by Architecture in Helsinki)
- He'll have new interests in no time, Joy.
- Look left, look right, Phillip.
Keep your hood on.
- One day, they're gonna write a chapter on us in
The Good Guide To Parenting.
- Do you really think so, Sarge?
- I guarantee it.
Power on, Joy.
- But Phillip,
he hadn't really travelled anywhere.
If anything, he was back where he started.
- Tricks, trumps, dummies, doesn't make any sense.
- Life is full of mysteries.
I think Mum and Sarge are trying to send me away.
- How can Vicki find this fun?
There are too many rules for bridge to be fun.
- The rules are based on
simple mathematical principles, Lockie.
They're quite easy to follow.
Well, for most people.
- Yeah, 100-year-olds with nothing better to do
than play boring card games.
- I can help explain bridge to you if you'd like.
- But instead, I was so stressed out
worrying about Vicki,
I decided to do some explaining to Phillip.
You know why Mum and Sarge have been acting strangely?
Because you don't have a live outside your shed,
and they're trying to give you one.
- I do so have a life.
- Just like you got friends?
- I've got lots of friends.
- Name them.
- Well, there's, um.
There's Albert and
Leonardo and
Isaac and Benjamin.
- A bunch of dead scientists don't count.
No wonder the kids from school think
you've escaped from Weirdsville.
'Cause you are weird.
- I didn't feel weird till you just said so.
- I figured being stuck in a car
with Vicki's parents was punishment
for being to mean to Phillip.
- How much further, Leonard?
- It's a race, Lockie, you have to think faster.
- I'm trying.
Should be just up ahead.
- There it is, a fork in the tree.
So we all drove around
in a petrol-guzzling four-wheel drive,
looking for one random clue that would lead us
to the next random clue.
But the most random thing?
It was as if Vicki really wanted to win.
Like her dad.
- You have to try harder, okay, Lockie?
It's really important.
- No, weird is what it is.
What happened to us having fun this weekend?
- This is fun.
It's great fun.
What's not fun about this?
Between Vicki being into
boring, old-person stuff and this,
it could only mean one thing:
Vicki wasn't happy where we were on our map after all.
And perhaps she wanted to change direction towards somewhere
well,
wrong.
- We've been here before.
We're going around in circles, Barry.
- Which way, Leonard?
Victory depends on it.
- Keep your eyes on the road.
- Left. No, right.
- Get it together, Lockie.
Suddenly, Vicki sounded
like someone else entirely.
- For goodness' sake, Barry, choose a direction.
Any direction.
- How can I, woman?
With you prattling on, I can barely hear myself think.
- Think? That'd be a first.
- I can barely hear myself think.
- Think? That'd be a first.
- Come on, Lockie, which way from here?
- I wasn't sure.
But I did know, suddenly, it felt like
Vicki's idea of a comfort zone was my idea of a danger zone.
- You have to choose, Lockie.
- I think we're lost.
So here we are, Vicki and I,
back where it all started.
- You got us here, you get us out.
- You're the one who dragged us into Oldpeoplesville,
on the fast track to becoming your parents.
- What are you talking about?
- What ever happened to us hanging out and having fun?
Why'd you even invite me?
- I invited you, beecause I thought, with you around,
my parents might not fight so much.
I thought it'd be more fun.
- It turned out that
last year's rally was a nightmare.
- That trophy was as good as mine,
right up to the point when you said, "Turn left."
- I said right.
- I'm turning on the GPS.
- That's cheating.
- Next year, kitten, you're in charge of the map.
- So you mean you're not really into dressing up
and singing The Sound Of Music?
- I'd rather eat cockroaches.
- And bridge?
- Garden worms.
- I guess you don't want us to be like your parents.
That was a stupid thing to say.
- Yeah. Yeah, it was.
Well, the map.
- Don't worry, I know where we're going.
Once I knew Vicki and I
were still heading in the same direction,
we didn't need the map.
And as for Egg?
It was time to make a decision.
- You don't have to be slaving over homework on the weekend.
Not when Erina's happy to help.
- I love algebra.
- Okay, what's the deal?
What's she going to want in return?
- Maybe she doesn't want anything.
But you'll never know unless you give it a try.
- How about a nice cold drink?
- Burger with goulash?
- Thanks.
- And finally, Sasha got what she wanted,
while Phillip got something he didn't expect.
- I got a friend.
- A friend, as in a real-life little friend?
That's wonderful.
We must have them over sometime soon.
- They're here now, just outside, parking the Triumph.
- Triumph?
- Triumph, as in large motorcycle Triumph?
- As in 500cc of pure grunt.
A friend with grunt.
Excellent.
- Mum, Sarge, meet Marjorie.
We share an interest in astronomy.
- A cup of tea, Marjorie?
- Coffee?
- I could murder a raspberry cordial, straight up, no ice.
Here's to Pluto.
- After Vicki told me why she invited me,
it wasn't too hard to endure Mrs. Streeton's singing,
or dress for the occasion.
- Am I red?
- Yes.
- Or even play cards
for five hours straight.
Not if it meant that Vicki got to experience her parents
in their comfort zone for a short time.
- Shuffle them up.
- One more, one more, one more, you start.
Fortunately, the next morning,
I regained my sense of direction
and with a bit of clever driving from Mr. Streeton,
we all came out a winner.
Unfortunately, Mr. Streeton wasn't near as good
at packing the car as he was driving it.
- Did someone put the trophy in?
- Hi, Kirstina, how's it going?
Something I can help you with?
That'll be my ride.
- Thanks to his new friend Marjorie,
he avoided his danger zone.
So I gave him a special trophy
to celebrate his un-weirdness.
("Break It (Down James Brown)" by Offcuts)
Yeah, I reckon this, right here,
had to be the best comfort zone there was.
No, I wouldn't be needing a map for a while.
I was happy exactly where I was.