SOAP BOX

I’ve been watching Home and Away since I was six, have spent the last ten years drifting in and out of Neighbours, and occasionally drop by The Bold and the Beautiful only to become really confused about this family policy they seem to have where you have to sleep with everyone who isn’t a blood relative, even if that person is a blood relative to one of your blood relatives. ‘You’re my half brother’s mother’s long lost son’s daughter. Let’s make out.’

My new found addiction is a New Zealand soap opera called Shortland Street. It started out innocently enough, the show was on at 4:30am, which two days a week is the same time I have to get up for work. Then on one of my days off I discovered it was on another station at 9:30, only there were all these characters I didn’t know. The chick who was about to give birth at 4:30am was now mother to a kid who looked about 18 months old. I was so excited because I was finally going to find out who the serial killer that had been terrorising the hospital was. And I did. And it was when they said his name that I realised something: I had no idea who that was. While I have an in-depth understanding of who everyone is related to/dating/friends with/in shady dealings with, I don’t actually know any of their names.

The chick who has the baby is softly spoken, cute, always looks sad, and is incredibly annoying. This is why my mind regards her as ‘Bambi’. Bambi is a lesbian and has a crush on a straight woman who looks like a hard nosed bitch but is actually alright. So I named her ‘woman who looks like a hard nosed bitch but is actually alright.’

Other characters are known to me as Disabled Nurse (who isn’t disabled at 4:30am and now I watch every episode waiting for him to get kneecapped or fall into a black hole or something); British pub owner who I spent ages trying to figure out if I thought he was attractive or not before deciding that no, no he wasn’t; Flamboyantly gay guy, or ‘FlamboyGu’ for short; Bad nose job lady (currently only seen at 9:30 and having some kind of affair with British pub owner even though he was engaged to Bambi’s sister a few weeks ago, but they broke up after she found out he hired a hit man to kill the guy that Bambi ended up killing because he was secretly filming himself having sexy time with Woman who looks like a hard nosed bitch but is actually alright and putting it on the internet, which made Bambi mad because Bambi has a crush on her, remember? He also gave Bambi’s mum cancer, but I’m still not sure about the details of how exactly he did that); and Sexy silver fox who runs the hospital or something. I dunno. But he wears a suit and I fancy him.

So at the end of this morning’s episode, Hard nosed bitch told Bambi’s mum that Bambi killed the Internet sexy time cancer man. And I won’t get to see the fallout because I have work tomorrow and genuinely considered calling in sick.