The Week In Classic Corrie

TUESDAY - Episodes originally broadcast 5th and 8th May 1995

Hooray!  Hooray!  It's a holi-holiday!  Martin whisked Gail away to a glamorous, erm, caravan site. for a thrill-packed vacation.  Honestly the glamour never starts with that family.  There was a minor contretemps as Nicky had one of his usual strops and refused to leave the Street, choosing instead to stay with Don and ruin his dirty weekend with Josie, but at least it was a relaxing week away... until they realised that the next caravan had been rented by Jack and Vera Duckworth.  What are the chances of that happening, eh?  On the plus side, Vera agreed to help look after the kids, allowing Gail to finally chill a bit.  Tracy was being her usual self-centred self, which caused ructions between Deirdre and Samir, not helped by Deirdre taking an awful lot of emotional support from Ken.  They ended up rowing and she slapped him round the face.  They soon made it up, because nothing can get in the way of their eternal love.  Except death of course.  Oh dear.  And it was the fiftieth anniversary of VE Day, so Percy was flying the flag, but he doesn't need any excuse really.  In the Rovers, Betty encountered an old soldier on a pub crawl, Billy - and they realised they had known each other back in the forties...

WEDNESDAY - Episodes originally broadcast 10th and 12th May 1995

Oh dear God.  Take a deep breath: one of Derek's gnomes has gone missing.  He searched the Kabin stock room, he searched the ginnel, but there was no sign.  He eventually received a postcard from the gnome - called, and here is where I sighed deeply, Arthur - on his holidays in Eastbourne.  Mavis was convinced it was down to Des.  Gail and Martin realised, listening to the Duckworths scream at one another in the caravan next door, that life could be a lot worse, and so they decided to put his adultery behind them.  Billy returned to the Rovers to talk to Betty, and took her out on the razz.  He told her he'd planned on proposing to her back in the old days.  And Maxine tried to persuade Fiona to pocket the money from the hairdresser's and cut out Denise altogether.  She did this through the medium of trying to convince her that splitting Phyllis's six quid between the two of them was worth their while so it wasn't exactly the Brinks-Mat Heist.  Fiona refused though, because Fiona is great.

THURSDAY - Episodes originally broadcast 15th and 17th May 1995

Tracy rattled round the Street being obnoxious to everyone in sight because she didn't have any kidneys and so she decided to make everyone else suffer.  She was particularly obnoxious to Samir, which made it all the more embarrassing when it turned out he was bang on to be her donor and so she'd be part Moroccan for the rest of her life.  In the salon - which was actually filmed inside the outdoor set so you could see Coronation Street through the window, which I don't remember ever happening before - Fiona passed on Denise's address in Macclesfield to Ken.  He went to see her but, in a rare moment of selflessness, he told her just wanted to make sure she was okay and didn't want to drag her back home.  Alf and Betty handed over their chains as the Mayoral year ended, much to Audrey's relief.  Tricia received notice that she needed to leave number 1 and wasted no time spreading it round town that Mike Baldwin was a heartless beast.  Like there was anyone left who didn't know that already.

FRIDAY - Episodes originally broadcast 19th and 22nd May 1995

Alma and Audrey headed to Southport on a shopping spree, being the hot glamourpusses they are.  While they were there Audrey picked up a couple of blokes and convinced them they were powerful businesswomen.  They drove away from town in the sunlight in Alma's sportscar and honestly it was like something out of a swinging 1960s film; there should've been a song by the Lovin' Spoonful playing in the background.  The downside was that flighty Audrey tried to persuade Alma to pretend to be a caterer so she could see the blokes again.  Samir and Tracy went to see their surgeon, who turned out to be Ashley the vicar from Emmerdale who ran over Lisa Duckworth a couple of years back, and they bonded over their shared fate.  Emily told him he was a saint for donating his kidney.  You know you can't become a saint until you die, right?  Just saying.  Denise returned to Weatherfield (disturbing Maxine listening to Oasis in the salon, because Britpop has arrived) and told Ken that she wanted a fresh start, having convinced herself that Daniel needed a father.  Yeah, you might be better looking elsewhere love.  And Steve got a deal in Dublin, which thrilled Fiona because she thought she'd get a foreign trip, until she realised he was taking his business partner - Vicky...

Have your hankies ready for the upcoming week's episodes because Samir is going to go for a stroll along the canal on Tuesday.  Raise a glass to him and his sacrifice with me over on Twitter @merseytart.

Classic Corrie is on ITV3 every weekday afternoon from 14:50.

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