“As Long as We’re Together,” Part One

“Oh, Damn!”;

In Which Will’s Singing Voice is Revealed

(a recap by Will Kaiser)

Title: “As Long as We’re Together” [sic], Part One

Airdate: September 11, 1978

Written and directed by Michael Landon

SUMMARY IN A NUTSHELL: After moving to Winoka, Carrie begins using profanity and urinating on the ground. Oh, and Anne Ramsey and Albert are in it.

RECAP: Two can play this quotation-mark-title game, Landon.

Well, welcome to Season Five, everybody. Dags and I just got back from the Calgary Stampede – “the world’s largest outdoor rodeo,” apparently – which was great fun and included a lot of Little House-flavored entertainments. (In particular, there was an event where little kids had to catch and ride ponies just like Nels and Charles did with the donkeys in “‘Meet Me at the Fair.'”)

We also visited Heritage Park, an elaborate recreation of a turn-of-the-Twentieth Century town – more Sleepy Eye than Walnut Grove. Fantastic fun and I’d say a must for any Little House-type person who finds themselves in Calgary, that lovely city.

Of course, we came home to a terrifying new chapter in our neverending American nightmare. I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again: If you pray, pray for peace. Killing is no answer to anything.

We also learned this week of the sad loss of Shannen Doherty, who died of cancer at 53. She and Melissa Gilbert had their troubles, but to my understanding Doherty always appreciated her days on the show, showed warmth and generosity to its fans, and credited Michael Landon as founding her success in the entertainment world. Rest in peace, Jenny.

Moving on. September 1978 saw Little House face a new adversary: WKRP in Cincinnati, which debuted on CBS opposite our show in the Monday night 8 p.m. Eastern slot.

I never liked WKRP much, but Dags did.

Anyways, they weren’t rivals for long, since CBS quickly realized nothing could beat Little House and moved WKRP to another night. (To the victor go the spoils, “Tiffany Network”!)

As always, the first question to ask at the beginning of each season is What Has David Done to the Theme Now? 

True to form, we have a new version, which, while better than the Season Three travesty, is I would say a small step down from Season Four’s intensely driving arrangement.

It’s actually quite simple, the melody arranged for strings and brasses.

This is accompanied by a ringing piano ostinato, rather heavy bass guitar, and a sort of soft-rock “clock” woodblock tock on the offbeats, a la Gerry Rafferty or somebody. (I’m no Nabokov, but I’ll admit I’m proud of that soft-rock/clock/woodblock/tock internal rhyme.)

The “yadda-dadda-da-da” trumpet riff is not restored, and we lose the slide whistle when Carrie bites it.

And yet, some snappy syncopation is added to keep us alert and engaged. All in all, it’s pure and rather elegant, just a little on the square side.

I’ve been teasing this since Season One, but as this arrangement is a bit drab and could use some spicing up, perhaps now is the time to reveal the lyrics I composed for the theme tune.

I have a cold (just like Joe Biden) and recorded this from bed, so please cut me some slack on the singing.

Now, I wondered if they would start this season with a previously-on, since the finale last time ended with Ma and Pa’s impulse decision to move to Dakota Territory (again) to be closer to Mary and her new paramour Adam. They don’t have one, though.

Instead, we open on the thoroughfare, where the Chonkywagon is a-carryin’ Ma and Pa towards the Mercantile.

The Winds of Doom that blew for weeks in “‘I’ll Be Waving as You Drive Away’” have stopped; but David Rose uses tense music from the lower strings to tell us things are still bad.

Interestingly, you can see how close Mr. Edwards’s old house, most recently used by Jonathan Garvey when he and Alice were having marital problems, was to town.

Title in quotes again. They’re really getting addicted to that.

In front of the store, Carl the Flunky packs a heavy load on a wagon with a sign reading Matson’s: We Buy and Sell. (I know some Matsons. They’re still sprinkled about Minnesota today.)

Carl waves sadly to the Ingallses as they pass.

Inside, the store is empty, and Charles and Caroline find Nels in the storeroom. 

Nels says he thought they’d gone already, and Charles says they wouldn’t leave without saying goodbye, which is nice.

Equally nicely, Nels then offers Caroline, his old crush, some tea.

Equally equally nicely – perhaps even more nicely than that, given Harriet tried to sell her house out from under her four stories ago – Caroline says she’d like to say goodbye to Mrs. Oleson.

Nels tells her Harriet’s become quite depressed, and when Caroline heads back to the family quarters she’s shocked to see all their fine furniture gone. 

Harriet comes out of the kitchen and puts on a smile. Kind of pathetically, she pretends they’re just “redecorating” rather than folding.

But soon she bursts into tears.

Caroline hugs her and says she’ll miss her. Harriet responds by laughing and saying she’s not the most missable person in Walnut Grove history. (I think many viewers might disagree!)

The two laugh and cry and hug again. I enjoy their complex relationship, don’t you?

Harriet says goodbye and sends her best wishes to Charles and the girls too.

Later, at the Little House, Jonathan Garvey helps Charles pack up the wagon.

WILL: You can tell Charles is depressed because his hair has less volume than usual.

DAGNY: Yeah. His hair’s like a mood ring.

Garvey says Alice is struggling with having to leave too.

WILL: This is like Fiddler. [singing] Anatevka, Anatevka, underfed, overworked Anatevka . . .

Chuck and Jon shake hands, then hug affectionately.

The next morning, Carrie exits the privy.

DAGNY: Are they gonna leave Carrie behind?

Inside, Caroline is saying goodbye to her amenities. She remembers the time Charles installed the pump in the new kitchen. I’m surprised she’d bring up those days, since they involved her almost going to bed with another man. But of course, Chuck doesn’t know that.

She starts crying then, reflecting on all the work they did to make the place a good home – now for naught.

Charles hugs her, then says they should remember Mr. Nash at the Burton School for the Blind’s advice about keeping goodbyes short and sweet.

Then, preposterously, he adds, “Only good times here.” Whatever, Chuck!

They head out to the wagon, where the Ing-Gals and Bandit are waiting in the back.

Although this story picks up more or less immediately after the last one (Charles had told Adam they’d meet him in Winoka in a month), Baby Grace has morphed from a three-month-old into a thumb-sucking toddler of about one and a half.

I don’t know who had been playing Grace to this point, but this is the first episode to feature the Turnbaugh twins, Brenda and Wendi, who would share the role for the rest of the series. Born in 1977, they are I believe the first Little House regular cast members who are younger than I am.

Laura says, “Ma looks so sad,” and Mary replies, “I know.” She can’t really of course, but I think this is supposed to suggest her empathy rather than indicating her sight’s magically returned.

Ma and Pa tearfully climb aboard, and Pa says, “We can do anything, long as we’re together.”

They drive off, and then, hilariously, we get reused footage from The Pilot of them crossing the country – complete with Jack following behind!

Is this meant to be Jack’s ghost, acting as a spirit guardian for their journey?

Perhaps, perhaps.

Once again, we see Pa stopping the journey in the pouring rain. (Presumably Jack’s ghost is now hiding under the wagon.)

It’s obviously cold, since we can see Pa’s breath, but that works. We dated Mary’s return to Walnut Grove to April of 1882 in the G timeline, so this is presumably May, which can be cold here in Minnesota. Since I moved here, there have been times when we’ve had snow in May, though in recent years the month is more likely to be hot and dry.

At some point, it stops raining, and the sun sets, or I suppose maybe rises.

WILL: This is also recycled footage.

DAGNY: From a different show?

No, it’s also from The Pilot, and has already been reused in “Gold Country.” I suppose Landon thought after four years on the air, nobody would remember which clips were new and which weren’t. Little did he know we’d still be poring over this stuff fifty years later!

Then we arrive in Winoka, Dakota Territory – as I mentioned last time, not a real place – which is depicted as a rootin’ tootin’ Wild West town more along the lines of Deadwood or Newton than Mankato, Springfield or Sleepy Eye.

It’s impossible to guess where in the Territory Winoka is located, but we’ll see if we can figure that out in time.

The street is full of people, some of whom are yelling “Wahoo!” (strong stuff for this show) and at least one of whom is Black.

In the background, we see a general store, a laundry, a stage stop, a saloon, a watchmaker, and a newspaper office – The Winoka Gazette.

Pa immediately starts complaining about all the wild city folk, and Ma reminds him this was his idea.

“I know what I said,” he replies mildly.

DAGNY: Wow, Doja Cat says the same thing in a song. “Yo, bitch, I said what I said!”

WILL: Her tribute to Little House, no doubt.

We hear a piano playing (anachronistic) ragtime, and Laura tries to describe everything for Mary in the back of the wagon.

“Lordy, Mary!” she says – a surprising expletive from her, though not the most surprising one we’ll get in this episode. 

“You’d never believe how big it is!” Laura adds, though Winoka really doesn’t seem any bigger than places she’s been before. (This has all happened in a single wonderful tracking shot, by the way. Nice work, Ted!)

A wagon bearing the name A-1 Tool and Hardware passes by.

Laura comments on some of the sights, comparing them, quite fittingly, to the towns they lived in in “Gold Country.” 

“Pa’s not going to like it,” she says.

Since her remarks suggest they aren’t in Gold Country now, I think we can assume Winoka is somewhere between Walnut Grove and the Black Hills.

They arrive at . . . well, it’s not clear quite where, but they stop and Pa says we’re here.

Some gunshots spook the Chonkies.

As it turns out, they’re at Adam’s blind school, which is already in full swing.

Adam takes a gentler approach with these kids than he did with Mary. Well, at least, he isn’t yelling at them to learn already so he can get paid.

He has his students guess several sounds.

DAGNY: Oh, is he going to fart?

Pa and Mary come in quietly, and when Adam snaps his fingers, Mary answers before any of the kids can.

Abandoning the class at once, Adam jumps up, and the two laugh and embrace.

Unable to resist, they’re soon sucking face.

WILL: She probably hasn’t brushed her teeth in a week.

DAGNY: Oh, I’m sure she wiped them with the corner of her skirt, at least.

“That sounds like kissin’!” exclaims a blond freckle-faced moppet in the crowd.

One girl in the class looks faintly familiar, but we’ll get to her at a later time.

Adam introduces Mary to the kids, then says he’d like to talk to Charles.

“I’m right here,” Pa says wryly, and Adam is embarrassed that he saw them kissing. It’s pretty funny.

I had the impression Adam would be the headmaster at this school, but it’s actually a Mr. Ames, a gray-haired fellow with a plummy accent who appears from the hall.

He’s nice and welcomes them all to town; and that’s about it for his contribution. (He’s played by David Hooks, who was on Santa Barbara, Ryan’s Hope, The Waltons and V, and in the Mystery Science Theater 3000 classic Parts: The Clonus Horror.)

Adam tells Pa about a job opening at a hotel, but warns him several people have been hired and fired by the owner, a Mr. Thoms.

(They’re clearly running out of names to use by this point in the show. You’ll recall previously we’ve met Miss Ames the militaristic Sunday school teacher and Amos Thoms the itinerant gunsmith.)

Adam says there are actually two openings at the hotel: one for a manager and one for a cook.

The hotel is called the Dakota. The name calls to mind the famous apartment building in New York; this episode of course was filmed before John Lennon, a resident of the building, was murdered there in 1980. I expect they wouldn’t have picked the name if it had already happened.

In Minneapolis, there’s a terrific nightclub called The Dakota that we’ve been to many times, notably to see Max Raabe and Palast Orchestra in 2013. (Usually Raabe plays bigger venues, but because the theater they were supposed to play was damaged by heavy snow and ice – in April (Minnesota!) – they got moved to the much more intimate Dakota. This was a treat for the band, who play in the style of a Weimar cabaret act.)

Prince also used to show up there and perform spontaneous shows sometimes.

Adam gives Charles directions, then laughs because he realizes Pa doesn’t need details like how many steps are in front of the building. It’s a nice touch.

Pa heads back to the wagon. Laura, who must be dying to see Adam, asks if they can go in, but they head to the hotel first.

The street is very busy. I would not like to cross it if I were blind. At all.

DAGNY: There are a lot of people in this town. It would be funny if we saw the newspaper guy from Deadwood out with his walking group.

The ragtime piano in the background is playing a tune that sounds a little like Rose Nylund’s famous “Miami is Nice” from The Golden Girls.

At the Dakota, Pa leaves Laura in charge of the wagon, and he and Ma go inside.

Meanwhile, Carrie slurps from the back of the wagon, “Laura . . . I have to go.”

WILL: Why don’t we have an adjective describing when you have to pee? Like when you need to drink, you’re thirsty. When you need to pee you should be “pissty” or something.

DAGNY: I’m not sure about that.

Laura tells Carrie to shut up and sit down. (Paraphrase.)

We see a small boy approaching the wagon from the street. Behind him are a blacksmith’s shop, a grain warehouse, a saloon or theater called The Palace, and, curiously, a J.B. Tyler & Sons wholesale store. This must be a pretty big chain, since we’ve already seen another Tyler shop in Mankato.

The boy, who passes the wagon, carries a shoeshine kit, but he can’t seem to find a customer.

By the way, he’s also Albert.

By this point, you’ll recall, we’ve already met Matthew Labyorteaux twice on this show. Both times he played the young Charles Ingalls in flashbacks, but this time he’s somebody completely new.

Matthew, the younger brother of Patrick, was already an established child actor by this point. Somebody at some point decided Labyorteaux was “too French,” so they dropped the Y for their acting credits – which doesn’t exactly change it to Scottish-sounding if you ask me.

Matthew appeared in the acclaimed John Cassavetes film A Woman Under the Influence and in the not-so-acclaimed Claude Akins vehicle Tarantulas: The Deadly Cargo. 

On TV, he had already been on Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman and on The Bob Newhart Show.

A world-renowned competitive video game player by age 14, Labyorteaux acted throughout the eighties in Whiz Kids, Steven Spielberg’s Amazing Stories, Night Court, and of course Highway to Heaven.

Labyorteaux guested on The Love Boat, and played the lead male role in Wes Craven’s oddball horror film Deadly Friend, about a young robotics genius who turns his literally brain-dead girlfriend into a reanimated cyborg, with disastrous results. (I don’t always love Craven’s movies, but they’re invariably weird and interesting.)

A costar of his from that movie is also in “As Long as We’re Together,” but we’ll get to her in just a moment.

More recently, Labyorteaux worked as a voice actor for video games and shows including the anime Yu-Gi-Oh! GX.

He’ll be with us for a good long while, so buckle up. I like Albert myself, and I think these days the character is pretty beloved, though I remember when I was younger there were people who complained he was the “Cousin Oliver” of Little House. (A title for which there’s quite a bit of competition.)

And some viewers, like my sister Peggy, were annoyed that the addition of a new male character distracted from stories about the Ing-Gals.

But now I’m getting ahead. Anyways, Laura watches Albert fail to get a customer and laughs (nice), whilst David gives us some sort of strange keyboard instrument on the soundtrack. Sounds a bit like a mellowed-out circus calliope, or something.

Noticing Laura, Albert hilariously doffs his hat and gives a genteel bow. (His portrayal in this story seems modeled after the Artful Dodger in Oliver Twist.)

Both kids laugh, then Albert moves on to the Alamo Tourist From Pee Wee’s Big Adventure, who, apparently having also moved to Winoka because of the hard times in Groveland, is sitting on the boardwalk smoking a cigar. 

Unusually, the Alamo T gets some dialogue in this one, ordering a shine.

DAGNY: Does Albert spit on the guy’s shoes to shine them? He’d be the original Hawk Tuah Girl.

Laura stares at Albert as he shines the guy’s shoes. He notices her and winks friskily.

Finding this moment utterly hilarious, David Rose whisks us to a commercial with his glib tune-age.

When we come back, we see more chaos in the streets.

Then we move into the Dakota, where a grouchy old man, presumably Thoms, is casting aspersions on Caroline’s culinary talent. (The actor, Frederic Downs, also played the grumpy grocer who catches Solomon Henry stealing in “The Wisdom of Solomon.”)

He’s marching Ma and Pa quickly through the hotel dining room, where a man addresses him as “Silas” and complains in what seems to be a Canadian accent that the food is inedible.

Then, in a surreal sequence, Thoms storms into the kitchen, where he finds an image out of Lewis Carroll: a large and (to be generous) plain-faced woman in cook’s whites, sitting next to a Brobdingnagian stockpot and eating out of a sauté pan with a mixing spoon. 

Addressing her as “Miz Schiller,” Thoms relays Harry the Complaining Canadian’s feedback. 

“Oh, but he’s never satisfied,” she replies, food falling out of her open mouth and back into the pan. “I think it’s good!”

“What’s that prove?” Thoms screams. “You eat everything! You’d eat anything!” (We’ll count this as Fat Joke #16.)

Miz Schiller shoves him a biscuit to try himself.

“I was wounded in the war by a cannonball that was softer’n this!” he screams. (Frederic Downs lays it on pretty thick, but I’ll admit, I’d watch a spinoff based on the adventures of these two.)

Thoms turns and pleads to Caroline for help.

The monstrous woman leaps up, and, spraying food everywhere, shouts, “Why is she in my kitchen!”

Miz Schiller, of course, is played by the unique and marvelous Anne Ramsey, known to everyone of my generation as the terrifying mafia matriarch Mama Fratelli in The Goonies.

Ramsey got an Oscar nomination for Throw Momma From the Train, and she was also in Scrooged and on Columbo, Wonder Woman, Laverne & Shirley, Manimal (yes!) and ALF.

She also played a villain in Deadly Friend, in which she comes to a hilarious if very gory end. (Not for the squeamish!)

I wonder if she and Matthew Labyorteaux reminisced about their Little House days on the set of that film.

Anyways, tired of being insulted, Miz Schiller abruptly quits, which draws cheers from the dining room.

Thoms tells Ma to start cookin’, then tells Pa about the other job’s responsibilities.

Back in the wagon, Carrie again asks to go to the bathroom, but Laura just blows her off.

WILL: She should just do an Elton John and pee in a bottle.

Outside, Albert is still shining the Alamo Tourist’s shoes.

Pleased with Albert’s workmanship, the guy gives him a dime ($3).

But seconds later, somebody gets 86-ed from a saloon, knocking the money out of Albert’s hand.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe it’s our old friend Ben Slick! You’ll recall this character started out as a boozer and gambler in Mankato, then relocated to the Grove where he lived a clean life for a while.

The hard times there must have driven him back to his old bad ways.

The bouncer chases Ben away, and shows little concern when Albert says he’s lost his dime under the boardwalk, out of the sun.

Unable to resist, Laura gets down from the wagon and moves closer; but Carrie pops her head out the back and slurps, “Laura, please! I’m not fooling!”

WILL [as CARRIE]: “Laura, please, I’m pissty!”

DAGNY: Okay.

Laura ignores this and starts chatting up Albert. Together they cook up a scheme to recapture the dime with a piece of gum and a shoelace.

The first attempt doesn’t work. The side of the dime we see does indeed look like one from 1881.

Albert is skeptical of Laura’s motives.

WILL: Can Albert even see with those bangs?

Disgustingly, Laura re-chews the gum without even checking if it’s dirty.

Meanwhile, Silas Thoms tries to trick Caroline into thinking he hates her biscuits, then reveals he actually loves them. (Why? Who knows.)

Thoms says they can have the jobs, which pay $50 ($1,500) per month, plus free room and board. Seems pretty generous, actually, at least relative to the wages we’ve previously seen on the show. But I suppose it’s for two people, plus the cost of living in a huge metropolis like Winoka must be unimaginably high.

Charles says they’ll need an extra room for the kids, and Thoms agrees, with a small rate adjustment. He’s turned from grouchy to quite jolly.

Stupid Chuck then turns to Caroline and goes, “I got a job!” She rightly points out that they both got jobs. And it would be at least as accurate to say she got them both jobs. Probably more so!

Back on the boardwalk, Laura retrieves the dime.

Ma and Pa come back, and Pa yells at Laura for fooling around rather than minding the wagon.

Poor Carrie slurps yet again that she needs to go.

Ma notes that the hotel has indoor plumbing – a thing Mary’s experienced, but which Laura never has.

But before Laura gets Carrie inside, Albert yells out for her again.

Behind him is a poster from a print shop, J.T. Caupley & Co., that can print up your signs and flyers for you. I find this a nice detail, for some reason.

Horrible Laura leaves Carrie yet again. I think by now we can all see where this is going.

What Albert wants is to give Laura a nickel – her share of the dime. He’s obviously an honorable scamp or ragamuffin.

Laura explains again that she doesn’t want his money, but quickly concludes he’s too stupid to understand plain English.

Nevertheless, the two have become friends. They introduce themselves, with Albert implying he has no surname. 

He departs. Something tells me we haven’t seen the last of this crazy kid!

Laura finally returns to help Carrie – only she’s already peed on the sidewalk, the poor child.

They actually show the puddle, which I think is quite unnecessary.

Upstairs, the family unpacks, and Pa says hopefully he’ll be able to rent the Chonkies out for freight jobs and the like.

Ma’s already late for work, and Laura has to tend to crying Baby Grace.

“You sure mess your panties a lot!” Laura says. She loves saying “panties,” doesn’t she?

Suddenly there’s a huge crash, and we see the wardrobe has fallen on top of Carrie, killing her instantly.

Actually, she’s not killed. I suppose this is one of those situations like when you assemble something from Ikea and skip the step of putting the fastener thing on the back so it doesn’t fall forward on you. (I always skip that step myself, guess I probably shouldn’t.)

Actually, Carrie slurps she helped it fall by climbing on it.

Down in the kitchen, Ma is cooking as furiously as an Iron Chef.

I like to cook, and obviously we have a big family too, but I think running a restaurant kitchen would be a leap for even an accomplished home cook to make.

She’s also the waitress, and she immediately has problems with the bouncer who attacked Ben Slick. His work shift must be over.

Anyways, he and his sleazy mustached companion, whom he addresses as “Glover,” leer at Ma and comment suggestively that she’s “a big improvement over Old Lady Schiller.” The Bouncer suggests she could earn a big tip with the right kind of friendliness.

These two aren’t as bad as the Brothers Galender, but they’re still nasty.

Charles comes out and huffily rescues her. He seems to expect people to be ashamed when confronted with their own indecency, an expectation apparently no less naive in 1882 than it is in 2024.

Well, the Bouncer doesn’t take his comments too well. (He’s played a Cletus Young – that’s right, Cletus – who was in The Artist and on Police Woman, Father Murphy, Carnivàle, ER, Supernatural, Cold Case, Parks and Rec, and Ray Donovan.)

(And while we’re at it, Glover is Richard (S.) Fullerton, who was also in a lot of stuff, including The Fall Guy, M*A*S*H, Hardcastle and McCormick, H(ighway) to H(eaven), Dawson’s Creek, Muppets From Space, Remember the Titans, Cabin Fever – I hate Eli Roth movies – and Secretariat.)

The Bouncer stares Charles in the eye, places a big order, then challenges him when he doesn’t write anything down. 

“Why, are you gonna forget it?” Charles says. It’s a fine retort, but I will say I hate when servers don’t write large orders down. They always screw up something, though on vacation we were waited on by Dagny’s first cousin once removed’s girlfriend, who, despite not writing anything down, did it all perfectly. (That’s what’s called “a keeper.”)

The Bouncer stares angrily, but Glover seems to get a kick out of the exchange.

Charles stares back, then exits to put the order in.

DAGNY: He’s not gonna get a good tip either.

(By the way, we see Herbert Diamond, who’s grown a mustache, at a table in the background.)

That night, Pa and Playboy Hair Ma, both looking exhausted, wash dishes whilst Bandit guards the empty restaurant.

The noise from the saloon next door is quite loud.

Charles worries that Caroline’s job is too much for one person, but she says it’ll be fine in time.

Then he talks her into quitting early and just leaving the wet dishes to dry themselves! Does he want her to get fired?

Over at the blind school, Adam tells them they’re having trouble making ends meet. He notes that the building is donated space, which he says helps.

Then he starts complaining about all the drunks in town. He’s gonna fit right in in Walnut Grove.

Meanwhile, Caroline falls asleep in her chair.

Charles wakes her up. You know, Dagny likes to fall asleep in front of the TV, but woe betide anyone who tries to wake her. She has a completely different personality when startled. It’s like a crocodile caught on a fishing line, snapping and thrashing and churning the waters.

We have a name for this phenomenon in our house: Sleepy Dagny. You do NOT want to meet her.

Ma is much gentler, though. She says she wants to stay and visit; but Mary tells her she wants to have sex with Adam, so they’ll catch up another time. (Paraphrase.)

In the saloon, a wheel of fortune spins, making a sound exactly like the clicking of the Garthim in The Dark Crystal!

After a break, we see what’s presumably a saloon girl entertaining what’s presumably a john. 

DAGNY: Oh, is that Mary and Adam?

Charles and Caroline can’t sleep because of the noise, and when they hear gunshots, Pa jumps up to confront the revelers on behalf of the hotel.

Caroline begs him not to go, then Carrie comes in and slurps, “Mama, someone’s tryin’ to kill me!” Carrie has a lot of good dialogue in this one.

Charles marches over to the saloon, where the Garthim noise is simply terrifying. (I know it probably means nothing to you, but if you grew up with it you can’t think of anything else.)

A barmaid sends Charles up to meet the proprietor, a Mr. Standish.

But on the stairs, he’s blocked by his old pal the Bouncer.

It’s about to come to blows when Standish, an elderly man in a pinstripe suit, appears and says, “What’s wrong, Harlan?”

Charles yells that he needs to keep the noise in his joint down. Standish expresses surprise that anyone would want to go to sleep as early as 10:00.

Charles threatens to get the sheriff, and Standish directs him to the man himself, who’s drinking at the bar.

Standish is Leon Charles, who was primarily a Hollywood dialogue coach, but who did some acting on the side. In the former capacity, he worked on Pillow Talk, The Parent Trap, Flower Drum Song, The Children’s Hour and Logan’s Run, and in the latter he appeared on Wonder Woman.

Incidentally, the credits identify Standish as Miles Standish – surely a reference to Myles Standish, the English mercenary, or perhaps private defense contractor would be a better way to put it, who assisted “the Pilgrims” in colonizing North America, though I’ve no idea why. (I mean I have no idea why he gets a shoutout in this story, not no idea why he helped colonize North America.)

The Winoka Sheriff is a chubby mustached guy – chubby and mustached, that is, as opposed to “chubby-mustached,” whatever image that may conjure for you.

He tells Charles to lighten up, saying Standish himself is actually the owner of his precious hotel.

I’m pleased to say I actually recognized the actor, F. William Parker, from Jack Frost, a 1990s straight-to-video horror comedy about a killer snowman that’s cheesy and tasteless and yet not without its points. 

Known for his famous line, “Fucker’s a snowman!!!”, Parker’s character is married to a woman played by Kelly Jean Peters, who was Granville Whipple’s best friend’s widow in “Soldier’s Return.” Sadly, both of them get killed by the snowman. (You can’t make this shit up sometimes.)

Parker continued acting through the late 2010s. He was in practically everything, and by that I mean practically everything: movies from Terms of Endearment to Revenge of the Nerds to David Lynch’s Lost Highway, and TV shows like Good Times, The Jeffersons, CHiPs, Alice, The Golden Girls, Moonlighting, Falcon Crest, Highway to Heaven, Square One TV (I liked that, though it didn’t actually make me any better at math), Family Matters, Seinfeld, The X-Files, The West Wing, Big Love, and House. Even Love Boat!

That’s just the tiniest slice of his resume. All the bit players we get to meet on this show bring a smile to my face. Imagine having a little part of yourself in all these entertainments! It’s immortality.

Anyways, Standish smiles down at Charles from his perch, Deadwood–style.

DAGNY: Charles’s social-worker powers don’t work in this town.

The next day, we witness a traffic accident involving Mustache Man, who seems to have taken a job as a cab driver here. Boy, a lot of the Grovesters had the same idea, huh?

Speaking of which, who to my wondering eyes should appear but Jonathan and Alice Garvey!

They come cruising into town in their own covered wagon, and they immediately spot Charles washing windows at the Dakota.

Charles drops what he’s doing and runs into the street to see his friends.

Garvey says since they had to leave town anyway, they thought Winoka sounded like as good a destination as any.

Hugs all around. (Andrew is there too, of course.)

In the kitchen, Caroline is working her ass off and scowling.

Charles yells that some customers have arrived, and Ma is delighted to see who it is.

Andy runs upstairs to surprise Laura. She’s dandling Baby Grace, but tosses her carelessly aside when she sees her old pal.

Andy’s only been in the room two seconds before he starts peeping at a half-dressed woman out the window.

I’m not sure how much time passes then; there’s a commercial break, which could indicate an hour or a month.

We see the Ingallses and Garveys eating dinner by themselves in the restaurant. It must be late at night, since Caroline mentioned earlier that the restaurant offers more-or-less continuous service for breakfast, lunch and dinner. But then why would Carrie be there? I suppose it could be Monday, when a lot of restaurants take the day off.

Now brace yourself, reader. What occurs next may shock you.

Everybody’s in a good mood, eating pie – looks like apple or maybe peach – after what was presumably a satisfying meal of fried chicken, Ma’s Miracle Soup, or the like.

Carrie heaps a big glob of pie onto her fork, but before she can get it to her mouth, it falls into her lap.

AND SHE SAYS:

Yes, “Oh, damn.”

Now, the first time our family watched this one, years ago, there was much screaming in disbelief.

It was like a temporary madness came over us all at witnessing such an inconceivably vile profanity uttered by this character.

Olive started pulling her hair in shock, and Roman began running in circles in our rumpus room like a person out of his senses. Of course, they were much younger at that time.

The impact is even more acute in that it’s probably the most comprehensible line ever to come out of her mouth!

Well, we weren’t the only ones shocked. Laura’s eyes bug out of her head, and Ma instantly says, “Don’t ever let me hear you talk like that!”

Stung by their reaction, Carrie apologizes. I hate when she cries – not because it’s annoying, but because it makes me sad. (I’m not made of stone, reader.)

Laura, obviously feeling guilty about the pissty thing, jumps in to defend her, saying it’s no surprise considering the vulgar expressions they hear people shouting all night next door.

Ma softens, and Pa kindly says Carrie should come to them and ask before introducing any new words to her vocabulary. (Boy, I hope they include some scenes of this in Part Two.)

(A word here if I may. I know some readers are bothered by my free use of profanity here. If you’re one of them, I apologize. Bad language is a spicy seasoning, obviously not to everyone’s taste. We raised our kids not to find swear words particularly shocking. We rarely use them in anger, though they undeniably add intensity to any expression of emotion and can be useful in that way. We certainly taught the kids to understand some people find them very offensive and to take care with their use.) 

(It’s mainly a matter of knowing your audience, I think – a practice I might be accused of neglecting with this blog. But Michael Landon Himself cursed like a sailor, and frankly, including such language here is a quick way to help the reader judge if the rest of Walnut Groovy – tone, content, sensibility, etc. – is for them. It is not for everyone; I write it mainly for my own amusement, and with my facetious attitude, fussy style, obsessive lists, crass jokes, shallow research, incompetent art, preposterous analysis, cuckoo theories, bizarre references, political asides and flights of fancy, I’m surprised anyone else likes it at all!)

(But there are many “normal” squeaky-clean Little House websites out there for you to enjoy if this one bothers you. I like several of them myself.)

Well, Carrie is still ashamed. Poor kid.

Laura then says, “She could ask me, Pa,” and Pa dryly replies, “Why, you know all the bad words?”

Clever Alice then changes the subject, saying, “It was awfully scaring coming here to the city, not knowin’ what to expect.” To my knowledge, scaring is not an adjective that occurs in nature; the OED says there are “fewer than 0.01 occurrences [of it] per million words in modern written English,” though apparently John Milton, whose works were cited in last season’s finale, was fond of it.

As was Oliver Goldsmith, who wrote: 

Dear is that shed to which [the peasant’s] soul conforms, 

And dear that hill which lifts him to the storms; 

And as a child, when scaring sounds molest, 

Clings close and closer to the mother’s breast, 

So the loud torrent, and the whirlwind’s roar, 

But bind him to his native mountains more.

Goldsmith was talking about Swiss peasants in the Alps, but I suppose he might have been talking about these Grovesters, shrinking from the so-called “civilization” of the city and missing their crude and horrible dirt farms.

But I’ve trailed off into the raspberry bushes. Alice goes on to make a nice little speech about how friendship will empower them all to make a good life even in an intimidating environment like Winoka.

Pa beams at this stream of sap. Ma might have to fire up the popcorn kettle tonight, in fact.

They close with a toast to friendship.

Then we get a Mustache Man POV shot from Winoka’s main drag, day.

And when the coach stops, who should step out but the bickering Olesons!

WILL: She’s like Tyne Daly in Buster Scruggs.

Winoka can’t really be that far from Walnut Grove, considering 90 percent of the town’s inhabitants have relocated there. Maybe it’s a stand-in for Sioux Falls – a mere hundred miles away from the Grove?

Mrs. Oleson orders the driver to give her her bags, and he immediately hits her in the face with them.

We see a sign in the background for the Mountain Man Saloon. (This is not the saloon next door to the Dakota, which doesn’t have a sign.)

As I mentioned, the driver is Mustache Man, but neither he nor the Olesons betray any recognition of each other.

They head to the Dakota, which Harriet and Nellie criticize as cheap and crummy. Willie says he likes it, and Harriet says he’s becoming just like his father.

Nels says to Willie if he takes after his father’s genes rather than his mother’s, “you won’t have to worry about getting fat, anyway.” That might be the nastiest fat joke so far – #17.

DAGNY: Whoa! That came out of nowhere.

WILL: Yeah. Plus if memory serves only one of them has a circus fat lady for a sister, and it isn’t Harriet.

Suddenly Caroline cries “Mrs. Oleson!” from the dining room. She and Charles come out and greet the Olesons warmly.

DAGNY: Hugs from Michael Landon look like they would have hurt, they’re so tight.

Charles tells them there are no vacancies, and Mrs. Oleson says that’s fine, because the place looks horrible anyway. (A paraphrase, but not much of one.)

Charles gives them some options for other lodgings, including a place he describes as expensive, the Mason Hotel.

As they depart, Nellie asks Caroline to say hello to Laura from her.

In the street, a grocer’s van drives by – I think it says Webb & Winter Provision & Dry Grocery on the side.

Nellie, who looks like she’s grown an inch since last season, struts down the boardwalk followed by the rest of her family.

Nels notices a help-wanted sign in the window of Standish’s saloon and stops in to check it out.

A boy in what’s presumably a school uniform comes running out and joins some identically dressed friends.

They play some sort of game that involves throwing coins with accuracy. The first boy, apparently Standish’s son, wins, and says, “Never gamble with the son of a gambler.”

Junior Standish is played by Adam Gunn, whom we’ve already met as Boss Hogg’s mean son in “‘I Remember, I Remember.'”

Across the street, Albert suddenly yells that the school is on fire.

Notice anything about that shot? If you look, it features an advertisement for Amos Thoms, the itinerant gunsmith from “His Father’s Son“! Boy, that guy gets around.

A crowd rushes to watch. “I hope that’s the ONLY school!” Willie says, hilariously.

But Albert is just lying so he can steal produce from a farmstand that’s left unguarded.

(There are squashes, corn and apples on the cart; this, combined with school being in session, suggests we’re into September by this point.)

(In the window, you can see a Jn. Collins is named as the proprietor of a gun shop. Presumably he’s unrelated to the J.M. Collins who has a similar shop in Mankato. Or perhaps they’re brothers?)

Albert also steals all the coins the boys left behind.

Mrs. Oleson notices him and demands to know what he’s doing.

“I’m working for the church, ma’am,” he says quickly. “Gambling’s a sin.”

And we end on a freeze frame of Albert running away – the fourth freeze frame so far.

Bum-Bum-Ba-Dum!

STYLE WATCH: Dagny felt Ma’s blouse was a little low-cut, for her anyways.

I liked Standish’s pinky ring. High-class.

Nellie is dressed like Little Red Riding Hood for some reason.

Charles appears to go commando again.

THE VERDICT: Matthew Labyorteaux is great in this, even if the rest of the episode is just characters in search of a story; but our full appraisal will come next time. Stay tuned.

UP NEXT: “As Long as We’re Together,” Part Two