Lorelai and Luke are awoken at 3 a.m. by the loud, clanging sounds of the dreaded bells. A town meeting has been called to discuss the Winter Carnival. Of course, all of Stars Hollow attends. Kirk has set up a live feed of Taylor from Maine, who’s apparently snowed in. Taylor wants to make sure everything goes without a hitch. As soon as Miss Patty confirms for everyone that Kirk will run the carnival, the mob quickly disperses, leaving Taylor talking to himself. Not for nothing, but what are his nephews doing up at 3 a.m.?
In the aftermath of the 3 a.m. town meeting, Luke’s pouring coffee into tea and Lorelai got to see the sunrise, pay her bills and watch the first hour of the Today Show – which is way more serious than the later hours.
Luke gets together with April at the park, but it’s freezing – so they decide to hang out at the diner next time. Their first official “hangout” is awkwardly cute.
Meanwhile at the Dragonfly, Lorelai is trying to welcome the New England Maple Syrup Council to the inn. Kirk, now firmly in charge of the Winter Carnival, is making that very difficult. Lorelai promises that her booth, Paul Anka (the dog) telling fortunes, will be a big hit. Kirk reminds Lorelai, chronologically, of past promises broken. The poor guy still can’t swim.
How impressive: Logan bought Rory a coffee cart for the day, coffee cart employee included. Yeah, we know your father’s filthy rich. You spend his money well…
Luke’s already blowing it with Anna, trying to back out of his diner hangout with April.
Anna: There’s no great time to be a parent…you just are one…you’re either all in or you’re all out
Here’s a crazy idea – tell Lorelai about your kid! It’s like watching a bad horror movie, and you’re pleading with the characters not to walk off alone into the woods. I find myself constantly yelling at the screen (Luke) lately.
At the Yale Daily News, Kaiser Gellar’s reign of terror continues – complete with a
magnet board tracking everyone’s whereabouts. Rory stumbles upon a secret meeting
she apparently was not invited to, because everyone assumes she’s Paris’ “Yes Man”.
Rory proceeds to try and reach some middle ground between the unhappy staff and
their editor, which might have seemed like a good idea at the time.
Back in Stars Hollow, Lorelai bumps into a hooded Taylor in disguise – who explains he’s incognito. He wants to make sure the town will be in good hands when he’s gone, and witnessing Kirk running the Winter Carnival is the perfect test. Lorelai also bumps into Zach (just her lucky day I guess), who’s more socially inept than ever now that his girl is gone and his band has broken up.
Luke’s very nervous for April’s visit to the diner, warning her to never trust strangling
mailmen and asking if she wants to do some coloring. Okay, he’s a little out of touch with the younger generation. At least he’s sure Lorelai won’t be there…
Logan drops in on Lorelai at the Dragonfly, exhausting all his options to win Rory back. “I’m going for broke here,” he claims. While Lorelai admires his moxie, the best she can do is leave it up to Rory – writing a note for Logan to give to her. And for the record: as much as I dislike Logan – I didn’t agree with Lorelai blaming him for everything bad that happened to her daughter.
Well, it was inevitable. Lorelai meets April at the diner, and Luke has plenty of explaining to do. Yet another complication that could’ve easily been avoided. Now I know what some of you are going to say: Gilmore Girls is a drama, and there has to be complications, conflicts, etc. I just feel the show could use a little less of it lately.
Not surprisingly, Rory’s hope of bringing Paris and her staff closer together doesn’t exactly go as planned. Paris, now known at the Yale Daily News as #1, announces that their “flaccid coup” has been crushed and summons #2 (Rory) to her office. So much for not playing favorites.
Logan brings the note from Lorelai (the proof is on the Dragonfly stationary) to Rory, and it at least buys him and Rory a dinner. Rory comes home to give Lorelai the update, but she’s got slightly more important things on her mind. The girls talk it out, Rory gives Lorelai some good advice, and explains the episode’s title.
The hour closes, of course, with the Stars Hollow Winter Carnival. The jig is up on Taylor, still in disguise. Miss Patty passes him, commenting “Taylor’s finally
flipped his lid”. How awesomely stupid does Paul Anka (the dog) look as the “Doggy Swami”. Zach confronts the “Asian George Clooney”, who he thinks is Lane’s new boyfriend, challenging him to a bottle-breaking contest. “Welcome to the S.H., b*tch!” Zach then accuses Mrs. Kim of setting Lane up so soon after their breakup, only to find out “Korean Brad Pitt” is none other than Lane’s uncle. Mrs. Kim then makes it clear, in an awesomely bizarre manner, that she will not stand in Lane & Zach’s way.
Lorelai and Luke steal a moment alone at the end of the carnival. Luke’s full of apologies, and Lorelai seems as cool as she could possibly be with everything. But just when we think things might get better, Luke makes the huge blunder of accepting Lorelai’s offer to postpone the wedding. Remember the perfect dress, Luke? The perfect date? Everything falling into place? Guess not…
