It’s becoming a bit of a tradition now that when I realise a new series of Trying is rapidly approaching, I finally get into gear and get my quote post ready to go. This series fast forwarded a few years so the kids are older and relatively settled into family life. But there are still plenty of challenges and lot to laugh at along the way. Rewatching this show reminds me how much I love it and will never get bored of it.

Episode 1

A guessing game to start with. Everyone’s preparing for a funeral but whose is it? Most thankfully, it’s not Vic’s.

Jason: Hiya, you okay mate?

Vic: Did you get my message?

Jason: I did. No one’s going to hug you.

Cut immediately to Nikki hugging him.

We have a prodigy in our midst.

Vicar: Isn’t she a bit young for a funeral?

Karen: She’s 5. God, you sound like the people at the archery centre

A knees up at the wake.

Lenny: Now listen, I know the old girl meant the world to you, so we’re going to be seeing her off in style. I’ve got a piano man who knows 250 Cockney songs.

Nikki: Oooh!

Lenny: It’s not all that, sweetheart, they all use the same three chords.

Men, opening up to each other? Tricky.

Princess: When was the last time you told your dad you loved him?

Jason: My dad? [laughs] No. He’s an old cat that doesn’t like to be stroked.

Princess: You’ve never told your dad you love him? Are you serious? Do you even have conversations?

Jason: Yeah!

Princess: ‘What’s the score?’ is not a conversation.

The whole bit that follows this with Jason trying to talk to his dad, and them somehow communicating through a random football player but still getting the message across - gorgeous. I love Pablo Gonzalez too!

Bev leaves Princess a rickety old but much-loved car.

Nikki: It’s okay Jas, we’re married now, you can stop pretending you know about engines.

Jason: I mean, I know they shouldn’t have birds nesting in them.

Episode 2

Whether date night is a good idea or not.

Nikki: Are we still excited to spend time together? You know, find things out about each other?

Jason: I’m not going to find out anything good about you now, am I, thirteen years in. I mean, if it was good, you would have led with it.

Nikki: Jason!

Jason: Alright, let’s get a pizza tonight or something.

Nikki: No, I’m talking about spending quality time with each other. You know, going out somewhere.

Jason: OUT?

Nikki: Yes, out.

Jason: Why? The only reason you go out is to meet someone to stay in with. We’ve done that, we won. This is our prize.

And the conversation continues with a mate.

Jason: How often are you and Hayley going out? Like on a date night.

Anthony: Why would we go out? We’re not single. People go out for sex. Whatever they tell you, it’s sex. You think that many people are into pottery? Come on, people join a pottery class for sex. If you get a milk jug out of it, that’s a bonus.

Jason: See, now they’re putting sofas in pubs so they’re trying to make going out seem like staying in.

Anthony: Ok, so I’m sitting inside with Hayley, you want us to stop talking, put on our coats, walk down the road, get on a bus, sit on the bus for 20 minutes, sit back down three miles from where we started and start talking again? That’s an absurd idea.

Jason: Preach.

Anthony: Plus, my mortgage is so high, I like to stay in as much as possible, get my money’s worth.

Episode 3

Scott is celebrating his birthday by forcing everyone to spend the weekend in a posh house, playing a murder mystery.

Scott: I am soon to be murdered by someone in this room.

Princess: Yea, I can see that for you.

Handing out the costumes randomly, Princess selects a slinky bright red wig.

Scott: Ah, Delilah Deville. Hot lips, the young, cunning femme fatale, corrupting any man she…

Nikki: Okay, alright.

Scott: …works with, respectfully. Whilst earning equal pay.

Jason is tasked with writing a speech about Scott and is struggling.

Tyler: Should we be going through his stuff?

Jason: You want to know a man, check his pockets.

Tyler: Library card?

Jason: When does it expire?

Tyler: Quite soon.

Jason: Is that good speech material? I’ve lost my bearings. Yea, I’ll get a couple of minutes out of that.

Episode 4

Another example of Nikki basically portraying me on TV:

Noah: I take my case work very seriously. So, Princess?

Nikki: Uh, Princess, yea, she seems a bit up and down at the minute, doesn’t she?

Jason: I think it’s just normal teenage stuff, isn’t it?

Nikki: I remember being a teenager just bursting into tears at everything. You just grow out of it, don’t you? Mostly. I did cry earlier. There was a really pretty windowbox that caught me a bit off guard. [choking up again] They don’t have a garden, they’re just… making it work.

Jason: It was a nice windowbox.

Jason’s going to start a football team!

Nikki: You will manage your expectations, won’t you?

Jason: Of course! I just want to build an environment where people can build friendships, fulfill potential and find true happiness.

Nikki: Ok, that’s some great expectation managing, Jas. These are Noah’s most challenging cases. I think it might take some time to get through to these kids. There’s probably a reason why they’ve struggled on other teams.

Jason: Of course, but I just really feel like I can help. Make a difference in their lives.

Nikki: Jason, I saw that you downloaded Dangerous Minds. I need you to hear me when I say this, and this is said by someone who is so full of love for the person that you are. You are NOT Michelle Pfeiffer and I need to hear you say that to me.

No quote, but Anthony’s AA top is legendary.

Princess sends Nikki to the corner shop to get her out the way.

Nikki: Bit of a long shot, but do you have a charcuterie section?

Shopkeeper: We have ham.

Episode 5

Mother’s Day presents… sort of.

Princess: My present is the trip to the spa.

Nikki: That’s my present to my mum.

Princess: Yea, but I’m coming and I don’t want to. So coming is my present.

Tyler: We bought you a special breakfast… so you can come down and cook it, whenever you’re ready. It’s your day.

Karen is sneaking them in to the spa.

Karen: This is my friend Maxine’s card so you have to be Maxine and Nikki’s going to be your guest.

Jilly: What do you mean I’m Maxine?

Karen: You have to pretend to be Maxine.

Jilly: But I don’t know anything about her.

Karen: You don’t need to.

Jilly: What does she do?

Karen: She’s a retired coroner.

Jilly: What if they ask me about being a coroner?

Karen: They won’t. They never talk to you here, that’s what you pay for.

Scott has started a podcast.

Karen: It’s called Scott of the Antlantic where he interviews adventurers who’ve overcome great challenges.

Nikki: Really? Because that last episode was just Freddie talking about his divorce.

Karen: Yea, that was a stretch.

Nikki: Well, listen, it’s good he’s got a producer involved.

Karen: Oh no, he pretends there’s one there so it seems professional.

The truth comes out, and it does not go down well.

Nikki: You are mean. You are a mean, selfish person.

Karen: You’re the selfish one.

Nikki: Me? I’m famously nice.

Karen: No, you’re just a big bag of tears ready to burst any second. She couldn’t come to you because she knew you’d get upset.

Nikki: Yes, well, in movies, people like you turn into people like me and the movie ends and everybody’s happy.

Episode 6

Scott is in training for the big row.

Scott: I am having some serious doubts about whether I can do this. I made a risotto last night and my arm still aches.

Nikki and Jason are asked to hold a talk for other aspiring adopters.

Nikki: We can only help other people if we’re honest about our mistakes. And I don’t mean ‘oh we love too much’, I mean actual mistakes. Like, tell them about the time you decided to let two kids with attachment issues watch Bambi. Or when you forgot to pick Tyler up from a sleepover and he thought he was being adopted again.

Jason: We gonna talk about your mistakes as well?

Nikki: Yea, course! If there’s time.

It’s hard to quote all the items from Vic’s first date with Carolyn, because it’s split into lots of scenes and they’re all wonderful. Him just hiding behind DIY and her completely accepting that but also chipping away at it. So well done.

Lying to cadge a lift.

Denise: Where are you heading off to?

Nikki: Belgium.

Jason: Paris.

Nikki: Belgium, with a stopover in Paris.

Denise: I never think of Belgium.

Nikki: It’s a bucket list thing for me, I’ve always wanted to go. To see the, um, [trying to decipher Jason’s charades] tiles, and the sandwiches.

Ben: No luggage?

Jason: No, it’s all a bit last minute dot com. When I get a hankering for waffles, no stopping me mate.

Denise: Where are you staying?

Nikki: Um, ker… Kerplunken. Yea, yea, yea. We’re staying in Kerplunken.

Jason: Yea, get ourselves down to Kerplunken, look at some tiles, eat some sandwiches. Can’t wait actually.

Episode 7

This is a long one but it sets the scene for the whole non-Spain part of the episode which is absolutely brilliant.

Jason: Okay. We have called this emergency coursework committee because Princess has to have three pieces of coursework handed in by Monday that she has not yet started. Now all we need is a passing grade because Princess can boost her overall mark on the exams. Which she will, because she’s going to be revising all weekend. Now Tyler is our point-man for that, he’s got his cue cards at the ready. Go on, my son. Okay, dad. I know you like a bit of history, so from you I would like 5000 words on the USA’s entry into World War II, please.

Vic: Yea, I’m your fella. I’ve written widely on the Germans over the years.

Jason: Essays, though?

Vic: Essays, letters, pamphlets.

Jason: Right, okay. I’m going to need to do my own pass on that when you’ve finished. John, art. I know you’re a watercolour man but what are we saying to a little bit of acrylic?

John: I have been a bit more bold and adventurous in the service of my art.

Jason: How?

John: Last month I asked some teenagers to move because they were obscuring my view of Apsley House.

Jilly: He was extraordinary.

Jason: Well let’s ride that wave, shall we? The theme here is encountering nature, flora, fauna, and the natural world. So fill your boots John.

John: I’ll go and get my easel from the caravan.

Jason: Okay, Jilly, bit of English. We’d like an essay on one of these books please. Have you read any of these?

Jilly: Oh, that was on the telly at Christmas.

Jason: Okay, we have a winner! Attitudes to gender roles in A Room With a View it is. I can’t wait, I’m on the edge of my seat. You do remember watching it, though, Jill? Because usually by 3 o’clock on Christmas Day you’re a bit…

Jilly: What?

Jason: Tired.

Later, it emerges that Jilly’s writing her essay on A View to a Kill!

Episode 8

It’s launch day!

Karen: You’re overdressed for this.

John: I’ve never been to a boat launch before.

Karen: You’re not going to one now. Would everyone stop talking like this is a real thing? It’s just going to be Scott flailing around in a blow-up dinghy. Obviously, my 50-year-old husband who has to arrange his body before he coughs so he doesn’t ‘put his back out’ is not rowing the Atlantic.

Vic has become very popular with the ladies.

Vic: Debbie wants a sex life. I wouldn’t mind but she wants it with me.

Nikki: And, er, you don’t?

Vic: I mean, cavorting around half-naked, it’s just not realistic at my age. I’m a pensioner I can’t afford to have the heating up that high.

Jason decides his football team needs a bit of a pep talk.

Jason: I’ve taken something away from you that I want to give back… no, not your fireworks, you’re not getting them back.

And then:

I’m going to be honest with you. Life, for you, might not always be an even playing field. But for the next 30 minutes we’ve got the slope. So I want you to think about every single thing in your life that has ever made you angry and I want you to go out there and smash these posh two-parent wankers to bits. COME ON!