It's beginning to look a lot like (a cheap and cheerful) Christmas in Walford as the incredibly flimsy looking German market takes shape. It's so flimsy that Kat has to make the observation it's beautiful, lest you don't notice that yourself. There is still no real explanation as to how Alfie is able to afford this German market or how it's paying for itself and apparently it's down to him because he tells Arfuuuuuuuuuur to finish the market before working on the stall... OK...
Then he shares an awkward kiss with Kat... it seems even his primitive brain has managed to piece together this mystery and truly that is a miracle. This doesn't stop some banter between him and Tyler - lest ye had forgotten the bet they made! Arfuuuuuuur acts in his awkward urban mixed race youffff character written by middle aged white man whose last brush with youth culture is most easily measured in fractions of a century. No change there. Unfortunately, he gets some advice on women from the invertebrate Alfie AND Ian... Wow. Their relationship is already doomed.
Alfie is overseeing the final decoration of the tree - which must have been MASSIVELY expensive as he requires a moving platform to get to the top of it... how did he pay for all this again? - and spies Count Moonula (Michael Moon) and Kat together. OHOH! She tells him that they're going to meet before the lights go on and Alfie is very short with her - wow, he's one cool customer!
Apparently, he's able to pull himself together for putting the star on top of the tree. Oh, wait - Kat makes a crude comment just as he's about to put it on top of the tree and Alfie (having got the attention of all and sundry) has a spaz attack because he's suddenly surprised his wife has no class and drops the star he had just dubbed the crowning jewel. SYMBOLISM!
This puts the normally cheeky chappy into a mood and he decrees EVERYTHING IS RUINED FOREVER! In other news, Christmas is cancelled. In yet another sign that doomsayers are right about the Earth's final hours approaching, Kat is able to cope with the petulant and churlish Alfie with something approaching balance and reason - telling him that he should go and sleep. He makes to go upstairs but turns around to see KAT ON THE PHONE! DUN DUN DUN!
He lays on the bed, fidgeting but then goes to look at the ring again. Yawn.
Count Moonula materialises - possibly have changed from a fog or a bat back to human form - and follows Alfie behind the bar, where he says he knows Kat is lying to him! EUREKA! He elaborates on how she's having an affair (again) and is laughing at him, which prompts Count Moonula to tell him to SNAP OUT OF IT! Apparently saying "go back to him" is some crucial mistake... what, did Alfie thing his wife was having an affair with a woman or possibly an intersexed individual?! Now THAT would be breaking new ground... or would it be too close to that Coronation Street one for that?
They're distracted by Arfuuuuuuur who pretty much pulls Alfie outside, where he receives the kind of adulation generally reserved for people that won major sporting events. Crowds of people chanting his name, singing his praises as if he was the messiah and there is Kat, who has somehow replaced the unreplaceable star atop the Christmas tree and we then see the bajillionty lights go on... uh, who is paying for all this electricity? HOW IS ALFIE PAYING FOR THIS?!
Then we have Kat looking oblivious to Alfie's sombre expression and morose tone of voice as he stares off into the distance, the realisation that his wife is a super huge mega slag having dawned on him at long last, apparently...
Sharon is stressing in the kitchen for some reason - apparently despite her fake engagement being over, she's still on-board helping to care for Lexi at ANOTHER meeting. Perhaps if ZE SOCIAL had meetings that lasted longer than five minutes, they wouldn't need so many of them?
Anyway, so involved in the care of a stranger's baby is she that she snubs Jacknocchio again as it's Oscar's birthday! Jacknocchio really has pretty impressive patience to tolerate Sharon's doting on Phil... and it's really not clear WHY - she's damaged goods. A recovering drug addict with a freakish child from a Kinder Egg advert (who has disappeared to the boarding school - although she called for him today, the first time in WEEKS she's even shown any sign of remembering the son she looked about one step away from still breast feeding when she arrived), not much of a looker and she has chronic asthma... although, that could be her attempts to act. It's hard to tell.
Which makes it hard to know whether she's looking for an inhaler in her chest of drawers or drugs. Jacknocchio walks in on her frantically going through cupboards and almost immediately discerns that the drug problem that Sharon had forgotten (you can forget these things, Lauren forgets her alcoholism all the time). Oh and Derek walks in, so now he knows!
Tanya has baked a cake for Oscar's birthday and Max assures her that the scan results will be fine. She then finds the unwelcome face of the Hogfather (Derek Branning) at the door. Tanya tries to uninvite him from the party he has invited himself to and he then winds up Lauren with some fairly obvious slights. She storms off, when the Hogfather suggests he should go and talk to her, Tanya gets rather cross and then all of a sudden asks like a dog that has been threatened with a rolled up newspaper. Wait, is she STILL worried that Derek is going to change his statement to the police? Who knows... Derek wants to talk to Max - because he couldn't just call him up and ask him to meet him later and when Tanya asks what it's about says "never you mind"... because that isn't going to arouse suspicion at all!
When the two bruvs have their meet up - Max mentions THE SECRET SECRET again (also giving him a new phone), Tanya appears and being as stupid as someone from the Square can be, decides to invite Derek along to the party because of this illusory hold that he has over her.
Denise and Ian's battle of the banal continues to reach new heights of torturous tedium. Ian offers mistletoe with all purchases over £3 and Denise retaliates by getting some of the Bianca's brood to do carol singing... why exactly would that ATTRACT people? Christmas music is usually something you want to escape from at this time of year. Anyway, it goes "hilariously" wrong and drives off all the punters that gathered expectantly around her shop - causing Ian to grin like an idiot.
Oh and then she looks jealous of Arfuuuuuuur and Pointless Poppy and starts shouting at Ian but quickly apologises. For some reason she's going to be alone at Christmas. Uh, what about your two daughters? One of them is at university only a couple of hours away! The romance continues to blossom but it's too early for mistletoe, Ian! DOHOHO! If you want comedy - Derek telling Half-Day Alice he's surprised she isn't at work, only for her to say she's going shopping is a real belly laugh.
In the Vic, Joey tells Lauren that it's best they avoid each other, walks off and seconds later Abi walks in to remonstrate her sister for preferring to get drunk than to be concerned about her mother... On that count, she's wrong. No sane person could survive in Walford without being drunk!
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