Title: Snow Job
Directed by: James Burrows
Written by: David Angell
Air Date: February 9, 1984
Previous: Fortune and Men's Weight
Next: Coach Buries a Grudge
Guest Starring: James Gallery
"Snow Job" is the 18th episode of the second season of Cheers.
Carla and Diane are engaging in their usual sniping. Carla, trying to get under Diane's skin, tells her that every year at about this time, Sam and his buddies go off to a ski lodge in Vermont to chase babes. Diane dismisses this, telling Carla that there's no way Sam would do such a thing now that he's with her.
Cue Sam coming up to Diane and telling her some tragic news: his uncle Nathan has died. In Vermont. Carla chortles gleefully. Diane, rather than simply confront Sam with the truth, pretends to believe him, while playing subtle mind games that keep making Sam turn back from his drives to Vermont.
In the B-plot, Cliff gets jealous when Norm strikes up a friendship with a guy named Tommy (James Gallery). In the C-plot, Coach is attempting to break his own record for fewest broken glasses in a calendar month.
Tropes:
- Bad Liar: Even if Diane hadn't been tipped off in advance about Sam's ski trip, she probably would have guessed, based on how absurdly obvious he is when talking about his dead uncle Nathan. He gets even worse near the end when he tries to extricate himself from his predicament by telling Diane he's a spy. ("Diane, I work for the government.")
- Banana Peel: Only seen after the fact, when Coach ruefully regards the banana peel that apparently called him to slip and fall, costing him the record.Coach: Damn tropical drinks.
- Love Triangle: Between Cliff, Norm, and Norm's new friend Tommy. Cliff is very jealous when Norm starts hanging out with another dude. Norm finally picks Cliff, although the backward glance Norm shoots as Tommy is leaving the bar suggests he has second thoughts.
- Person as Verb: In the cold open a postman from a different branch tells Cliff that his last name has become a "symbol" in his office.Postman: My supervisor told me to get my head out of my Clavin.
- Running Gag: Sam keeps leaving, Diane smugly predicts that he'll return, Sam returns after some comment of Diane's starts bothering him, Carla is horrified to see Sam return.
- Serious Business: The opening scene has Cliff deliver a pompous lecture to some young mailman about having a button unbuttoned on his uniform.
- Three Lines, Some Waiting: A relatively unusual example from the early seasons of three distinct plot lines in an episode. This happened more often in the Rebecca seasons when the show was more of an Ensemble Cast.
- Waxing Lyrical: Cliff, making a show of not being bothered as Norm hangs out with someone else, quotes Simon & Garfunkel.Cliff: I touch no one and no one touches me. I am a rock. I am an island.
