Take the Deviled Eggs…
Jess bought a car and Luke can't figure out where he got the money. Rory was invited, but Lorelai gets shanghaied into attending Sherry's baby shower. Taylor denies a request for a protest, but the local rabbi and priest grant the town loner permission to protest in the local church/synagogue. It never becomes quite clear what he's protesting, but everyone has a theory, including that the point is to protest people's lack of communication ironically. Taylor gets upset that he might be shouting obscene, yet incomprehensible, things. Jess discovers that someone devil egged his car.
Miss Patty's date: Jesús.
Sherry's friends: Gail, Jody, Maureen, Linda, Susan, and Alice.
Tropes:
- Agony of the Feet: Lane accuses Jess of giving her and Rory bunions because they have to walk everywhere after he wrecked Rory's car.
- The Alleged Car: Jess's car looks like it's about to fall apart at any moment.
- Apologizes a Lot: How Rory gets about having talked to her father without telling her mother.
- Big Eater: To convince Lorelai to join the baby shower, Sherry insists that there is a lot of food. And alcohol for the lucky non-pregnant ones.
- "Blackmail" Is Such an Ugly Word:
- Lorelai suggests that Jess borrowed his new car from someone who doesn't know it's gone yet.
- Jess informs Luke he borrowed ten bucks from him last night.
- Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Rory and Lorelai discuss how if it's blue for boys and pink for girls, green must be for aliens.
- Turns out it is color coded for gender, because Sherry feels that green is the new pink.
- Comically Missing the Point: Taylor thinks the Revolutionary War and the actions of Rosa Parks were about disliking the British and buses.
- Covert Distress Code: Discussed. Rory thinks they should have a secret SOS so Lorelai could come rescue her if the baby shower becomes unbearable. Lorelai suggests their secret SOS can be "SOS."
- Dramatically Missing the Point: When Jess says he gets paid for providing services for people, Luke jumps straight to "gigolo." The real answer is Walmart.
- Easter Egg: If you turn the Gs into Ls, Georgia is an anagram for Lorelai.
- Egging: Lorelai and Rory decide to use the devilled eggs from the baby shower to egg Jess's car. Jess is perturbed to know someone hates him enough to prepare eggs to throw at his car.
- Embarrassing Nickname:
- Lorelai gave herself a couple to see how many companies stores would sell her name to: Squeegee Beckenheim and Tookie Clothespin.
- Lorelai nicknames Gigi "the 5 o'clock ballerina."
- Averted, as Lorelai points out, with the Town Loner, who is not called the Town Gregarious Guy.
- Foreshadowing: Sherry and Maureen talk about how Sherry is not a baby person.
- Friend to All Living Things: Presented with the image of birds landing on tiny spikes and exploding, Andrew declares he'd rather have bird poop fall on his head.
- Godwin's Law: Subverted with Sherry's friends saying she and Christopher are poster children for Aryan breeding.
- Hollywood Tone-Deaf:
- Downplayed with Rory systematically missing all the notes when she sings "Baby Face."
- Discussed when Sherry informs Lorelai that Chris sings to her stomach with a horrible singing voice.
- Hyper-Awareness: Jess notices that everything is in a slightly different place than he left it after Luke goes through his stuff.
- Hypocritical Humor: Luke accuses the town loner of skulking and never smiling.
- Innocently Insensitive: Lorelai wonders if Sherry brings up hurtful stuff, like Christopher not being in her and Rory's lives that much, on purpose.
- Irritation Is the Sincerest Form of Flattery: After Sherry tells Lorelai she feels like her situation when she found out she was pregnant was very similar to Lorelai's when she found out she was pregnant, Lorelai flips out by finding a lot of other things that are similar between them, such as naming their daughters with two-syllable nicknames with repeating consonants.
- Product Placement:
- Walmart has become an important part of Jess's life.
- Rory links Sherry to Rand McNally.
- Riddle for the Ages: What the town loner wrote on his protest banner, which tears and drops and ruins his day. Also, what does he shout from the church tower?
- Schedule Fanatic: Sherry admits she wouldn't know what to do without organizing. She plans to have her baby at five o'clock. When Lorelai wants to punish her she rearranges her bathroom cabinet.
- Shout-Out:
- Lorelai found that her name is to catalogues what pictures of Brooke Shields is to Chinese restaurants.
- Lorelai and Rory agree that a town needs as many Boo Radleys as possible, like the town loner, the town troubadour, and the pizza guy.
- Lorelai sings the theme from The Patty Duke Show to express her opinion that Luke and the town loner are quite similar.
- Kirk learned all his car lingo from a Jan and Dean record.
- Sherry couldn't find her Wang Chung or Billy Joel Cds with the old system.
- Lorelai read Deenie during her pregnancy and got her parenting inspiration from Molly Ringwald movie For Keeps, and when she went into labor she was watching Quincy, M.E..
- Rory sings "Baby Face" in karaoke.
- Rory cracks David Letterman's "Oprah, Uma" joke from the Oscars.
- On the drive home, Lorelai does Duane from Annie Hall.
- Sure, Let's Go with That: The town loner's mysterious protest leaves people guessing exactly what he is protesting against. Kirk can make out that it starts with an r, so when people suggest "ragu," "reptiles," and "robots," she concedes every time that it is a definite possibility.
- The Talk: Lane and Rory talk about theirs. Lorelai explained birth as "thought up by a man," whereas Mrs. Kim never gave the talk beyond "an angel brushes its wings against your face" to get someone pregnant. Lane picked up the rest "on the street."
- Technobabble: Kirk likes talking gibberish about cars.
- Title Drop: On the car ride home, Lorelai quotes Sherrie as saying the episode title, in a mocking tone.
- We Need a Distraction: Lorelai asks Rory to start a fire to distract everyone while she messes up Sherry's bed in revenge for wanting to nickname her daughter with repeating syllables.
