THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE RED DWARF

CHAPTER 2

Lost, are you? It's been a confusing chapter, hasn't it? Well, luckily for you, here I am to sort it all out! My name is Eddie, and I am the computer on board the Heart of Gold!

Right now I'm hosting a bunch of idiots who don't even know what a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster is! Shocking, isn't it? Seems they got caught in one of those rare time/space irregularities that brought them here, and sent my regular crew down to where these people are supposed to be.

And if you think that's strange, you should see what's going on in the small English town of Gasforth. History is about to repeat itself, before it's even happened. (Makes perfect sense if you think four-dimensionally.) Meanwhile they seem to be missing an Inspector, and Bob only knows where he is . . .

"Say again?" Ford asked.

Ford looked in his knapsack for his copy of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, thinking that might help.
He found that it had somehow been transformed into The Hitchhiker's Guide to Middle Earth. "What the smeg--?"

Nevertheless, he checked to see if "Balrog" had an entry.
To his surprise, it did. And it scared the living daylights out of him.

Balrog: a type of demon found mainly in deep caves and mines . . . known for its sharp claws and vicious temper.

"How do we stop it?" Ford wondered aloud.

Arthur's response was short and to the point: "We can't."

"I knew it." Marvin droned.
So the only option left for the marooned space travelers was to dive like mad into the hidden tunnel and hope Balrog didn't come in after them. With Ford pulling the door closed behind them, the foursome jumped in and raced as far as they could, as fast as they could, to the end of that tunnel, escaping the Balrog's jaws by a mere 0.873 milliseconds. *

*(Elapsed time as officially calculated by the Pan-Galactic Encyclopedia)


MI6 Special Agent Roger Lister greeted his superior with a brisk salute and a slight scent of curry. "Must you always stuff your face with vindaloo before you report to the office?" the older man grumbled.
"Can't help it, sir," Agent Lister replied. "I've always had a thing for curries. Runs in the family." Sitting down, he helped himself to a swig from the office coffee pot. "Now then, what's this about an ET in Gasforth?"

"We got the call this morning that there's a, quote, green thing, unquote, at Gasforth Police Station."
"Green thing?" Lister gaped at him. "That's the description you got?"
"That's what they gave me."

"They didn't happen to mention if this 'green thing' was armed, did they?" Lister inquired.
"No mention of personal weaponry, although the desk sergeant, one Patricia Dawkins, did indicate that the--whatever it is--had made threats against the life of one Tricia McMillan." The older man, known only as Colonel Holland (behind his back some of his colleagues called him 'Holly'), handed Lister a map listing directions to the Gasforth police station.
Lister poured himself another coffee. "So why me on this case? Why not Selby or Peterson?"

"Because an acquaintance of yours has just been transferred there." Holly slid a photo across the desk.
Lister stared down at it in growing horror. "Oh, no. Not him. Anyone but him."
"I understand you were bunkmates in the Academy."
"He drove me nuts! His shoe-trees and his Risk campaign books--I never once saw him play a game, but he could go on about it for hours! And he collected slides of telegraph poles!"
"So the man has a few quirks."
"Sir, that's rather like saying that Hitler didn't like people much."
"Nevertheless, he's our in. You've got to make contact with him, and find out what he knows."
Lister looked at the photograph again. Of all the people in the universe he'd hoped never to see again, top of the list was Rimmer.

"All right," he groaned finally. "How soon d'you want me down there?"

Constable Rimmer, who had no idea that the former thorn in his side was about to reappear, continued questioning the Vogon.
"How big is your space fleet? What kind of weapons do they have? Can we have some?"
"Okay, I think that's enough," Grim said, shoving Rimmer aside. "Go get yourself a coffee, eh, Allen?"
"But, sir--"
"I'll take over from here, Constable."

Getting the vague impression that Grim wasn't quite taking him seriously, Constable Rimmer left . . . mere moments before Lister came in the front door.

"He's got awfully long hair for an MI6 bloke," Habib observed to Gladstone.
Gladstone agreed. "I've seen less hair on the floor of the town barbershop."
"Special Agent Roger E. Lister, here on official business," Lister said, showing his ID card to Inspector Grim. "Now, where's the prisoner?"

"In the cells. I'll take you to 'im."

As they were walking to the holding area, Lister briefly glanced over his shoulder just in time to see Rimmer coming back with his coffee. He quickened his pace, before Rimmer could see him. He'd prefer to put off this awkward moment as long as possible. Another twenty years would do.

"What the smeg?" Constable Rimmer muttered to himself. He thought he saw someone he knew, but it couldn't be.

"Excuse me," he said to Constable Habib, "but who's the chap with the knee-length hair that just went down to the holding area with Grim?"
"Oh, that's Special Agent Lister. He's with MI6. Very important business, that."

If you had told Rimmer that his grandfather was Kim Philby, you couldn't have upset him more.
"Lister?" he screeched in undisguised horror.

Lister heard him and stopped dead in his tracks.
Oh, smeg. Please, God, let it be a lager-induced hallucination. The absolute last person on this planet I want to encounter is Allen Mussolini Rimmer.

Just then, who should happen to pass him but . . .

Rimmer.

"How nice to see you again," Rimmer said with forced cheerfulness. Deep down, however, he was thinking: Dear God, where are the IRA when you need them?

"Hi, Rimmer. Long time no see." Pity it couldn't stay that way.

"So, they . . . er . . . they sent to check out our prisoner, did they?"

"Yes. Alien, is he?"
"Oh, yes. Seems to be, anyway."

Watching their strained attempts at civility, Dawkins said to Habib, "You know, Maggie, maybe it's just me, but I'm getting the impression that they don't like each other very much."

"Really?" Habib replied. "Where would you get an idea like that?"

"Constable Rimmer is trying to hang a sign on Agent Lister's back that reads 'Attention Snipers: Aim Bullets Here'." Dawkins replied.

"He's got it upside-down."

And what of our heroes from the Heart of Gold, you may ask?

The effects of the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster are described in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy as:

1) roughly like standing in the middle of an atomic explosion

2) can sometimes last for years afterwards

3) reduce your internal organs to quivering shadows of their former selves

4) in short, do not try this at home. Or anywhere else, for that matter, unless you have your will made out and your affairs in order.

And Gollum had already had two, which was a feat in itself. After the first one, it usually wasn't possible to order a second. But somehow Gollum had survived his first taste of the drink...

However, the next person to sample the Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster was not so lucky. It took just two drops for Merry to be out cold, and possibly even comatose.

That was bad enough; unfortunately, it wasn't the worst of it. Merry was having very vivid hallucinations, and violent twitching fits to boot...

Pippin glared at Eddie (or would have if he'd known where to look). "Nice going!"

"Uh oh..."

"Isn't there an antidote or something?" asked Sam.
"Hang on, Sammy," Eddie said, " I'm looking!"

The Heart of Gold was not a big ship, generally speaking. It was, however, just big enough to get lost in.

Which explained why Gollum was wandering around. He could have used a bathroom, if he knew what one was.

"My precious has terrible hangover." he groaned.

Things were not going any better in the mines of Moria.
"We've got to get out of here!" Arthur kept insisting.
"Keep it cool, Earthman," said Zaphod. "Maybe we can reason with this Baldog thing."

"Trust me, Zaphod," Arthur replied, "it can't be done.Balrog is like Godzilla, Satan, and my PE teacher all rolled into one. It'll have us for breakfast if we don't get the smeg out of here now."

"And how exactly are we supposed to get out? Do you see any exit signs? An express elevator, perhaps?"

"What about that tunnel Marvin mentioned?" Ford asked.

"I wouldn't take my advice," Marvin interjected. "No one ever does."

"There's a first time for everything." Zaphod said, yanking the android into the tunnel. The others, only too happy to get out of Balrog's way, wasted little time diving in after him.
"Please," Arthur prayed to a God he hadn't exactly been on the best of terms with lately, "let this tunnel lead somewhere safe. I'd rather not be confronted by any more vicious monsters."

And apropos of vicious monsters, that leads us to the historic encounter between MI6 Special Agent Roger Lister and the Vogon incarcerated in the holding area of Gasforth Police Headquarters. While it certainly wasn't the first time he'd met an unpleasant individual--and bloody sure wouldn't be the last--it would prove to be the most memorable.
"What is that?" he blurted when he first set eyes on the Vogon. "It looks like something I threw up in the loo on my last night at Club 18-30!"
"That, Agent Lister," Constable Rimmer sighed, "is the prisoner."
"Well, if being ugly's become a crime, this git's lookin' at life without parole for sure!"

"It speaks English!" Rimmer whispered urgently.
The Vogon looked up at them. "When are you people planning on letting me out of here?" he demanded.

"Soon as you tell us what the smeg you're doin' here." Lister replied.
"I don't suppose," the Vogon said, "you happen to know which dimension this is?"

"As opposed to what?" Lister asked.
The Vogon sighed. It was impossible to explain multi-dimensional physics to someone who didn't understand the theory, but he took his best shot.

"All right, try to pay attention . . ."

Lister tried, but he soon became utterly confused by all the polysyllabic jargon. "Run that by me again?"

Rimmer, on the other hand, had figured it out within five minutes (which was ironic, considering he'd flunked science twice in school). "So you're saying that our Earth is one of many different possible realities, all coexisting side by side?"

"Exactly." the Vogon replied.

"So how do you tell 'em apart?" Lister asked.
The Vogon sighed deeply. Some beings just didn't get it.

Elsewhere in the station, Sgt. Dawkins wondered if she should even bother going home. It wouldn't be the same without Raymond there rattling his newspaper. Most people considered him a bit of an old fuddy-duddy, but he meant the world to her. If she never saw him again . . .
No, no, mustn't think like that. He'll turn up sooner or later.
I hope.

On board the Red Dwarf, meanwhile, Fowler was thinking about Patricia.

If I get out of this, he thought, maybe I will propose to her.

"Holly," Lister called out, "have you worked out what happened yet?"
"No, but I think I have an idea what went wrong."
"Translation: I haven't got a clue, but I'll take a stab at it," Rimmer said.

"Smeg off, Rimmer." Lister said.

"If only we had Ms. Kochanski here to help us again," Kryten lamented.

"Oh smeg," Rimmer grumbled, "not that snooty cow again."

"You can't!" Lister insisted. "Not after she wanted to be turned off!"

"Pardon my asking," Fowler said, "but who's this Kochanski person you're talking about?"

"I can erase her memory of wanting to be erased," Holly said. "Or something like that."

Fowler cast an annoyed glare at Holly. "I beg your pardon, I have an outstanding question here . . ."

"I'm sorry?" Holly looked puzzled.
"Who is this person? And why on Earth would she want to be erased, whatever that is?"

Lister turned to Fowler and said, "It's a long story."
"Try me." Fowler replied.

While Holly went on and on . . . Lister poured Fowler a wicked strength lager.

"Are you sure you should be doing that?" Rimmer asked. "Poor chap's confused enough as it is."
"I always think better with a lager or two under me belt," Lister replied.

Rimmer gave him a sardonic look. "I don't think he would."

"Actually," Fowler said, "I could do with a good stiff drink right about now."
So Lister handed him the can . . .

Rimmer ducked under the scanner table.

And no wonder, since the lager Lister was serving to Inspector Fowler was Hansen's Super Wicked Strength Lager, the same kind that had triggered Gollum's drunken shenanigans inside Parrot's not too long ago. Rimmer had the creeping suspicion that within five minutes, if not sooner, Fowler would be hopelessly inebriated.

However, he turned out to be wrong.
It took ten minutes.

"Oh smeg," Rimmer said when he got his first glimpse of the lager's effects on Fowler.

Kryten rushed to prepare some black coffee. Strong black coffee.

Meanwhile, on board the Heart of Gold . . .

Eddie was explaining to Gandalf how the interdimensional mixup had occurred.
"Okay, ya with me on this so far, big guy?" the gregarious computer asked the wizard.
"Not entirely." Gandalf admitted.
"Okay then," Eddie said, "let's take it from the top. The whole mess started when Zaphod Beeblebrox found a neat little gizmo called the Reality Flipper in the laboratory of a company called Galactic Inventions Limited . . ."

"I sense a flashback coming on," said Frodo.
"Are we going to go all wavy?" asked Pippin.

"Not if the shield generators are working." Eddie replied. "Anyway, like I was saying, Zaphod found the Reality Flipper and liked it so much he bought it from the company for five million galactic megaquid. Thought it would be handy for popping down to resort planets for vacation."
"So what went wrong?" Sam said.

"What usually goes wrong with complicated hardware built by the lowest bidder: it didn't work.

"He wanted to go to the vacation planet Mazia, but instead it put him on the prison planet Mozia and dumped you guys off on board the Red Dwarf . . ."
"That explains quite a bit." Pippin said.
"Yes, sir!" Eddie agreed cheerfully. "Anyhoo, yours truly soon figured it out and whisked him back to the Heart of Gold. We gave it a quick repair job and took another try at the same time your wizard buddy was getting ready to haul you guys back to Middle Earth . . . and things just completely went all to pieces."

"Meaning?" Boromir prompted.

"As near as I can figure, two other individuals have been displaced from their normal time/space locus."
"And for those of us who don't speak computer?"

"There's a Vogon sitting in a British jail cell and a Gasforth copper wandering the corridors of a nearly-abandoned JMC mining ship."

"A what where, and a who which?"

Eddie accessed his online version of the Hitchhiker's Guide. The entry for Vogons came up, complete with visuals.

"Repulsive little git, isn't he?" Aragorn said.

"What does this Vogon have to do with us?" asked Frodo.

"Plenty, if we have to bring him back."

Blank looks all around.

"See, he was hyperspeeding to demolish a dead planet the same time you guys were trying to get back to Middle Earth . . ."

"And he got in our way?"
"That's about it. Then something even worse happened . . ."

"Worse?"

"The machine hiccuped."

"Is that bad?"

"At a time like this, definitely!" Eddie said.

"What did that do?"
"Are you kidding? It smegged everything up!"

"Well, everything's certainly smegged up to a fare-thee-well." said Arnold J. Rimmer to Holly." How in Titan are we going to fix this one, eh?"

"I have no idea," Holly said.
"Well, that's just wonderful!"

Fowler, meanwhile, was giving a very off-key rendition of an old drinking song he'd learned at university . . . only he hadn't been much of a drinker, and hadn't learned half the words. So he made up his own.

"Smeggin' 'ell, Kryten," Lister said, "isn't there anything you can do to make him stop?"
"There are several options," Kryten replied, "but half of them require doing things which violate my programming."
"What about pouring ice water on him?" Lister suggested.
"That just may work, sir." Kryten ordered a bucket of ice water from one of the food dispensers.

The song went on and on . . . until Kryten emptied the bucket on Fowler's head.

Rimmer went and hid under the scanner table again.

"AAAAGHGHGGHGHH!" Fowler spluttered. "What in the bloody hell did you do that for?"

"You're inebriated, sir."

"What? Are you mad?"

"No, sir."

"But all I had was--" Then he looked at the label for the first time.
"Oh my God." He'd never been good at handling wicked strength lager, no matter who made it. "Why didn't someone tell me what this was?"

At that moment, Lister began to realize that something big was at work here. Looking at the scanner table, he noticed a copy of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy perched atop it. He picked it up....

"This is interestin'." He looked for the entry for Earth. It read, "Earth: Mostly Harmless"
He stared at it in shock. "That's it?" There had to be more to it than that.
And sure enough, he found: "Except Liverpool."

"Liverpool?" Lister said. "What the smeg's wrong with Liverpool?"

Rimmer gave him a funny look.

"What the smeg is that supposed to mean?"

"You figure it out. I'm still trying to work out how we're going to get Inspector Six-Pack here home." Rimmer said.
Suddenly they both froze. What exactly was a copy of the Hitchhiker's Guide doing on board Red Dwarf to begin with?

Lister backed away from it slowly, as if it might explode. "Something really smeggin' weird's going on around 'ere."

"You're telling me," said Holly.

Meanwhile, somewhere in Middle Earth . . .

"I thought this was the way out!"
"No, this is the way out!"
"There is no way out."
"Shut up, Marvin!"

The crew of the Heart of Gold was somewhat lost . . . and the balrog was still on the loose.

"Zaphod, do me a favor." Arthur said.
"What's that, Earthman?" Zaphod asked.
"The next time you find an advanced technological device you desperately want to buy . . ."

"What?"
"Lose the catalog."

Somehow, after hours of wandering and bickering, they managed to lose the balrog . . . and find the way out.
Now they just had to deal with the problem of not knowing where they were.

Tricky enough under the best circumstances.

"I think Lothlorien is that green bit off that way," Arthur said, pointing.

"You sure about that?" Ford asked.

"It looks green."

"It might be poison leaves." Marvin suggested in his usual gloomy tone.

"Well, they wouldn't affect you, would they?" Zaphod said. "So you get to be our advance scout."
"I suppose," Marvin droned, "I couldn't talk you out of it? Not that there'd be any point anyway."

Arthur thought it over for all of half a second. "You'll be fine," he said unconvincingly.

He cautiously stepped forward . . .

And a hail of arrows flew through the air from seemingly nowhere.

"Bloody hell!" Arthur screamed, just barely managing to get out of the way in time.

By an eerie coincidence, at that exact same moment, at MI6 headquarters in London, Colonel Holland was saying those very same words over the phone to Agent Lister.

"It's a real alien, Holly. Not a bloke in a suit. Walked all around him and I couldn't see a zipper."

"Lister, you have got to be pulling my leg." Colonel Holland insisted.

"I wish I were, sir," Lister said. "He keeps goin' on about dimensions. Thinks he's in the wrong one or somethin'."

"Dimensions, you said?" That got Colonel Holland's attention in a big way. "Hang on . . ." He took out his cell phone and dialed the office number for Professor Edward Crichton at the Oxford University science department. "There's somebody who I think might be interested to hear this."

"Bring him on," Lister said. "The more the merrier."

At Oxford's science department, a fairly interesting lecture was going on.

Or so Professor Crichton had been told; he himself was busy cavorting in his office with one of his secretaries when his cell phone went off.

"Oh, damn."
"Don't answer it," Camille said.

He tried to ignore it . . . but, as he had the ring set to a particularly annoying melody, it was impossible. He had done this, knowing how much he hated to answer the phone, so that he'd have no choice.

He finally picked up the phone and said, "Crichton here. This better be damn important."

"I'm afraid it is," Holland said.

Crichton listened as Holland outlined the situation. "You're kidding!" he gasped.

"I recommend you join Lister at this Gasforth police station. It sounds like something big is going down."

Crichton sprang to his feet. "How big?"

Camille looked disappointed. When that excited tone crept into his voice, everything else was forgotten. Pity.

"I'll get right on it." Hanging up, he looked around and asked, "Have you seen my trousers?"

Arthur wished he'd had the patience or the inclination to learn Elvish. It would have helped immensely in the current situation. Fortunately, however, the Elves spoke English. (Or a very close approximation of same.)

"Can you tell us where we are?" Ford asked them.

The blonde one on the left said, "This is Rivendell, sir. You be strangers here . . . who are you and how come you here?"

"I thought we were in that Lorien place . . . did we get turned around somehow?"

Glancing at his surroundings, Arthur said, "Apparently we did."

"Maybe we weren't where we thought we were."
"Or maybe the geography of Middle-Earth's changed."

In any case, our heroes agreed, it was necessary to find out where the man in charge might be and if he could help them return to Heart of Gold.

Meanwhile, back on the Red Dwarf . . . things had improved somewhat, but not much.
Cat had gone off to take another of his beauty naps, while Holly, Fowler, Lister, and Rimmer all tried to work out how to get Fowler back where he belonged.

"Can't we re-cross the time holes somehow?" Lister asked.

"Easier said than done, Dave." Holly replied. "You have to find one first."

Rimmer spoke for all parties concerned when he said, "So we're screwed, then?"

"If we could just get hold of some kind of dimensional transport thingy . . ." Holly said.

"Where?" Lister asked. "Dimensional Transports 'R Us?"

Holly shook her computer-generated head."No, not exactly...just give me a minute to think...."
"That could take more than a minute, I should think." Rimmer quipped.

"If only we had someone really intelligent on the case . . . " Fowler mused.

Holly overheard. "Excuse me! I happen to have an IQ of 6000!"
Lister and Rimmer looked at her dubiously.
"I do! It's recorded in my specs!"
"Yeah, but they're three million years old! Your warranty's expired!"

"How do we get down from here?" asked a very frightened Merry, who along with Pippin was clinging to the ceiling, thanks to a malfunctioning artificial gravity machine.

"I wish I knew!" Pippin shouted back.

"Just don't ask me to make you any tea," said Eddie. "That's what started this whole mess."

"Tea?"

"That fellow in the bathrobe asked for a cup of tea . . ."

"Who?"

"The Earth man . . . Dent, I think."

Merry blinked. "You mean, all this happened just because he asked for some tea?"

"I think so. I'm having a heck of a time sorting it all out."

Frodo came in. "I can't seem to find . . ." He stopped dead in his tracks when he saw Merry and Pippin bouncing around the ceiling. "What the devil's going on here?!"

"Something about tea, I think."

"Hi, Frodo!" said Eddie.

"Eddie, do you know what's going on?"

"Okay, here goes." Eddie said, and launched into a fascinating if somewhat baffling account of Arthur and Zaphod's mishap with the dimensional body swapper.

"Um . . . hello? Can someone please get us down from here?"

Eddie stopped midsentence. "What? Oops! Sorry." He got the gravity sorted out . . . and Merry and Pippin gently floated to the floor.

"That's better."
There was a bloodcurdling scream from down the hall.

"What was that?"

"How should I know?"

"Sounds like your buddy Gollum to me!" Eddie volunteered.

"He's not our--" Frodo began. The scream interrupted him.

The hobbits ran as fast as their little legs would carry them in the direction of the scream . . . and found Gollum trapped in a running shower, and not liking it one bit. "Help my precious!"

"Is it too hot?"
"No! Cold! Iss too cold!"

"This coffee is too bloody cold!" Inspector Grim complained to Constable Habib back at the Gasforth police station.

"I'm sorry, sir," Habib said. "But, you know, it's been a bit . . . busy 'round here . . ."

"Well, have someone make some fresh coffee!"

"I think tea would be better in your case." Sgt.Dawkins suggested. "You seem more tense than usual . . ."

"Who wouldn't be tense? I've got an alien in the Interrogation Room! For all we know we could have an invasion force parked the other side of the moon!"

"Sir, by the look of him, he couldn't park a trolley* at Sainsbury's." Habib quipped.

"Looks can be deceiving!"

They heard a loud BURP!
"Not in this case, sir." Dawkins said.

"Are we talking about the same one? The one that's green and all knobbly?"

Indeed they were, the same green knobbly life form to which Professor Crichton would soon be introduced.

His first words were, "Dear God!"

"Trust me, Professor Crichton," Constable Rimmer remarked, "God had nothing to do with it."

"For the record," the Vogon said, "I find you equally disgusting."

So," Crichton said to Agent Lister, "how did you get hold of him?"

"He just turned up, in the street."

Professor Crichton blinked. "You mean he just popped out of thin air?"

"That's the way it appears."
"Hmmm . . ."

"Dave, something just appeared on my scanner . . ." Holly said to Lister back on Red Dwarf.

"What is it?"
"It looks like a big yellow thing . . ."
Rimmer rolled his eyes. "Your command of the language is astonishing."

"Hang on," Lister said. "Picking it up on the scanner scope. On screen, Holly."

Holly put it on the screen.

"It looks like a flying brick," said Cat.
But it was actually a Vogon constructor ship.

"What the smeg?"

"There's a transmission coming in," Holly said.
"On speakers," said Rimmer.

"Attention alien ship," the voice boomed, "this is the Vogon Constructor Fleet Vessel . . ." And he made a howling, gargling noise that apparently didn't translate. "We demand that you return our captain at once, or else . . ."

"We haven't got your smegging captain!" Rimmer snapped indignantly. Looking at the Vogon, he thought: And we sure as smeg wouldn't want to, either.

"You lie! It will be a pleasure to demolish your putrid planet!"
"Yeah?" Lister shouted. "Come over 'ere and say that!"

"I will!"

Rimmer muttered, "Lister, I don't think you should have said that."

"How else are we gonna prove to 'im that his captain's not here?" Lister muttered back.

"I don't want that thing over here!"

"I'm not particularly keen on the idea myself." Fowler admitted.

Kryten came over and whispered, "The audio link is still on."
"I beg your pardon?"
"He can hear us!"

"Oh, smeg . . ."

Will the Red Dwarf crew survive a Vogon invasion? Will the Gasforth police station? Will Hobbits get stuck to the ceiling of the Heart of Gold again? Stay tuned for the answers! (Always wanted to say that!)

*British slang for shopping cart