This Country

You see this house here?

There?

The bloke that used to live in there, right,

kept hearing strange noises coming out of his attic at night.

And he'd go to the fridge

and find that food was missing from the fridge.

So he thought, "I'm just going to go up to the attic and check this out."

And he found an entire family of Peruvian panpipe buskers

just living up there.

And he thought, "I'm just going to leave them to it,

"cos they're not really doing me any harm."

And then, a few years later, he thought,

"Well, I'll just go up to the attic to check on them.

"See if they're all right."

And it turned out they'd all died of asbestos poisoning.

Yeah, he doesn't live here any more.

He lives in Stroud, cos it's closer to his work.

Loads has happened

- since you've last been here. - You missed so much.

- You missed the duck race. - The duck race.

Absolutely fucked it.

Fucking hell.

Kurtan's got a new girlfriend, ain't you?

Yeah, I have, actually.

Called Sophie Elizabeth Huxley.

But I call her Soph.

Yeah, and she also lets me call her Soph as well, doesn't she?

Yeah, she does.

Well, I was on Tinder for a bit.

But I wasn't getting any matches, so...

You didn't get one match.

- Yeah. - Not one match.

That's only cos no-one round here is on Tinder,

so, you know, I had to keep setting my radius further and further and further,

then the radius got to France,

and it just got silly by the end, you know?

I can't afford to be going back and forth on the Chunnel

every other weekend to take some French frog out bowling.

No way.

So, then, one evening, I was on Facebook and it popped up,

"People you might know."

Yeah, so he messaged every girl on there, saying,

"Hey, what is your spirit animal?"

Icebreaker.

Icebreaker.

And then Soph was actually the first one to reply,

saying, "Giraffe. What about you?"

And I said, "Whatever animal has sex with a giraffe."

- And she found it a laugh. - Yeah.

A lot of girls don't find that a laugh, though,

especially if their spirit animal

- was a hamster or their dead nan. - Yeah.

I just decided to sack off college altogether in the end,

especially now I got Soph. To be honest,

didn't really want to go in the first place,

but the vicar was just trying to push me into it.

Basically, just trying to live his dream through me.

Anyway, he's latched onto Kerry now,

and he's leeching the life out of her.

She can't see how toxic he is.

So, the trick is to just get the trowel in like that.

It's been an interesting few months, actually.

I've been spending a lot more time with Kerry,

which is great.

She's come on leaps and bounds, with regard to her outlook on life.

Who been nicking after them runners?

They're absolutely fucked.

- Sorry for saying... - Kerry...

Cos I've changed massively since you've been here last.

Cos I've reformed myself.

Cos I've been hanging out with the vicar, and that,

and he's sort of taught me the way of the world.

Like, how to be kind to others

and treat people the way I always want to be treated.

This is marvellous.

Some people will always be scared of me,

and I can't change that, no matter how nice I am.

But there's a balance to be had between being nice and being feared.

Like, Dr Barnardo, he was just too nice and not feared,

so he just got overrun by orphans, and everyone just took the piss.

Yes! Yes!

That's what I'm talking about!

- Just a bit less power now. - Well, exactly.

If I meet it in the middle, then I'll get there.

Yes.

All right?

I was just playing a bit of golf.

Cos it's fun.

That was very good indeed.

Kurtan, it's so good to see you!

Erm, Vicar, Sophie. Sophie, Vicar.

Hi, Sophie, lovely to meet you at last.

It's lovely to meet you, too, Vicar.

Good.

Yeah, pretty good. Probably the best I've been in a long time...

- Look at that! Look at that! - That's brilliant.

I'm so happy for you both.

Kurtan's all was going on about you, Vicar.

Is he? - Yeah.

That's not...

You know, Kurtan, you can pop in any time

to see me for a cup of tea and a catch-up.

Don't really like tea.

Well, just a catch up, then.

Don't really like catching up. It's not my thing.

Well, I'm running Secret Cinema Club on Thursday,

if you two wanted to come.

We're doing Grease. It should be fun.

I love Grease.

- So do I. - That's my favourite... We'd love to.

Would you? That would be great. Well, you should definitely come.

- Yeah, we will. - Yeah, fine. Whatever.

- Great! - All right. Yeah.

- So nice to meet you. - And you, Sophie. That's great.

But if you want to pop in before then,

- Kurtan, you know where I am. - Yeah.

Sticking your nose in everyone's business...

Yeah, but he seems really nice!

Yeah, cos he's a sociopath. That's what they all want you to think.

It's all just an act.

I just watched this video

of this girl doing a random act of kindness on YouTube.

She basically paid for this old man's shopping at the till.

And this old man was, like, about 90 years old.

And he's so fucking old, like, you could see through his skin.

And he just starts bawling his eyes out.

He's like, "You're fucking joking me, this ain't fucking real life."

I just thought... I want to make someone feel like that.

Cos that's... I really... That's what I want to do.

What?

What?!

As a random act of kindness.

As a random act of kindness!

I don't know what she's talking about, cos I do wipe my arse properly.

OK?

No, listen. Right, if I turn my phone off, right, Soph,

that means I don't want to talk to anyone, not just you.

Yeah, I just want a bit of Kurtan time.

You know

Yeah, OK, fine, then.

Whatever.

Yeah. Bye.

Fucking hell.

Cannot believe that.

So I turned my phone off, right, for literally, like, two days.

She's going absolutely mental about it,

going, "I thought you were dead. I was going to call the police."

I'm not dead. Just can't be arsed to text her sometimes.

You know

Problem is, when we first started dating, I set the bar too high,

cos I was just texting her the whole time,

but that was because I wanted to reel her in.

But now the fish is in the net,

I ain't going to keep throwing worms at it.

Cos that's a waste of worms.

You know, correct me if I'm wrong,

but four texts a day is complete madness.

No-one can keep up with that.

Not even Giffgaff.

So, Slugs updated his Facebook status this morning,

saying how his PlayStation broke and how gutted he was, and that.

So I thought I'd do my very own random act of kindness for him,

because perhaps I have been quite harsh to him in the past, you know?

I mean, he's not that annoying, it's just...

He just needs to learn not to breathe out of his mouth,

cos that just winds everyone up.

Hello!

Erm...

Sorry, is Slugs in?

Michael.

Me and Michael have been going out for nearly a year.

It's going well.

Really well.

- Hello. - Hi.

- So, I heard your PlayStation broke. - Yeah.

- It's really sad. - It sucks, man.

Really sucks.

But I've got a little surprise for you,

because I know how harsh life has been to you.

Cos it has been really harsh, you know,

and you deserve happiness just as much as the next man, don't you?

- Yeah. - Yeah.

Which is why, as a random act of kindness,

I am giving you my PlayStation.

Thanks.

Hello. You happy with that

Yeah.

Yeah, thanks.

Yeah?

Hello.

Sorry, Slugs...

Can I speak to Slugs, please?

Michael?

Is he coming?

Yeah.

He is coming? Right. OK.

Hello?

Hello.

Is there a problem here?

With what?