- Cory Matthews: A Cal Ripken card? How did you get this?
- Bernice Matthews: I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die. Then I pulled it out of his cold, lifeless hands.
- [pause]
- Bernice Matthews: Or I got it at a swap meet for seven bucks. You pick.
- Jessica: Who's Graziella Terziana?
- Eric Matthews: What?
- Jessica: Her name, it's written on your arm.
- Eric Matthews: Uh, that - I can't stop every girl who wants to sign my body.
- Jessica: Oh, Mr. Charming.
- Eric Matthews: I could loan you a pen.
- Jessica: And smart too. Using his little sister as date bait like that.
- Eric Matthews: That obvious, huh?
- Jessica: Oh, yeah.
- Eric Matthews: Big mistake?
- Jessica: Did I say that?
- Eric Matthews: So I didn't have to work so hard.
- Jessica: Who said you had to work at all?
- [They kiss. Cory, who has been up in his tree house, is shocked. Alan and Shawn come strolling into the backyard and Jessica and Eric break off their kiss]
- Alan Matthews: Nice night, huh?
- Eric Matthews: Yeah.
- Alan Matthews: Well, we're just, uh, passing through.
- Eric Matthews: Good. Pass.
- [Alan walks away and Shawn nudges Eric]
- Shawn Hunter: Eric, the lipmaster!
- [He walks away]
- Eric Matthews: Yeah. Sure. Look, anybody else, or are we all done here?
- Cory Matthews: [still in his tree house] Everyone have a great day without me?
- Eric Matthews: How long have you been up there?
- Cory Matthews: Long enough to watch you swap spit with a Feeny!
- George Feeny: Mr. Matthews, just the man I wanted to see.
- Eric Matthews: Mr. Feeny?
- George Feeny: Let me ask you - if one were entertaining a young woman, a young girl your age, um, how would he go about it?
- Eric Matthews: Mr. Feeny, you dating a teenage girl?
- George Feeny: Not since the Eisenhower administration. No, my niece is visiting for a few days. She's your age. She'll need to be entertained and I thought that maybe you could help me out.
- Eric Matthews: Look, I'd love to meet your niece, Mr. Feeny. But, see, I got this really bad case of strep throat.
- [begins to speak hoarsely as he backs out away]
- Eric Matthews: It's spreading down my lungs and into my pancreas, so as you can see, I'm - I'm completely strep.
- George Feeny: Relax. I'm merely curious as to how a contemporary teenage girl entertains herself.
- Eric Matthews: [drops the act] Oh, OK. Well, it's my experience that if they can't find a senior with a car they'll settle for some gullible sophomore who's willing to empty his pockets on a dinner he can't really afford, a movie he doesn't want to see, and a door slammed in his face.
- George Feeny: Somewhere in that brimming cup of bile I heard dinner and a movie?
- Eric Matthews: Yeah, see, dinner and a movie is the premier form of dating entertainment. Dinner, movie. Movie, dinner. Dinner, dinner, movie, movie.
- George Feeny: A wonderfully rich tapestry of human experience.
- Eric Matthews: Don't mock what I am, Mr. Feeny.
- Alan Matthews: What are you doing back from Baltimore so early?
- Cory Matthews: I didn't go to Baltimore.
- Alan Matthews: Why not?
- Cory Matthews: 'Cause I stayed here all day 'cause Grandma dumped me while my best friend was out stealing my dad.
- Shawn Hunter: Oh, grow up. I wasn't stealing your father.
- Alan Matthews: Good night, Shawn.
- Shawn Hunter: Night, Dad.
- [after an altercation with Cory's grandma]
- George Feeny: Who is that woman?
- Cory Matthews: My grandma. Don't you just love her?
- George Feeny: No. No, I don't.
- Jessica: [Eric has been using Morgan to meet girls and Jessica is the latest girl] Is this your little sister?
- Eric Matthews: That she is.
- Morgan Matthews: I love Eric.
- George Feeny: Oh, please, Jessica you couldn't possibly fall for this line of...
- Jessica: She is so cute.
- George Feeny: And so well-rehearsed!
- Morgan Matthews: Eric's taking me to the carnival today.
- Eric Matthews: When did I say that?
- George Feeny: [chuckling] Looks like your parrot has learned a few new words.
- Morgan Matthews: Do you want to come with us?
- Eric Matthews: Oh, with us. To the carnival with us, yes. Please come with us?
- Jessica: Well, if that's okay with you, Uncle George.
- George Feeny: Well, I think the polite thing would be to extend an invitation for me to join you.
- Eric Matthews: [through his teeth, while smiling] Mr. Feeny, would you like to come to the carnival with us?
- George Feeny: Oh, thank you so very much for asking but no. I'd rather have gum surgery.
- Cory Matthews: Grandma didn't show up.
- Alan Matthews: I've been there.
- Cory Matthews: Wait a minute. She did this to you?
- Alan Matthews: Hey, pick a category. You like sports? Birthdays? You like rocket ships?
- Cory Matthews: I'll take rocket ships.
- Alan Matthews: All right. Um, one day my class was supposed to go on this field trip to the Franklin Museum of Science to see the "Man in Space" exhibit.
- Cory Matthews: Cool.
- Alan Matthews: Yeah, it would've been, except Grandma forgot to return the permission slip, so I didn't get to go.
- Cory Matthews: I been there.
- Alan Matthews: Yeah, me too and I felt just the way you're feeling now.
- Cory Matthews: Did you hate her?
- Alan Matthews: Well, no. It was kind of hard to hate her, Cory, you know 'cause a couple months later, she woke me up in the middle of the night, she bundles me up, she throws me in the Winnebago, we drive for two days and two nights.
- Cory Matthews: Where'd she take you?
- Alan Matthews: Cape Canaveral. Mercury 3. First American in space. My classmates are back in Philadelphia looking at a little black-and-white TV. I'm there feeling the heat from the rocket on my face.
- Cory Matthews: Grandma took you all the way to Cape Canaveral?
- Alan Matthews: See, Grandma doesn't show love like other people do but she loves you no matter what you think. She just shows love in her own way. And when she's with you, she wants it to be so special that you'll always remember.
- Cory Matthews: I always do remember.
- Alan Matthews: Yeah, so do I. When that rocket took off and the smile on my face was a mile wide, and all of America was watching their little TV set, I remember that my mother was watching *me*.
- [Grandma's distinctive"La Cucaracha" horn plays outside]
- Alan Matthews: Guess who.