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1-7 of 7
- Geoff McAlister and Stanley Wasserman are in a gay May-September relationship. They are both a reflection of their respective generation: Geoff is an active massage therapist who keeps care of himself physically, whereas Stanley enjoys relaxing at home indulging in the finer things in life, especially when it comes to food and drink. Despite the fact that Geoff defers more often than not to Stanley's wishes, Geoff loves Stanley and visa versa. They see themselves as a gay version of their neighbours, Elaine and Carlisle Wainwright, and hope to be as happy as the Wainwrights appear. A health fanatic, Geoff ignores a lump in his left testicle, which does end up being cancerous, the testicle which needs to be removed. Geoff refuses, wanting to deal with his problem in a more holistic manner. In reality, Geoff is angry and upset with his situation, and takes it out on Stanley, who has never taken care of his own body. After they find out the Wainwright's relationship is not all it appears to be on the surface, Geoff and Stanley examine their own relationship and find it's doing much better than the Wainwrights. Geoff's cancer ends up making their individual lives converge as they both see Geoff through this health scare.
- Young and naive Alicia Plecas is behind in her rent. She is unemployed and unskilled. Although she is going to hairdressing school, hairdressing is a skill that she lacks. Yuri hopes to trade sexual favours for rent, but Alicia refuses. For protection, she finds Hal, who is also sexually interested in Alicia, and hopes to get her into bed eventually. Hal manages to get her a cleaning job for Carlisle, despite the fact that she doesn't have the necessary skills to do that either. She ends up being an awful, clumsy cleaner, but she and Carlisle end up bonding over similar personal issues, and admittedly a bit of lust on Carlisle's side. Sexually, she and Hal continually almost make Hal's wish come true, but Alicia's missing pet hamster, Bushy-Bush, always gets in the way. Ultimately, Hal can't control his urges any longer; his actions cause a permanent rift between himself and Alicia. Despite knowing that Carlisle has his own unspoken lusty thoughts toward her, Alicia at least gets the necessary confidence from him to stand on her own two feet for the first time in her life.
- Sault, a recent transplant to Vancouver from Toronto, is feeling a little alienated in her new surroundings, both within the city and within the building. Stanley, her next door neighbor, complained to the super that her cigarette smoke is traveling unwanted through the vents. Despite that, Stanley's partner, Geoff, invites Sault over for dinner as a gesture of kindness. Sault's abrasive personality grates on Stanley, but Geoff continues to maintain a friendship with her. This is strengthened when Geoff mistakenly assumes that Sault, like him, is a cancer victim, while in reality she suffers from alopecia. She doesn't correct him since she figures this misunderstanding will strengthen the bond with her one and only friend in Vancouver. He continues to support her in any way he can with her supposed cancer, which gets her deeper and deeper into the lie. But she also sees the mileage she can get out of being a cancer victim in other aspects of her life, that is until Geoff finds out the truth. Sault realizes that it may not be the surroundings that are the problem but rather her.
- Hal says to his roommate Nick, "Your whole life is constipated", which is true in both a literal and figurative sense, the latter especially in relation to his love life. Not quite what you would call a ladies' man, Nick and his life start to loosen up when he meets Elaine, a married older woman in the building. Although their connection happens on many levels, they have the love of classic Canadian rock as a strong meeting point, of course including the Stampeder's song "Sweet City Woman". This liaison with Nick makes Elaine reexamine her life with older and stuffier Carlisle. Everything comes to a head when Nick crashes Carlisle's book launch party, and puts "Sweet City Woman" on the record player. Mirroring his now loosened life, Nick's constipation finally subsides. The episode concludes with a scene straight out of "The Graduate".
- Bao's mother, recently arrived from Hong Kong, moves in with the Tans. "Grandma" solely speaks Cantonese but is trying to learn English. Everyone in the household needs to make adjustments to get used to Grandma, but Ricky seems to have the hardest time. Grandma, despite her glaucoma, spends much of her time as the new pair of eyes at the store, and cannot help but comment directly, albeit in Cantonese, about all the store's customers, including Elaine Wainwright, who she accuses of being a shoplifter. There indeed has been a string of thefts at the store, so Yuri installs an antiquated and only half functioning security camera. Grandma ends up being more perceptive than anyone gives her credit and better eyes for the store than the camera. Meanwhile, Ricky, the aspiring karaoke star, is asked to sit with Grandma during a time he wants to sing in a karaoke competition. He decides to ditch Grandma for the competition - which he ends up winning - but Grandma, alone, gets into a near disaster. This incident not only places Ricky in hot water with his parents Bao and Toni, but on bad terms with Grandma. He makes things up with Grandma when he learns that marijuana aids in relieving symptoms of glaucoma, and hooks Grandma up with resident slackers and pot-growers, Nick Papathanasiou and Hal Garcia. Although initially suspicious of Nick and Hal, Grandma ends up getting along famously with the pair. Ricky gets a new appreciation for Grandma when he learns more of her past life as a nightclub singer cum burlesque star. Ricky and Grandma end up joining forces in creative ways to get Ricky a new karaoke machine, and to get Elaine Wainwright, who is indeed the store's shoplifter, to return all the stolen merchandise.
- Pauline and Bea Dubois, the elderly sister owners of the building, are disagreeing on how the building should be run. Pauline prefers to make do with Yuri's talents to fix whatever problem, whereas Bea thinks that many things are falling apart and should just be replaced as goodwill toward the tenants. Because of their differences and long term competition with each other, they needle each other in small ways just to get under each other's skin. The elder Pauline is the more forceful one, whereas Bea will do things on the sly. One thing that Bea has been doing on the sly is getting her affairs in order: she's dying. When Pauline finds out, she's upset not because Bea didn't tell her or not because she's sad for her sister's condition but because Bea once again is doing something first in life. Pauline decides to manufacture mock ways of killing herself first. Bea doesn't appreciate this as Pauline has always tried to steal the limelight. When Bea confronts Pauline that her illness is indeed a fact, the Misses Dubois collectively decide to turn out the lights. Meanwhile, Yuri stumbles across Bushy-Bush. Not knowing he's Alicia's pet, Yuri decides to keep the hamster for himself.
- Hal and Nick are pining over their lost conquests, Hal with Alicia, and Nick with Elaine. Hal slowly comes to the realization that Alicia may have exposed his true shallowness with women. To test his theory, he decides to call up old girlfriends to see what they think of him. On the other side of the apartment, Sault enters Nick's life. Sault is trying to rekindle her friendship with Geoff, and by unfortunate association Stanley. She uses her new 'buddy' as a pawn in her plan. She decides to hold small dinner party with Geoff, Stanley and Nick, the latter with whom she promises a roll in the hay afterward if he attends and helps with the cooking. He agrees. At dinner, things are going awkwardly, but Sault and Stanley start to bond over Stanley's spinach dish, which Sault loves so much she wants to the recipe. The bond breaks down when Stanley refuses to share the recipe. Nick, who likes Sault in a bizarre way, does whatever he can to help her get the recipe. Just as Sault starts to feel a special bond with Nick, Nick reluctantly decides that Sault will probably never like him that way and leaves Sault in the lurch.