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The Other Man’s Grass

Every city-dweller daydreams sometimes about dropping out of the rat-race and moving to the country. Every country-dweller wonders what it might be like to try their luck in the "Big Smoke". Always Greener is the story of two families who actually dare to give it a go.
John Taylor and Sandra Todd are brother and sister: John is married with three kids and living in Allanhurst, ten minutes by bus from the city of Sydney where he and Sandra grew up; Sandra widowed with two kids living on a farm outside Inverness, a NSW country town. Both are at a major crossroads in their lives.
John is sinking under the increasing demands of his job as a social worker in an outreach program for drug-dependents and the homeless. His marriage placed under severe strain by the spectre of burnout, he’s reached crisis-point.
Life for Sandra has been a constant uphill struggle since her husband was killed in a tragic bushfire. Financial pressures have forced her to sell everything but the family home and her job as a receptionist at a local real estate agent is going nowhere fast. She wants out.
A fateful remark sets both families thinking. "You don’t know how lucky you lot are. I’d swap with you any day," says John, on a Christmas visit to Inverness. And swap is exactly what the Taylors and the Todds decide to do: Sandra moving with her kids to John’s house in the city to try her luck in property; John and family moving to the country to regroup, de-stress and discover a new way of life.
Their decision is not taken lightly. There are, after all, the dreams and wishes of five very demanding teenagers to consider. But when you factor in John’s eldest daughter’s drug habits, his youngest daughter’s persecution by a school bully, his son’s infatuation with a country girl and Sandra’s kids’ deep dissatisfaction with small-town life, there seems little choice.
After all, what does any of them have to lose? In the words of the proverb "the other man’s grass is always greener". Isn’t it?

What, Where, Why, When, How?

Todd and Taylor senior confront their offspring with their life-swap proposal—and receive a barrage of differing responses. Cam and Pip Todd immediately embrace the idea and set about helping to touch up their dilapidated kitchen for its new occupants. However, the revelation that Sandra considers it unfair to take with them to the city Pip’s beloved dog Jack brings a momentary change of heart. Sandra implores her to consider carefully, to make lists of the things she will miss and the things she won’t. The last thing she wants is for Pip to complain next New Year that things should be different when they could have been. Pip decides to go—it’s what her dead father would have wanted.
Marissa’s reaction to her parents’ plan is to pack her bags and grab a cab to her boyfriend Skid’s place. It takes careful handling and passionate pleading by Liz to reverse the decision. The encounter with Skid also causes Liz very much to reevaluate Skid as a drug-dealing bad influence on her daughter. Seeing him (in high heels!) playing with his little nephew makes her worryingly clucky. John (who doesn’t want to see his move to the freedom of the country curtailed by a new baby) is provoked to suggest a vasectomy. Liz is only reluctantly persuaded to agree—she hopes it hurts like hell. Sandra meanwhile is hopeful of extracting a glowing reference from Derek, but an invitation to dinner is comically misconstrued and no reference is forthcoming. Tom meanwhile is upset by news of the move. Further upset by the fact that Sandra didn’t immediately confide in him. It’s an awkward and upsetting moment for the two friends.

Close Encounters of the Furred Kind

Both families are experiencing cold feet as they begin to realize their decisions—are they really going to do this? Marissa is not making it easy for her parents. She’s still not convinced that this move is such a great idea and is determined to go out with a bang. When Liz attends a school reunion, her fears about uprooting the family are alleviated. She embraces the future and decides to take it easy on Marissa. Jason has taken to country living, and it helps that he has the lovely Katy Turnball as incentive. Sandra is feeling overwhelmed by the idea of such a huge change. She feels guilty about leaving the memory of her dead husband and also about dragging her children into the big city.

Movers and Shakers

Liz is stalled by memories of the past. The family’s growth reflected as a timeline of height marks on the kitchen wall. It’s an emotional time. Where packing up is not just about material objects.
John’s recent vasectomy has rendered him useless. So his discovery that Greg’s muscle power will not be available is added stress. Greg offers up his son as an alternative.
The removalists arrive, the unfortunately named R.G Bargy and his young offsider, Danny. The discovery that Mickey has disappeared to the country forces Liz to hit upon the idea of having Skid masquerade as one of the removalists. She takes advantage of John’s mistaking Skid for one of the removalists, in the hope of dispelling any preconceptions about the lad that her husband may have. The introduction process turns sour when John, unaware of the boy’s true identity, notices Skid and Marissa bantering like the teen couple they in fact are. His impressions are now quite firmly geared to the negative. Causing Liz’s subtle deception to spiral disastrously.
Skid notices that Marissa has taken a passing interest in Danny, the young offsider. It sparks Skid’s competitive nature. Marissa is prevailed upon by Jason to retrieve his illicit stash of pornographic magazines. His punishment she decides involves the sprinkling of Chilli powder onto the offending magazines pages. However the novelty of the situation is used for far greater effect by Skid, simply as revenge on the cute, toilet bound removalist.
Jason sidesteps his responsibility to family in an attempt at eliciting some form of response from the gorgeous Katy Turnbull. Katy keeps Jason hanging on like a panting puppy. After finally boring of Katy’s non-action he heads home, only to discover he has incurred Sandra’s displeasure by not helping with the stressful move.
Kimberley is confronted by Shelley one last time. Thanks to a past suggestion of Marissa’s about the use of pepper as a form of self-defence and a harrowing, adrenaline pumping foot chase—Kimberley finally wins a small victory in the face of defeat.
Sandra struggles with Pip’s petulance. The no-show of the removalists, the stress of having to sort out a work reference combined with Pip’s sulky indifference is more than a plateful for the already panicked Sandra. Her saviour comes in the form of a problem solving Tom. He extracts Sandra’s work reference from Derek with little more than a calm, offhanded threat. He also recognises Bert’s love of his dog. A fondness, he correctly believes, that will prove the old man unable to drown her puppies. By resolution Sandra assesses that Tom has gone far beyond being the loyal friend in her hour of need. And in this moment we recognise how much she really means to this young man.
Cam struggles to break free from the family’s history. The tie of generations, mixed with the guilt of letting his father down are a heavy burden for the young teen. He is buoyed by the knowledge that Sandra knows his father would have wanted him to do that which makes him happy.
Pip’s heart is held for ransom by Bert Adams’ macabre sense of justice. He still wants to drown the pups. But Tom’s settlement with Bert, allowing Pip to receive one of Jack’s puppies in the near future finally placates her.

Pinch Me Linda, I’m Really Here!

Liz is stalled by memories of the past. It’s an emotional time, when packing up is not just about material objects. John’s recent vasectomy has rendered him useless. Jason sidesteps his responsibility to the family in an attempt to elicit some response from the gorgeous Katy Turnbull. In the Todd household, Sandra struggles with Pip’s petulance and the stress of having to sort out a work reference. Cam struggles to break from the family’s history. The tie of generations, mixed with the guilt of letting his father down are a heavy burden for the young teen.

Keep Off The Grass

John decides the simplest way to get "in" with the community, is to attend Church. Despite the children’s protests, they go to Church only to be confronted by the unusual Reverend Millburn and a proposal from Isabelle for the family to host a barbecue for the congregration. Put in a no-win situation, John and Liz agree.
In the city, Pip and Cam seem to be enjoying new found avenues to spend money. They’re in retail heaven when Mickey introduces them to the metropolis that is the local mall. But it’s a worry for Sandra as her finances are limited and the phone calls she makes to prospective employers, are not productive.
The day of the barbecue arrives, but after initial promise that things might run smoothly, everything rapidly starts to go pear shaped as first Jack eats the meat and then it starts to rain. When John gets the idea that Marissa has put marijuana in the cookies she’s handing out, he make a fool of himself retrieving them. As it turns out—she didn’t.
All the fun of the barbecue however contrasts Sandra’s disappointment, when she finds out she’s been unsuccessful in her bid for a job yet again.

Love, Pain and the Whole Damned Thing

First day of school jitters hit Pip hard as she not only worries about Shelley the bully, but also the bigger issue of whether or not she will fit in. Cam, meanwhile, has stupidly taken Jason’s advice and challenged the biggest kid in school to a duel in order to gain the respect of the rest of the students. Meanwhile, Sandra has her own "first" to contend with when a sexy plumber fixes her plumbing problems, then asks her out on a date. On the farm, Marissa becomes disenchanted when she is left out of the mix as her father and boyfriend bond.

Dog Days

The Taylors must tell Tom Morgan they cannot afford to keep him on as a farmhand for much longer. Marissa starts work at the real estate office where Sandra once worked. In the big city, Pip realizes that Shelley’s aggression is the outward expression of a deeply unhappy girl and Pip begins to empathize with her. Sandra gets a new job, but it’s not a job that she wants. She has to choose whether to be practical and take the job, or to wait a bit longer and risk having to go back home. Pip’s dog Jack (who was left behind in the country), goes in search of her and his journey is marked by a series of emotional highs and lows.

Call it Fete

Sandra struggles with entering the wrong side of he r thirties and the fact that her children seem to have forgotten her unwelcome milestone. But the kids haven’t forgotten their mother’s birthday—they’ve simply chosen to ignore it in an attempt to protect her from dredging up memories of past celebrations with their father. Meanwhile, in the quiet, rural Inverness, the Taylor family is preparing for a local church fete. Marissa’s preoccupation with creating her own clothing label has her entrepreneurial spirit working overtime. She is determined to challenge this quiet country town’s fashion ideal. Her search for the perfect marketing strategy finds her attempting to thrust her brother, then father, into dresses and Tom (the farmhand), out of his clothing altogether!

Sisters Are Doing It For Themselves

Liz makes a big decision to tell John she wants to investigate turning the farm into a Bed and Breakfast. Jason sets out on his first day as a fencing contractor and the going is rough when his ego is threatened by the tough country boys he is working with and by Katy Turnb ull. Sandra attempts to head off for her first day at work even though she is ill and passes out at the front gate. Marissa’s interest in Tom continues to be piqued.

The String in the Biscuit

Love rears its ugly head on Valentine’s Day—Pip and Bouncer explore their grand passion, Mickey gets up close and personal with Shelley and John barely survives a forgotten anniversary crisis to celebrate another year of marriage. Marissa gives Skid his marching orders and Kim gets a Valentine’s card from Mr. Nobody.

The Mating Urge

A pregnancy test gives a positive reading. Someone in either Allanhurst or Inverness is up the duff…
Meanwhile, the fencing gang—Haro, Scumbag, Patch, Tom and Jason—move in and get to work. But once Patch and Scumbag catch sight of Marissa, work takes a back seat, as they both attempt to capture her interest, not realising, of course, that it’s an exercise in futility. Marissa thinks they’re both pathetic, an opinion that’s only compounded as their bumbling double act continues. Marissa’s interest, however, is drawn to the lesser known male of the fencing gang species…
In the city, Sandra is invited by her colleague, Greg Grainger, to attend a real estate awards night. It’s definitely pitched as work, not play—a good opportunity to make some contacts in the industry. But Sandra can’t help but feel just a little attracted to her handsome colleague. After the Awards Night, her and Greg kick on, going to a bar for a drink. The night progresses, and with the help of a little too much champagne Sandra almost ends up kissing him.
This leads to a phone conversation with Liz, the next morning, where Sandra worries she’s made a bad move with her workmate. Cam, unfortunately, overhears the end of the conversation, and believes that Sandra was out with Greg Steele. Having already heard Mickey relay Greg’s less than flattering stories of his date from last night, Cam attacks Greg Steele, warning him to stay away from Sandra. It’s an embarrassing situation for Sandra when a bemused Greg tells her what happened.
Cam’s annoyed that both Pip and Sandra are going out on a Friday night, and he’s left at home by himself. To liven things up, Mickey brings around some of his dad’s beer, and the two boys proceed to get smashed. Cam tells Mickey about his on-line girlfriend, and the two boys start up a bit of cyber chat. But when Cam’s off puking his guts in the toilet, Mickey gives Lieutenant Uhura the online girlfriend, Cam’s address. The following day Cam is taken by complete surprise when a very attractive twenty year old woman shows up on the doorstep.

Baby Love

A reunion at the farmhouse raises life and death issues for members of the Todd and Taylor Families. Liz and John find themselves in a stalemate over their unborn baby—will they or won’t they add to the Taylor’s clan? The Todd family reach a turning point; it’s a year since Rob’s death and they return to the country to remember him. All does not go according to plan when Mickey decides it’s time to prove his father wrong—that he is not gay. Katy is back from hospital and wants nothing to do with Jason or anybody else.

Bright Sparks

Marissa gets a shock when she discovers the reason for Tom’s indifference. Dream date, or embarrassing disaster? Sandra is having no better luck with her love life than Cam. As the smoke of bushfire hangs over Inverness, John discovers that it’s not so easy to escape your past.

What’s in A Name?

Tom discovers the identity of his mother. Sandra tries to find Perfect Greg. Jason’s mates continue to get him into trouble. John finds a new friend and a new boss in Isabelle. Liz has a somnolent encounter with the local doctor.

History Repeating

John is forced to reveal a secret from his past after Jason is brought home drunk by the police. The town of Inverness is hit by a chicken pox epidemic, and Liz worries about the health of her unborn baby. The city kids camp over night for tickets to a concert. Pip and Shelley finally bond and Cam experiences his first real kiss. Sandra seizes the day and makes a date with one of the Gregs—but which one? Tom cannot get any answers from Isabelle about his past. Frustrated, he makes a decision to walk away—literally.

Extraordinary Ordinary

Kim’s attempt to make a "Family Documentary" reveals more home truths than she anticipates. Sandra yearns for the magic touch. Jason hides an important secret from his father while Marissa’s night on the town gives her plenty to think about.

The Good Woman’s Guide to A Happy Home

Kim’s party video sparks a nasty chain reaction when Greg discovers Mickey’s been lying about finishing his relationship with Shelley. Eileen and Derek reach a crisis-point in their marriage when Eileen uncovers proof positive of his philandering. A surprise visitor brings resolution to John and Jason’s stubborn refusal to back down over recent misunderstandings.

Mirror Image

Jason’s new best mate, a twin, is the son of two teachers, who John and Liz also befriend until a dark secret pushes the happy families apart. Marissa struggles to remember the person she was in the city. Has the country changed her that much? Kim has been adopted by a bitchy, teenage duo who delight in bullying others. Sandra is continuing to date Greg until a fiery encounter with Mickey exposes Greg’s brutal nature. Tom’s new job as the groundsman of a Psychiatric Hospital brings him closer to Katy, and he discovers the bizarre truth behind her breakdown.

A Cross to Bear

Just when John thinks the nightmare of Easter with the parents-in-law has been safely avoided. Jason’s surprise Easter visit to Katy forces the issue with Tom and the truth is finally out. Marissa’s dissatisfaction with life in the country comes to a head.

A Man Walks into A Bar…

Isabelle reacts angrily when she discovers Tom has befriended Katy, and told her the truth about his parentage. Suspicious that Cam’s lying to her about Mickey, Shelley starts to revert to her old self. Pip and Cam are horrified to learn she’s tried to kill herself again. Working behind the bar at the pub makes John wonder why he bothered leaving social work and he’s starting to reassess his future. Marissa moves back to the city and is disappointed to learn Tom’s about to go home to Inverness.

Cliffhanger

Tom turns up on Sandra’s doorstep with a letter from Isabelle. After some goading from Marissa, he admits that he can’t read it. Although Tom won’t let Marissa see it, she guesses its contents. Tom goes home and is reconciled with Isabelle. Shelley arrives at the Todd house, bloodied and bruised. She’s been beaten up and won’t say by whom. Jason is eager to resume his relationship with Katy, but she has other ideas. Cam is dismayed to discover that Greg still has designs on Sandra. He hopes that having Shelley to stay at their house will help to repel Greg—but if it doesn’t, he is planning a return to Inverness!