Previously on Flipping Out…the gang is living and working in Sherman Oaks at Valley Vista during ongoing renovations. It’s been hard on everyone but Jeff still thinks it beats paying $100k for a rental for the year, especially given the financial strain on the business since Jeff lost his lucrative sponsorship deal with Living Spaces. Salvation may have come in the form of Mary and Marty, Newport Beach homeowners who have recently hired Jeff to re-do their already perfectly done home. Jeff and Gage are proceeding with the surrogacy using the embryo of Jeff’s with the highest chance of implantation success. If it works, they’ll have a little girl.
We open at Valley Vista, hammering and sawing coming from every direction. Jeff confronts Zoila on the planks of death and asks if she’s seen the pool man. Zoila looks like she’s been awake for 42 whole seconds and needs some coffee before trying to navigate the death trap of flooring provided by her employer.
Not the best place for a morning meeting
Zoila says she hasn’t seen the pool man but she noticed it was really messy out there. Jeff asks her to go outside and see if they’ve cleaned up around the pool and she begrudgingly does so, complaining about how cold it is the entire time.
When she comes back inside, she tells Jeff it’s cleaner than it was before. He’s perplexed as to how the pool man came and went and Zoila never even knew he was there. Zoila still hasn’t had coffee and now she’s cold so she starts going off about how she can’t be responsible for knowing who is and isn’t there all the time and that she was working.
Isn’t that your actual job?
Jeff tells Zoila that as House Manager, it most certainly is her job to know who’s there. And he’d also like her to go outside and tell the workers to make sure they remove all the trash before they leave. Zoila doesn’t want to do it – she doesn’t want to make enemies. Jeff doesn’t care: “When I ask you do to something I expect you to do it.” Zoila tells him that she’s not an octopus. She has two hands and two legs and the two legs are really bad. This makes everyone giggle and Zoila heads out to check on the workers.
I’m not octopus.
I have two hand, two leg.
And the two leg are really bad Jeffrey! Really bad.
It’s very hard to stay mad at Zoila when she’s such a good sport
Jeff, Megan and Vanina head to Valley Village to check on the progress there.
Valley Village
The client is a very pregnant woman named Kelly, whom Jeff greets with the worst-possible “MY GOD YOU’RE HUGE!”
Oh hey it’s just Jeff being Jeff!
Kelly takes it in stride – Jeff and Kelly went to college together and they’ve been friends forever so she knows it’s just Jeff being Jeff. She’s six months along with twins, a boy and a girl. Kelly recently bought a really giant house that’s full of all the furnishings the realtors rented for staging and she needs to buy her own things as soon as possible.
As they walk through the house, Jeff asks if Kelly wants a runner for the stairs “for the dogs.” Kelly’s all “um, yeah and for the kids too. You know when you have a baby you have to think about these things too right?”
This seems like soooooo many stairs with merely baby gates for protection
Megan points out that the upstairs railing will need to be plexiglass-sealed to prevent one of Kelly’s new kids from falling down and breaking their neck. Jeff, realizing how ugly that will look, wonders why Kelly can’t just keep an eye on the kids? I’m sort of with Jeff here – and I mean who among us can afford to plexiglass in our bannisters just for those few years when the kids are little? But the point is driven home to Jeff that EVERYTHING in his life is going to change, even the way he looks at interior design, once he has kids.
But plexiglass the rail? REALLY?!?
Jenni and Jeff interview with Jeff admitting that he’s concerned about the extraordinary effect a little one will have on his already skewed work-life balance. But then Jenni chimes in to say that she’s seen Jeff and Gage with her daughter Alianna and she thinks they’re going to be way better parents than they think they’re going to be. “Or we won’t.” They both shrug. I love these two.
Or we won’t be good parents. Meh.
We all do the best we can do, Jeff. Ooo ooo! We’re in Encino at Jenni’s house! We see Jenni’s morning routine – making Alianna’s lunch, bumping into her husband on his way to surgery.
Jenni’s house
Making Alianna’s lunch at 6:43 a.m.
It’s Jenni’s husband!
Jenni wakes Alianna and brings her down to breakfast while she interviews that Alianna is 2 ½ and Jenni’s best friend. My heart feels funny things because I also only have one daughter who is super amazing and I’m so happy for Jenni that she’s found all this that she wanted.