The 5 Mrs. Buchanans (TV Series)

Never on the Road Again (1995)

Harriet Sansom Harris: Vivian Buchanan

Quotes 

• Vivian Buchanan : Alex, I am so tired of your specious grandstanding.

  Delilah Buchanan : Oh, and I am tired of you and your twenty-five dollar words, Vivian! I bet you don't even know what that means!

  Vivian Buchanan : Specious? Adjective. Seeming to be good or true without really being so. From the Latin speciosus. Take that, ya hick!

  Delilah Buchanan : Well, at least I'm not a *specious* hick!... Am I?

• Delilah : Guess what? I was just down at the market and I saw Patsy Strickland, and she told me that Jeopardy is auditioning contestants tomorrow in Indianapolis, so I'm gonna go down and try out!

  Alex : Delilah, that's, uh... Uh, that's, uh... Jeopardy, huh?

  Delilah : Yeah, I am so excited about it! I mean, this is my chance to prove to people that I'm not just another dumb blonde.

  Vivian : Well, Delilah, we all know that you have your areas of knowledge, but they do have all those categories! I mean, geography? Science? What are you gonna do if they ask you about opera?

  [Delilah takes a moment] 

  Delilah : "Who is a black talk show host?"

  Alex : Wear something pretty.

• Vivian : I've written a children's story and I'm meeting with a magazine editor tomorrow.

  Alex : Vivian! I had to idea you were interested in creative writing.

  Vivian : Oh, well, you know, it's not like it's great literature. The baby chick gets lost here, he tracks a little worm there - blah, blah, boo-hoo, the little monsters will eat it up and I'll make a bundle!

  Alex : Gosh, it's like having Dr. Seuss right here in my kitchen.

• [Vivian reads a story that she wrote] 

  Vivian : It was morning in the meadow. Flopsy the bunny saw her bunny boyfriend on the other side of the lane, down the hill, past the glen. Hop, hop, hop! Flopsy ran after him with her little nose a-twitching. Then a semi came barreling down the road and ran her over. Later...

  Alex : Hold it, Vivian! What kind of story is that?

  Vivian : A children's story.

  Bree : Well, it's cruel!

  Vivian : Life's cruel! The sooner kids learn it, the better.

  Mother Buchanan : I hope you don't read that trash to my grandchildren. I'm sure that it would traumatize Lyndon and P.J.

  Vivian : Traumatize them? It was their idea! Of course, it was my idea to call the dead bunny Flopsy... instead of Grandma.

• Delilah : Oh, girls, am I in trouble! I just went in the ladies room but it's out of order!

  Vivian : Then use the men's room.

  Delilah : I can't do that!

  Alex : Sure you can, it's an emergency. Just knock on the door and go in. The men will understand.

  Delilah : Okay, I'll just knock on the door and go on in. We'll all just be adults about it... Oh God, I hope I don't see anybody's dinky!

• Alex : Bree, what are you doing?

  Bree : I'm waving back at those two men.

  Alex : Well, stop it! They'll think you're flirting with them.

  Bree : Why would they think that? They're disgusting.

  Vivian : They're truckers. They don't know they're disgusting.

• Vivian : There is a roach the size of a Shetland Pony under this table.

  Alex : Oh Vivian, is it really that big?

  Vivian : He stole my shoe!

• Delilah : We just missed the dumb funeral. We can all go home.

  Mother Buchanan : The funeral is not dumb and we did not miss it. And we'll go home over my dead body!

  [Vivian reaches for Mother Buchanan's neck] 

  Alex : Vivian, don't even think about it.

  Vivian : Come on, Alex, we're right here!

• [everyone is wearing matching nightgowns] 

  Vivian : Alright, whose bright idea was it to send Bree out to buy the nightgowns?

  Bree : I don't know what your problem is. I look cute as a button in mine!

  Mother Buchanan : You do not. You look stupid, just like the rest of us.

• [Delilah is snoring] 

  Vivian Buchanan : The woman is a Hoover! Either wake Delilah up or push her around the carpeting.

• Alex : This is ridiculous! I can't believe this is the only motel with a vacancy in this entire hayseed county.

  Vivian : Yeah, Great Aunt Velma just had to die the same weekend Hee-Haw Live was in town.

• Bree : Vivian, just lay down and go to sleep.

  Vivian : I will if you promise not to play footsie with me anymore.

  Bree : I'm sorry, it's just that my legs are so cold and yours are so warm and hairy.

  Vivian : Okay, so I didn't shave for a couple of days...

  Bree : A couple of days? It felt like I was walking through Kentucky bluegrass down there.

  Vivian : I oughta knock your block off!

  Bree : Go ahead and try, Sasquatch!

• Bree Buchanan : I'm bored. When do we get to see the body?

  Vivian Buchanan : What is it with you and dead bodies? You're sick!

  [ribbing Vivian for not shaving] 

  Bree Buchanan : I may be sick, but my legs are silky smooth.

• [Six pallbearers wheel an enormous wooden box into a funeral] 

  Alex : Yeah, is there anything unusual you wanted to tell us about Great Aunt Velma?

  Mother Buchanan : Like what?

  Alex : Well, like, uh... Was she ever in Ripley's Believe It Or Not?

  Mother Buchanan : If you're referring to her size, yes, she had something of a weight problem.

  Vivian : Something of a weight problem? The woman's in a packing crate!

  Mother Buchanan : I told you all that she weighed 650 pounds.

  Delilah : Noooo, I think we would have remembered that!