Father, Dear Father

- Season 6

(1972)

A misconstrued telephone conversation from his agent Georgie leads Patrick to believe that he is to be cited as the guilty party in a divorce for an incident which happened many years earlier but has now come back to haunt him. He decides to remedy the situation but only succeeds in getting himself into further trouble.

Patrick slips whilst visiting his brother Philip in hospital, falls down a laundry chute and ends up as a patient on the same ward. The brothers' charts are accidentally switched and Patrick bears the wrath of the disapproving mother of Philip's girl-friend before taking another tumble down the same laundry chute.

With his daughters away for a few days, Patrick is looking forward to some quiet and peaceful time on his own with no female interruptions. However when Georgie, Barbara and his mother all contact him in succession ,each one of them seeking his help and advice, he ends up with a house full of women after all.

An old school friend of Patrick,Basil,asks him to give a speech at the school's founders day and a nervous Patrick practices by speaking into a tape recorder. On the day Patrick is persuaded to play for the school cricket team and is hit in the throat by a ball,losing his voice.Basil suggests he mime to his speech on the tape recorder but Nanny has been using it to exercise her singing voice.

Karen and Anna fall out over Tim,an advertisement photographer,who Patrick initially meets dressed as a tramp for a fancy dress party,leading Patrick to believe he is a down-and-out. The girls patch things up and Tim pays Patrick to pose as a tramp for a photo shoot when the hired actor fails to show. Unfortunately for Patrick,a policeman mistakes him for the real thing.

Anxious to marry Anna, Tim wants to please Patrick and invites him to lunch at a restaurant but leaves his wallet on the table. When Patrick goes looking for him the manager assumes he is trying to run off without paying and makes him wash dishes,thereby missing a garden party at Buckingham Palace. At least Patrick agrees to the wedding.

Tim is severely hung over after his stag night and Patrick gets him some head-ache pills. Unfortunately he mixes them up with sleeping pills,making the groom even drowsier. After walking him up and down Patrick and Bill get him to the church on time but after the wedding there is further bad news meaning that the happy couple will have to stay with Patrick until they can find their own place.