The Better Oxygen

Most of the time on ‘Echolocation!’, they move onto different people every week. Sometimes there’s a two-part episode, but the show has always been pretty consistent about telling different stories, even when the stories aren’t quite complete, like last week when Ophelia and Iris were on the table in their lab while the water was pouring in because they bought some cheap sealant and no one was coming to help because they live a hundred miles away from the coast in a metal pod and they were crying and stuff.

Like, did they…did they get out? The show didn’t go back to them, so maybe they were eaten by whales. But today we got what might be the first three-part episode! As Grant had to row all the way back to buy portable oxygen chambers in Melbourne because Janine was getting seriously oxygen sick and they needed a pure source. That’s the thing about living in a renovated sunken cruise ship: the pressure can really get to you, and all the oxygen you’re breathing is recycled. Janine has been having headaches for weeks now, and Grant theorised that it was because of the shoddy oxygen they were having imported from Russia. They can’t afford to pay rent AND upgrade their oxygen, but Grant thought that maybe a bit of hyperbaric time per day might make things easier, plus they make portable chambers now. He rowed for hours to pick up the chambers, and in this episode he finally got back only to face the new problem of how to transport the chambers down to the house, because they don’t fit in the transport tube.

Meanwhile, Janine’s head has swelled to the point where it’s 20% bigger than usual and she’s started to hallucinate, so whether they like it or not, they might have to switch their oxygen provider. I haven’t seen the end of the episode yet, but…I hope Grant gets there in time. I don’t think explosive decompression would fit the theme of light evening entertainment.