One Foot in the Grave had a son who had died as a child. A number of episodes were also experimental in that they took place entirely in one setting. Such episodes include: Victor, Margaret and Mrs Warboys stuck in a traffic jam; Victor and Margaret in bed suffering insomnia; Victor left alone in the house waiting to see if he has to take part in jury service; Victor and Margaret having a long wait in their solicitor's waiting room; and Victor and Margaret trying to cope during a power cut on the hottest night of the year. Despite Margaret's frequent exasperation with her husband's
One Foot in the Grave an incident she had at school when she was a child. When she was five, she had two budgies; one day when she opened the door of their cage, one flew straight out and hit the window killing itself, while the other stayed in the cage despite her best efforts to get it to come out. The next day at school her teacher asked the class to write a story about something that had happened to them so Margaret wrote her story about the budgies. Her teacher made Margaret read it out loud in front of the whole class which