O-Negative (Chompoo gets an offer she can't refuse)

The return of the candy lady

Domestic bliss

Episode 8 of the Thai TV show O-Negative (Episode 7) starts where the previous episode ended. The girls have gone out to buy food while the two boys are still at Go's bar painting the mural. Meanwhile, Go is off buying fried breadsticks for Chompoo.

The girls are at a food stand. Chompoo is whining because it is out of her favorite fried bread sticks. The girls are trying to decide what to do when it occurs to me the food stand looks familiar. It looks like the food stand from Prim's last flashback and sure enough the old lady selling candy soon appears.

This triggers a continuation of Prim's flashback. The family is in the car after getting their food. Prim is in the backseat watching her two parents fight in the front seat. Her mother is furious that her dad bought so much candy from the old lady. He defends his action, saying the lady was very poor and the money will be a great help to her.

The fight escalates as Prim's mom accuses her dad of being a soft touch who is wasting their family's money. There is a bitter back and forth about some friend of his he is helping through a rough stretch. Her parents really start tearing into each other with low blows. Prim has been growing increasingly distressed through all of this. Eventually, at a stop light, Prim's mom gets out of the car and storms off.

We cut to Peun and Art working on the mural. Art asks why Peun didn't go with Foon and Peun responds with his usual complaints about Foon's confusing behavior. Art mocks him for being a bit of a crybaby. Amen to that. Granted, Foon would be a completely nutty girlfriend with her secrecy, but she is pretty obviously throwing herself at Peun and he needs to take his whimpering down a notch.

Unspoken Prim to Peun -- cool your jets

At that point Prim comes in with the food. Peun starts laying it on a little think with his compliments to her. She seems a bit taken aback and plays the friend zone card as a reminder just in case. Art makes note of the exchange.

Meanwhile the rest of the kids meet on the street in front of the bar. Chompoo gets an angry call from her dad who insists she come home right away. Go offers to take her there and tells the rest of them to call it a night.

Foon heads up with the drinks Go had bought and the four of them debate what to do. Foon convinces them to leave, but Art says he is going to stay and work some more. Prim tells Foon and Peun to go ahead and go home and says she'll stay with Art and help him finish up. Foon teases the two about finally being able to have quality time with each other.

Will Peun take the hint?

As Foon and Peun walk to her car I'm sure you can guess what happens. Yup, he starts whining to her that he thinks she's trying to avoid him. What? Are we watching the same show? She tells him that he's overthinking things and that he shouldn't be so sensitive. She then kisses him on his cheek to reassurre him. He's pleased, but from what we've gathered so far from watching the dunce in action I'm sure he'll be back to fretting about her intentions in a scene or two.

Meanwhile Prim and Art are having a pleasant time with each other. He starts singing, she asks him what song and he says it is by Ploychompoo and is the one that has the handsome guy in the video. Amazingly, and as a demonstration that I need a life, I actually found the music video. It is called ปลิว (Away). The joke is that Tor Thanapob Leeluttanakajorn, the actor who plays Peun, is the handsome guy in the video. The song is about a girl who has a secret crush and that is played upon as Art wistfully sneaks peeks at Prim.

Soon they are interrupted by Peun who shows up after seeing Foon home. Is that boob Peun capable of interpreting any social signals? The two obviously just wanted to be together for a bit. To say Art looks unhappy is an understatement.

I want one of them beautiful Thai zoomer murals painted on my wall

Through the miracle of time-lapse photography the days pass and the mural gets completed. The kids pose in front of it and then it is time for the grand opening of the Upstairs Bar & Bistro. The place is crowded, even Professor Buddy and the attractive painting teacher are there.

O Group reflects on how they used to hate Go in the hazing days, but now they like him. There are then a bunch of crowd scenes and shots of the kids dancing.

Chompoo is put on the spot

We next see Go standing on top of the bar with an announcement. Not only is this the bar's first night of business, but it is also a couple's first day as a couple. He is going to reveal the couple. He gets off the bar and directs everybody's attention to O Group. Art, Foon, Prim and Peun all nervously look at each other wondering who the couple is. However, Go points to Chompoo and says it is her.

She, along with everybody else in the bar, is mystified until Go confesses he likes Chompoo and then drops to his knees and asks her to be his girlfriend. Chompoo doesn't quite know whether to take Go seriously or not, but soon the crowd is chanting "say yes" and she does excitedly accept. The crowd then chants "kiss, kiss, kiss" but Go shyly chickens out and just asks her to dance. It doesn't matter to Chompoo because she is ecstatic and so she happily does some wild Chompoo dancing.

Prim confronts a mystery she cannot solve

Art is sitting outside getting some air and Prim comes out to join him. Art is fiddling around with  his camera and she asks him if she can see the pictures on it. She starts at the pictures of Go asking Chompoo to be his girlfriend, but as she continues to scroll she notices he has about a bazillion pictures of her on his phone. She asks him why. Hmmm... when he's not taking photos of her he is drawing pictures of her... whatever could that mean?

Meanwhile Peun is inside with Foon and Chompoo. Foon is going on about how wonderful Go was to Chompoo and how jealous she is that Chompoo got a man to go down on his knees to ask her to go out. Foon says she would love it if a man would do something like that for her. Peun is taking this all in.

Beavis and Butthead used to do a funny thing where when they got an idea, because they were so stupid, instead of a bright lightbulb turning on over their head a lightbulb that barely flickered appeared instead. I picture Peun with one of those barely flickering lightbulbs over his head.

We cut back to Art and Prim. Art asks Prim if she has a boyfriend. She says no and asks Art if he has a girlfriend. He says no, that he doesn't think girls would be interested in him. He adds that he's too timid to talk to girls and that he doesn't know how to approach them. She points out that she's a girl and wonders if maybe he doesn't see her as one. Realizing the corner he's painted himself into he flounders around, unable to explain what he meant.

She then edges a bit closer to him and asks him if there is a girl he likes. He says yes, but says he is too shy to tell  her, and besides -- he doesn't know if the feeling is mutual.

We join Art and Peun the next morning. Peun is asking Art whether he should ask Foon to be his girlfriend or not. Art's response is to quit bugging him about it and just ask her. After some bromance comedy about Peun creeping out Art by pretending he's Foon and practicing asking on him, Peun decides to surprise Foon on her birthday.

I sense a disturbance in the Force

On Foon's birthday Peun brings up her Facebook page and is typing Happy Birthday wishes to her when he notices a video, with some heart emojis, from a fellow called Ong-art. Peun watches the video. Ong-art sings happy birthday, teases Foon about looking too  thin and blows a kiss her way at the end. On her timeline he's also listed the two of them in a relationship. Needless to say, Peun is stricken.

Foon has also watched the video. she almost deletes it, but doesn't.

Later Chompoo, Prim, Art and Peun are at a picnic table discussing Ong-art's video. Chompoo has dug through Foon's old Facebook posts and has seen a lot of pictures of the two so she deduces that he is her boyfriend. Peun is looking miserable. When Foon arrives Chompoo starts grilling her about him. Foon says he is her ex-boyfriend. She points out she didn't like or comment on his post, and in fact that she almost deleted it. Peun looks relieved.

Later, after a class, Foon invites them all to Go's bar where she'll treat on her birthday. One by one they beg off, claiming they are busy. By the time Foon gets to the bar Peun is the only one still with her. She's upset they all ditched her on her birthday, so Go tells her to go up and drink all the beer she wants. It dark when she gets up there, but then the lights all turn on, out comes a cake and it turns out that they've thrown her a surprise party.

What could possibly go wrong?

When the party is over Peun walks Foon back to her car. When they get there he points her towards the trunk of her car and tells her he has a surprise. He uses the key to open the trunk. When it does balloons pop out and there is a sign saying "be my girlfriend" in it.

So... I'm wondering... how did he manage to decorate the inside of the trunk of her car?

At any rate, Peun asks Foon if she'll be his girlfriend and she hems and haws a bit and then says that she likes him a lot but that she can't go out with him. He wonders why and she says that Ong-art is still her boyfriend. She's wanted to break up with Ong-art, but hasn't had a reason to until Peun came along. She asks him to wait for a little longer. What?

Now I'm even more puzzled than I was by her decorated car truck. Can't she just do the ol' "you're a great guy, but I've met somebody else, can we still be friends" schtick that has broken so many a heart? Do you need to do some sort of a more formal breakup in Thailand?

[Episode 9]