Soap cliches

Gosh, still can't find much to do whilst actually feeding babies except sitting passively and listening to radio or (God forbid) watching daytime T.V. One hand to hold baby, one to hold bottle = captive T.V. audience. I can feel my brains dissolving in my head watching "Diagnosis Murder," "Neighbours," "Trash in the Attic," "Doctors," "Makeover your something-or-other" and so on and so forth.

I've been thinking, though, that someone ought to compile a catalogue of soap cliches for actors and writers. Then, using the catalogue, people could put their own soaps together with no trouble. Here are just a few obvious ones:

1. the suspicious embrace / cuddle, in which the camera focuses in on one of the cuddler's faces, because there's some hidden agenda going on.

2. the heavy dramatic irony scene, in which Character A has done something awful behind Character B's back - e.g. affair with best friend, Character C; Character B spends five minutes extolling the virtues and wonders of Character A, and even considers marriage, whilst Character C pulls lots of telling faces.

3. the half-overheard conversation, in which someone misunderstands what someone else is saying (e.g. by only overhearing a bit, and missing the "not" in the sentence, etc.) and gets hurt for at least half an episode, until the mistake is cleared up.

4. the comic sub-plot, in which someone leaves a cake on a car roof, a dog eats someone's dinner, or something of that nature, to complement the more serious doings of the main plot.

5. the hospital scene, in which someone is seriously ill in a nearby room, whilst his or her relatives and friends are waiting in the corridor for news. The doctor comes out and looks serious, and tells the relatives that it's late and they should go home and get some sleep. Relatives look concerned, and insist that they couldn't possibly go home (don't they have visiting hours in soap hospitals?).

... please add to the list ad infinitum...