Case Quizes Clinical Cases

Revisiting: Cracking Quiz, Gromit!

wallace and gromit

What remedy is Wallace from “Wallace and Gromit”? Did you guess right?

Mom, it’s time for the quiz.  I don’t know if you are aware of this or not but June 1st was the 50th anniversary of the Beatles’ “Sgt Pepper” album.

Wow!  So hard to believe!  It was 50 years ago today, Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play…

So it seemed like as good a time as any to rewatch the Sgt Pepper musical film the Bee Gees and Peter Frampton were in.

What???  Excuse me????  What do the Bee Gees have to do with the Beatles?  They (The Bee Gees) hated that movie!  It was the worst career move they ever made!

Hey, it wasn’t their idea!  It was their manager’s, Robert Stigwood’s, idea!  I feel like such a bad Bee Gees fan because I kind of like this movie.

Shana, you’re the only fan this movie has!

I once watched a documentary where Barry and his brothers were talking about how much they hated doing it.

See?

I could never understand why they hated it; except that, well, most of the songs were from “Abbey Road”.

Well, there ya go!

“Nowhere Man” was in it too, and that’s from “Rubber Soul”!

Say no more!  Say no more!

Anyway, despite being historically inaccurate, I think Sgt. Pepper was an OK film.  I just hope that Robin and Maurice (in heaven) and Barry (in Miami) can forgive me.  Here’s the trailer:

That was the absolute worst trailer I have ever seen!  And if the movie is anything like that, look out!

I guess I should play something from the actual “Sgt. Pepper” album.

If you have to!

Here’s Paul McCartney performing “Lovely Rita” and “Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite” in 2013. 

Shana, don’t look now, but, that video was removed from YouTube!  We’ll play something by Paul at the end.

But now, it’s time for the quiz!

We are doing a famous-person quiz this month because, sadly, I just found out that Peter Sallis, the voice-actor who played “Wallace” in the claymation series, “Wallace and Gromit”, died.

Waaaaah!!!!!!!!!

Mom, take it easy!  Peter Sallis was 96 years old!

Oh. Well that’s different.  Waaaah!!!!!!!

Mom!  Go sit down, maybe pour yourself a cup of tea, while I give the “Wallace and Gromit” run-down for our audience (you know, for the sake of our readers from India and Pakistan): It was a British claymation series (meaning everything in the series is made of clay!  Yes, everything!  There were four short films, a theatrical movie, and a series of short episodes called “Cracking Contraptions”, which, as far as I know, didn’t make it to DVD in the U.S. (our loss!)  There was also a computer game that I never got around to playing.  If I can find it, I will want to play it during the summer.

So, in a nutshell, Wallace is an inventor.  He lives alone with his dog, Gromit, who is something of a genius but Wallace doesn’t seem to notice as he talks to him like a baby and says things like, “Time for walkies!”  The fact is that Gromit is quite capable of walking himself.

So, here’s the thing about this short movie called “The Wrong Trousers”:  Wallace has poured all his hard work and time into inventing things that have absolutely no value to anyone but him!  He has no “real job”.  The point being that he comes to realize that he can’t pay his bills!  He becomes very worried and decides he has to take in a boarder.  The boarder, however, turns out to be a con-artist!  Gromit picks up on this immediately but the good-natured, naive, trusting Wallace is so sincere and honest, he assumes that everyone else is too!  Consequently, Wallace gets totally taken advantage of by the unscrupulous Penguin!  Luckily, Gromit saves him in the end.

All Wallace really needs to be happy is his home, his work, his beloved cheese, and his dog.

I give you now my mom, who will run down the plot for you.  

Thanks Shana, I have to do this for our readers who don’t speak English but are able to read it.  It’s Gromit’s brirthday.  Wallace has purchased a pair of magical trousers (“Ex-NASA”, he says) that can take Gromit for a walk on a leash.  Gromit is horrified!  While Gromit is on his walk, Wallace looks at the bills and realizes he can’t pay them.  He will have to take in a boarder.  The boarder turns out to be a penguin who’s wanted by the police.  Gromit has him pegged as a trouble-maker so the penguin (AKA “Feathers McGraw”) has to get rid of him.  He takes over Gromit’s room.  Wallace didn’t intend for this to happen but doesn’t know how to say “No!”   Gromit winds up outside in the dog house and ultimately runs away from home as he sees the penguin “buttering up” Wallace and taking his place. 

The penguin grasps how these “techno-trousers” can be used to rob the museum of a fabulous diamond!  He would have to somehow get Wallace into the trousers and, using the remote control, force Wallace to walk–and at times, leap–all over town in them! 

On returning home, the elderly Wallace would be so exhausted, he would surely sleep for hours, and during his sleep, and still in the mechanical trousers, and with the aid of the remote control that Feathers McGraw has rewired to his purposes, the evil penguin would send Wallace to the museum after it closed to steal the diamond.  Unfortunately, Wallace sets off the alarm, wakes up, and all heck breaks loose!  “Now see here,” he says to the penguin, “you can’t get away with this, I’ll call my solicitor!” 

Between Wallace and Gromit working together, using the many inventions Wallace has in his home, including the model train that runs through the house, they manage to capture Feathers McGraw and bring him to justice.  With the reward money, Wallace is able to pay off his bills.  “No more boarders for me,” he says to Gromit.  “It’s not worth it.  Do you want some cheese?” 

Thanks to Shana, the episode is here in its entirety for you to watch.  Now listen, people, make a list of the elements of the case, find rubrics for them, “repertorize”, and then tell me, “What Remedy Is Wallace?”  (And RIP Peter Sallis.)

***

To play us out, from the Sgt. Pepper album, 50-years-old today, here is Paul McCartney, live, in 1992 with, “Fixing A Hole”:

Bye everybody, good luck solving the quiz!

_____________________

Votes:

 

Pulsatilla

Calc-carb.-2

Arg-n.

Sulphur  

Graphites

Baryta carb-2

Baryta sulph.

 

 

Well, I don’t know where everybody went this time….  Was this quiz too hard?  Maria said it was too hard.  Well, hold on, it looks like Sarah Q from Jordan is here!

Good grief!  Can everybody please sit down?

Hi Ellen!

Is there an Ellen here?  Paging Ellen!!!!

Happy Birthday! (I remembered after all)!

Is it Ellen’s birthday too?????

And a great many more happy and healthy birthdays!  So…on to the quiz!  This one was really fun.  It was like real-life case taking, minus that it was a clay animation.  I mean to say that you had to really watch for the strange, rare and peculiar symptoms.  Textbook cases cut out all the interpreting and filtering we would have to do in real life.

You’re right!

Here we go:

Symptom 1: He has apparently spent all his money on gifts for his dog.

Well, wait, let me look that up.  (Must be under “Dog”.  “Mind: Dog, spent his money on, all of it, on him”)  Hmm…..

Symptom 2: He can’t tell his penguin guest “No!” when the guest takes his dog’s room, despite his love for his dog.

Right!  I can probably find that under “Penguin”.  (Mind: Penguin, no, can’t say no to, room, takes dog’s, despite love for”)  I can’t find it!!!

Symptom 3: He really, really loves cheese.

“Cheese, Gromit, cheese!!!”

There is a framed picture of cheese on the wall.

So there was!

He even dreams of cheese. (Dreaming of cheese was not in Murphy’s.)

Stupid Repertory!

Symptom 4: When he is being walked about in the robotic trousers, he doesn’t wake up, until the burglar alarm.

He doesn’t wake up because that was part of the Plan, to make Wallace so exhausted that he would sleep through the whole robbery!  So delete the “deep sleep” rubric, it’s not a symptom.

So here are those 4 symptoms, using Radar and Murphy’s Repertory.  Pulsatilla, has this delusion/reality that he/she is just the victim and the world takes advantage of them.  I say delusion/reality because their weakness invites others to take advantage of them (reality) yet once they see this repeating in their lives, they feel that it is always the case (delusion).  In the mini-movie that was pretty much the whole theme, Wallace being taken advantage of by the penguin.  My guess is Pulsatilla.

Okay,..  now if I could just get myself to press “send”…

Sarah, I agree with you that being taken advantage of was the whole theme of this movie.  Whatever the remedy is, it has to have this theme!  And that’s why I went with your second choice, Calcarea carbonica.  Calc-carb is independent, Pulsatilla is very dependent and needy and probably would have cried through the whole calamity!  Here’s the thing with Calc-carb, as explained by Catherine Coulter:

 

  1. Slow, slowness of mind, the last one to know, as they say.
  2. Target for bullies!
  3. Naive
  4. Unworldly
  5. Easily duped (“Constantly duped but still trusting.”–Catherine Coulter, Portraits Of Homeopathic Remedies p. 43)

 

With Penguin being a con-artist, being “duped” is at the center of this case, as you said!  Have you read my article on Calc-carb?

They are yielding, though it’s missing from that rubric, which is a big mistake!  They are non-confrontational, non-competitive, they don’t complain, they just retreat into their shell–their oyster shell.  They feel very vulnerable outside of their shell (house).  They have a fear of failure so they would never get into a confrontation (with a penguin).  People have their way with Calc-carb, as Penguin did.  They want to do things at their own pace, they are not suited to the work place where they might have deadlines to meet and people telling them what to do and to hurry up, etc.; you can’t hurry a Calc-carb, they just get slower and slower; they can work at their own pace only.  Notice Wallace doesn’t have a job.  He’s a hard worker, but, he can’t work for anyone else.  He has no money because he doesn’t work.  He just wants to stay at home (in his shell) and engage in his projects, none of which are done for money–because having to sell things would be an ordeal, and they dislike ordeals, they do not do well when under pressure.

Elaine, first of all, sorry, I do know your name is Elaine, how could I be your greatest fan and not know your name?

I have a homeopath friend named Ellen I also write emails to.

Oh!  So you’re seeing another homeopath on the side!  Well, I should have known!!!

Ellen Kire, perhaps you’ve heard of her.

No.  And why isn’t she answering the Quiz???

Sorry I wrote your name wrong >_< )

I’ll forgive you this time, just promise you won’t see her again!

Calc carb?!  Ah, so close and yet so far!  I have read your calc-carb article many times, the one with Charlie Brown, and Dr. Katz’s son, I forgot his name.

Ben Katz.

I love that article, it was the first one I read by you.  I think the “yielding” rubric threw me off.

Well, of course, because Calc-carb isn’t in there, but, any remedy that Catherine Coulter says is non-competitive and easily and repeatedly duped should be in the “yielding” rubric, wouldn’t you agree?  So, this is a big mistake.

Homeopathy is hard!

Yes, it truly is.  It can be easy in the sense that we can all learn that Arnica is for injuries, Ignatia is for acute grief with uncontrollable sobbing, Calendula is for cuts and scrapes, Hypericum is for injury to the nerves, Aconite is for fright and Apis is for bee and wasp stings… we can do great work even knowing just that!!!!  But yes, there are complicated aspects to homeopathy too, no doubt about it!

I have to get to know the remedies like they are my close friends.

OK, but, take my advice and stay away from the spider remedies, I hear they’re back-biters!

I get an idea about a type and try and philosophically mold it into what I need for the case. Its not really working for me though. My father in law was supposedly an Arsenicum, but turned out to be a Nat Mur.

There are similarities…

My brother’s mother-in-law was a Thuja–so I thought–but it aggravated and ended up needing Gelsemium!  Its definitely much harder than what I imagined when I first started.  My confidence is shot.

Don’t worry, you’re just getting started!

Perhaps that’s a blessing in disguise, because that’s when a person gets real about studying.  Here’s hoping next month turns out better for me.  Thank you Elaine, I love your quizzes, even if I fail.  Through failure, one learns to succeed.

You didn’t really fail, Sarah, Calc-carb came up #2 in your repertorization!  I’d say you did pretty good!

Don’t look now but, I think I see Wayne Butcher all the way from Australia!

 

Hi Elaine,

Hi, Wayne!

Just by coincidence, the creators of Wallace and Gromit are in Australia at the moment.

No way!  Are you serious?

I think Wallace is a Calc Carb.  He is eccentric, plodding, slow, unhurried, lethargic, simple in manner, homely, flabby, pudgy faced, does not seem to bear a grudge and is sometimes confused.

Well-said!!! You are absolutely right!!!! I couldn’t have explained it any better myself; in fact, I have nothing to say!!!

Hello Elaine and Shana,

Oh look!  It’s the gang from Slovakia!

here are our answers to your funny quiz.  We hope our answers are just as funny….:)  The video was not very useful to us, but we tried to guess on the basis of what Shana said.

Miroslav is thinking that Wallace´s constitution is Calcarea carb, because he wants only to stay home, working; a fellowship of a dog and eating cheese …

Miroslav is right!!!

Jitka: My first idea, according to Shana’s indications, was that Wallace might be Argentum nit. – he likes cheese, staying at home, he is creative.  But according to the video, I would say that he could also be Sulphur – he is an intelligent but naive inventor.  But I´m going to follow my first thought and I vote for Argentum nitricum.

I think we’d need more than love of cheese, staying at home and creativity to go with Arg-n.  Wallace seems to have no fears or phobias or impulsive behaviors and no hurriedness that we associate with Arg-n.  This video was all about being conned (tricked), fooled (by the evil penguin who got Wallace to participate in a robbery).  Calc-carb is easily fooled, he has a trusting nature, he’s known for his sincerity and so he thinks others are sincere too.  He will believe whatever you tell him.  I couldn’t call Sulphur naive.  Calc-carb, yes, Calc-carb is naive and trusting.  And by the way, your answers weren’t funny at all!  You have to work harder on that.

Well, I think it’s time we announced our winners: Wayne from Australia and Miroslav from Slovakia–congratulations, you guys!  I leave you now with the Wallace and Gromit Theme Song as we bid a fond farewell to Peter Sallis:

See ya again next time!

_____________________
Elaine Lewis, D.Hom., C.Hom.

Elaine takes online cases! Write to her at [email protected]

Visit her website: elaineLewis.hpathy.com

About the author

Elaine Lewis

Elaine Lewis, D.Hom., C.Hom.
Elaine is a passionate homeopath, helping people offline as well as online. Contact her at [email protected]
Elaine is a graduate of Robin Murphy's Hahnemann Academy of North America and author of many articles on homeopathy including her monthly feature in the Hpathy ezine, "The Quiz". Visit her website at:
https://elainelewis.hpathy.com/ and TheSilhouettes.org

About the author

Shana Lewis

Shana spices up the Hpathy Quiz with her timely announcements and reviews on the latest in pop culture. Her vast knowledge of music before her time has inspired the nickname: "Shanapedia"!

Leave a Comment