Outdoor pool week has a simple order of operations: build the deck, fit the glass, put up the fence, fill the pool. By Thursday morning, with the cars still parked on site after the circus and outdoor pool week heading for a Sunday reveal, the Blockheads hadn’t started step one. “Not one bit of decking board has gone down on these main decks,” said one worried voice, and the commute didn’t help. Kai had taken House One’s car home to the sharehouse, which left Adam and Jolene as the only team with wheels, and Tayla “doesn’t ask, she tells”: she and Rick climbed in anyway, leaving everyone else to find taxis. House One’s review of the trip was “a very annoying 17 minutes to work”.
Key Moments Today
- ARGUMENTCourtney calls a stitch-up over the timber coping, and Dan fires back: “We don’t actively go out of our way to stitch you up.”
- DISASTERTayla’s and Chantel’s pool tiles are swapped at delivery and laid: “Cursios, take them off before I actually smash someone.”
- DRAMAScott asks House Four if they’re confident of finishing with no decking down. The answers came back fast: “No. No. Nah. No.”
Then came the paperwork. Courtney was told her design used decking boards as the coping around the pool, a problem because natural timber leaches into the water and stains it: “we need like a tile coper or a paver.” Her reaction was to call a stitch-up, pointing out that Nine in Six, who “never miss a single beat”, had held the plans for over a month. Dan had a different reading (“We don’t actively go out of our way to stitch you up”), another contestant suggested Courtney “should probably look at herself” for not checking the specs, and Courtney settled on a diplomatic “They’re very good. They’re not infallible.” Elsewhere Rick collected a second Hardest Worker prize, $5,000 as the only contestant to win it twice, saying it would “go a long way ’cause we’re struggling financially”, followed by the plea “Please don’t tell Courtney.”
The real chaos arrived by courier, or rather by courier to the wrong house. Chantel’s pool tiles and Tayla’s pool tiles had been swapped at delivery, and Chantel, who noticed they didn’t match her sample, “just thought they were a bad batch” while the Cursios kept laying them. Tayla then found her own pool being tiled with someone else’s pick (“They’re ugly AF”), rang Darren at Beaumont, and ran over to find House Two’s entire pool covered in her tile. What followed was a one-woman cyclone: an inhaler, a demand of “Cursios, take them off before I actually smash someone”, and a Chantel who stayed calm with “I’m not taking them off. I can’t afford more.” The fix was a small miracle of logistics. The real tiles live in Sydney, but Beaumont had seven boxes of Tayla’s pick left, the sheets were counted (44), and there was enough. Her verdict on her own choice: “It’s me in a tile.”
Friday brought Bunnings and Sizzle ‘N Score, with Foreman Dan on a little pot on wheels to lift the degree of difficulty. House Three landed its first ball in a hole all season, then Rosco took the score to 20: the highest of the season, and 20 free trees. Scott also arrived with a surprise, having secretly asked the landscapers what hero piece would make each garden sing. House One got a raw edge table and stone seat set, Houses Two, Four and Five each got a Trendz Fireplace flown in from New Zealand, and House Three got a Corten steel sphere sculpture by Peninsula artist Matt Hill. The Friday midday check-in was less festive. Asked whether they were confident of finishing, House Four answered “No. No. Nah. No.” with 206 square metres to go and no decking boards down; Rick and Tayla had 191 square metres to cover; and Lisa and Rosco (97 square metres, four chippies) spent the walk back working out that if nobody finishes there may be no CommBank budget prize either, “so really, if you finish, you win”. Chantel and Wyatt, with brackets on, were possibly the furthest ahead, and Adam and Jolene showed off a Cosentino Dekton outdoor kitchen island with seating for five.
The night ended with Scott dropping in with a 20-minute teaser of Season 22’s first episode, which meant a house full of Blockheads rewatching their own intros. Courtney’s “I’m just an admin” turned up alongside the clip of her saying “I work as a site manager in commercial construction”, and the room’s verdict was “So much for admin.” Next up is the Sunday pool reveal (“Pool part-ay!”), assuming anyone has a deck by then.
