'Tween a Rock and an Ed Place

"'Tween a Rock and an Ed Place" is the 17th episode of Season 5 and the 119th episode of Ed, Edd n Eddy. In this episode, the Eds get invited to Jonny and Plank's Groovy Arbor Day Party. When the Eds arrive, the party turns out to be boring as nobody attends except for the Eds, Plank and Jonny.

Plot
Sarah and Nazz are in a hallway of the school, applying lipstick, when a commotion comes from the gym. Inside, the Eds are working on a project that Eddy, of all people, actually likes. The point of the project is to establish a correlation between the nose's scent glands and the test subject's brain. Naturally, the test subject is Ed, who has a lid over his head, blocking out his eyes. Edd has brought a piece of pie in, and all Ed has to do is sniff his way towards it. Ed has nearly reached the pie when, much to Edd's surprise, he veers off. The reason Ed abandoned his course is simple: Eddy is holding up a rank-smelling gymbag and is using it to distract his friend. Edd reprimands Eddy, but Eddy ignores him, choosing instead to lead Ed into a wall once, twice, and finally three times. On this third attempt, Ed breaks through the wall and into the boys' locker room, where Jonny is offering an invitation to Kevin. Eddy takes no notice of this until Jonny hops up to them and offers them an invitation to his Arbor Day party as well before running off, presumably to invite everyone else. Eddy is ecstatic at having actually been given an invitation to a party, and he swiftly drags his friends away from the school so they can prepare for tonight, ignoring Double D's protestations that they have to complete their project.

That night, the Eds head to Jonny's house. Ed and Edd are dressed in their best suits and Eddy is dressed to kill in his own semblance of party clothes. When they get there, Jonny eagerly invites them in, and Eddy does his best to make an entrance that will surely wow all the partygoers. When he bursts in, however, he finds that nobody is in the living room. Undeterred, he presumes that it's a kitchen party and slides into the kitchen. As in the first room he entered, there is no one there.

Actually, wait, there is someone here. Plank is sitting at a table in the corner, and according to Jonny some good jokes are being told. As only Jonny, Ed, and perhaps Plank himself can hear them, though, it's a pretty awkward situation for Edd and Eddy, as they seem to be sitting in a silence occupied only occasionally by the laughter of Jonny and Ed. Suddenly, Eddy leaps onto the table and starts dancing while making a suggestion of what they can do while waiting for the others only to find that he's all alone in the kitchen again.

The four others have adjoined to the parlor. Eddy joins them there and sits down on a rug, disgruntled. Jonny runs around in circles; it seems that he's chosen to play some party games, and this one is a form of Duck, Duck, Goose he calls "Poke, Poke, Spruce". He finally chooses a spruce, but this is bad news for the game, as his choice is Plank. Jonny runs around in circles until Eddy yells for him to stop, and then nervously asks when they can have some food, only to learn that Plank supposedly ordered some pizzas. While Jonny resumes running around in circles, Eddy gets more and more annoyed until he throws Plank into Jonny's head, allowing Plank to "catch" Jonny.

With Jonny downed, Eddy suggests that they crank up the tunes, but Jonny ignores him and announces a new game of trying to guess how many seeds are in a jar. Fed up, Eddy grabs Jonny by his lapels and demands to know when the others will get there so the party can finally start. Jonny then lets Eddy in on the bad news: Kevin is making cupcakes tonight, Rolf can't find socks that match, Nazz is pedaling papers, Jimmy has to wash his hair, and Sarah just told him to leave her alone. Annoyed, Eddy throws Jonny down and heads for the door, and when Jonny asks where he's going, Eddy tells him that the party sucks and he's leaving.

Jonny begins to weep. Hearing this, Eddy looks back at him, disgusted. Edd feels sympathy for Jonny, though, and begs his friend to stay. Given that it seems all that Jonny wants to do is make an Arbor Day wish, all they have to do is make the wish with him and go, so Eddy accepts. Hearing this, Jonny is instantly cheerful, and says that he was just fooling when he was crying. Jonny then sets them up to make their wishes, and immediately after the wishing is over, Ed says that he wished the party would never end and they'd party forever. Jonny tells him that that was Plank's wish two, and the three (board, baldy, and Ed) dance around, singing about how they're having a never-ending party. Eddy looks at Edd, angry, and his anger is in no way pacified when Ed and Jonny board up the doors. Suddenly, Jonny stops and puts a sapling upon the "Arbor Day acorn" and tells him that now they'll watch as this sapling grows into a fully-grown oak tree, a process which will take several decades. Eddy begs for relief and for the tree to grow when he hears this, but it doesn't seem likely that he'll get his wish any time soon.

Memorable Quotes
[Eddy lifts the blindfold from Ed's nose so he can smell.] Ed: "Peek-a-boo! I smell you!" [smells around] "I smelt it, who dealt it?"
 * Ed: [blindfolded for their project] "Where are you, you little dickens? Eddy? Oh! Oh! Okay, I smell cabbage, and...um, bowling shoes? Canned luncheon meat? No, wait! That is me."


 * Ed: [happy and eager] "I wish this will never end and we will party forever!"

Edd: [mightily distressed] "My brain hasn't correlated that yet, Ed."
 * Ed: [enthusiastically rubbing himself with his old gym bag] "Do we reek of swank or what, Double D?"

Ed: "Baby chickens are so cute!"
 * Eddy: [on the way to the party] "So, here's the drill, head for the cheese dip first. My brother told me that's where all the chicks hang out!"

Ed: [looking at huge jar of peas and beans] "Three?" Edd: [calculating avidly] "976?" Ed: [watching jar smash on floor] "Two?"
 * Jonny: [brandishing a mammoth jar] "New game! Plank says, 'guess how many peas are in the jar.'"

Jonny: "Didn't I tell ya, Eddy? Everyone said they were too busy. Kevin's making cupcakes, Rolf can't find socks that match, Nazz's peddling papers, Jimmy's washing his hair, and Sarah said, 'beat it, baldy.'"
 * Eddy: "For Pete's sake, Jonny, these games stink, man! If you're gonna have a party, you gotta spice things up! Geez Louise! When's everybody supposed to get here anyway?"

Eddy: "GROW YOU STUPID TREE, GROW!"
 * Ed & Jonny: [continuously at the end of the episode] "Never ending party, never ending party, never ending party, never ending party…"

Trivia

 * This is the fourth time we see the inside of Jonny's House. The first time was in "Rent-a-Ed," the second time was in "Once Upon an Ed" and the third time was in Ed, Edd n Eddy's Jingle Jingle Jangle.
 * There is a poster by the gym for "Mr. Cathro's Science Class." Ken Cathro is Ed, Edd n Eddy's post-production supervisor and editor.
 * The music pieces Plank was playing at the end of the episode are entitled "Ode to Margot" & "Watson's Waltz". Margot is producer Dan Sioui's bulldog – she appeared in Ed, Edd n Eddy - The Mis-Edventures.
 * When the kids all move away in the scene where Plank was telling jokes, Plank did not move. In the next scene, however, Plank disappeared from that spot. This adds to the mystery of Plank being a living being.
 * The title is based on the phrase "'tween a rock and a hard place," which represents challenges, struggling and difficulty. Rock and a Hard Place was also an album from the band Aerosmith.
 * In the gym there is a sign that reads, "1972 Jr. Champions." 1972 was the year Erin Fitzgerald (the granddaughter of Ella Fitzgerald) was born!
 * Edd claimed that Arbor Day was in April, six months from the present time, confirming that the episode takes place in October.
 * Kevin was not fully seen in this episode. Only his legs were visible underneath the bathroom stall. However, he did speak in this episode.
 * No scams were involved in this episode.
 * This is the final episode to air in 2006.
 * 86th time Lee and Marie don't appear.
 * 85th time May is absent.
 * There were no scams in this episode.
 * This is the first time Plank is shown playing an instrument (in this case, pan pipes). Plank is shown playing an instrument again in the episode "Smile for the Ed."
 * The music that Eddy plays at the party is the same music heard in "An Ed is Born."