Rap541

Amy is still living in the big house on the farm as of about a month ago. I don't check her Facebook that frequently since it's boring but for all the talk, she's still there. Also the property Matt goes on about building a new house on away from the farm was sold. With no house on it.

Something interesting came up on the LPBW reddit that I thought I'd share here. Apparently Jer and Auj hit the NY Times Best Seller list due to "bulk orders". It's apparently a practice among conservative Christians to get their books known. https://electricliterature.com/are-conservative-titles-using-shady-tricks-to-get-onto-the-bestseller-list/ The point? If there's a little dagger on the listing in the NY Times, then the NY Times thinks your sales were due to bulk orders and notes it with the dagger. And look who has that dagger on their listing during their one week on the list? https://imgur.com/a/LteJsqb My own book is currently out on Amazon and I am rather proud of my meager sales because they're *my* meager sales.

So, I disagree in that there's a point where I tire of the handwringing over what an awful mother Bethenny is - in the comments just before this one, Bethenny is being compared to Joan Crawford who was accused of fairly severe physical abuse by her daughter and the wish is expressed that Bryn get to spend more time with Jason and his family to save her. So Jason thinks it's in Bryn's best interest to be around someone like Joan Crawford? And is a great dad for wanting his daughter to share time with a woman that everyone else thinks is damaging her and who express their wish that Bethenny be restricted from seeing the child? Bethenny is theoretically recreating her own childhood with Bernedette and Jason is a great dad and thinks it's in Bryn's best interest to be around that and shouldn't seek custody... even though there's constant moaning and handwringing over how Bryn is in danger and needs to be kept by the Hoppys? There's this constant theme of how Bryn is being damaged by her time with Bethenny but Jason is a great dad doing the right thing by making sure Bryn gets that time in to be damaged. Sorry, I'm not understanding how Jason is a great dad for making sure his daughter has a relationship with someone deemed a nightmare and probably abusive - that's what the Mommy Dearest comparisons are about, that's implying Bethenny is an abusive mom. If we're going to go that far, then how is Jason a great dad for encouraging the relationship and not pursuing a plan to rescue his kid? If Bryn needs saving from Bethenny, there's only one person who can do it - Jason. And he's not pursuing any change in custody. If the situation is really so dire for Bryn, how is Jason being a great dad for doing nothing?

I don't entirely disagree in that I can usually tell but again - they weren't being inhospitable by directing Chris to where the caffeine coffee was, and it's not unreasonable in a house of elderly and infirm people for weird things to be said. My personal story? So my dad died and we were having the wake with the neighbors and my brother was making alcoholic drinks and he turns to me and says "Hey are you on <insert diabetic medication> because I can make this without all the fruit juice " and yeah, FYI younglings, things will change when you get older. To where sending people down the stairs for real coffee will happen.

Or maybe Matt is more considerate because he's getting older and realizing he's probably not going to catch anyone else? I mean, he's not that appealing....

So Amy is about 58 or so. Which means when she was a six year old, she would have been walking home from school in a nice, white, middle to upper class neighborhood in Detroit in 1966-1968 (not sure her age exactly) Trust me when I say that kids walked alone to school at this age in the 1960s. The "YOU WILL BE ABDUCTED" stuff didn't start until the early 1980s (Adam Walsh, Etan Patz) and it was pretty normal for kids to walk to school without adult escort.

I was a latch key kid at six so... I don't disagree with you but times really were different. Etan Patz would be my age and Amy is a good twelve years older. Kids were expected to handle things like bullying. Amy's parents clearly went with the "we're not treating her differently than the other kids" school of thought, thinking it would make her differences pronounced if they were handholding her while they let the other kids roam free. I would say - and I concede this may be an unpopular opinion - that we've gone way off the deep end in refusing to allow children any sort of responsibility in their childhoods. They can't be trusted to walk to school alone, they can't be at the house alone. They can't be trusted to watch a younger sibling. They can't play outdoors unless under the watchful eye of a parent. And then they turn 18 and they're suddenly expected to function and look, a lot of them aren't.... I also dont believe reality backs up the assertion that many children are ab ducted and murdered these days

No, she looks like someone who is trying to create a look that others will emulate. She's trying way too hard.

And Matt has some awareness of that because now Matt's official story is that production has been egging this on, he's never REALLY had any anger towards Amy, and he and Amy get along really well at all the events they attend together so this is all a production based lie. And you know, production is making him follow a storyline that isn't true. Personally I found the whole "Matt on the farm" scene rather telling. Matt loves the farm *when the family isn't there*. He even said so. I trust this means its now holy writ - Matt is on record preferring the farm when the family is not there. This is the concern Zach was referring to in a prior episode - that if Matt controlled the farm, then Matt would control the family's access to the farm and would not be as accommodating as Amy is. Do note - Matt's entire point in that whole scene of his wandering about the farm, reveling in his love for it, was that the farm was his and how sad he is that he is forced to consider Amy's plans when he really just wants his way. And yes, his bitching about Amy changing his mind makes me want to show him the actual episodes where he complained that he wanted the big house and wanted to switch with Amy. Different times, different parenting. I'm about 12 years younger than Amy and I waited for the school bus alone, wearing an orange vest during hunting season so I wouldn't be shot. It amazes me how I was a latchkey kid and how that's now child abuse.

You don't have elderly relatives, 😉 It's their house and they probably drink decaf for health reasons and don't want regular coffee accidently turning up in their cups because if you're old and you take medications, you try to be careful about stuff like caffeine interacting and you really can't tell the difference between decaf and regular by taste. At the same time, they want to be hospitable to guests but don't want that risk so.... regular coffee is brewed downstairs (likely where they don't go easily as elderly people) and younger people don't have trouble with the stairs and there's no worry of contaminating the decaf but everyone who wants it still has coffee.

Probably mean kids at school. I think the haze of adulthood makes us forget how what seemed like childish fun was probably pretty mean to the person on the receiving end. I don't think Amy was referring to someone picking her up for a hug that was too exuberant but actually being picked up against her will. And even that exuberant hug can be threatening when you are too small to put a stop to it.

Ironically we have a local charity drive that does commercials where people who participate a lot in the Health and Wealth raffle (100 dollars a ticket, tons of prizes, but like all raffles, more losers than winners) are interviewed by someone who asks them what they won (its always nothing) and the interviewed person is usually all "I'm just glad I could help" and then the interviewer reveals that they were a patient at the local hospital that gets the fundage from the raffle and they *didn't die* from their brain cancer because good people like the interviewee kept giving. There's several sweet, schmaltzy variations of this and it's way similar to this scene and it really is effective. My bitch about realism? That bitch hanging up on people essentially leaving them to die didn't get prison time? Well, fuck then, we all know Bobby will probably get a parade for killing all those people...

Agreed. To begin with, I find Jessie a pretty unsympathetic character in that she's *barely* in recovery and the vast majority of her health issues came about from the bad choices she made while addicted. Also, if we're just going to torture Nic, then the dad is the better option to live. A) She wanted to save her sister and now she's caretaking her disliked father and b) Disliked father will likely go south healthwise and she can be made to feel guilty about being the one who guilted him into the surgery that ultimately killed him. I also think it's the sis because of the compromised heart - I think they actually made the point that she would need a heart transplant as well. Also - who is paying for all this?

I also had the impression that the injuries were such that getting her intubated, while technically required, was a meaningless gesture. Like the guy in the motorcycle accident last season, who was alive but....nothing was actually going to save him.

I consider it to be holding him up as an example when the "Jason wants his child to know her mother and knows thats very important" when that's cited as the reason why he's not to be chided as a jerk for letting his daughter continue to be raised by Bethenny and not pursuing greater direct custody himself. If she's so awful as a parent that people are constantly complaining, why isn't Bryn's father ever taken to task for happily dropping Bryn off every other week into the nightmare world of Bethenny Frankel? How can he be called a good father when he's perfectly fine with the monster Bethenny raising his child? I mean, his excuse? Bryn is thriving.

I just don't understand the logic that Jason is doing the best thing for Bryn by not pursuing custody because a toxic awful mother who dates drug users and has a revolving door on the bedroom is better than no mother and Jason is absolutely making the right choice in insisting that Bryn spend time with her mother without supervision. The litany of what an awful mom Bethenny is comes up again and again. I definitely get the impression if Jason did pursue more custody, there are many fans who would applaud him. But Jason - knowing all the toxic things about Bethenny - has never pursued rescuing his daughter from her every other week of nightmarish torture and danger and in fact in court says Bryn is thriving under the current set up. If she's so toxic she shouldn't be a parent, why is Jason still held up for not seeking custody?

Well, her place certainly looked unsanitary enough to cause staph infections. I think I caught one watching the boil scene.

I feel like Valerie's grandma being presented to us in a completely separate from all other plots bunch of scenes is the gun being hung on the wall. Something important is going on - was I the only one who noticed that there was a LOT of cash in Granny's hidey hole? Maybe I have just watched too much Breaking Bad but I always question piles of cash with no apparent source of income.

I'm gonna be the cold pragmatist on this one. May was always meant to be adopted by the couple in question but one parent took seriously ill. They didn't have second thoughts about having a child - I believe it was tuberculous which would have necessitated the sick person not be around the child so it wasn't as though they were just hemming and hawing. This couple wanted to have May in their home, bonding with them for months. The Turners were never given the impression that May was up for grabs. May is in the enviable position of being wanted by two different families who both clearly want a child to love. I think the social service lady was being cold because she was trying to be firm - the adoptive family had done nothing wrong and the Turners were never made any promises, May was always a foster child to the Turners. I assume she will go to her new family and it's a lovely home. Until next season when we find out the adoptive parents were abusive monsters! Now, Lucille is way too much of an endearingly sweet perfect virgin for me to like, and I found her having the vapors over Cyril's supposed lie a wee bit much, but honestly, does anyone ever hold Sister Monica Joan accountable for her shit?

Actually, I have been asking for some time why Jason *isn't* attempting to change custody in his favor, considering all these awful allegations. But the reality here is that Bethenny wants more custody while Jason wants to keep things *exactly as they are because Bryn is thriving*. Despite all these terrible things Bethenny is doing, Jason's response has always been to maintain the status quo of 50 percent of Bryn's time being spent with the nightmare horror show that is Bethenny Frankel.

Bingo! Although I will qualify this with how Matt would *never* actually say "It's my house now, so Amy is no longer allowed on the property and is not welcome at any family events, is that understood?" to anyone. Matt's way too conscious of public opinion to actually be a man and make a clear statement. What Matt would do is *publically* tell people that of course Amy is still welcome at pumpkin farm events and he *loves* having her show up - and then make sure to not tell her when events are occurring and also make sure that if she does show up, that he makes it very very clear that he's really not happy, and thats all her fault, and she's ruining his good time and more importantly, the kids good time. Since Amy actually cares about the kids having a good time, she will stay away despite Matt's public protests on how welcome she is. No doubt he will also publically ponder why Amy is being so difficult when he is so wonderfully open to having her around. I think he would throw some parties and events to make the point that he rules the roost, but I think that would end as soon as Amy stopped engaging him. Matt sees the house as the prize that attracts the kids. What I suspect is that while yes, that's in play, it's also Amy's willingness to be a hostess that is part of it. She seems to enjoy having the family and friends over. With Matt, if it's not his idea to have the party, he's not happy.

The issue is mostly made up at this point but here's what normally happens. The property of a couple that divorces is either sold or ceded to one of the partners while the other partner is compensated. In a marriage with children, the home usually goes to the custodial parent. In a situation where the children are grown, the home is usually sold and the money split. In this case, both Amy and Matt have a business that pretty much demands that they continue to live on the property - and I don't mean the pumpkin business. I'm talking about the reality show that uses the farm as its main set. Whatever decision has been made - and there's probably a decision - the farm will not be sold and Matt and Amy will both continue to live there until TLC pulls the plug on the show.

Conversely, Matt doesn't want to live in the big house (and has now openly said so) but hates the thought of Amy living there even more to where he willingly stays in a house he has previously declared causes him constant pain, despite owning a perfectly comfortable and properly scaled to his size home in Arizona. I never want to hear Matt whine about his agony from living in the double wide again. He'd rather live in pain as long as he can spite Amy.

I hate to be all "its a tv show" but... You know that they probably did have pizza or something and it just wasn't interesting enough to be filmed, right? I mean honestly, everything about this moving episode screams "this was staged for the cameras". Zach asking Chris, nothing being packed, no one griping or complaining about the complete lack of organization... and no one really moving with any purpose on screen yet somehow that house got moved. A guess? This probably wasn't the real move. They filmed the uhaul being loaded with a few boxes, and some things got shifted from the old house to the new on camera. I strongly suspect someone in production has been trading notes with production of The Little Couple in how to best display an otherwise boring couple and the formula there is to make otherwise reasonably competant people look like clueless morons. Not helped that Zach really is rather clueless.

If she's testing positive for alcohol, all I can say is that if she was black and poor, she'd already be in jail for violating her plea deal. I don't want to hear this bitch whine and moan how she needs x,y, and z because she's getting triggered by stuffed fish - she's drinking at her cabaret shows. She has been given a chance that she didn't really deserve to avoid jail. She isn't abiding by the terms of her plea deal and she hasn't been. She's been given MANY chances, chances that a lot of people don't get. Luann needs to stop playing the "I'm a sorta cute not really alcoholic but if I don't have everything just so, I will drink so its all on you" game and get her shit together.