ladle

Maybe it's just because I'm in academia, where couples live apart while they teach at different institutions and travel extensively to do fieldwork all the time, but I don't understand all of the ruckus about the hubs not being around 50% of the time. Vicki, why don't you do you and let Meghan and Jimmy do Meghan and Jimmy? (And I don't even like Meghan. OR Jimmy!) But I guess if none of these women were judgmental biznatches we wouldn't have a show.

Eh, that struck me as a little self-conscious and playing to the camera. I thought Sonja's "How did we get here?" seemed more organic and was funnier. And I don't even like Sonja. I was surprised Heather didn't point out how sexist it was that they were talking about not raising their daughters to use the F-bomb but left their sons out of it.

God help me, whenever they do a vacation episode, I miss Jill a little. Where are the fannypacks of yesteryear...

Then she proceeded to do a talking head in which she made dramatic and grotesque gagging faces about it. I guess I should probably give her the benefit of the doubt that the editing monkeys were at work and that maybe she was reacting to something totally unrelated, like bitter coffee, but.... but I won't. Because I just don't like her. And, look, I'm not saying that she should delight in viewing Luann's cooze and go write a poem about it. Just that it's a little weird that it would be so disgusting to her. Seriously, though-- and I know we can ask this about basically anything Sonja says but... what the fuck was she even talking about? Does Sonja even have an undergraduate degree? (Not a big deal if she doesn't, but if she's going to then rant about somebody "not having the education"...). I remember from Scary Island, Bethenny saying she attended culinary school...

Everything Kristin does bothers me irrationally (when she should really just be irrelevant to me), but her reaction to Luann's naked vulva made my eyes roll alllll the way back into my head. She was acting like she had just been forced to watch a donkey show. Just what is soooo revolting about another woman's cooter? Ugh. I just don't like her, you guys. I just don't like her.

In the bucket of crazy that is Sonja, this is probably just a mere, insignificant drop, but I was confused by her comment that Bethenny, "Doesn't have the education." Did Sexy-J turn around and get a PhD while I wasn't watching?

How are Meghan and Jim's ex-wife raising the teenage daughter "together" when Meghan and Jim have only been married for four months? Vicki's right: Meghan's presumptuous. To me, she comes across as the type of person who has been indulged her whole life because of her looks and now lends too much credibility to her own thoughts and words because of it. I like neither Vicki nor Tamra, but I'll admit it brings me a smile to see them interacting happily.

Thanks for sharing. This is actually not as bad as I thought it would be, considering it's Tamra.

I missed this! What happened? Anyone care to elaborate?

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Tamra is the Real Housewives equivalent of Vee from "Orange Is the New Black" (last season). Street smart, able to get people to follow her, and willing to go way below the belt, to a place few others are willing to go, to get what she wants. Unlike most other housewives, she's really never had a"comeuppance" season (though she's working hard to convince us last season was it) and, while I want her to get it, I'm not sure she ever will. My question - and I may be stupid but - is who are all of those people behind her in her intro sequence? Ryan's step-kids? Isn't one of her daughters 18 now? Will she be on the show?

I don't even know how to explain this, you guys, but there's just something about Shannon that I *want* to like. There's some kernel of something that's endearing there. I mean, she drinks straight vodka! She makes self-deprecating lemon jokes! That's my kinda gal! But then she acts all uptight and unlikable... sigh.

Over the years, I've built up a thick layer of apathy toward all of the craziness that happens on "reality" TV. It has gotten to the point where I'll watch Toddlers and Tiaras reruns and have thoughts like, "Yep, Kaylee really needs to get an eyebrow wax if she wants to supreme." That said, parading those kids out on national TV to forgive their father for cheating on their mom was about eight different kinds of disturbing and wrong. In fact, it may be the most disturbing thing that's happened on this show since Naked Wasted. (With Tamra in the bubble bath as a distant third.)

And to get vintage for a second, Ramona was seen in one of the early seasons being *very* friendly with another woman (not a cast member) in her Hamptons pool. I remember because at the time, Avery referred to her as a "lesbo" and had that same face-scrunching reaction Ramona is having now.

I view the friction between Bethenny and some of the other ladies in terms of workplace conflict. Kristin wonders why *she* has to show up to contractually-obligated work events, while Bethenny is repeatedly excused. Heather tries to interact with Bethenny using moves from the trusty Real Housewives playbook. Play #47: Tell one HW that another HW feels she has been slighted by you in order to incite drama. Play #64: After an altercation with another cast member, pull her aside while the camera zooms in as you hash it out one on one. Not only does Bethenny not engage in these interactions, but she makes Heather out to be a dick for even trying. And Heather's all "*confused puppydog face* I don't know what to do with this. I'm just trying to do my job!" And they both suck because on the one hand, Bethenny, you're on the show, you know what it is now (and what it was, even, to an extent while you were on it the first time) so don't act like you're confused by the manufactured drama and above it all. And, Heather, you should have taken the hint the first few times this happened. Take off your bossypants (and, while you're at it, that awful animal-print vest). I mean, I love this show, but I think they're all awful. Except maybe Dorinda, who hasn't had the chance to be awful yet. And Kristin, who is too boring to be awful. The only thing remotely interesting about her is the question of why she's still on the show.

I was surprised by how much I felt for them and agreed with them on this point as well. I don't agree that this was part of the "liberal agenda," and my eyes pretty much rolled all the way in the back of my head when they started talking about the exploitation of women (Maybe one day they will realize they are part of a lifestyle that inherently exploits women and girls, their wombs, and their domestic labor. Maybe...). And I understand that pretty much every legal expert who's weighed in on this has come out and said that the report was released legally. But I don't think it was *right* that it was released. While compliance with the FOIA request may have been within the *letter* of the law, I don't think it was within the *spirit* of the law to release a document in which underage molestation victims were so easily identifiable. I think that their anger on this point is real and understandable. But, yeah...otherwise, this went pretty much as I expected. Softball question, sound bite, sound bite. Lather, rinse, repeat. Edited because my eyes rolled into the back of MY head, not THEIR head.

Throughout the years, while I've found the Duggars' belief system to be stomach-turning on a lot of different levels, one thing I've always felt about them was that they were honestly devout. True believers. And that may have been naive, because now I don't know. How do you go on TV and violate one of the commandments not once but several times by outright lying about how you found out about the abuse? How do you reconcile that with your faith? Was the police report mistaken? Have you convinced yourself that the lie is the truth? Did you stop believing, or did you never believe? Are there aspects of the Bible that are negotiable or mutable to you? I mean, I understand the concept of picking and choosing when it comes to faith. My mom's a Catholic, but she's pro-choice. I have friends who consider themselves Jewish but do not believe in God. I get all that. But doesn't that kind of selectivity go against fundamentalism, as a very concept?

Just as long as you weren't doing the former in your bikini!

Is that what she actually said?? My husband and I went back and forth over whether she said "It *must be* an agenda" or "*the lesbian* agenda." We rewound it three times and watched it with captions, and I think we decided it was "must be," not "lesbian." But, man, it did sound like she was blaming the lesbians there. Now, that's patently unfair. They stopped letting the girls play hide-and-seek. That changed EVERYTHING!

Trippy.

Why is she there? Why is she there? Why is she THERE?! Okay, thanks. Just wanted to get that off my chest.

Posters keep mentioning that the victims never received counseling, but is that true? Based on one of Alice's original comments from 2007 (which have turned out to be accurate in other respects), "The family is to report to DHS every six months and that the girls are in counciling. This is what the courts ordered." If it's true that the court mandated counseling (which-- can it even do for victims? I have no idea), then I assume it would have to be legit, accredited counseling and not "counseling" received through their "church"? Am I right? I hope I'm right.

I keep thinking, is there really no crime Jim Bob and Michelle can be charged with, here? They allowed a predator to live in the same house as their daughters and did not seem to take any precautions (other than prayer?), did not even put a lock on their daughters' door, and from what I am reading, the offenses then occurred again and again over a span of time. Does that not rise to the level of child endangerment, at the very least? Or has the statute of limitations passed for that as well?

Probably not, since everything in that statement was spelled correctly. :)

My mind keeps going back to that episode in which Ben and Jessa (and Jinger?) go to visit Josh in D.C., and Josh is weirdly competitive with Ben at the gym, and he's all "What are your intentions with my sister?" (paraphrasing) At the time I just took it as another hackneyed "big bro looking out for his younger sister" plotline, but in light of the fact that he's possibly her molester?? NAUSEATING.

I'm not ready to put that all on Bethenny. Maybe she did mention him, but he did not want to be on camera, and he didn't fit with the storyline Bravo was going for, so they edited it out? On a related point, I also think it's weird how little these women talk about their kids -- not that having kids means that they can't have other interests, and I get that they wouldn't want to exclude Carole, but I have a young child and it comes up organically in conversation all the time. Usually other people bring it up, asking how she is. Plus a few of them have young children, so you'd think it could be a point of bonding... But who knows? Maybe Bethenny and Kristin gabbed about diaper genies 'til the cows came home, but that never made it to air because that's, like, a Cindy Barshop level of dull.