methadonna

So, I keep reading that people's reaction after seeing this episode was, "There's an Aurora?" Not me. I started reading the thread and, after enough references, thought, "There's an Aurora?" I STILL don't recall one being on this cast. I recently discovered there was a Disney princess named Aurora and had that reaction; I still haven't figured out who she is or what she's from. Shit, next you're gonna tell me there's a Roman goddess named Aurora. Or the geomagnetic disturbance of something in the polar something making pretty lights in nature something called Aurora [Something]. Either I'm not paying enough attention or I'm being totally punked. Speaking of (maybe not paying enough attn, maybe getting played): I apologize if someone brought this up and I missed it, but I keep seeing people commenting on how the EoI peeps are on the jury. I'm probably wrong because trying to apply logic, rhyme, or reason to how any of this will play out is as useful as trying to apply strategy to a game that you think is 3-D Chess while Jeff keeps adding elements if Candyland, BUT: I never thought the current EoI members were there to serve as traditional/permanent jury members. Given that any of them still can re-enter the game, I thought they were there more of observers: pre-merge, the tribe(s) that don't go to council aren't privy to what occurs at it, so it was equitable that the EoI members weren't, either. (Plus, their existence was a secret, natch, but, especially given Jeff's highlighting to those still actively playing that the EoI members had had it just as tough--which is true on some levels, wrt "surviving," though arguable wrt mental toll, although I'm not sure at least the initial stage of EoI was necessarily easier, it was definitely different--I'm sure he'd argue their missing the ongoings at Tribal was simply an equalizer to not being on the losing tribe). Now that they've merged, everyone actively playing is present for the discourse--true or bullshit-- that occurs. As one of the EoI residents may still return to the game, they've missed all of the actions and dynamics between tribals, but this gives them an equal awareness of tribals, at least. And, probably more importantly, as whoever returns is still likely to ultimately get [re]voted out and end up on the "real" jury (which I'm forgetting when, post-merge, usually starts, but anyone who gets back in now and then out again would be on it) are on similar footing, information-wise, as any jury member who (in a less dumb season) spends their days at Ponderosa and just gets boated in to watch the tribals from after the merge until the FTC. I'm actually now considering that *I'm* the one who read this wrong, and those three really will stay on the jury (assuming, and I am, they don't get back in the game) ... and, I'm not sure I mind it. If the other two hadn't dropped, maybe I'd feel differently, but it's only an extra three* at this point, and they certainly are more actively in the game than if they were spending the rest of their time chilling at Ponderosa: perhaps someone else voted out after this will elect not to to EoI it, and they WON'T be on the jury. It's not that I'm suddenly digging EoI, but, as it's there, it doesn't seem wrong to me that getting to be on the jury could serve as the basic reward for a Reem who, despite being voted out first, IS (presumably, if she doesn't raise the sail) engaging for all 39 days, in some ways, a greater challenge than actively playing and getting voted out as the first juror in seasons past. And, yes, I realize I just essentially argued one side and then flipped and went with the other, but that was my literal thought process: I hadn't even considered that they were really the jury and was surprised everyone else seemed to, but as I wrote out why, I considered that maybe they WERE, AND, to my surprise, within the context if the EoI rules, I wasn't opposed. *OT, but the editing/storytelling of the other two's leaving EoI was SO terrible: I eventually remembered that hoisting the sail meant surrender, but I hadn't initially, and, aesthetically and symbolically, it was much closer to a new/merge tribe creating and raising their flag that, coupled with the initial visuals of the two joyfully raising it while the three staying stood, crying ambiguously in the background, suggested a celebratory moment of "We're still in this game, and we're here together," and it was only when I caught the actual emotion in Aubrey's tearful face that I remembered the whole flag deal and realized the two were out. Bad editing, bad story-telling, but bad choice of symbols to begin with. Maybe I'm just dumb, but a raised tattered, dirty white, nameless sail makes far more sense to me as the EoI parallel of the raised Tribal flag--solid, colored, named--than the signal to leave.

From your title, I totally thought you wanted a show where two strangers are required to start having sex at first meeting and regularly for eight weeks, and then decide if they should continue doing each other or get back on Tinder. Then I finished reading and realized you wanted a monogamous version of The Bachelor, and I felt like a dirty old lady 🙂

Thanks, @aphroditewitch, for the info on the pre-nup: I didn't know if that was something that required the presence of both members together for signing for it to be legal, so I was just trying to think of mitigating factors as to why choosing to file for divorce even a week after DECISION DAY rather than while still part of production would make sense (if it's not 100% obvious that that's the best choice). Not that I wouldn't prefer the transparency if that's the intent--I don't want people who know it's a sure thing to pretend they're staying together because...reasons): I just don't get why a couple like Kristine and (uhhhh whatever her guy's name is)*, who maybe aren't certain but have at least the potential to create a real marriage, would even question staying together THEN and seeing how things go when the cameras--which seem to be universally seen as adding another layer of stress and exhaustion to an already surreal situation--go away. I guess I was unclear in my mentioning annulment: I wasn't questioning why it wasn't an option, just noting that the "annulment won't be an option; they will have to divorce" would be the tipping point for alcohol poisoning if part of the MAFS drinking game, yet the reasons (besides Good TV) for its mattering whether they chose to get divorced at D-Day vs a month later were never (to my recollection) mentioned, leading to my uninformed spitballing that perhaps choosing it while still part of the show might simplify the process. I wasn't questioning whether or why annulment wasn't an option: rather, I was mocking how overtly clear they've made that, while overwhelmingly being oblique about the production-pushed "final" choice. Sorry that I didn't make that clear, and sorry if this isn't any better *I actually think the Kristine uncertainty is all editing or production-driven: I don't know that they'll last long-term, but I'll be shocked if there's any uncertainty besides produced suspense in their choosing to stay married on D-Day. AJ and Stephanie are probably a better example, where I am doubtful that they will still be married a year from now but (unless AJ is even more off-putting off-screen), I can't see why Steph wouldn't want to try even a few weeks after the cameras are gone to see if he acts better or worse, as I, at least, can't figure out how much of his OTT behavior in either direction is really who he is (in which case, RUN!), or if Super Hyper Happy Annoying AJ is more a manifestation of overcompensating for his anxiety about both the unknowns/weirdness of the situation (especially at the beginning)--I think nearly all of us have seen someone we know suddenly acting overly effusive to the point of second-hand embarrassment (or even finding ourselves doing it and simultaneously being aware of it yet feeling unable to act "normal") to compensate for their discomfiture with the situation, as opposed to shutting down (less awkward and painful to watch but sometimes--like in a very social situation, where you need to try to connect with people: bad enough in a party with strangers, let alone strangers who are now your wife and everyone who is her "side"--seemingly more detrimental than trying to be too friendly <-- maybe not and I'm just projecting my extremely introverted self here? I think AJ is an extreme example of this, but his annoying faux life o' the party persona seems greatly amplified in each situation that requires adjusting to a new and usually large group of people (except when he goes the opposite way...), and he usually seems to calm down over the course of it, and, similarly, if his extreme swing freakouts are the flip side of this, which COULD lessen when the stress of filming and goes away... I mean, I don't know if I could have stood seven weeks with the dude, but 1) I'd actually be put off more by Shiny Happy People AJ, which Stephanie either isn't or has done a great job pretending she isn't, and, 2) if Stephanie really does like him even in those times as much as she presents, plus she's certainly seen there IS a more normal, modulated version of him that she enjoys, I don't think she's wrong for being concerned about his other extreme of reaction to stress--I think it shows that she's one of the most sensible and healthy people ever on this show, and maybe she'll be able to get through to Kate--she seems to like enough about him that I'd think it would be worth seeing if his behavior stabilizes more once they're out of that fishbowl. She seems to have a good enough head on her shoulders that I don't think she'd have an issue walking away if it doesn't, and his more negative reactions don't seem harmful to her to where, even though he ain't my cup of tea, I don't think another few weeks of him, even if he continues as he has, would be detrimental to her (unlike every extra minute Luke spends with her seems to diminish Kate even more). Sorry, I know that was crazy long-winded, but that's really what I had in mind with "Why wouldn't a couple (who doesn't hate each other or are toxic and unhealthy) at least see if post-camera life changes things for the better or clarifies that, yeah, buh-bye?" I know this is all for the show, and that's the Occam's Razor answer, but if The Experts/production would get over the idea that the audience wants to see the happily ever after ending, despite the fact that everyone knows 90% of the "yes"es become "no"s within a year, the best solution I can think of that still gives them their desired "Do you want to stay married?" [new expert] "Orrrrr, do you Want To Get A Divorce?" "resolution" episode would be for them to have a few weeks after filming ends to stay together (if they want; for the hopeless, they could escape immediately and it wouldn't matter to the viewers) and THEN come back and have their damn D-Day filming: it obviously wouldn't be any more a forever decision than it is now, but it would give a more realistic conclusion than having people who DO want to at least give it a go post-documentation and then determine it's a no go say yes at D-Day only to announce at the reunion or tabloids they're out. #Savekate

Unless deciding to divorce at D-Day (vs a week or four months later) has financial and/or practical benefits for the participants (like the production provides the lawyers or other help navigating the process, and covers it financially, or that it's most likely a simpler process as, at this point, they don't really have shared assets and it is a simpler process than once the couple moves out of their provided housing and truly has to integrate what they brought to the marriage, which--not a lawyer--but I think inherently complicates things in most states: interesting that, for all the talk of "no anulment," there's never been a mention of a prenuptial, or--if that's not possible legally since they can't meet and agree to it--a postnuptial agreement), I don't GET the point of D-Day. Unless you're in a situation like Kate and Luke's (where it's not even a question that there is NO reason to spend another day together, which, sadly, I'm not sure Kate is in a place to see yet), why the hell WOULDN'T you decide to stay together if you at least tolerate each other, even still seeing it as a trial run, but to give it a few weeks to see if things differ once the artificiality and apparently extreme stress of "the documentation process" is gone? They might be accurate in the (say it with me) "Annulment isn't an option; they will have to get a divorce" mantra, but it's not like they're choosing between "decide to divorce today" and "decide you will stay married forever; you can never ever separate if you don't do it now." I realize there needs to be a climax and resolution to the series, but it's just so patently absurd to pretend it actually matters if they claim divorce that day or the next. Unless, again, contrary to the speculation that there's financial incentive to say yes, not choosing divorce That Sole Day makes a likely divorce in even the near future seem more risky and difficult to navigate. That said, if Kate doesn't flee on D-Day, the moment her contractual obligations end, I am truly worried for her. I know a lot of people have lost patience with her, and I get it--it's hard to watch someone in an unhealthy situation they can change by leaving but don't--but everything we know about abused partners makes it completely understandable to me, and I fear it's going to take her a long time and several aborted attempts to leave. Seeing just the physical difference in her affect and appearance in general from the wedding day to less than two months later is striking and heartbreaking. She herself has said he's "broken" her, and while I think you can often see that impact, physically, when someone has spent a long time in an unhealthy relationship, seeing that manifest to such an extreme in a mere seven weeks is horrifying, and adding in the consideration that Like has made it quite clear that he wants them to maintain a happy facade while filming, and she appears to care enough about her appearance (not negatively) that I have to believe she IS presenting herself more positively than she might feel up to were she not on camera (like, take-to-her-bed, don't shower or do her hair and make-up level of depression), I think that the shift in her disposition at what is probably the BEST she can make herself appear, is heartbreaking and alarming. I really hope (but completely lack faith) that at least one of those "experts" will actually follow their ethical requirements as professionals (and simply human beings, supposedly) and try to get her whatever help she needs to see that the failure would be saving her marriage in exchange for losing herself, rather than pushing for a bullshit happy ending for what they think makes better TV and likely entrenches her further in this rabbit hole.

I can’t decide who’s dumber, the realtor for painting a far more disturbing scenario than the not-good-but-not-like-her-description, on a piece of land she’s trying to sell to this family, who need five spouses to remember two things, or Christine, who not only couldn’t parse the reality of there are rodents that may carry plague, but didn’t quite seem to know what the plague was, with her “they carry some kind of plague or something.” I don’t think that was speech with a lot of filler, that was “These confusing animal with some sciencey thing and i don’t know what it is, but, i guess it’s some evil science-i’d-hard thing that the prairie dogs gave to the dirt, and now if the prince or princess or even one of my kids that only has to get through three years of living in this infested kickball field, THE ANGELS SING HERE. Now it it makes sense: they’re plagued-infested angels. Because i think that land looked like a busted out spot deep in the woods that transients would create tent cities on ‘cause it’s clear and flat and no one would be interested in seeing it. Cottonwood seems far less realistic to build on, but at least the land is pretty. I don’t know shit about real estate, but i’m embarrassed for this realtor, who probably dealt with these fuckwits for free in exchange for the advertising, but if i needed an agent in Flagstaff and literally had to choose solely from a random listing of local names, I would pick anyone with a name that wasn’t her to avoid her. She seems THAT BAD. I mean, if she got one family to buy the same amount as what would have been four separate clients, AND land she just told them has the plague, even though they don’t know if that’s.... quite how it works, but now it ‘s how they do. about the land. they’re choosing. And singing angels or someshit., then I guess she must be brilliant. But it must be a water-rising-to-its-own-infested-water thing, so idiot realtor is perfect for idiot Browns, but she seems like she couldn’t be more off-putting for any potential clients watching. (I am also stunned by Tony’s ... everything, even though that bar didn’t seem high enough for him to be under. But what kind of moron who’s NOT moving there, BOT EVEN an adult kid of the parents moving there, REALLY needs to give his highly negative opinion that goes against the majority who at least were ok+ with it? There’s a difference between saying, “Bot the my opinion counts, but, for the record, i think this place is gorgeous and I think it’ll be such a great fit for you guys and thinking you’re on the anti- side of middle school debate class? (Nevermind they don’t care how their own teens who will be taken from their established-against-all-odds HS lives to spend 2-3 years there (one on the property if they’re lucky)... why do they care if some schlub their adult-out-of-the-home-and-area child married thinks? Are they gonna ask people wherever Robin is getting Kody his arsenic-laced food what they think? Hell, they’d actually be more relevant than Tony, as they know the area and could be their neighbors. SHUT UP TONY. Shut up, you phony. Shut up realtor, you dummy of the year. Shut up Robin, and Kody, and seven car drives; shut up First, Second, and Third not-legal wives. Shut up, bs plot line we’ve always known now would be here Shut up, Plague Angels who sing in my ear.

Dying. I’m behind and just started reading this while I started watching (listening to) the episode. And as I read “Hey, wonderful man,” I heard it. After realizing I was not suffering from Synesthesister Wife, I realized I was reading dialogue AS it was playing. It was kinda freaky. (But if I wanted to be on Seeking Sister Wife, I could be sure God was speaking to me directly to tell me that I should be Living Plural Marriage).

Aww, thanks, @parrotfeathers and @Gam2! I know I tend to go way too tl;dr, so I delete most of the posts I write, because I’m afraid they’re ... too much. It may be pathetic to admit—and I’m being totally earnest here and not thirst-trapping (did I use that right? Again, Old... ;-) <—— Like dat. I am physically incapable of using emojis*, and truth in advertising limits my use of LOL to when I literally am, but take me back to 1993 and I’m cool with a well-placed emoticon—but that made my day. (So much, apparently, that it took another two to get around to remembering to finish posting). But, legit. *Not true: I am now capable of using them, after my 69-year-old mother showed me they were right there on the keyboard. Last month. I couldn’t figure out how someone thinks that my being able to forward a message makes me like some giant of industry had figured out how to search, download and embed images of a million yellow smiley faces and a pile of poop, when she can’t understand that Safari and Firefox can bring you to the same place; I’m not sure if I’m more or less impressed by the reality, but I’d prefer she wiped the knowledge from her brain (and its abilities from shitting all over her texts) and used that place to store the memory that Google isn’t a separate program she needs to close Firefox to open because “that’s where [her] email is.” Sigh. Also, I humbly apologize for not using his proper honorarium before and just calling him Mike instead of Coach Mike. I got confused because I thought I was watching an infomercial talk show, not playing football. But I guess if Phil can call himself Doctor Phil, Mike can call himself Coach Mike. Btw, from now on, I shall only be addressed as HRH Queen Methadonna. Maybe Coach Mike offers life-coaching in being concise? I know I’d probably have to pay for all the LC I - LC XII first, but eventually I’d Go Clear and Concise and then I could walk through walls and write something short enough to tweet and be on Dr. Phil (As Her Royal Queen Methadonna, natch, ‘cause ... I say so, but only in one of the episodes where everyone gets bad wigs and facial hair to fake identities to go along with the fake story. But I’ll be coached to stay in my chair) and all sorts of sobperpowers. Also, watching the show today two days ago (besides learning that making someone with severe anxiety don a blindfold in a room filled with strangers is therapeutic ... even if just watching it made me so anxious I fell off the bed and developed a fully-breathed stutter ‘cause that’s what I thought it sounds like when someone gasping for air tries to talk. Which I couldn’t even cure ‘cause I don’t know what else has tryptophan besides turkey and I don’t eat meat. Hopefully caramel Frappuccinos are chock full of it, though. I did learn from Phil that anxiety comes from the inverse of what causes depression. Which made total sense for how often they’re diagnosed together. At least I could rely on my rule that Phil is chock full of [insert proper emoji here]), I noticed that I had gotten the pocast title That Mysonjay Came Up With wrong: the brackets surround “blanks”, not “Phil.” Still dumber than fuck and Robin, but it opens up another realm of possibilities if I take it literally and assume those brackets are denoting that another word or phrase has been replaced by “blanks...”. Phil in the Skin Poistion Lab, Phil in the Doghouse, Phil in the Gutter, Phil in the Can Making an Emoji, Phil in the Beverlyhillbillies McMansion Christmas Wonderland that Robin Made ALL BY HERSELF When She Wasn’t Testifying on Capitol Hill** That Abuse of Women is Bad or Being An Advocate for The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Foster System To Which Her Husband Is Maybe a Mandated Reporter ... [you get the point. Vaguely Applicable Punctuation and Italicized Emphasis]. **Does anyone else picture this oft-reported claim literally, with Robs standing outside on the publicly accessible green part—Anthony there to Have Her Back, like, actually psupporting it so the greater weight of her head doesn’t make her fall over like some guy who romances women on mywifebedead.com and The People of Walmart’s Huntin Socks Aisle—ranting (in that Keepin’ Sweetly Ranting kinda way) at interns just tryin’ to get to their Congressional Rep’s office or wherever the ones who aren’t being sexually exploited go to do actual policy or coffee-schlepping work and not sex work, like the Operation Rescue or Independent Church of Me crazies would on my college campus, trying to get anyone to listen to how When West Virginia Smiled is a logical name for an organization to create awareness of the needs of battered women or look at her graphic ‘shopped posters of the atrocities seen in Agatha Hannigan’s Home for Girls and other accurate representations of foster care? Just me? Fine: phil in the blanks of your imagination, bitches. And then decorate it with top-shelf Christmas tinsel and plump it up with OMG Is That Beautifully Pre-Wrapped Botox for Me?

No go if no one to move wit? Check Surgery on hold if no progress? ________

Well, look at that. It was. Keep dropping those 600-LB anvils, show.

He went home and started exercising?! At a gym, not by walker by to the stoop? AND was only negative insofar as being anxious about being anxious, not because They’re All Gonna Laugh At Me?! Is this Ny 600 LB Bizzaroworld? But all the focus on “you need to move to Houston and don’t forget you need someone to move with you” makes me think there’s gonna be a...big...problem.

I think something has gone very wrong when I look at this guy and think,”He doesn’t look so bad...” Also, how do some of these people stay on their stomachs and prop themselves up on their arms? Granted, it’s mostly disability-related, but even if I didn’t have a jacked up neck, shoulders,everything, I dont think I could do that for more than a minute—I spend most of my time in bed, too, (albeit only in about a fifth of it: if I am overhanging the edge, it’s because my cat thinks she gets the other 80%, not because I am surpassing the bed in a body::bed surface area race), but I’ve never once thought to prop myself up prone to eat or bead bracelets—and I’m about 100 lbs. Maybe it’s the lack of counterweight (a ridiculous percentage of that weight is in my...chest). Maybe a matching set of butt-wings would provide the anchor to make such a position possible. Maybe nother 500 lbs could open up a whole new range of possibilities

Iirc, Mike first showed up (on Dr. Phil) in an episode where they were celebrating and discussing Demi Lovato’s seven (?) years of sobriety. This was obviously a while ago! Mike had allegedly played a large role in Demi’s getting sober, and she now (then) co-owned CAST center(s?) with him. They spent some time focusing on Demi “working” at CAST, which seemed to mean giving a rare concert and chat. I forget what CAST stands for, but it *wasnt* directly related to show biz as I’d thought, even though everyone there seemed to be an aspiring mactor type and I was sure that’s whom he was targeting, which made the acronym seem really disingenuous to me. Add in that his famous rich former protege pupil was now his co-owner, and the whole thing just seemed hella shady to me. It made me think of how Scientology uses auditions for their promo reels to suck in new members by taking the just-got-to-LA-yesterday-for-pilot-season types and love-bombing them with the combo of dangling the “first big break” and allure of the connections they’ll make by joining them. (Note, none of this was even remotely confirmed as being the case for CAST; it was just my gut response to it). I don’t remember seeing Mike again since that episode... cut to Demi’s falling off the wagon and Mike thus obviously losing his great success story (I haven’t checked on what happened to their collaboration, business-wise, as a result, but he obviously lost the face of the brand that he was using to gain star-power credibility). At the time of their appearance, I just felt like he was exploiting her and was going to use her coattails to ride to greater success. Now, within months of his losing that cred and ambassador, he’s suddenly showing up on Dr. Phil more often than Phil was on Oprah. I can’t figure out exactly what the deal here is, but something seems hella fishy. I don’t know where in this timeline Mysonjay decided to punish publish Mike’s book (a total typo, but it was too fitting to deny others the opportunity to appreciate my brilliant stupidity), but if it was after that initial appearance but before Demi lost her poster-child for You Can Turn Shit Around And Maintain It status, maybe they were counting on using that connection and appearance to pimp out the book, and, once that was gone, Phil and Pham thought they not only had lost that insta-cred but that now it was a liability. Cue: remake Mike into a recognized figure in his own right by shoving him down our throats with no mention of his original appearance with Demi (it seemed like they didn’t even mention CAST for his first few appearances, and I’ve only noticed it the one time (I think with a talentless guy who wanted to be a rock star, adding to my theory that Mike preys upon wanna-be stars. But I could have made that up; there’s a finite number of variations to create an episode these days), hope everyone forgot he was That Guy Who Got Demi Lovato Sober And Together (for awhile), and construct Mike into a recognized expert in his own right, and then sell his book with the baggage erased and history rewritten. Or maybe it’s an Illuminati thing; that’s just my first thought. Or maybe The Bible Locator of IHaveSevenKids just ran out of misogynistic platitudes and Phil needed some fresh meat (Dr. Plastic Brain is proving to be his (and Robbin’s) own best/worst counter-proof, seemingly aging at Progeria-esque levels; dude ain’t gonna be around forever). To be fair, I DID think Mike did a great job with that My Beautiful Daughter Is A Hideous Terror type that I think was his first [re]appearance on the show, but now he’s been relegated to airtime filler like the other co-host-helpers that Phil cycles through semi-annually because he’s too tired to ... phil* in the 25 minutes he has before Robbin’ can come on to be a Natural Skincare Expert/Battered Women Advocate/Someone Who Does a Lot of Work With The Foster Care System. Plus, I may question his sincerity with his wannabe-Hollywood status, but, afaik, Mike’s never been on an episode of Real Housewives, which automatically grants him more authority than Eleventy-Board-Certified Doctor Charles Sophy Of The Largest CPS Org In The Country (ya know, that system that Highly Involved With Phil and Robbin’ are always shading in their contradictory humblebrags). While I’m at it: the sole bit of respect I had for them was rooted in their seeming to use their platform and riches to make a concrete difference in some important causes. And, while I don’t think the extremely rich are obligated to live like paupers to be effective philanthropists, and I really can’t begrudge people who seemed to grow up with so little and then develop such great wealth wanting to live well, even unnecessarily extravagantly, I will never be able to reconcile that earnest plea to (lower-income) viewers to donate to the There’s No Free Breakfast/Lunch Program When School’s Out organization with that repulsive display of (temporary and disposable) Christmas Decor Excess That Robbin’ Did All By Herself. Bitch,live well, but don’t be telling me how little it takes [from my very fixed incone] to feed a hungry child, when you could have still had a luxe and stunning but not repulsively excessive Christmas decor AND funded all them meals yourself with what you spent on the rest of your holiday vomit. I never celebrated Christmas, so the notion of spending more than the cost of a box of Chanukah candles, let alone putting in the time to do it (and undo it) to “celebrate” the holidays is a pretty foreign thing to me and I admittedly just can’t relate to prioritizing it, but I can appreciate the beauty of an elegant Christmas display, but don’t show me such a disgustingly over the top set-up and then tell me how easily I can help financially support my fellow Poors. Surely there’s a better balance they can find between enjoying the luxury of their enormous wealth and encouraging your viewers to joining you in supporting a good cause. And it starts with a combination of scaling back that shit about 90%, leaving you with a stlll-extravagant display, and not making more money off your viewers by spending a sizeable portion of an episode airing a segment with not even a purported reason but to demonstrate your privilege. Save for repeating such a showing but done in an empty Scientology building, or maybe a tour of Candy Spelling’s home, I can’t think of a more repulsive ten minutes of TV (and I watched Dr. Pimple Popper, My 600-lb Life, AND Botched this week). *yeah, I know, but it at least makes more sense than [Phil] in the Blanks Which Mysonjay Came Up With. The standards are obviously low.

Are we gonna call this wrestling chick by all eleventy first names every time? (Behind, obvs)

I wonder how many WON’T be?! (Although, I have to say, I can’t remember what decade I last noticed Joey Lawerence, but he looks de-‘roided from how I remember him). While I’m under no delusion of Ryan Lochte’s being a secret genius, I think he’s figured out that sounding like a moron is part of his image, and he’s embraced it full on. The alternative wrt “cupcakes” is too depressing to contemplate.

Dina Lohan: “[My children] are my best friends.” She has even less self-awareness than I thought, and I hadn’t realized it was possible to have less than “none.” They should create a clip series of her and Lindsay over the years, conclude it with that statement, and show it in parenting classes. Less than thirty seconds, and I think they’d have a successful full lesson that otherwise takes some people a lifetime to learn. I’da liked to see Michael Lohan, though (no, not really, not ever) and how far up Mooch’s ass he’d climb. You know he’d be in there. (Looking for connections and coke). For my fellow Olds: was Tamar the Braxton that was on our dearly beloved StartingOver (RIP)?

I kept checking the original airing date, because this seemed like an episode of Oprah from the 80s/early 90s, when all of our problems were caused by repressed memories of sexual abuse and ritual/satanic abuse was definitely occurring at your child’s day care, and anyone on a listserv or BBS had trauma-caused DID with alters who were 4 years old who could use a CPU, keyboard, modem, gopher, and vi to post, but could only write in baby talk (albeit phonetically correct, graphic baby talk). Shit, (I’m not even snarking; I’ve never admitted this before), there were many years Oprah had me convinced that, because I was very unhappy kid for no tangible reason and had some real issues because of it, I must have been abused and just didn’t remember it, rather than consider that perhaps ... I was just fucking depressed, and ... that’s probably why I was depressed). [I’m in no way mocking the many people who truly are horrifically abused, nor what I think may be the extremely rarer case of ritual abuse or developing a coping mechanism of some form of more significant dissociation than we all do every day. But I do give side-eye to the thousands of people who not only discovered Teh Interwebz in 1993 but had “littles” who could post prolifically on it in prose with consistent if not standard syntax and form that belied the [also near-universally similar] “little” spellings (or that basements in every neighborhood were used for mass abuse and sacrifices or held the supersonic planes everyone was using to fly little kids across the world for a few hours of torture). (Shit, even Trump’s tweets are more consistent in their “little” words, misspellings, depth, and construction (and hands. SNS)]. (Ironically, I’ve (unrelated to my childhood depression) been dx’ed with PTSD due to having spent years being extremely physically ill and having my symptoms chocked up to “conversion disorder” (albeit often parsed in far more misogynistic and dismissive terms), because of parts of the very definitions Phil presented, as those fail to take into consideration the practioner’s level of understanding of (or, as Phil would say unironically, insight into) their own limitations ... five brain and spine surgeries and another dozen or so others after seeming to have most of it figured out with almost a joke of a list of rare illness diagnoses (ie, I can’t be too angry about doctors who couldn’t figure it out—I’m a tough, and possibly unique, case of this combination of rare conditions and atypical presentation!—but I CAN be angry at how quickly they were prepared to assign a psych dx that were actually a poorer match than MANYphysical ones, correct or not, rather than simply admit “I don’t know”... (outside of my main specialist, across the country, now, that’s actually my preferred standard for whether *I’ll* hire a dr now—‘cause I’m no longer doubted, but I still jump right into that mindset that I will be: I’ll take a dr who admits he or she needs me to spell out my conditions and then says, wow, guess I have some research to do! over one who claims they know them, any day), I’m usually pretty loath to agree that solely a psychiatric dx like conversion disorder or depression is the proper (full) diagnosis for someone with debilitating physical symptoms, but this chick was pretty textbook, even without the ever- growing degree of depravity she believed she’d experienced among her abuse. But I do think that anyone who helped facilitate her belief in that as her truth (not to mention—‘cause, fuck, not like Phil did—the Folie à deux that also likely sucked in the brother) shares guilt with whoever did presumably violate her to whatever degree and start this shit show. But I thought we’d accepted that the level of abuse that now seems to be unquestionably fantastical—save, perchance, for rare corroborated cases in actual cults and such— the perception-is-reality Salem Witch pre-school Trials of the 80s and 90s were pretty universally debacles of well- and less-than-well-intentioned professionals, facilitated by the attention of Oprah, Geraldo, and the rest of the 80s/90s-era talk show hosts and journalists (and, of course, lawyers like Janet Reno) either misguidedly or intentionally creating a crisis that never existed, likely screwing up the kids far more than a tragically common case of “common” abuse would have, nevermind essentially ending the lives of those accused... was fiction. Like at least twenty years ago (unless you were a woman of color accused, and then you’re still in prison. Or did they finally let those four out on some Alford plea shit? Sorry, blanking on which of the many preschool cases it was, but I think there were at least two of four Latina aides who were at recently still rotting in prison despite their case’s being debunked eons ago?). No kids rode the peripatetic school airplane to endure ritual abuse in Mexico, where they watched giraffes (‘cause they’re all over Mexico, natch. Dat’s why we need such a big wall or other permanent structure across the border, to keep all the giraffes in Mexico safe) slaughtered and drank their blood, and made it home in time for afternoon pick-up, and this chick didn’t repress the memories of being a character in an even more twisted version of “The Most Dangerous Game” and then coming home for dinner and failing to remember being savaged by seven men while another girl got Misery-hobbled. Sadly, I suspect the reality is irrelevant if she’s been supported in believing it this long, although I guess Dr. Shud B Lawless can save her with his magical brain-changing light-up toy. (“It went BLIP when it moved and BOP when it stoppped and WHIRRR when it stood still... but I never knew just what it was, that toy Lawless pimped to Phil”). Somehow, I think the mother might actually be harder to cure. What an odd affect on that one.

I finally found this forum! So, I apologize if I missed this as I skimmed through quickly, expecting to at least see his name mentioned, but I didn’t (although we’re many of his brother). So, based on yesterday’s show (maybe there was a clue in week 1 that ruled him out that I forgot), I was convinced that the Peacock was Marky Mark (Mark Wahlberg). With the hints that suggested he was a former boy band type cum actor, his name just jumped to mind (I can’t figure out who the intended audience of this lunacy is, but the comment re: “our” mothers’ having had pictures on their walls made me realize that—although I’d consider it my generation who’d have been in his TeenBeat period demographic, whereas the common guess of Donny Osmond would be my mom’s—as young as I feel like I am, at 43, I COULD be in the age bracket of the theoretical mothers of the theoretical “you” they’re addressing, which a) made me feel old and b) made me think the assumption that he’s of a previous generation may be a misdirection, as, if there were a real audience (I agree with those who think there’s no real audience there: after all of the attention drawn to the degree of secrecy allegedly maintained throughout filming, it doesn’t jibe that they’d have open it up to hundreds of potential everyday fools to spoil), and they followed the template of many of these competitions, there’d be a group of telegenic teenage girls at the front, regardless of their representation of the audience demo in general: if that imaginary audience being addressed is the young adults typically represented as the audience of these shows, rather than the Xers I suspect most actually are, then the “your mother” would actually better fit the age range of the current age that I suspect most of us assuming they mean “our” mothers than someone from Osmond’s time would. Depressing, I know). But, anyway, here’s the key thing that made me think I was no longer just pulling out names of former teenyboppers from that period who’ve had a resurgence in acting or another field (I forget how specific they were, but I know Week 1 I was thinking more generally about men whom I’d previously dismissed as members of manufactured hit groups with great success at that time but unproven actual talent but have turned into adults who are now taken more seriously on their own) when I did a quick search simply on “Mark Wahlberg Peacock” to see if this was coming up a lot in speculation. It wasn’t: the results I got instead further convinced me: eleventy million mentions, including his own tweet from 2011, of “I’m a peacock; you gotta let me fly” (The Other Guys). After last night’s performance, how could that not be him? I then checked wrt Vegas—hoping to see he’d fone a residency there or something—and they’ve recently opened a Wahlburgers restaurant in Vegas. I don’t recall the clues well enough to know if there was anything more specific that was leading to the expectation that it was performance or magic related, but there’s that. And, if there was something more specific to magic (I think there was, as my first thought, before any other hints, had been Penn, although I think he’s broader than this costume seems to allow for (I generally don’t think we can gauge based on size if the costume makes someone appear bigger or taller, but I don’t think it could shrink someone, and Penn seems to have such a larger frame that, even if he were dangerously thin, he’d still be bigger than this costume suggests possible): subsequent hints have made it clear that it’s not him anyway, but I think one of the judge’s suggested Teller, reaffirming (probably incorrectly) one’s leap, even if subconscious, to a Vegas-type act; this seems like a red herring: Vegas and Magic could be discrete (again, unless I’m forgetting something more concrete: I haven’t gone back to check, so I feel like I have to constantly add that disclaimer, as “guessing” is so strongly rooted in confirmation bias). But, if there was Vegas and magic both mentioned (leading most to inherently connect them, while they could be discrete clues), wasn’t MW in Magic Mike? (Added: erm, apparently he wasn’t. For some reason, googling “Mark Wahlberg magic” brings up a shitton of Magic Mike info, including many reviews that also mention Wahlberg”... and that I guess ppl want him to be in it? Or comparing it to his films? But I guess he wasn’t, actually, despite even The Washington Post referencing both in the same review. PSA, I guess you have to read past the Goog blurb to know things. So I’m a dummy. But I’m doing a good job at proving how strongly the confirmation bias aspect is here. Now, if I were someone who did better than just reading the summaries from Google as “research,” I’d also check on the specifics of the magic clue, but I’m not, and I’m leaving this in only because it almost does a better job of showing how the metonymy (such as Vegas for magic) affects our interpretations, when Vegas really could be about hamburger stands and magic ... something else (it’d help if I remembered if the magic connection was confirmed or we really did get there from its Vegas, but if it is, maybe it’s a similar situation. Or maybe I’m just an idiot). Peacock has the Michael Jackson clue, right? I’m now over this enough that I can’t be fussed to do more digging, but there WAS some weird alleged dramz between the two re: post-9/11 escape-NY planes. Whether that fits the clue well enough, again, I’m now too annoyed to check (and I suspect Michael Jackson intersected with anyone Hollywood-y at some level as to make that as effective a determiner as saying someone’s acting career had them connected to Kevin Bacon with fewer than six degrees of separation, but it’s enough for me now just because of the specificity of that one line regarding his being a peacock and you (and your mama, or the depressing possibility that “you” Olds (me) ARE your mama) gotta let him fly. Unless I’ve missed significant discussion of this (given my overestimated Google Fu prowess, a strong possibility), I am either a damn fucking genius or as clueless about film, the universe, and everything as I’ve ever been, so the real loser here is you for reading this whole thing. And for discovering that the entertainer assumed to be in his 60s or older because [the audience’s] mother woulda heartthrobbed him is actually just as arguably of the next generation, and Your Mama is YOU, 35 to 55. And, that Hollywood STILL thinks that means you’re Old. [I got through this whole spiel without mentioning my hate for Jenny McCarthy. But every time I see Nicole Scherzinger, my heart aches a bit for the original of the Make a Star Competitive Faux-Reality genre, Popstars, which coincidentally was how I discovered Mighty Big TV back in the day. Ah, the memories.

I couldn’t believe she actually SAID it. Like, let’s be honest: I think most of us (if we somehow simultaneously possessed most of our current brains while lacking the part that says, “Ain’t enough money in the world to get me to do this shit”) would want to come in to the first meeting looking “good” for TV (I mean, it’s not Survivor: hopefully even these chucklefuck producers aren’t so crazy that they’re gonna surprise-maroon you and arrest you directly from Day 1 of training, so you let the audience know you’re cute before you go in and then make yourself up appropriately crappy* for Go Directly to Jail day). But, you don’t actually say dat shit out loud: you say, I’m sorry, Sherriff Godsnguns: I guess I was thinking of training as a time to be dressed more professionally* and of course expected to dress more casually or per your instructions to best fit my cover story for my “arrest.” *Not that she was dressed business-casual, but still. Otoh, can’t people who are REALLY being arrested end up getting brought to jail in everything from pajamas to [walking-the-]streets-wear to an evening gown, based on when, where, and why they’re brought in? None of them are doing the report-to-jail thing; they’re supposedly getting arrested and being booked directly; it doesn’t seem absurd to me that someone would get booked in a nice, or crappy, little black dress. It seems more important that they appear in a way that fits their cover story. (Most of which I guess we don’t know yet, so maybe yoga pants is specific to MAGA Barbie’s jail character, but—while I’m happy for them to call her out on anything—it seems like there was either some serious context missing, or it was just weird. She’s gonna be in stripes or whatever jail costumes they have there by the time she hits the pod anyway). But she was still a double-plus idiot for straight-up admitting it was “for the TV aspect”: now Sheriff Godnguns knows she’s there for famewhore ops AND has to worry about her ability to think on her feet (lie) while in jail. (Maybe it’s foreshadowing that she’s the one who blows it, ‘cuz she doesn’t know what to say if it’s not repeating exactly what she’s been told to say by production or Breitbart? Lying SHOULD come easily to her if she really follows the mold of her apparent role models, but that stupidly honest response makes me question whether she possesses the necessary skills of manipulation and bullshitting that this gig—or whatever “reality” show she was hoping to land—requires).

God damn is there some Poorer-Man’s Ann Coulter Factory where they churn these Shock-and-Awwww Barbies out? Since she probably believes in reverse racism anyway, Ima just set it up for her: why do these ignorant female right-wing talking empty heads who don’t get that, if they weren’t getting attention for spouting their offensive shit, their misogynistic male counterparts wouldn’t allow them in positions where they could talk (or be on top) ever, all look alike? Is it wrong that I’m hoping her stay is the farthest from a cakewalk we’ve ever seen on this show or Lockup? Of course (hurting my brain, trying to think like a Right Wing Barbie does (or doesn’t)), then she’ll probably come away from it with the argument that “they” are all animals, and yay for more jails to keep ‘em locked up... and we need a magic-mirror Wall. Damned confirmation bias (which I clearly lack): it’s gonna be damned if they beat her down and damned if they don’t. What to do, what to wish for? Eh, if she’s gonna come away feelingly justifiably Right no matter what happens, I guess I’ll go with the version that results in the most bodily harm for her.

No wonder dude fought the name change hard: his original mock up of a new logo was a [baker’s?] dozen variants of Coreys’ ... (by the time it was revisited in the Bagel, Bagel, Bagel scene, the tiny text had at least been altered to The Famous Corey’s). I’d be hesitant about changing the name to include my own, too, if I didn’t know how to spell my name or understand how apostrophes work. (And, I guess Amos probably wasn’t yet, either, when he first named his cookies, but he had that whole rhyming thing going for him. If it weren’t for his imminent appearance on this show, was there anything that suggested a modicum of truth to the “Famous” claim about Corey? I’m not even being totally sarcastic: was his “NYC” bagelry well-known to locals before Marcus came and shat that hackneyed “authentic New York” aesthetic he’s been thinking the world needed since Artistic Stitch heroically threw out every last thread (heh) of their dignity along with their makeover to save the city, planet, galaxy, and Xenu from Marcus’s pre-Giuliani-subway caricature theme he’d puked onto their walls, or is this more of a Fifteen-Minutes-of-Reality-TV-Famous Corey’s kinda deal?) I’m assuming that this is one of the holdover eps from last season, and when we actually get an episode filmed this year, Marcus will be wearing clothing that suggests a mended heart? Or is he actually following the strategy of his business mentor, the great mogul Teen (+10*} Mom Maci [née] Bookout of Genuine Naugahyde Pocket Things That Matter, and that is all that he will wear on camera for at least his next dozen trap babies businesses? *10, if we’re like Coreys’ss’s and so afraid of change we don’t want to revert to our original name that we’d changed(?!) and stick to that either outdated or Totes Authentic Noo Yawk Citay Process of measuring a year in coffees, in broken-heart-sweaters, in bright pink letters, in cheesecake-topped milkshakes, in subway tiles, in trips around the sun; 23 if we go with the apparently effective and lucrative Authentic Noveau-Riche Tennessee Process: in new houses, inbaby daddies, in consumed beer bottles, infertility and oops-baby paradoxes, in premature sun damage, in narcissistic multitudes of craft-store close-out painted-initial decor. How do you measure, measure a year? The Teen Mom Profit: the reality tv crossover I didn’t know I needed. (Or maybe just the more accurate renaming than Teen Mom OG was).And then an Inside Look where Amber sits down with TM’s newest spawn of reality whores, the producers. (Actually, the only producers I think should ever be in front of a camera again with a shot at adding a layer of insight rather than just self-serviing personal visibility, are those two men who did the Aftermath of the Aftermath episode of Leah Remini Saves the World from Scientology: I thought they were fantastic wrt both insight and empathy while still calling them out and asking for more when LR and MR would (often, unintentionally and unknowingly, imho) answer around the question). But I’d better stop before I get more off-topic than Authentic New York cheesecake milkshakes that I can’t possibly care about, not just because they sound and look disgusting, but because I don’t know Their Story. Maybe if I knew that they were partners who each came from Broken Homes and bonded over their similarly conflicting bifoodal backgrounds I’d connect to their story and thus connect to them.... nope, just like dem watches, where the haunting background story doesn’t change the fact that they are FUG, there is no Story in the world that could be written beautifully enough to make cheesecake ever make sense to me, let alone why you would use it to ruin a perfectly innocuous shake. And their origin story could have the original NY cart-drawing horses having put them together themselves in the damn tunnel, you’re not gonna convince me there’s anything authentically NY about this monstrosity. My heart is breaking so hard, it’s turning into a cartoon showing through my sweater. I am coming across as far more critical here than I really am: I think Marcus is brilliant in many, many ways. But, Marcus’s thinking he knows “Authentic NY” is even sillier (and aesthetically proven patently false) than his suddenly thinking he knows fashion.

Ah, there’s the MTV we know and love, with their fierce commitment to reducing teen pregnancy. Lexi has actual, specific, sensible goals, and now that Kieffer* has gloriously failed to complete the simplest task necessary for his plan to “make” her move and “not let her get her way for once,” she takes the very first step to trying to achieve that goal. But, rather than be handed an opportunity for which she may actually be qualified (maybe I misunderstood, but I thought she was willing to even just basically job-shadow to learn more about the field), as so many (OK, like three; the rest don’t even have that much drive) of the girls on this franchise have, despite their ineptitude (Kail), she basically found out it wasn’t gonna be an option for her, because they were only interested in bothering with someone hard-working (which I believe she is, since she made sure to finish school early when she found out she was pregnant, rather than “swear” she’d keep up with online classes or go back after) AND with a highly flexible schedule, which, being a teen mom who doesn’t seem to expect to be able to dump her baby on the closest adult who can breathe, she DOESN’T. Can she still pursue this field? Probably. Via a different and lengthier and more challenging path. But the object lesson here seemed to be a pretty strong “Having a baby as a teen doesn’t mean you’re doomed, but it sure is gonna make accomplishing even an altered goal that much more challenging, and maybe impossible.” It made me so sad for her as it seemed to register on her face simultaneously as it did in her mind that even this seemingly responsible and mature step she was trying to take was currently halted by having a baby. It was probably the most concrete thing I’ve seen on this franchise of the effect of a young pregnancy, even if you’re driven and trying. Which seems like a pretty key point to hammer home to the dumbass teens who think getting pregnant will be all attention and cute baby clothes and IG followers and “still being a teen” while enabler parents take on most of the real responsibility and maybe reality TV sublebrity status and paycheck. But what does MTV, oh great bastion of virtual society-wide birth control, choose to highlight as a takeaway? Da fuq? No. She doesn’t. To her credit, she TRIES to take a big step toward pursuing her dream job, but she only gets a little step in before walking into the brick wall that is being a teen mom. But, no, they don’t glamorize teen pregnancy at all. *Is that his name? I know there’s at least Kieffer Sutherland to precede him by a generation or two, so I don’t know why it continues to amaze me that this is a name, but it just always sounds like a jokey nickname to me, like something that a younger sibling calls his respectably named brother, Keith, while he’s still learning to talk, and the family thinks it’s so cute that they start using it too, until they say it in front of his little friends and he threatens to kill them if they ever say it again as he dies of embarassment as fourth-graders do, but then maybe he tells his fratbros about it eight years later while wasted and they start using it. As a joke. Because it sounds so fucking stupid. Maybe because my sister (who ironically ended up marrying an endodontist) and I have always goofingly (more of a real term than Kieffer) called “teeth” “teefers,” because it sounds dumb as hell and cracks us up.

Brilliant! <—- sorry, I thought I was writing a DCC bio and thus needed an exclamation point to punctuate every idea. This has all the makings of a country song title. Granted, I don’t know shit about country music, but I literally read it in my head to a melody. And, because I have the words for myself AND Victoria, I took a stab at it. (If I were a DCC or Teen Mom, I guess I’d film myself singing it while driving and then post it to Instagram (also while driving), but I’m not and I don’t, so you’ll have to just make up your own cliché of a country tune to hear it to. (DISCLAIMER: just like in all Law and Order episodes, the events and characters in this self-indulgent li’l country ballad ditty are totes fictional) Don’t Let Your Daughters Grow Up to be Cheerleaders (inspired by @bombast) She sat, stunned, mascara coating her face For 18 years, she’d prepped for this place A spot is yours, just fill out the form: They’d promised her Wouldn’t matter if she danced in everyone else’s space Wouldn’t matter if she couldn’t get that waist Blond hair, histrionically all over the place: she was a beautiful storm: They’d promised of her Mothers and fathers, don’t let your daughters limit their dreams to being cheerleaders She sat, not wanting to hear all the lead-up that would end with a “but” Ten weeks of trying, don’t tell her she’s cut A spot could be yours, but the job’s got to go She thought they’d promised her She’d spent a year on a lesser team, benched on her butt Being a World Class DCC, she’d flip the script, —redemption; show them—; she knew in her gut Now, at least she’d beat ‘em to the punch: No, ma’am, NO NO NO NO Not what they’d promised her Mothers and fathers, don’t let your daughters give up their jobs to be cheerleaders Four years, three full summers, heck, she’d devoted her adult life Watched each friend advance a real career, grow up, become a mom, a boss, a wife But she had a goal she’d set out to reach: Though no one promised her Inspirational! to fight and fight on through all of the strife To achieve yes ma’ams and no pay, fit the mold, fit the shorts, maybe go under the knife But giving up so much to wear so little: the lessons were rife; PERSISTENCE is the key, she now could teach Because she’d promised herself Mothers and fathers, don’t let your daughters waste their entire 20s to try to be underpaid, underdressed, autotronic walkdancing Madonna/whore dichotomies Mothers and fathers, don’t let your daughters grow up to be cheerleaders

I’m only partially through this show, but I don’t believe a word of this. Girl isn’t a good enough actress. She’s trying to become the next Cash Me trash to Cash In on a performance she’s putting on. If she’s doing online school (I guess I believe some words of it<—-added: note, I literally was writing this as I watched; by the end, this statement will no longer be true as I don’t believe pretty much any of it, including that she’s of school age or that they’re related unless it’s that they’re sisters or have used enough of the same facial fillers as to genetically modify them to the point they might share (injected) DNA), she isn’t worrying about facing a backlash from her peers (who may indeed live the kind of lifestyle she desires but surely aren’t so tacky as to talk about it as she does), and if she has friends at all (don’t know if they get into that later (added: yup, they do, and, no, she supposedly doesn’t, expedited by a line she probably already has on merch, ready to sell as her Instagram (she expects) blows up with followers), they probably know she was going on as an act. Mom mentioned Instagram and YouTube wrt a job: I think that’s the only realness here. She’s using this to (she thinks) get followers and make money by being “an influencer.” IF she’s really 15 (more in a sec), that’s realistically the only job she COULD have (she obviously wouldn’t make it far as a child actor!). OHMIGOD the fake crying. And, she’s 15? Her face can’t even move when she fake-cries, she’s so botoxed. Yes, she’s acting (less than) 15, but she looks like she’s in her late 20s, at the least. And I’m not sure I’m buying (heh) that she IS under 16: all the talk about her not having had a job might make the point that she’s not earning the money she’s [allegedly] spending, but it otherwise doesn’t make a lot of sense: unless you live in a farming community (or, where she supposedly lives, as a [child] actor), there’s really not a way for her to legally work yet! Sure, I babysat from before I was ten (hitting puberty early had its benefits), but I think that hiring underage kids to babysit is a lot tougher these days (when people get accused of abuse for letting their kids ride the subway, when, like, that’s how you get around in the city! Or ride their bikes without supervision, like, that’s how you get around (I assume) if you live in the country! 11-14-year old babysitters aren’t really a thing anymore (it used to crack my shit up that my so-tough middle-schoolers has what was basically an after school babysitting program because they couldn’t go home to an empty house, when I WAS the neighborhood after school babysitter for practically a classful of littler kids before I even was old enough to go to middle school. That aspect, surely, is better now, but I also think something’s lost when a 13-year-old kid can’t stay after school because they’d have to cross a street without a crossing guard, rather than doing that at 7 and being responsible and serious about babysitting by 13. But that’s reality, and this whole focus on her not having a job yet, if she’s really under 16, is absurd, since even Back In My Day, you couldn’t get a work-permit until 16-17 (with highly limited hours ... sure, I worked under the table at an all-night pizza place to avoid that, but I was in college. And the sketchiness of the whole gig does demonstrate why there ARE (and were, 25 years ago, PHIL!—laws against that. (Especially in affluent areas, where people can hire adult nannies with actual training, babysitting is out; I don’t think I’ve seen a kid do a paper route in years, since you need to be old enough to drive and to work wacky hours, and no legitimate retail place is gonna hire someone without a work permit: when and where does he think an allegedly under-16 outside an area with farm-exception papers should be working? Besides Instagram!). If they were talking about PLANNING to get a job at 16, and volunteering for now, I might be more inclined to believe this isn’t totally fake. But, maybe Phil hasn’t learned that child labor laws have become a thing since he was a roller-skating waiter, but you need a work-permit to do that even that shit now, dude). Phil is just as fake, though: first, he says she doesn’t need to babysit (for the younger kids in this family that is just her and the mom and the Boyton), that she needs to work in the real world (fair enough point ... in a month), and then he criticized her going to virtual school (rather than using it that fact to, say, help question why she needs what “everyone else” has when she doesn’t even SEE “everybody else”). But then, even though doing family chores or attending virtual school are Baad, she should use Mysonjay’s Doctor on Demand which, imho, lets her avoid reality and beneficial interpersonal relations in a far more problematic way than virtual school (if complemented with other experiences) inherently does. (Because he and MySonJay and Face Cream Turned Me Into a Plastic Lollipop Robin didn’t hop on the virtual school bandwagon quick enough to launch some DisciplesonDemand: I Can’t Believe I Can Count To Three school choice virtual charter crap. (I apologize in advance if he’s schphilling K12TheVirtualShelves.com school by August (Robin is in charge of naming, natch. And, promoting, with comparable evidence of its effectiveness as she is as the “face” of a skincare line)). Ohhhhhgawd the waterworks (sans water) about not feeling loved, her parents’ being divorced, a job is hard work, and the “My bags are my friends” line? (But, hey, they did address the no-friends thing! Which conflicts with her living “with a friend” in a hotel for a year (again, if she’s really 15, Phil totally dropped the ball on that one: dafuq? Or it was when she was 18, a decade ago. Or the whole thing is BS) and the mom inviting the “family” friend (who looks younger than the “daughter”) to live with them and chauffeur her around (again, if she’s 15, SKETCH! Where is Phil’s trusty statistics about how single moms are destined to get their kid abused?!) But, again, a friend. And, if they were really so rich, wouldn’t they have hired people (that whole job thing again) to do all that shit? (Plus the Aftershow Special episode complete with tidy ending?) How much time did she spend coming up with these things? (In which case, she actually IS screwed, as there wasn’t memable moment among it. She coulda yelled her name out a bunch of times as she left the stage and gotten a lot more of the remaining 14 minutes she sought (Miss Vanjie!) than she’ll ever experience from all those try-hard moments. (I hate myself for granting her any seconds of that quarter-hour by commenting on it). If production ever believed a bit of this story, she would have been sent off to Mormon Horse Camp or OnStar or A Dual-Diagnosis Center On An Island On a Beach On Water Near Dolphins That People Would Kill To Go To Lookisntitpretty? Or something, whether for what she tried to pretend were the real underlying issues or for the personality disorder suggested in seeking attention that way. Add in that Phil failed to rip the mom apart both for raising her, in general, and for her own claimed Dr. Phil cliches (it’s my time? She let her live in a hotel with a friend or a handbag at what would have to be, at most, 14, if we believe the timeline (whether it’s the Ritz or Motel 6 isn’t really the primary problem there, if that were real), having the same Botox injector?) to even a bit of the extent he typically does mothers who have put every (less-in-total but-of-greater-percentage, considering their resources) material and mental reserves they have into truly—if not always in the best way, often with the best of intentions and ability—trying to help and get help for their legitimately in-need child? Nope. Not buying this on anyone’s end. I think it was a good idea for an episode theme, and they planned it and made a 209-page Maibs binder, but they couldn’t find anyone who legitimately had such a problem who was willing to put it out on Dr. Phil (even all of the Real Housewives types who want to show off what they supposedly have are doing it under the delusion that they’re being aspirational (and getting paid); no one with the kind of money they were pretending to have would expose themselves on THIS show like that, certainly not if they weren’t at a point of desperation for help for a child who needed a way higher level of care than a few sessions with a camdoc. Phil wasnt even committed enough to say, “This isn’t a (bratty kid) problem; it’s an everyone problem” NOR “I don’t ask myself why you act so badly they wouldn’t even let you into the Get An Agent scam workshops the way you do; I ask myself why not.” Weird, though, that the super fake ones usually have their greatest tell from the bad fake-hair and other identity-faking, with sometimes oddly delivered but not both terribly performed and inconsistent lines, while—despite their matching fake faces (with lack of lines)—the “Mom” and “Kid” weren’t trying to hide their identities at all, but the show also wasn’t even trying to put together a plausible or cohesive arc. Maybe the show and the “guests” were just trying to out-exploit each other until it passed the line into parody and no one cared as long as they could hock the both sides of the Phil Phamily Phrauducts (which they did).

Yeah, I don’t know what’s happening to me. After always loathing her on RHoBH, I spent this [not-summer] finding her surprisingly innocuous and often enjoyable on Celebrity Big Brother. Now (which, I realize, is really “before” in Brandi’s life’s timeline), I’m mostly enjoying her, here, too. I don’t know if it’s just a matter of relativity (being around half of this cast would make even the semi-repugnant seem pretty great in comparison), or she’s actually finally starting to grow up, but for every moment of tomfoolery (the lap? fo realz?), there’s another when I rather enjoy her (note: I’m not considering any potential for all of this When Animals* Attack bootsycamp therapy to have had a positive impact or effected change and growth). *To clarify, I meant the animals the “doctors” “therapeutically” sicced on the campers, like the dogs (gah, still getting anxious thinking about that!) and bugs-in-a-log**, not, like, Amber or any other sloths that found their way onto the couches of Bootcamp Manor. **I know that our cell phones or chopped off fingers or eyeballs or something are going to be our means of home access in the future and we won’t need keys (whatever, I was supooosed to have a robot by now, too) but I think they’re gonna be around longer than the Mark Cuban wants me to believe. As will those idiots who hide a spare key in a plastic rock that’s so bad it practically has neon sign above that says “I’m Fake. I’m not a real rock. I’m not even a garden gnome. Check here for key if you’d like to break in and kill me (if I had anything worth stealing, I’d also have a better security system than a plastic rock, so robbery isn’t worth it, but you’re all set for assault and murder). Kthnx.” As Dr. Shizz and Dr. Vj clearly are in need of another calling, I think they should take their bug-in-a-log keyholders on Shark Tank, because, unlike with the psych thing, they have something that could help people here. I doubt a lot of criminals wanna stick their hand in a log-o-bugs, and, dual-use: what a great learning tool for kids for actions and consequences! Most latchkey kids probably won’t forget their keys more than once if retrieving it is even worse than admitting you’re related to people who bought a plastic rock to “hide” your spare. Maybe, given the drs’s’.s sadistic bent, they could expand the product line to include things like a boa constrictor (it will happily sit there, keeping your key safe inside; you decide when you’re desperate enough to stick your hand in to remove it), or even a full outside couch with an Amber on it: to retrieve your key, you’d need to motivate her to move enough so you could get the key she was busy hatching. And she don’t even do that much work for her child, so you know that key is well-protected. (I haven’t figured out yet which one is best for hiding extra mood stabilizers that are simultaneously so necessary you have to stay in your crib for everyone’s protection after being off them for 24 hours and so completely unnecessary that just getting a nuBoyfriend (who is sicker than Matt for watching this WHILE it was filmed and being all THAT. That is who I want and what’s been missing from my entire life and lips, and I shall immediately throw away any career I’d have ever hoped to have had doing this and get her pregnant ASAP because the one thing I didn’t get to watch directly while filming Bootsycamp was what it looks like when this intellectually stimulating, worldly, stunning catch is actively neglecting her child, and I need to see it live to find out if that’s an oxymoron, and if it seems any different from just watching her film for x weeks and never mention the kid) completely negates the need for them. NuMatt has such powers! Big Pharma is either gonna have him cloned and sold as the next atypical stabilizer for 1000 times his value (or value+1: it won’t matter what kinda mark-up they try; NuNumatt’s won’t ever be worth more than the zero the original was). Or, they’ll stick with what they’ve got on the market and, to prevent all the cray Fanbers from thinking they just needed a camera-yielding Sasquatchwlips of their own rather than pillses, they’ll kill him off , so no risk to their profits or to the future of humanity.

So why’s everyone claiming she hasn’t weighed herself recently? It’s stated right there in the ad. Obviously, someone stuffed her in a walk-in closet, and, upon learning she fit, knew it could store tons. I mean, it doesn’t tell us precisely how many tons she is, but at least it’s a more realistic estimate and update: she didn’t try to claim “380 lbs of storage.” Whitney’s totes right: y’all bein’ lyin’ haterz and no one gives her credit for her honesty. Bish put it right there, that her second floor can store her tons. Credit where credit (and back-taxes) are due (Bonus: if she goes to jail for tax fraud, maybe she can try the Abby Lee Miller approach to dieting-and-simultaneously-ensuring-I-get-special-accommodations-and-attention-for-my-medical-dietetic needs. I’ve heard (at the start of every single damn episode of My 380bs-to-Tons Life) that there’s “a doctor in Houston” who specializes in working with patients her size. P.S. for Heather or other paid sycophants who are reading here to curate the positive things Whit likes to read about herself and/or misinterpret anything that doesn’t tell her how great she is as something from Hater Who Sez She Is A Waste of Space and Should Kill Herself: just in case Whitney “happens” upon this message while she’s only trying to read the nice things about herself online (I tried to watch this show solely because this forum brings me such delight, but the show didn’t, so I gave up. I know Whitney would never give up once she’s taken on such a giagantic challenge. But, I’m no Whitney). Except for the reunion. I watched the hell out of that shit: tuning in for reunions even for shows I don’t watch are like my cat-breath-inhaling: something (else) I can do that requires no physical exertion and brings joy to my senses without adding on calories but I wouldn’t shouldn’t admit it to the world, yet here I am. And I thought I’d experienced enough embarrassment-by-proxy for this De-Lister just reading here, but I almost wuz-dedded by embarrassment for her when she justified her subjecting herself to depression-level-causing online hate because sometimes she “just runs into it” while trying to read all the posts she gets about how great she is (I.e., Heather, you’re slacking off on censoring her from the Haterz when she only tries to look for posts from all her giant ass-kissers, natch). Like, of course. Because, much like huffing your cat or ordering a pizza with half pepperoni/half direct lard from the ER or picking your nose, I’d guess that specifically looking for all the good things people say about them online is something lots of self-absorbed narcissistic twits people DO, but YOU DON’T ADMIT IT OR DO IT IN PUBLIC (and on camera)! Yet that wasn’t even said as an activity worthy of note: that was the aside for how she comes across messages she’s been told not to read. Of course no one suggested that spending your time looking for all of the posts from [the same class of weirdos who consider Amber and Jenelle role models for mothers or are filling my local jail with letters professing their love and admiration of Nico Cruz], telling you how great you are, is ALSO an abnormal and unhealthy activity, especially for someone who claims she what people think about her now, vs when she was thinner and conventionally attractive not-hideous, because the voices in her head are nicer to her now. Or whatever her totes-no-BS claims are. But, even accepting that that is yet another psychological or physical behavior she considers unchangeworthy, does she not even recognize that YOU DON’T TELL PEOPLE THAT?! Just like you walk around a formal event, showing off an ensemble of sports bra and multiple cummerbunds of naked gut as black-tie-wear but won’t admit that said tumm-ber-buns are significantly larger than they were when you really did weigh “only” 380: Why can’t she be open about what’s actually relevant and NOT SHARE everything that falls under the category of Things Like Picking-Your-Nose(and sniffing it like it’s something normal like cat breath before chowing down)? Why does she get this all backward? ObTopic: WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH HER? (And, while I don’t doubt she gets a lot of horrible things said about her online, it sure sounded like she was twisting a lot of not-asskissing-but-not-hateful comments and projecting her own self-loathing onto her interpretation of them (like concern that continuing to live in and promote her delusions will result in her dying (and that’s not the same as body-shaming) becomes suggesting she SHOULD die; similarly, banning @Brooks for truthfully stating there IS no real BGDC is likely because she interpreted it as “You’re too fat and disgusting to deserve to have a dance class , and also thus don’t deserve to be alive”...). Um, anyway, so, Heather, let’s be clear:I did NOT say Whitney SHOULD be stuffed in the closet and left there until she can has enough space and a fairy godmother who grants her the requisite skills to dance her way around it. Nor did I say she deserved to be stuffed in the closet So and Because I Hope She Will Die. So don’t be mixing up my words, either, when you’ve got your thirst-trap open and catch my compliment of your being more honest about your tonnage. But, by all means, block me here: you will never see me near your social media because, as much as I don’t like to read hateful things directed at someone, I am far more horrified to learn that enough people publicly tell you great things.