Ziggy

Every time! I'm getting goosebumps just thinking about it :-)

To be fair, we (and Ethan and the family) didn’t see her at all at the gravesite. Sure we heard her talk to someone from TLC, but we don’t really know what happened.

She said (in her interview) that she could go and be with Kim, or she could stay at the farm alone. She didn’t want to be alone, so she road over. That’s when she realized it was too much. Articulating your only two options isn’t the same thing as forcing others to choose. She as right. Those were her only two options. She didn’t have a car, so what else could she do?

The plan was to go to the gravesite without Kim. The plan changed, and Moriah (not Ethan) informed Olivia. I find it odd that you are under the impression Olivia is asking anyone to choose. I don’t recall that ever happening, but I do remember her saying that she doesn’t want to be there if Kim is - not in a mean way or in a demanding way, just matter-of-fact. I’m not sure what you saw Olivia do that you deem to be her “behaving badly.” When she found out Kim was going to be there, she quickly excused herself. She did try to talk to Ethan in private, and he got mad and walked away. I'm not saying Olivia is perfect or handled everything perfectly, but we really didn’t see much at all.

I don’t think Olivia was upset that Ethan, Moriah and Micah were going. I think Olivia was upset that she wasn’t told until right before they were leaving. She had no time to process it, and she had to decide RIGHT NOW. Also, I wouldn’t be surprised if she wasn’t po’d that her own husband didn’t bother talking to her about it.

Thank you! I get that he and Moriah are annoyed that Olivia has such a problem with their mom. So I do get that it affects him, and uncomfortable as it is, it's ok for him and Moriah to talk to Olivia about it from the perspective of how it affects them. But he pushed it and acted like she owed him an explanation. I kind of felt the same way when he talked to Max about Moriah. That was completely inappropriate, but I do get that Moriah wanted him to do it. Still weird.

I understand what you're saying, but it's also kind of taking one piece completely out of context. I completely agree that it seems clear to many of us that the best thing to do would have been to suck it up, stand next to her husband and be supportive for one day. But whatever happened between Olivia and Kim has clearly traumatized Olivia, and that's something I've never experienced. I mean, I've had bad things happen to me, but I've never felt as paralyzed as Olivia has. Who am I to tell her that what she's feeling isn't real? Olivia found out Kim was going to be at the grave site, what, an hour before they were supposed to be there? She panicked. If someone had said something the day before, I'm sure she would have had time to process it. That was harsh! Also, Ethan was an idiot about it! Isaac asked him if Olivia knew, and he said he didn't know. Are you kidding me?!? My husband would have gotten more than an earful from me if he had pulled that! What a coward!!! He should have been the one to talk to her, and he should have done it sooner. I do get agree that it would have been nice if she could have sucked it up just this one time ... for their brother who died. Sometimes, though, when things keep happening and we finally snap, it's something really minor that becomes the straw that broke the camel's back. Like when my kids know I need to get something done for work and they just keep bugging me. But I'm really trying to be patient and it's not until one of them is bleeding from the head that I scream, "Why won't you leave me alone?" It's like that :-) As soon as Ethan mentioned that they were there for his brother who died, she felt like a shmuck! I mean she really did feel bad and knew that she should have been more sensitive and aware. This is a family that does not know to talk about things. Olivia is actually trying to work through this, but it's going to take time.

This! I feel like this perfectly explains so much about Kim. When I heard her talking to Micah about the babysitter, I was shocked, not shocked, because it's just exactly what I kind of expected all along ... or at least that there was trauma that she thought she was protecting her kids from. So much of what Kim said in the first couple of seasons about her parenting style just screamed that she knew what was best and it didn't matter what her kids said or wanted. She was super defensive. The biggest reason she didn't want Ethan and Olivia to be around the younger children without her present was so that they didn't say anything bad about her! It's so sad to see how she lacks the confidence to allow her children to see anything other than what she shows them. My kids question me on things. They see different ways at their friends houses, at school, from tv, etc. Sometimes I explain and they understand. Sometimes I just have to be ok with, "Well, that's what other parents do, but that's not what we do." Even when it's followed by, "But, Mom ... !" That's part of parenting. Don't get me wrong. Sometimes I listen and think, whoa, I'm really off base on this one. I need to make some changes. That's part of parenting, too, accepting the fact that you're not perfect without being defensive and judgy. Kim was so threatened by Olivia, that she didn't even listen or bother getting to know her. When you really listen to what Olivia is saying, there's a decent amount of humility there. She's excited about what she's learned and trying knew things, but she's also pretty self aware and knows she has a lot to learn.

I do not think that's true. I think Ethan very logically knows what he needs to do (communicate more). He wants to work on his marriage, but it is a struggle for him. His habit is to walk away from conflict and work on his cars, and it is a real challenge for him to face the situation and have a conversation. He's learning that talking to Olivia works. He's learning that it's not as painful and torturous as he fears it's going to be, but it's still going to take time and practice for him to do it consistently. But he always comes back to her and talks to her, and he and they are better for it. I did appreciate the fact that he said talking about his parents' separation was not something he wanted to do on camera. Some of his coldness towards Olivia when he arrived might have had more to do with the cameras than anything else. Olivia still has a lot to learn, too. She's frustrated, and understandably so. From her perspective, he won't follow the simplistic of directions. "Before you make a major purchase, please do me the courteously of talking to me first." My husband used to think he was asking my permission. I get why it probably seems like that, but really, it's just letting the other person have a chance to express any concerns about it. Our challenges were more about him making plans without talking to me first (um, what if he forgot a previous commitment we had). It wasn't about me giving him permission at all. She's really, really trying to be patient. But not answering the phone??? That just eats away at you and makes you less patient when the husband finally does arrive. Would it have been so hard for him to text her, "Having a bad day. Will explain when I get home. Love you!" It took a lot of strength for her to just listen when he told her about everything that happened. I think Olivia knows that she's just trhing the same things over and over again, but I don't think she knows what else to do.

Agreed. I would have liked for that storyline to wrap up, but there's just too much left. I'm sure they will cut out some of the story about Claire and the jail and the Governor, etc. Taking her to a jail does change things a bit. I do think they're laying the groundwork for the Bugs. They did that flashback last year with the gold, and Mr. Bug has made several trips to River Run. It doesn't seem like there would be another reason to include that if they weren't intending to finish that story.

Agreed. I felt the same way when they cast Alex Randal and when they cast Bree. Even though the show has not chosen to go with the uncanny resemblance of some characters, I've usually been impressed with how they are able to tell the story. Still, not quite seeing the resemblance when they are both in uniform.

Interesting ... I get that not everyone reads the book or watches the show for the same reasons, but to me Outlander is the story of the Frasers. The war is the backdrop, so I would have been livid if they cut out this story of the Christies.

Yes! I'm getting close to finishing my Book 6 reread, and I'm so happy with the castings. Spot on.

That is so sad! I have a son on the Autism Spectrum, so sometimes I kind of understand where Mary is coming from. You want to challenge them but not overwhelm them. You need to make sure you give all your kids enough attention. You know the rules have to be different (that's sometimes true of all kids), but you don't want to expect too much of anyone. This is something that all parents struggle with, but it sometimes more noticeable when you have one child with very different needs.

Oh my gosh! That is so true. I think she does that with all of them. She's at a place in her faith where she is following rules because they are rules. As soon as one of them challenges her, she doesn't always have a good explanation. I'm not saying she's necessarily right or wrong. She's just still in the process of understanding the wisdom (or lack thereof) of the what she's learning. As she matures in her faith, ideally she will understand more the reasons behind certain teachings and have the wisdom to disregard some teachings that might not really make sense any more (might be based on the needs of a certain time in history - a need that no longer exists). I'm just saying, Mary rarely has a good answer when one of them says, but why? Mary loves her family very much, and in he own way she is really trying to do the right thing. But she is still learning and still trying to make the connection between her religion and living in the real world.

Thank you!

Does anyone know the name of the song that is playing?Does anyone know the name of the song that is playing?

Right, I don't necessarily stall when I release the clutch too quickly. But there is a difference between saying that it is possible to release the clutch quickly and not stall and saying "I'm taking to long to get off the clutch." He was saying that releasing the clutch too slowly was the problem. Exactly! I do think it's a bit fair to say that TPTB are looking at the entire world and not just their little corner (like me in Illinois), so I do think they should have been more on top of it than me. Still, I think most of the world was feeling pretty invincible. Even if some countries were already starting to shut down and travel was a pain and flights were being cancelled, the reality of the next few months was simply not something anyone expected.

Were there already lockdowns, safe distancing or masks in February? There are always masks in China, so that doesn't count. (It's customary in China to wear a mask if you have a bad cold ... so that you don't spread it to others.) There hasn't really been a pandemic since the Spanish Flu, and it was very easy to dismiss concerns when that's the most recent, similar event. Medicine has progressed so much since then. We have an understanding of germs and how viruses are spread. There is a real comfort in how much science has learned since the 1900's. We really thought we had no reason to be concerned. All I'm saying is, it's easy to look back now and think, why would they start a race in February 2020? But remember, in February 2020, almost no one thought this was a thing! Nothing was happening in February. We didn't even start talking about this until March, and even then everyone report, every email from the school, every "we might go remote" from a company was still saying "Out of an abundance of caution ... "

My 15 year old is learning how to drive a manual, so he was really excited to watch this episode with me. We were both really confused when Akbar said, "I'm stalling out. I'm taking to long to get off the clutch." Do you think he misspeak? Or did he really think that he was supposed to let the clutch out really fast? I often wonder if teams who repeatedly stall at first are really in 3rd gear when they think they're in 1st. That has been my mistake on more than one occasion, and that has happened to my son several of times (though he'll deny it) :-)

I get what you’re saying, but at the time I didn’t think it was going to amount to anything. There had been other viruses in the news before: H1N1: Zika, Eboli. While there were certainly people who became very ill, people who died, family and friends affected, none of them affected anyone I knew. Even during the first month or so of lockdowns, I was expecting it to blow over any time. I’m not so sure they had any reason to think it COVID was actually a big deal or actually going to affect the race. None of the other viruses affected the race. Why would this one be any different (said me 2 years ago)?

I also learned on a stick and drove one for many years. We recently bought one, and it had been about 20 years for me. Took me about 2 minutes to get used to hit. Like a riding a bike. Of course, I was still driving on the right-hand side of the rode, but I bet you’d be fine!

This whole conversation made me curious about just what happened in the first episode. Here's the dialogue about the man who lost his arm. In the scene, he is missing the arm, and Shed's cleaning the wound. Holden: Hey, Paj, how's the arm? Paj: Looking good. Still got a few nerves, though. Shed's been telling me how the prosthetic's gonna hook up. Shed: Well, you know that naturally, the company'll try to screw you out of a good one, right? Paj: I've been signed on long enough to get one with force feedback, pressure and temp sensors, the whole package. Shed: I know. What you should have is that new bio-gel they developed on the inner planets. Then you wouldn't need a prosthetic. It regrows the limb perfectly. Paj: Screw the Inners and their magic Jell-O.

That was so badass to cut off his arm! I don’t think I would have had the courage, even if we did have the technology to regrow limbs! Josep’s arm was being regrown in one of the last scenes. They did the same thing for Amos at the end of Season 4 … regrew some of his finger. Even though he’ll heal, that totally freaks me out!

I think the scene was meant to be a wake (or visitation), like at a funeral home. I’m guessing no one brought coffins to Laconia, so a table was the best they could do.