bilgistic

I wondered about the traveling, but I assume Ali married someone that isn't from the U.S. and they traveled to her spouse's home. It was established that she lives in Argentina. When Madison first interviewed her, the chyron with her name was a different last name from Hamburg (Madison's and Barbara's last name)...I think.

My boyfriend's COVID test came back negative this morning! Not sure why he's been run down, but he's finally going to get a flu shot this afternoon and see his doctor Monday. My grandma was moved to a smaller hospital during the night. The large one she was at was apparently overrun with COVID patients.

YES. I was in tears watching this episode. Talking shit to your CHILD about their other parent is abusive. No single adult in that family has taken any responsibility for the generations of alcoholism and drug abuse and toxic behavior, and that is abusive. Madison and Ali's father putting Ali's behavior as a teenager off on her when no one was getting her any real help is disgusting. I have borderline personality disorder; it's usually directly caused by childhood trauma. Fuck their dad for blaming her for the trauma he inflicted. Conway is a MESS. She says she tried to look out for Barbara, but when was that? When she was homeless or living with other people in her family? Again, this toxicity is learned from her father/parents, but the way she talked about Ali was repulsive. I still think the father killed Barbara, but Conway looks hella shady.

Our ancient dishwasher died as I started it up with a full load inside. My boyfriend's still waiting for his COVID test result, so the maintenance folks can't come fix/replace it. Also today, my 94-year-old grandmother fell in her basement and fractured her pelvis. No surgery, but rehab. Fuck everything.

My sister, who lives in the rural NC foothills and works in a restaurant, has pictures on Instagram of her attending a Thanksgiving gathering at a friend's house. There are at least 15 people in the pictures.🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️ I guess that'll make contact tracing easier.

I'm kind of enjoying this show, but it makes me so anxious. I've never seen Kaley Cuoco in anything—I'm the one person who doesn't watch "The Big Bang Theory"—but her acting reminds me of Jennifer Aniston. I'm finding this really frustrating because she's making the absolute wrong decision at every turn and being really obvious about it. Also, I really want her to get her hair out of her face. It just looks stupid when the front of her hair is down and all the rest of her hair is up. If she was trying to be stealthy at the memorial, wearing that widow-y hat with the netting and having her cleavage out wasn't the way to do it. She's a mess. How is she getting on planes without her ID? I assume even airline staff have to go through security, right?

My boyfriend's going tomorrow to get tested—he made the appointment yesterday for the first available at the nearest CVS. He took two naps yesterday, which is basically unheard of, and a long one today. Here in NC, they don't let you take a test if you're asymptomatic, which is beyond stupid. You have to have knowingly been exposed or be a frontline/essential worker. He technically is the latter, as he does commercial delivery and they have been allowed to operate/remain open since day one. His test result will dictate how I respond, i.e., if I get tested. I haven't left the apartment since the 15th when we went to Walmart wearing masks the whole time, so I theoretically wouldn't have infected anyone.

My boyfriend's sister had nasal cancer and is in recovery post-chemo and radiation. She wants us to come down for Christmas. She lives in the Wilmington, NC, area, as do my boyfriend's parents. All of them have been staying at home, so their risk is low, but I worry about our exposing his sister to any various ailments because of her basically absent immunity right now. I hardly ever leave the apartment, but my boyfriend is a delivery driver for a commercial and industrial supply company. That's all possibly moot because my boyfriend is feeling more tired than usual and is considering going tomorrow to get tested for coronavirus. He doesn't have a fever so far. But if he has coronavirus, I have it.

My dad's test was negative and he's not having symptoms (yet?). I want to tell him to take another test in a few days since an early test after exposure can be negative, but I know he won't, just like my mom won't take a test. I can only hope they weren't really exposed to my dad's boss...and/or the person to whom the boss was exposed. It seems likely to me that my dad was exposed in working in a small store with what seems to be people who aren't following guidelines, but there's literally nothing I can do.

The only actual thing the authorities cared about was the women not paying taxes. Literally every multi-level marketing company—and there are hundreds of them—is a pyramid scheme and they're multi-million-dollar-plus companies. The authorities look the other way because they ostensibly pay taxes. Barbara was shitty to prey on her AA contacts, for sure. I think Madison's father/Barbara's ex-husband (why can't I remember his name?) has an in with the cops and he got the fire lit under the investigation into the gifting tables and that's also how he has avoided being charged with Barbara's murder.

This is exactly it. I watched the whole second episode and said, "It's still the ex-husband." The cops are something else, wanting Madison's footage/interviews. Fuck off. You didn't do your job to solve his mother's murder. He's not going to do it for you. I wanted to yank Madison out of that police station through my TV screen. He owes them nothing. The authorities sure did jump on a bunch of bored housewives not paying taxes, though!

When they opened up the dish of Brussels sprouts, I asked my boyfriend how they were going to make desserts taste like farts. Brussels sprouts are vile. I like corn well enough but that corn soup syrup that Eva made looked like actual vomit. No thank you.

I wrote about some of this in the "movie vs. TV show" thread but there's no discussion there. In the movie, the student was from a fairly well-off family that had a ranch (as a second home), and he and the teacher snuck off to spend time there on one occasion. They were actually nearly caught by a foreman/property manager, but he didn't see the teacher and didn't think it was too weird that the kid was staying at the ranch alone because he had "told his dad he was there". The rental place in this episode had to be a stand-in for the ranch from the movie. It's worth noting that the movie student was a little more popular and had a better social standing, so to speak, because of his family's relative wealth. I don't think either the movie or show student is perceived as any kind of weird/damaged kid that can't "get" women and is therefore easy prey for the teacher. It's absolutely not that simple. In the movie, the teacher is unmarried and has a roommate in an apartment. Her roommate comes home early or unexpectedly and finds the student at the apartment with the teacher in her bedroom. It's implied that the roommate tells the authorities about the relationship. The movie teacher doesn't tell anyone about the relationship. I want to know where Eric told his mom he was for two whole days and nights. My mother would never. I was shocked that Claire told her teacher friend. Obviously she has terrible judgement, but why would she ever think that would be a good idea? She'd literally just told Eric at the cabin that no one could know about them. I'm still waiting for Claire to be pregnant (my continued speculation). Any second now...

I hate sugar cookies, so I rarely eat iced cookies that are found at the grocery store. Some of the cookies these contestants make sound amazing. I'm salivating during the whole show and jealous that the judges get to eat all the different varieties!

I know. It's hard to set boundaries, and I had to over Labor Day, literally telling my mother I wouldn't see her because of the risks she was taking. Instead of taking that as a lesson in changing her behavior so she could see me, her first-born, she continued to be wild. That hurts. I spent my childhood literally taking care of my sisters and being my mother's amateur psychologist and sounding board (and mediator between my father and mother). It took me years to realize how unhealthy and damaging it all was for me. I have to release myself from that role in my adulthood (I'm 46!), but these patterns seem baked in. Mom just called me to update me on how things are in Georgia and ask me what phase NC is in. Like, you have a computer and iPhone. I appreciate that she knows I'm knowledgeable/that I stay informed but she didn't care to take heed of the information I've been sharing so far to make smart decisions, so really, what is the point? It's just me doing more emotional labor. I knew this was coming. I knew that they would be dealing with a possible infection. It sucks, but this was avoidable. Which we can expand to include the nation. So much of this nightmare was avoidable.