dubbel zout

Frank shoves his favorites into stories without thinking beyond the "get." Guess what, Frank? I don't care about your "gets." I'm sure this cuts him to the quick.

He doesn't need to relate to Natalia to be angry with Ava. I don't know what they're trying to do with Sonny here. Sonny is something of an advocate for the LGBTQ+ community: He's bankrolling Kristina's center. Of course it's not pure altruism on his part, but he's supporting his daughter much more than Natalia ever has with Blaze.

I don't think it made sense for Sonny to be okay with Natalia's bigotry. This is Mr. "I never had a problem with the gays even way back when I lived in Bensonhurst." He just accepts that Natalia called into question Kristina's character because Natalia said she personally knows Kristina is a good person? That's like someone saying they aren't racist because they have a Black friend. This is solely about making Ava the bad guy for releasing the tape. The contents have somehow become mostly irrelevant, for Sonny at least, and that's not what we've been told over the years. ETA: When Kristina came out, it took Alexis longer to accept her than it did Sonny, FFS. Not that Alexis was against it, but she needed a minute to process it all, whereas Sonny immediately busted out his "I've known gay people all my life" spiel. So for him to now be okay with what Natalia said—to ridicule his own daughter's community—does not make sense to me at all.

That was something, wasn't it? And both of them were like, "Yeah, it sucks when the scales fall from your kid's eyes, but whatever, it's fixable." She obviously wasn't thinking long-term, but I think the general idea was to open Sonny's eyes to how awful Natalia is so he'd kick her to the curb and reinstate Ava in his penthouse. You know how needy girlchildren are. Sons don't need no stinkin' father!

The way the justice system works in Port Charles, Carly will be able to claim that she pretended to be the head of the Corinthos organization to keep Donna safe, and that will be what keeps her out of prison. She's such a good mother!

The doorman in Kristina's building is not "doing an amazing job" if he's not calling Kristina to tell her who's on the way up to her apartment. Also, get a frickin' peephole! I wonder if we're gearing up for a Who Killed Ava? story. Alexis had a too-brief moment of calling out Natalia, and then of course it had to turn to "we need to talk about Ava."

This was certainly in full play today with Sonny not caring about Natalia's hate speech, and Kristina saying the bigger crime was whoever gave the recording to the Invader. Shut up, Lois. Oh, right. I knew that didn't look right, but I couldn't figure out what I did wrong. Heh. (I really need to stop thinking I have any sort of grasp on GH history.)

The show has a history of not knowing how to keep villains around for the long run. I mean, we got that dreadful Denise Demucci story to sort of redeem how terrible Ava had been, but the fact remains she ripped a kid out of Nina's uterus. She messed with Morgan's meds. She's messing with Sonny's meds. Yet right now she's in a tizzy because of some dumb recording that has little bearing on Sonny and, in the larger view, actually did Blaze a favor of sorts. (People are going to hate Blaze no matter who she sleeps with.) I don't want to watch yet another custody battle, especially one involving Sonny, but there doesn't seem to be any sort of plan for Ava. There doesn't seem to be any sort of plan for the majority of the characters. They shuffle along so the actors meet their minimums and nothing of any consequence ever happens. Zzzz.

Except in Port Charles and/or when you're up against Sonny.

Blaze should have fired Natalia as her manager on the spot.

I think Kristina is overreacting a bit with this. Molly and TJ don’t want her being a co-parent in any way, but they aren’t going to forbid all contact with the baby. Everyone needs to take a few breaths here.

I thought the show did a decent job of showing Alpha get drawn into the case and decide to help Geordie solve it. I also chuckled when everyone kept telling Alphy that Geordie has a "thing" for vicars, hee.

Nina's needs for Paris Fashion Week weren't out of line, especially for what Crimson's reputation is supposed to be. There's no way Gio doesn't know what Sonny does. I buy that it's all be secondhand info at best, but for him to think Sonny is some upright businessman is incredibly dumb. I can also buy that Gio chooses to ignore it because Sonny has financially supported him for so long. Ava sucks for dragging Trina into her potential custody battle. But giving what's-his-face her recording of Natalia being a bigot? That's an Ava I want to see. But thinking it won't get traced back to her? Natalia was talking to Ava! Am I supposed to feel sorry for Kristina? I don't. All of her feelings were entirely predictable, and shows how stupid everyone was for not exhaustively talking things through.

I'm not that precious with my cast-iron skillet. I make sure I scrub off any leftover food, then I put it over a high flame to make sure it's dry, turn off the burner to rub in a bit of oil (tongs and folded paper towel work here), and let it cool on the burner. It seems to work just fine for me. I've overdone the oil sometimes, but I wipe out the excess. The whole process takes about five minutes. A lot of times ATK overdoes stuff like this, but I like seeing the entire process and then cherry-picking what I'm willing to do. Of course the results are often less than they'd be had I followed all of the steps, but I can live with that.

I loved all of the scenes Leonard was in. It looks like they might be using Al Weaver more this season, which is only a good thing IMO. This show is such an odd mix of modern and very dated sensibilities. (It has been for a while, of course.)

Maybe Lucky can be Laura's get-a-grip person and set her straight on Heather and Ava.

Same! Those pharma ads are very lucrative, so good for her. I'm sure it made life a lot easier while she was looking for other work.

They did use Kristina's egg, which is where all of the problems began.

I'm always terrible at keeping track of time lines and when stories overlap (or don't). We still don't know what Ava's ultimate plan is. Sure, when she was living with Sonny she was close to power and all of that, but so what? How is she going to use it and to what end? I really hope we're not sidetracked with a dumb custody battle.

The writing has made Molly and TJ terrified of how Kristina will react to any reasonable question/request about the baby. It's also made Kristina super sensitive to any reasonable question/request about the baby, so like I originally wrote: conflict above all. I'm hating this story even more than I originally did. It can so easily go into a really gross place, and I have no faith in the writers not to. That's exactly what Jason yelled at her about. I'll give him credit for that, at least. But it's Carly. She'll do something stupid she thinks will "help." No, I think he was talking about Jason and Carly. Jason for working with the FBI (Sonny was convinced Jason would tell them everything about the bidness), and Carly for not banishing Jason from her life the way Sonny wanted her to. No. I've always been confused about the threat the tape had for Carly. I guess by simply saying she was in charge that meant she was doing bad stuff. Another deeply dumb story. Threaten Carly with going to jail for insider trading, which is something she actually did commit.

The writers aren't including any of these things—it's all conflict of one sort or another. That's one of the best things she's worn.

Laura should have noped out immediately. Don't get involved in someone else's custody battle—especially if you aren't related to any of the parties. Eva LaRue's laugh is as annoying as LW's. BL, Gio playing badly at Ava's gallery reflects more on him than on her. Dope. At least Gio has some professional integrity. I didn't find Jason yelling at Carly satisfying at all, since he proved yet again what a crap father he is by putting her and her kids (mainly Donna) over his own kids. I don't know how finding about Brennan will change any of that. So he yells at her to stop interfering. This is Carly. Of course she'll keep interfering. Kristina insisting that Molly and TJ never fight so their current problems mean they're heading for Splitsville is absurd. The idea that they seemingly don't fight is a bigger red flag to me.

I laughed so hard at that. And at Dex basically telling her she's a total Karen and Joss is like, "Oooh, thanks!" That's a real shame. And that when Carly has tried, it's always ended up a complete mess.

She can legit submit those scenes for the younger performer Daytime Emmy. It irks me how badly used he is time and time again. DZ is good-looking, he can act, and Dante has ties to numerous characters. Why is he seldom seen, and when he is, it's usually in service to his nitwit girlfriend?

It's okay if Sam breaks the law when it benefits her, but when anyone else does, they're CRIMINALS. I hope Dante is starting to have second thoughts about the halfwit he's shacked up with. See, Show? Look how effective you can be when you put care and thought into a scene. I hope the Skymeadow Lodge is nicer than the door Finn entered. Yikes.