LilyoftheValley

I feel really sorry for Josh right now (never thought I would say that). So now that he is "better" I guess that means he has to have 15 kids with his wife, right? God that is so fucked up. I cannot even begin to express how fucked up that is. Coercing someone into having even one child they do not want is messed up, but this is a whole new level of depravity. It makes me a little sick to my stomach. Josh has no skills and no way to support the kids he already has, so he has to be firmly in the Duggar/Quiverful fold in order to have a chance of keeping those kids properly housed, clothed and fed. In order to be in the fold, he must have ten more kids on top of that. This is so disturbing on so many levels. Hey look, Josh is a dick for cheating on his wife, but the most normal things he ever did was look at porn and seek out casual sex that does not result in babies. This is like a twilight zone episode.

I think Kwenthrith some how manged to "procure" a male baby so that her bid to take over the throne of Mercia would be easier for the people to accept. Like, okay here is this crazy woman but she has a SON, a clear heir to the throne and (hopefully) we won't have any more civil wars for a while. Ragnar's mercy was for Helga, not Floki. I sort of like the Rollo scenes. He is used to feeling competent and powerful. His little deal with the devil seemingly as made him practically infantile.

He had to let one ear go in order to save the dynasty's reputation. Ya'll think that Ragnar is now extra pissed at Bjorn now that Floki's baby died? I think Ragnar can pragmatically overcome a lot, but he will not get over feeling that Bjorn is responsible for the death of Floki's daughter.

It seems to me that Philip is a competent thought not great chef who used the talent to two superior chefs to build his restaurants. The fact that one of those places is now closed speak volumes to me (not long after the real chefs left). I think the thing that has shocked Manbun the most is how easily the judges were able to see right through him and judge the chef is actually is and not the one he wants everyone to believe he is. A lot of people in LA are like this; the thing separated Philip from most of them is that his family had enough money that they could buy him two restaurants. It made his whole scam look legit.

It seems that Philip is like a lot of people in LA - he is obsessed with idea of celebrity, and that his grandfather was a celebrity, he probably got it in his head that he could be on too. Since acting and modeling were probably out, he went with "celebrity chef", used to guys more talented that him, as well as his mother's money, and viola!, he's a "celebrity chef". I think that the other chefs could pick up on this and that is why Philip rubbed them the wrong way. Basically, the man is a poser and they could tell. The judges could tell too, but Philip just thinks that they "hate" him and "don't get his food".

It's like a child, saying that the judges "hated" him. He lost because his food was not as good as the other chefs'. Also, he thinks that just working hard and wanting it means he should win. Such a douchey millennial. If he does not get what he wants, it must be because someone who "hates" him for no reason is denying him. Tool.

I think the problem is that a man can put on jeans and t shirt and pull on a blazer/sport coat and still look really good. I guess women can do that to but the issue as I see it here is that many women on the show express themselves either through fashion or through a lack of fashion. I think Marjorie just doesn't give a shit about fashion, which is fine, but when you are the "face" of anything you have to fake it a little bit. Then we have people like last season's Betty Paige impersonator (never seen that look before) who looked like Betty Paige as FOH. It did not look professional to see a grown woman in a Halloween costume as the face of a "nice" restaurant. Karen's outfit simply did not look professional. Indeed, I think that sleeveless rarely looks all that professional. Or rather, when in doubt, don't go sleeveless. Had Karen thrown a blazer on that and worn some black flats, she would have looked fine. I dunno, but if I were going on TC, I would bring a nice outfit that would look really sharp if I were picked for FOH. I suppose I see this as part of being the quintessential restaurateur, and not just a chef who is always in the back of house. For all that Philip is clueless, at least he clearly wants to be a well-rounded restaurateur, which is something all the best chefs are at the end of the day. The prize from this show is money for the winner to open up their own restaurant - that means the winner should be a person who could run their own top restaurant. A person who cannot present themselves as a true professional won't be able to pull that off.

I cannot believe I forgot to laugh about "Bangkok Dangerous" last night. Thank God the forum reminded me to. It's like the title of a really bad early 80's porno. Seriously does Manbun really have no self-awareness at all? And really dude, any cocktail with "dangerous" in it should at least have proper liquor and not soju. Dumbass.

I agree. Twenty years ago these people would have been seen as a creative genius - a person just too cool for school whose unbounded self-expression could not be contained by any norms of mainstream professionalism. Now they are run-of-the-mill. Pink hair and tattoos are banal and ordinary. They actually just look like dumpy women approaching middle age who are desperately clinging to what they think is youthful and hip. At the end of the day their look is just dated and and very, very sloppy. Ironically, it would be truly refreshing to see a woman on this show who looked and dressed her age without them talking about their sexuality. I would love to see a woman on this show who kept herself totally professional.

I don't think Man Bun is a good chef and I do not think he is successful. He parents bought him two restaurants (one of which is now closed) and so Man Bun thinks he has the cache of a chef who "owns" two restaurants. It's all just total bullshit. At best this guy would be maybe a sous chef at this point in his career if mommy and daddy had not bought him a career. Marjorie was totally right on - this guy has never had a mentor and so he had never had a person critiquing his food. Man Bun might have some potential but he skipped about 15 years in his career - you know, the part you really need in order to develop as a professional. He is not half as good as he thinks he is. I strongly suspect that all his restaurants will be closed by the time he is 30 and he will just be ranting about how no one "got" his food. This is the problem with rich parents just handing you everything on a platter. Eventually the masses catch on that the emperor has no clothes. Man Bun has no clothes.

I went to law school in LA and several of the women there had that valley girl twang. I cannot think of anything less professional than a lawyer talking like a mall rat, but apparently people with dippy accents are unaware of it. I think the "douchey LA accent" is more of a class thing than an accent thing. Southern Louisiana creoles have a totally different class background than a Man Bun from Los Angeles. Isaac and his wife are probably just a little sensitive about their working class roots. I mean how many times have people accused Isaac of having "unrefined" food? Basically he is seen as an unrefined person (another word for low class) and his food (naturally) reflects that. It seems like Kevin from a few seasons back had food sort of like Isaac's, but Kevin's food was just considered more rustic than unrefined. There is definitely a class/race issue on Top Chef that one can seen over the seasons. Personally I think it is a class thing more than anything else. Someone from an upper class background whose food is traditional never gets the critique of "unrefined". It is people like Isaac who get that.

Was there anything specifically about the dishes that you did not like? Or do you think that your expectations were just really high?

But why do teams always get behind on RW? It seems to me that they have dishes that take too long to execute or they have poorly trained staff. The team that wins always seems to be the team that decided to execute a strategy right from the start. To me, you make sure you have starters that are really, really easy to put out in under a minute. Then, you should have an expo or a food runner making sure the food is going out fast. I sort of disagree with Jeremy's plan to get the judge's table out first. I have worked in several restaurants (though only FOH) and getting a flow is so incredibly important to keeping things running smoothly. I think that Jeremy's decision just threw a wrench the machine they were getting going. So let's say that they were pumping out starters assembly line style, which is working okay (maybe they are a bit behind but they will catch up), and then Jeremy makes them pump out starters for the judges and when the judges are done he immediately starts with their second course when there are still ten table that need starters. So at this point the line cooks are now shifting focus to make second courses for ten people and then going back to starters, and then going to mains, and then going to second course, etc. I think Jeremy's decision just ruined the flow in the kitchen. So instead of keeping up with two dishes, his chefs are now keeping up with eight dishes at any given time. If I were the teams, I would have a little amuse bouche set aside just for the judges to buy me about ten more minutes of time before I needed to get their starters out.

I also did not get what Marjorie's issue was with the list. Just write it all down and then organize it the way you like. I honestly do not understand why a big master list is not made before people go to the store, and then everyone should look over the master list to make sure everything they need is there. I also would NEVER just call a person with my list. I would give them the thing in writing.

I am 100% sure that Philip's restaurant was bankrolled by his mommy and daddy. The problem with people like that is that they look more successful than they actually are. Philip did not have to work his way up; he told his parents he wanted to open a restaurant and that was it. So he looks like a successful chef with his own restaurant but I am skeptical. Personally I wonder how successful the restaurant truly is. If he is not making a profit but his parents give him 5k a month no matter what, then he will look like he is doing better than he really is. Also, if that $500,000 you need to open a restaurant was just given to you, then you have no debt to pay off, which is often how restaurants go bust. He reminds me of a grown-up, richer version of that guy a few years back who was cut by Tom almost immediately. He bragged about publishing his own cookbook when he was 17. Well it was a self-publication vanity project that his parents paid for. That is all well and good but the only accomplishment there was writing up the recipes and hiring a photographer.

I agree that Philip is simply too stupid to understand that everyone was on his side when they asked him to make his dish easier to assemble. It is odd that Philip seems with it sometimes and oblivious other times. Philip reminds me of one of my favorite Mark Twain quotes: "All you need in this life is confidence and ignorance, and then success is sure." Like I know that Philip thinks all the dishes at his restaurant are great, but the thing is that generally if food is pretty good, people compliment it. My guess is that Philip's restaurant serves pretty good food most of the time, but he is not even close to being on the same level as some of the other chefs who have been on this show.

I do not want to get to OT but since some people here think that snacks are absolutely necessary I think it is fair to point out that there are lots of cultures in the world that do not snack at all, and somehow those people manage to go the day without "blood sugar drops" or "headaches" or whatever else Americans think happens without three meals and three snacks a day. I friend of mine from Nigeria told me that people eat breakfast, lunch and dinner at the table and that food is not spoken of or mentioned otherwise. Back when I lived in Austria there were two flavors of potato chips - plain and paprika. There simply wasn't a big culture of snacking. I never saw an adult (or anyone for that matter) carrying around a bag of pretzels or carrots in their purse - you know, healthy snacks. It just was not considered necessary to be eating all day. I think nutritionists in the US do their clients a great disservice by encouraging snacking. First of all, if you are really, truly hungry then you should be eating a whole balanced and nutritious meal, not a snack. And if you are getting that hungry between meals, then your meals are too small and not nutritious enough. I mean, I guess if some nutritionist thinks that a breakfast of a half a cup of special K and skim milk is a reasonable meal, then perhaps snacking is necessary. But if you eat real, wholesome food for breakfast then you won't be hungry until lunch, period.

I wonder if Jana realizes her only way to avoid having twenty kids (in their religion) is to put off getting married and so she is staying single for as long as she can get away with. As to JD, I agree he is the least offensive adult Duggar. I think he would make a perfectly decent husband to someone, but to my taste he is simply not interesting enough as a human being to marry. Though I do not think being an interesting person is something that even occurs to the Duggars.

Yeah one of them would snitch.

I know that when people found out that Henry VIII fourth wife, Anne of Cleves, knew almost nothing about sex, that her contemporaries were completely shocked. At least in the 16th century in England, it was not considered normal to "send a girl to sea without her biscuit". Basically, girls got some sex education to prepare them for marriage (Anne of Cleves aside). Oh yeah, and Duggar-dolts, these people were but two generations removed from your beloved King James. Also, one thing people forget is that children and adults all slept in the same room a lot of the time, so it is doubtful that kids knew nothing about sex until someone explained it them. Even Sir Thomas Moore's daughters slept in a trundle bed in their parents room until they got married, and Thomas Moore was not a poor man. I cannot emphasize enough how the Duggars are nostalgic for a time that never was. There was never a time of sexual innocence in the past. People knew what sex was before they got married. Perhaps the only people to ever come close to such repression were the Puritans, and the normal English people thought they were daft enough to banish them the Holland, and the Dutch thought they were daft enough to banish them to America.

It would be hilarious if the Duggars subscribed to the straight from childhood to adulthood idea of child-rearing. Those kids have the longest adolescence of any kids I have ever seen. They share a room with their siblings and get a sundae from their parents for their 23rd birthday. They have the exact same lifestyle at 25 as they do at 5.

I lived in Austria in the 90's and there really wasn't much snacking going on then. People ate breakfast, lunch and dinner and that was it. I have to assume that most of the rest of Europe was like that too. I still do not think that snacking is necessary and that Dr. Now, being a man who grew up in Iran, probably did not snack or see snacking as common until he came to the U.S. as an adult. Maybe, just maybe, he saw an entire nation of people manage to survive without snacking, and maybe, just maybe, that nation does not have any 600 pound plus people. Just a thought.

I call this morality without ethics (which is of course no morality at all). It is, as you say, a child's understanding of right and wrong. The best example of all this is the "life at all costs" approach to pregnancy and childbirth. The "moral" thing to do is bring every pregnancy to term and fight for the child's life, when most of the time the ethical thing to do is to terminate the pregnancy and spare the baby a very short life of pain and suffering (in addition to sparing the rest of the family all that pain). The Duggars cannot wrap their childlike minds around ethics, and so they desperately cling to what they think are strong morals. But as I said, morals without ethics are only empty platitudes. It gives fundies an ego boost without requiring any critical thinking on their part.

It's simply how a cult operates - some guru up high dictates the knowledge the followers will have and that is the end of it. This was essentially how at least western civilization operated until the enlightenment. It was not until the middle of the 18th century that thinking for yourself and having critical thinking skills was even an option. It is incredibly depressing to me that people reject one of the greatest things humanity ever achieved - that the individual can form her own meaning and develop her own set of ethics. This is why I can never understand the appeal of cults, gurus, preachers, organized religion, patriarchy, etc. Why would you hand over that autonomy to someone else? it used to be that you had to. You don't have to anymore. You know what I think it is? The Duggars and Bates family are simply total cowards. They're afraid to dig deep and think for themselves. They're weak and fearful and so they hand that over to someone else, and in true cult fashion that person is a sexual predator.

To me what we are seeing is the problem of not letting a person develop some of their own ethics and morality as they go from adolescence into adulthood. This all just made me think of how my mother, father, brother and myself do not necessarily share the same moral and ethical viewpoint on everything, and that's okay. We are all grown adults and we are entitled to have differing views on ethics and morality. Now our viewpoints are not completely divergent or anything, but we they are not all the same. As a parent you give that individual human being guidance as they grow into adulthood, but you also let them work some things out for themselves. To me this is the biggest concern of not letting the kids have friends outside the family. The Duggars seriously underestimate how important this is for development. Just as an example, when my niece and cousin would come over the weekend, the neighbor kids would sometimes too. When the four of them got to be about 9, whenever I would hear them disagreeing, I would not intervene. They needed to work things out for themselves as a group of peers starting at that age. The Duggar children are so incredibly stunted by never experiencing this. There was no time in their childhood and adolescence where they had to weigh another person's ethical and moral argument - it was just shoved down their throats by a parent or an older child. We talk a lot about how they constantly drop interests and career ideas, but at the end of the day it all boils down to the fact that none of these children are ever truly challenged growing up. The moment they reach any sort of real challenge, they have absolutely zero life skills for how to handle it. I mean look at the males in the family. Unlike the girls, they can leave the house and venture out on their own. Josh only did because he was just handed a job on a silver platter. Had that not happened, he would have happily remained working as a used car salesman at his dad's lot. The rest of them must be paralyzed by fear of actually having to face a real challenge.