KerleyQ

And then how long after that will it take him to mentally handwave it and still insist that she's a different woman now?

I feel like Liam and Steffy having to sit together and watch Finn and Hope have a happy life is exactly what they deserve. Because I don't think either one of them will be fully happy. They'll both be jealous, and it will be in their faces all the time, because, between the four of them, there are three kids with ties across both couples (four if Douglas comes home). So they're going to have to see each other a lot. (Oh, and I'd put solid money on Finn wanting to maintain a relationship with his former stepdaughter than Liam puts into maintaining any kind of bond with his former stepson.) That's what's kind of been wiggling around in my mind, too. Sheila found out she was dying, or maybe Sugar even reached out to her to get some closure or something when she found out she was dying. Then Sheila sold her a sob story about her son, probably portraying it like Jack and Li all but stole him from her womb, and then, wouldn't you know it, her son ended up married to someone who hates her ('and for no good reason! She's stuck on ancient history. I'm different now!") and his wife won't let him spend any time with him or her beloved grandson. So, if Sugar could just help her get Steffy out of the way, Sheila's happy family can be reunited.

Wouldn't Deacon have noticed if he was with a Sheila with 10 toes?

Steffy also has a dash of her grandmother in her. Particularly a dash of that borderline incestuous overinvolvement in her family's love lives.

Least surprising "surprise" ever. I've been waiting for a shot of that dead woman's 10 toes ever since Steffy stabbed her. SK was really great today, but I could have done without the "call me daddy" reference. It was probably the most cringeworthy element of their "love story." They're definitely going to do Finn/Hope. I oddly look forward to finding out exactly how bad the actor who plays RJ is going to be in the scenes where Luna finally tells him what happened. The preview was already kind of funny. And the writing is so hokey. "We'd like you to work closely with Zende. We're sure he's got some secrets he can pass along."

But how are we going to know that Hope is a character who enjoys hot sex now if we don't see side boob?

I'm not spoiling this, since it has no actual information, but one of the writers (I think that's who it was, anyway) tweeted out last night to make sure you stay tuned for the last ten seconds of today's show. Just about every reply to the tweet was some variation of "we all know Sheila's alive. This isn't going to be a shock." My favorite was "ten seconds? So one second per toe?"

You'd think, after all she's been through with Sheila, Lauren would want to hightail it over to that memorial so she can open the casket and make sure there is a sincerely dead Sheila in there. And doesn't she know who Deacon is? Wasn't he on Y&R at some point? There's Steffy acting all annoyed that Hope went to the memorial. Once again, it's only Steffy's family members who deserve support from their loved ones. Hope supporting her own father is some kind of insult to Steffy's world view. Does she think she's unique and super special in loving her family? She can't fathom that other people have those same feelings for their own families? And there's Liam kissing Steffy's ass. The only scene he has been tolerable in for months has been that cute scene with Beth the other day. I want to say "where's Bill," but I fear he comes with a side of Poppy.

Funny how Steffy wants full control over Finn's every thought and feeling, but she never considers that he might not want her discussing their marriage with the ex who keeps sniffing around her. What, exactly, do Liam and Steffy think is going to happen at Sheila's memorial that it's so awful for Hope and Finn to go? Are they going to be required to absorb some of her spirit? Her ghost is going to hitch a ride home with them and never leave? She's dead (as far as any of us know), she can't do anything. If having a memorial helps Deacon and Finn deal with all of this, what's the harm? Nobody asked Liam or Steffy to go. They didn't take the kids. What's the big freaking deal? And Steffy had to be a bitch when Liam mentioned he was there checking to see how Hope is doing. "She's here living her best life while my brother is in pain." Oh, fuck off. (I find myself saying "oh fuck off" multiple times per episode when Steffy talks these days. There's so little she says that doesn't warrant that response.)

It's fun watching the Steffy blinders slowly fall away from Finn's eyes. He looked like he was fighting off an eye roll at one point today, and he looked just flat out exasperated by her at multiple times. Slowly, he's moving away from being the Finn who was so blindly whipped that he proposed to Steffy right after she cheated on him and didn't know who her baby daddy was. "We don't have to agree on everything," certainly flew out the window the second it looked like Finn was going to disagree with her about whether he should go to the memorial. And how lovely of her to rehash how she killed his mother "right there." Like she doesn't know how difficult that is for him. And Donna? "We can come more often now that Sheila is gone." Jesus. You all know he cared about her. Yeah, he's aware that she was a pariah, but you can have like an ounce of sensitivity to not gloat over her death in his face at his place of business, maybe? I have zero care for Sheila and thought Deacon was a dumbass to keep getting involved with her, but still. Beth is adorable, and Liam is only bearable these days in scenes with kids (where that's the primary focus of his interactions).

Wasn't he involved with Beth a long time ago? I wasn't watching in the early years, but I could swear I remember reading, at some point, about a triangle between him, Stephanie, and Beth.

If Finn and Steffy do split, I hope it's not Sheila-specific, but, instead, is because of stuff like that bitchface she pulled today when he dared to disagree with her about Hope being the biggest evil ever. He is really not allowed to form his own opinions on anything, is he? "She was laser focused on my brother. She had him designing her line." Um, bitch, what? Who had him designing Hope's line? Because I very specifically remember her being ready to say "no" to him coming back on her line, until you told her it was basically take Thomas back or the line was being cut. And "after everything hope has done to my brother"? Do I even need to reference that scorecard again? At one point, at the end of their first scene, Finn legitimately looked like he was trying not to laugh at Steffy. "Maybe a guy will come along who's worth saying 'yes' to." Yes, where is that brother of yours, anyway, Liam? Luna, forget worrying about any Forrester family relationships. The first time you're working with Zende and he tries his shit again, look him right in the eye and say "I've already told you, more than once, that this is not happening. Are you going to stop, or do I need to talk to Steffy or Ridge about sexual harassment?" (I can't stop using the word "bitch" about Steffy these days, but I need to find something else. Maybe I'll borrow one of @GHScorpiosRule's names for GH's Carly, and start calling her Slagbeast. She's certainly attained Slagbeast status.)

Hey, Waffle, unless they're taking Kelly and Beth to the memorial, none of this is any of your concern. And, Steffy, you know how much trouble Finn is having processing all of this. If going to the memorial feels like something he needs to do, then you should support him. It's not like he can bring her home with him, she's dead. I get hating Sheila and not wanting her around, but from the moment Finn has found out she was his birth mother, Steffy has never allowed him to figure out how he feels about it. And, again, I get it, she was dangerous. But, she's dead now (as far as we all know), so she's not a present danger. It's time to back the fuck off and let him deal with all the conflicting emotions he's been facing. Steffy is treating Finn exactly the way she treated Thomas - diving in when his emotions are all over the place and telling him how he should feel and act, based on what is most comfortable for her.

When Steffy blocked her slap, I was hoping Hope would follow it up with a good swift kick. "You should have been honest with him that that was all you were interested in." Um, she was. She was very clear when they started hooking up that it was all she was interested in. Thomas was the one who decided it was going to turn into a grand love story and marriage. Thomas was the one who bought a fucking ring months into it and kept pressuring her to turn it into more. Hope was always very direct about what she wanted and what she wasn't ready for. I sincerely hope that Hope steals Steffy's husband. Brooke should have walked right out of that conference room. Ridge is a dick. Zende, please, stop. You're creepy, dude. You know that Luna never wanted to sleep with you. You know that she has turned you down multiple times. You know how upset she is about what happened between you. And you're still pulling the "do you ever think about us?" bullshit on her? You have to know that that is just going to make her uncomfortable. Go hit a bar and pick up a woman, for the love of fuck, and stop creeping on this girl.

I hope that Liam does decide he's really in love with Hope after all, and when he goes to tell her, he walks in on her and Finn in bed.

I really hope that Hope is one thousand percent done with Thomas now. He's not changed, he was just behaving because he was getting what he wanted. As soon as things didn't go his way, he used Douglas as a weapon to hurt her. Sending him in there to tell Hope that Caroline is his mother and he wants to leave was the single most painful thing he could do to her, and he knows that. A decent father would have told Douglas that the romantic relationship between him and Hope does not affect his relationship with either parent, that they both still love him more than anything in the world, just like they were both his parents who love him when Hope was married to Liam. Instead, he sends Douglas in there with the "why aren't we good enough" line. Whenever he comes back to town, he should be dead to her, period. No sex is good enough for his bullshit. And all of his assurances of how "I would never hurt you," meant "as long as you do what I want." And his bitchass sister? Oh, fuck her. Get her good, Hope. Tear her marriage to pieces and then help Finn fight for custody. I want to see RJ tear into her, too. And who holds Forrester stock? Let's see Steffy get booted from her position for decimating what seems to be the company's most successful line. Let's see her start facing some consequences for her bullshit. And, Ridge, it's past time you have a talk with your little princess about how you, Brooke, and her sainted mother were all responsible for the decisions and mistakes that were made over the years. Brooke didn't singlehandedly bring chaos into their lives. He brought chaos into their lives when he couldn't decide between two women and flitted back and forth. Taylor brought chaos into their lives when she stayed away for years at a time, even doing it still to this day, not staying in town to be with her kids and grandkids if Ridge's dick isn't included in the deal. Hell, throw Eric into the mix with the other three, since he was certainly involved in all of that mess at various points. And, of course, the fifth adult, who was probably the biggest agent of chaos - her dear granny. Stephanie interfered and manipulated (you know, just like her bitchass granddaughter) in everyone's love lives whenever things weren't going how she wanted them to go. She was probably responsible for more than half of the chaos, and another quarter or so of it was everyone's reactions to her chaos. Ridge needs to get some balls and tell her that she needs to treat his wife (or whatever they are now) with some amount of respect, and if she has complaints about her childhood, she needs to direct them to him, because he was her father, and he was the one who made choices that affected her and her siblings. The buck should stop with him.

I have a feeling I am going to get a little rage-y when I watch today's episode.

I don't want to agree with Thomas about anything, ever, but... I do agree that Hope does not love him like he loves her. And she knows she doesn't. She loves him to some degree, but a lot of what she loves is that he's so into her. She loves that he's Douglas's father. She loves the sex. But, she isn't as deeply in love with him as he wants her to be. And, even though she's fighting right now to save the relationship, she's not ready to put any kind of timeline on being ready to marry him (which is the one thing that would reel him back in). I don't blame her on that, at all, but this is why she shouldn't have ever gone there with him in the first place. No matter how "all better" everyone thinks he is, he's been obsessed with her from the moment he and Douglas came back to L.A. The odds of ever being able to have a healthy, balanced relationship are pretty non-existent when that's the starting point. The best thing Hope can do for herself and Thomas is to let him go and spend some time being single and focusing on her kids. Which is not, of course, to say that she should just let him take Douglas out of the country right this second out of anger. She should be firm in saying "you can go now, and we'll discuss a schedule for Douglas to travel back and forth. He has school, he has friends, he has activities, he has a sister he loves. You can't just completely uproot our son because you're pissed at me."

I swear, if AN doesn't get a lead actress nomination this year... I don't think Thomas should get to just take Douglas with him, and that's that. They need to work out a custody arrangement. Hope is his mother and, last we knew, had primary physical custody. I understand Hope being mad at Steffy for interfering in her relationship with Thomas, but she should be even more furious with both Steffy and Thomas for thinking that Thomas can just up and take her son away from her for good. As much as Steffy may not like it, Hope is Douglas's mother, period. And Thomas is the one who made that choice. He can't unring that bell now.

Ridge is such a tool. "you just attacked my daughter." You mean like your daughter attacked her? And like you're attacking her now? Fuck right off. And "I know he loves you, because he says it every five minutes. It's all he ever talks about." Um, is that not cause for concern, given his past, Ridge? Ridge and the Taytots are acting like Hope and Thomas have been together three or four years, and she's still refusing to get engaged. It has been nine months since they kissed in Rome. And, again, I ask, is her divorce even final yet? I'm cracking up at how Ridge is all over defending Steffy when Hope airs her legitimate gripes about how she's interfering in her relationship. But then when Steffy gets there and pulls her bitch shit with Brooke, suddenly, Ridge is trying to rein her in. And when Brooke says the exact same thing Hope said, that Steffy is turning this into a Forresters vs. Logans thing, he looks at Steffy like "is that true?" Thomas is a tool. He promised Hope that he wouldn't pressure her about getting engaged, spent the next three months pressuring her anyway, and now he's having a tantrum over her not just giving in to the pressure. If he actually tries to take Douglas out of the country to get back at her, I hope she goes scorched earth on his ass for reverting right back to using Douglas to manipulate her, and that it ends up blowing this chance he had to be with her. Because fuck this guy. He had what he wanted. They were together. She was becoming more and more committed to him as the months went on. She was wearing his damn ring around her neck as requested. And he couldn't be fucking patient. So, I hope he loses her completely.

I was thinking the same thing during yesterday's show, when she kept telling him how angry he was and how he should go work that anger out.

Ridge, Thomas, and Steffy have to be some of the most entitled people in the world. It doesn't matter at all what Hope wants or how Hope feels? The relationship has to move exactly according to Thomas's timetable and wishes, or else she's leading him on? That's not how relationships work. And, again, they've been together about 5 minutes, and he's only been (allegedly) non-psycho for about 10 minutes. Also, is Hope's divorce even final yet? And what is Steffy even talking about with Hope pushing Thomas away repeatedly? She tried to end things one time, and then reconsidered it. Ever since then, she's been very consistent. Just because Thomas hasn't wanted to hear what Hope has been saying, doesn't mean she hasn't been saying it. I could almost, almost, cut Steffy some slack if, when she was talking about him being Hope's rebound, she would have related it to her own experience as Liam's rebound, and talked about how now that she's found Finn and understands what it is to be her husband's first and only choice, she had the strength to turn down Liam's repeated attempts to make her his rebound again. And then say that she wants that for Thomas, too, for both of them to be happily out of Liam and Hope's mess. Could you imagine if when Finn and Steffy's marriage starts becoming more troubled, Hope advised Finn to take Hayes and get out of town for a while? Steffy would kill her. Speaking of Finn, Steffy, don't you have your own relationship to tend to? Your brother having a sad because his girlfriend has maintained her stance on waiting a while before discussing marriage seems like a lesser issue than your husband having visions of you stabbing his birth mother every time you guys try to get intimate.

Checking out the spoilers apparently the Forrester men are going with full on delusional next week. Blindsided? How is Hope sticking to the exact same thing she's said every single time you've brought up getting married blindsiding you? You blindsided her by springing another proposal on her before she told you she was ready for it, and then storming out in anger when she gave you the same answer she's been giving you. Dude, you're the one who convinced your son to do this shit, when Hope has been clear that she's not ready yet. You want answers from someone? Ask yourself why you keep pushing this relationship. (Spoiler alert, it's probably because you figure if he has Hope locked down, your son won't go all psycho, and you can shove all responsibility for his mental well being onto her shoulders). I mean... Zende, what are you doing, man? She's told you how many times that she loves RJ and doesn't see you that way? Leave her alone already.

As will I (as much as I hate to take Steffy's side in anything).

I do not know why Hope is just standing there indulging Steffy for this long. Just tell her it's between you and Thomas and walk out of the room, Hope. Instead, we were treated to the two of them basically repeating the same lines over and over again. And, Steffy, if you're worried that Hope not being ready to marry your psycho brother five minutes after she divorced someone else is going to wreck him, then you, deep down, know that he isn't "a different man now," no matter how much you and your parents insist he is. If he wasn't still an obsessive psycho about Hope, he wouldn't be in danger of going off the rails over this. Even if all the shit Thomas has done in the not remotely distant past wasn't an issue, if Hope was one of my friends, I'd be concerned about her and talking to her about the red flags in their relationship. There's the love bombing. There's the "nobody will love you like I do." There's him ignoring her boundaries. There's him proposing like 10 minutes after they started hooking up. There's him repeatedly pushing the engagement despite agreeing to give her time. There's the angry way he reacted to not getting what he wanted. If Brad Bell was trying to write an abusive relationship, he couldn't have hit the warning signs any more clearly.