S32.E05: You Don't Strike Me as a Renaissance Man

[lilabennet]

Chee does seem to do a lot of different things very well, while also managing to not constantly brag about how smart he is à la Leo and Alana or Eswar and Aparna.  I appreciate that, but I also get the feeling that part of his humble attitude may be a side effect of being henpecked by Hung.

[Babalu]

4 hours ago, AZChristian said:

Maybe they didn't realize that the native language of France is French.  LOL.

At least they knew France was in Africa.

[Fukui San]

OK, now we have really, really established that being a software engineer has no applications beyond engineering software.

The blond sisters are an objectively bad team but they are very good at communicating with one another and supporting each other. I don't hate their survival.

I drove stick in high school but haven't done so in 20+ years. I wonder how I'd fare?

I was waiting for someone to drop a cream pie.

[Fake Jan Brady]

I'm still chuckling over Michelle and Victoria's final words.

"Now when I say 'I love you she says 'Love you too'"

Smash cut to:

"Love you"

"I know".

[aghst]

I know navigation is an essential part of the game, at least design several legs around how well teams navigate.

But who in 2020 is poring over a paper map any more for driving directions?

If they were allowed smart phones, it would be too easy and it would be about Google skills?

Maybe, but it would reflect life and travel as they are now.

Well they're allowed to ask bystanders and cab drivers to look stuff up on their phones.  So they're kind of going half-way on the restrictions.  Many times, the bystanders congregate to watch the filming so they're not really discouraging the racers from borrowing phones.  It's just one step removed from them having their own phones handy.

Otherwise, they ask bystanders for directions, which introduces randomness since one team might have better luck finding people who knows places well.

Its only in the last 10 years or so but phones are indispensable now for traveling abroad.  It's inconceivable, the idea of not taking a phone on a trip.  You might have to find a wifi connection or know how to get SIM cards for local networks.  Isn't that a skill showing how you navigate through a place?

[GaT]

On 11/9/2020 at 8:35 PM, Johann said:

Fyi for those that rely on their DVRs, this episode wasn't picked up as new, even though it says it is in the description.  I guess because it was preempted last week.  I had to add it as a single episode.  Next week's ep is set to record as usual.

Well, this pisses me off. Now I have to wait for the episode to show up on OnDemand & try to avoid spoilers until then. 😠

[Tdoc72]

6 minutes ago, GaT said:

Well, this pisses me off. Now I have to wait for the episode to show up on OnDemand & try to avoid spoilers until then. 😠

My dvd didn’t pick it up either. As of midnight, it still wasn’t onDemand but it was on the CBS app. 

[Zahdii]

I'm almost certain that at least once in the past, a team hired a taxi driver to drive to their location while they followed behind.

[Katy M]

26 minutes ago, Zahdii said:

I'm almost certain that at least once in the past, a team hired a taxi driver to drive to their location while they followed behind.

Yep.  I remember that.  Creative and lucky they had that much money left, I guess.

5 hours ago, aghst said:

Its only in the last 10 years or so but phones are indispensable now for traveling abroad.  It's inconceivable, the idea of not taking a phone on a trip.  You might have to find a wifi connection or know how to get SIM cards for local networks.  Isn't that a skill showing how you navigate through a place?

Went to Canada last year without a phone. I survived.

[Haleth]

Will was way out of line complaining that Leo didn't help them enough.  Entitled much?  Yeah, Leo was only getting them out of the way so other teams could drive off, but that's what a race is.  It's certainly easier to get the car into gear on a flat surface than a ramp.

The blondes' facial expressions crack me up so I'm glad they are still in it.  For now.  Plus I've seen enough of Michelle.

6.5 hours driving around?  And how many times did Aparna pick the wrong dinner guest?  Not a good showing for the women.

Having pies thrown at them at the bakery was funny.  

9 hours ago, chaifan said:

Did the matched up actors leave the room after they were matched?  So the 2nd team only had 8 to choose from, then 7, etc.?  If that's the case, then I give the later teams extra props, as their odds of finding a match were less than the earlier teams.  (Like most needle in a haystack challenges, it's an extra reward to get there first.) 

 

7 hours ago, blackwing said:

And each only was used once, so it became progressively harder for those who came later.

Nope.  Riley (or was it Madison?) and another racer both picked the man with the dead animal around his shoulders.

5 hours ago, aghst said:

If they were allowed smart phones, it would be too easy and it would be about Google skills?

Maybe, but it would reflect life and travel as they are now.

That would not be fun to watch.

[AZChristian]

Will and James jump in car to drive through Paris.

Will:  "I took manual transmission driving lessons, so I am prepared for this leg."

Grind, jerk, no movement.

Leo:  "Can I help you?"

Will:  "Yes, please."

Leo:  "Okay, I'll move you backwards back down the ramp."

Will:  "Can't you move us FORWARD?"

Later.

Will:  "I figured out I was trying to start in 3rd gear."  (Going UP a ramp, which is tricky enough for novices in 1st gear.)

Me:  "I wonder if he can get a refund on his driving lessons, or is he just that stupid that he didn't bother to look at the clearly marked numbers on the knob."

[Katy M]

39 minutes ago, AZChristian said:

Leo:  "Okay, I'll move you backwards back down the ramp."

Will:  "Can't you move us FORWARD?"

Yeah, I was kind of wondering how that was going to work.  If he couldn't get past him to go forward, how would he get past his car and the other team's to get Will backward?

[Lamb18]

11 hours ago, mtlchick said:

That was a pretty fun yet tough leg. But I would love to get the details on how the sisters spent SIX AND A HALF HOURS driving to someplace relatively close.  I know Paris traffic is bad but there has to be more to it. 

It's hard to understand as the road to Bercy is along the river. I've had cabs take me along that road on the way to my hotel from the airport. But there are several busy intersections in the area and they could have easily took a wrong turn. Also I think one team, maybe one of the sister teams, drove all the way into Paris from the airport instead of going to Chantilly ( it is on the way from Charles de Gaulle airport.

There wouldn't have been much signage for Bercy until they were nearly there. The best way to go would have been to turn off on the big freeway loop around the city and take the Bercy  exit. The painting roadblock did remind me of season 4's mask roadblock in Venice. The carnival place in Bercy is relatively new; it used to be a rundown warehouse/wine storage area that was no longer used. I'm glad they are restoring the area instead tearing it all down.

[AZChristian]

13 minutes ago, Katy M said:

Yeah, I was kind of wondering how that was going to work.  If he couldn't get past him to go forward, how would he get past his car and the other team's to get Will backward?

I don't still have it on my DVR.  Was there room for Leo to just move W&J forward about 5 feet and leave them up against the wall there?  That would have been kind of funny.

[SoCal4Us]

Well "Be one with the car, My Love" is my new line for anyone leaving the house. Thank you James!

[Cotypubby]

7 hours ago, aghst said:

I know navigation is an essential part of the game, at least design several legs around how well teams navigate.

But who in 2020 is poring over a paper map any more for driving directions?

If they were allowed smart phones, it would be too easy and it would be about Google skills?

Maybe, but it would reflect life and travel as they are now.

Well they're allowed to ask bystanders and cab drivers to look stuff up on their phones.  So they're kind of going half-way on the restrictions.  Many times, the bystanders congregate to watch the filming so they're not really discouraging the racers from borrowing phones.  It's just one step removed from them having their own phones handy.

Otherwise, they ask bystanders for directions, which introduces randomness since one team might have better luck finding people who knows places well.

Its only in the last 10 years or so but phones are indispensable now for traveling abroad.  It's inconceivable, the idea of not taking a phone on a trip.  You might have to find a wifi connection or know how to get SIM cards for local networks.  Isn't that a skill showing how you navigate through a place?

That would be so boring and take all the drama out of the race. Half the fun of the show is watching people try to figure out how to get somewhere and getting extremely lost. “Hey Siri, where is Bercy?” would be dull to watch.

[J-Man]

Did we see anyone other than Riley/Maddison in front of the Yield? I'm wondering why no one else chose to use it. It might have made sense for one of the teams toward the bottom of the pack.

[blackwing]

So this episode helped me distinguish between Riley and Maddison... Riley is the shorter one with the squintier eyes and the smaller beard.  I think.  I didn't care for how he kept complaining about his brother's athletic skills.  Those tasks looked tough... especially the throw the ball into the clown mouth.  Three times in a row?  Maybe the hole was a lot bigger than it looked on TV.  I noticed that Michelle was the only one who did that task with an underhanded throw.  The horse race, there is a game like that at Six Flags, and I think I've even seen it in local carnivals.  If it's really an "old" game, I had no idea it was so old.

13 minutes ago, AZChristian said:

I don't still have it on my DVR.  Was there room for Leo to just move W&J forward about 5 feet and leave them up against the wall there?  That would have been kind of funny.

 

I think that's essentially what he did... he moved them down the ramp a little and hugged them against the wall, leaving room so that others could get by their car.  I was wondering what would happen if Will just refused to move, and stubbornly sat there until he got it.  He wouldn't have been breaking any rules, he wasn't purposely blocking or delaying others, he just was a bad driver.

What gall for the little one to whine about how Leo had "no empathy" for them.  I don't like Leo, but why should he have?  Will and James blatantly targeted Leo and Alana.  If the situation had been reversed I have absolutely no doubt they wouldn't have had empathy either.

8 hours ago, Dani said:

They are full sisters. Genetics are weird and siblings can look very different. Asianness varies greatly even in full Asians. 

According to their bio both of their parents are Vietnamese immigrants. 

Interesting, thanks for the info.  I assumed their father is white because their last name is Newland... perhaps the parents anglicized their last name when they immigrated.  (I've wondered about Natalie and Nadia Anderson as well.)

1 hour ago, Haleth said:

Nope.  Riley (or was it Madison?) and another racer both picked the man with the dead animal around his shoulders.

Didn't catch that, thanks.  A lot of the male characters looked very similar.  I don't know why more people didn't try and identify the women in the colorful dresses.  The lady in the yellow dress with the gray Marie Antoinette hair would have been the first one I tried.  Hung was smart to notice that there was a guy that looked like Jesus and then went and found him in the paintings.  I think she was the only one that approached the task this way.

 

So now there are 7 teams left, and still 5 teams in the alliance hahahaha.  Waiting for it all to crumble.

[AZChristian]

6 minutes ago, blackwing said:

Interesting, thanks for the info.  I assumed their father is white because their last name is Newland... perhaps the parents anglicized their last name when they immigrated.

The most common last name in Vietnam is Nguyen . . . Newland could well be an anglicized version of that.

[Katy M]

25 minutes ago, blackwing said:

So now there are 7 teams left, and still 5 teams in the alliance hahahaha.  Waiting for it all to crumble.

I've never really understood alliances in this game. They're not all that helpful, and if it comes down between you getting ahead and helping an ally, you're going to get ahead, so it really makes no sense.  Not one team dropped the pies due to surprise, so I don't think that heads up was that big of a deal, though they did seem to run through faster.  No real advantage, though.

 

27 minutes ago, blackwing said:

What gall for the little one to whine about how Leo had "no empathy" for them.  I don't like Leo, but why should he have?  Will and James blatantly targeted Leo and Alana.  If the situation had been reversed I have absolutely no doubt they wouldn't have had empathy either.

Yeah, no kidding.  Like I said earlier this is the first epi I've watched, but from the dialogue I gathered that they recently U-turned them.  When you u-turn a team, you're not going to make friends.  And that's worse (not wrong) than supposedly being snarky or unempathetic.

[mertensia]

8 hours ago, aghst said:

I know navigation is an essential part of the game, at least design several legs around how well teams navigate.

But who in 2020 is poring over a paper map any more for driving directions?

If they were allowed smart phones, it would be too easy and it would be about Google skills?

Maybe, but it would reflect life and travel as they are now.

Well they're allowed to ask bystanders and cab drivers to look stuff up on their phones.  So they're kind of going half-way on the restrictions.  Many times, the bystanders congregate to watch the filming so they're not really discouraging the racers from borrowing phones.  It's just one step removed from them having their own phones handy.

Otherwise, they ask bystanders for directions, which introduces randomness since one team might have better luck finding people who knows places well.

Its only in the last 10 years or so but phones are indispensable now for traveling abroad.  It's inconceivable, the idea of not taking a phone on a trip.  You might have to find a wifi connection or know how to get SIM cards for local networks.  Isn't that a skill showing how you navigate through a place?

I use a map. I find they help me understand better where things are. Northern Arizona, Maui, Kauai, the Big Island, and Italy: all navigated using maps.

Also, there are places where there is no cellphone coverage. Try much of the American Southwest outside the cities. I'm told GPS can also be unreliable in those areas. 

I certainly have never traveled internationally with a cellphone; I see no reason to. 

[Katy M]

30 minutes ago, blackwing said:

think that's essentially what he did... he moved them down the ramp a little and hugged them against the wall, leaving room so that others could get by their car.  I was wondering what would happen if Will just refused to move, and stubbornly sat there until he got it.  He wouldn't have been breaking any rules, he wasn't purposely blocking or delaying others, he just was a bad driver.

But, then what would happen when other cars started piling up.  They're not the only people who want out of the airport.  I wouldn't have wanted to chance security or the police.

[AZChristian]

Surprised that Gary (as a jock) was a Renaissance man.

Surprised that DeAngelo (as a jock) knew what a Renaissance man is.

 

[aemom]

11 hours ago, Cotypubby said:

When the chefs were throwing pies at Leo and Alana, all I could think was that I would be pissed if someone did that to me and got it all over my glasses. I hope they were able to clean up or something. 

I was worried that they would BREAK someone's glasses.  They were throwing those pies without mercy.

 

8 hours ago, Fake Jan Brady said:

I'm still chuckling over Michelle and Victoria's final words.

"Now when I say 'I love you she says 'Love you too'"

Smash cut to:

"Love you"

"I know".

Someone's a Han Solo fan. 😉

[vousviou]

I think it's worth pointing out that the caption for Michelle and Victoria was almost certainly referring to the whole day's time in the car -- Airport to chateau to museum -- not just the section from chateau to museum.

The caption only referred to "elapsed time in car" and factoring in all of the other travel time, if they had spent six hours just on the little 2 KM stretch they showed on the map, they would have gotten a visit from Phil shutting them down before they started playing carnival games.

[chaifan]

3 hours ago, Haleth said:

Nope.  Riley (or was it Madison?) and another racer both picked the man with the dead animal around his shoulders.

 

That's what I thought at first, but go to page 1 of this thread - someone posted the portraits each team matched up.  The first two were very similar, but different guys. 

[vousviou]

18 minutes ago, AZChristian said:

Surprised that Gary (as a jock) was a Renaissance man.

Surprised that DeAngelo (as a jock) knew what a Renaissance man is.

 

The first episode intro pointed out that they had bonded over their diverse interests, including enjoying sci fi and going in costumes to conventions.

The stereotype of NFL players as meatheads is wildly exaggerated -- George Plimpton, founder of the Paris Review, talked about how  he realized it was wrong when he wrote Paper Lion in the 60s, and said he found the Detroit Lions back then were generally well educated.

[Snickerdoodle]

13 hours ago, sinycalone said:

The pie-throwing was my highlight....laughed so hard.  Nice surprise for sure.

I can't figure out, like others have mentioned, how Victoria/Michelle were driving that fairly short distance for 6 1/2 hours.  Yes, it was raining; yes, traffic can be bad -- but they were getting maps with specific directions.   What a nightmare for them...but I won't miss them.

Well, Gary is a Renaissance Man!  That was funny....he was not kidding.

I think the smartest one (forget who it was) picked out Jesus in one of the paintings....and had no trouble finding the "duplicate" because he stood out.  (I really thought some of the living doubles were not really very close in appearance to the paintings.)

 

 

 

I think Victoria and Michelle were looking for some grand-looking building to be the museum.  Instead it looked more like a warehouse, and I don't think they ever read the sign outside.  The Amazing Editors insinuated they were very close to the museum many times, but looked past it.

Speaking of the editors, I loved that they kept the camera on DeAngelo while Gary was talking about how he loves art.  DeAngelo's facial expressions made me laugh, plus his exasperated, "Who ARE you?" at the end.

Edited November 12, 2020 by Snickerdoodle

[Netfoot]

36 minutes ago, mertensia said:

I certainly have never traveled internationally with a cellphone; I see no reason to

Toured the UK a couple years ago, and covered 4,000 odd miles, navigating the entire way with my phone providing a hotspot for Google Maps on my tablet. Except for about 2 hours around the north end of Conniston Water, where there was no signal. After that, discovered that you can pre-load the map for the next days travel from the night before. (You don't get traffic updates, but you can find your way.)

For the two hours, I used a paper map, which long ago, I was taught how to use by the same people who taught me how to shoot a Lee-Enfield Number 4 rifle.

I'd recommend Google Maps over any other type of navigation I've ever tried (because you can ask it to point out coffee shops, etc, along your route) but map reading is a basic, essential skill, like telling time or boiling an egg.

[AZChristian]

7 minutes ago, vousviou said:

The first episode intro pointed out that they had bonded over their diverse interests, including enjoying sci fi and going in costumes to conventions.

The stereotype of NFL players as meatheads is wildly exaggerated -- George Plimpton, founder of the Paris Review, talked about how  he realized it was wrong when he wrote Paper Lion in the 60s, and said he found the Detroit Lions back then were generally well educated.

I think many pro athletes do take advantage of their athletic scholarships to do more than serve as a stepping stone to professional sports.  I once had a high school history teacher who went on to become a relief pitcher for the Baltimore Orioles.  His teammates called him "The Professor" because his favorite pastime in the bullpen (when not warming up) was conducting Jeopardy-like quizzes for them.  

Sadly, too much of what we hear these days includes stories of brain damage due to head-to-head hits on helmets.

I just thought their interaction was hysterical.

3 minutes ago, Netfoot said:

. . .  map reading is a basic, essential skill, like telling time or boiling an egg.

Or driving (and PRACTICING) with a stick shift if you're going to apply for The Amazing Race.

[vousviou]

7 minutes ago, Snickerdoodle said:

I think Victoria and Michelle were looking for some grand-looking building to be the museum.  Instead it looked more like a warehouse, and I don't think they ever read the sign outside.  The Amazing Editors insinuated they were very close to the museum many times, but looked past it.

Which is notable considering the location of the Symphony in the last episode was throwing some of the teams for a loop because it wasn't a fancy orchestra hall but a plain building in the middle of a refuse sorting area.

[blackwing]

6 minutes ago, vousviou said:

The first episode intro pointed out that they had bonded over their diverse interests, including enjoying sci fi and going in costumes to conventions.

The stereotype of NFL players as meatheads is wildly exaggerated -- George Plimpton, founder of the Paris Review, talked about how  he realized it was wrong when he wrote Paper Lion in the 60s, and said he found the Detroit Lions back then were generally well educated.

Yes, that was pleasantly surprising to hear Gary say he loved art and to see how quickly he got the task done.  I agree that many football players don't meet the dumb meathead stereotype.  I've always thought that of the professional athletes in the four major sports, football players as a whole are probably smarter.  All of them go to college, and unless they declare early for the draft, they all graduate.  I know that every college probably has the stereotypical easy classes like "Rocks for Jocks" that are filled with athletes, but I know some schools have had academic cheating scandals where others take the exams for the athletes, so at least there is an effort to keep the football players honest.  Contrast to baseball or hockey, where the great majority of players don't go to college.  And in football, there are huge playbooks that the players have to memorize, and they have to remember the play numbers, etc.

I am interested to see what Aparna says about why she needed 17 attempts, when most others only needed one.  I feel like there should have been an additional time penalty for each guess.  Like five minutes before you can make another attempt.  Otherwise what was stopping her from finding a woman in the yellow dress and just rattling off all of the paintings she thought the woman was in?  I've thought the same on other "guessing" tasks in the past where teams can just immediately change their answer, and some of them had no wait period required.

[vousviou]

2 minutes ago, AZChristian said:

I think many pro athletes do take advantage of their athletic scholarships to do more than serve as a stepping stone to professional sports.  I once had a high school history teacher who went on to become a relief pitcher for the Baltimore Orioles.  His teammates called him "The Professor" because his favorite pastime in the bullpen (when not warming up) was conducting Jeopardy-like quizzes for them.  

Sadly, too much of what we hear these days includes stories of brain damage due to head-to-head hits on helmets.

I just thought their interaction was hysterical.

You are right about many taking advantage of the scholarships -- the typical athlete, even a star, has no idea if they are going to make a pro team or not, and they know they need a plan B.

[Haleth]

1 hour ago, chaifan said:

That's what I thought at first, but go to page 1 of this thread - someone posted the portraits each team matched up.  The first two were very similar, but different guys. 

You’re right that racers picked the first two of those portraits but two racers picked the second dude with the dead thing on his shoulders.

The carnival games after the circus in the first episode makes me wonder if this will be a theme?

Edited November 12, 2020 by Haleth

[Quilt Fairy]

1 hour ago, mertensia said:

I use a map. I find they help me understand better where things are.

Me, too.  (Although to be fair, I am an old fart.)  I would take a map over a GPS system telling me "turn left in 50 yards" any day.  I like to know where I am and what the basic road/street network is, which helps me understand how to get where I need to go.  You don't get that from something telling you where to go step by step.   I have also read that being able to navigate increases the size of your brain, although the article where I read that was probably also written by an old fart.

I wonder if part of the sisters' problem was that the clue said they were looking for a museum, while the actual building itself looked like a row of garages or loading docks. 

BTW, I re-watched this episode after it was clear that I had not correctly understood the portrait task.  There were 9 available portrait/person matches, not 8.

[shura]

10 hours ago, Fukui San said:

OK, now we have really, really established that being a software engineer has no applications beyond engineering software.

I am actually starting to wonder if they are good even at engineering software...

Is it me or was there no mention at all of Gary and DeAngelo for the first 25 minutes of the episode?  Didn't see them start the leg, didn't see them board a plane, nothing - all the while everybody else was already driving in Paris and even finishing their painting-matching task.  I thought I missed a minute at the beginning of the episode where the show explained how one of them got sick and they had to forfeit or something.  Only when the Beards (after having finished the paintings thing!) mentioned their alliance with the football players I knew there were still there.

[Katy M]

2 minutes ago, shura said:

I am actually starting to wonder if they are good even at engineering software...

Is it me or was there no mention at all of Gary and DeAngelo for the first 25 minutes of the episode?  Didn't see them start the leg, didn't see them board a plane, nothing - all the while everybody else was already driving in Paris and even finishing their painting-matching task.  I thought I missed a minute at the beginning of the episode where the show explained how one of them got sick and they had to forfeit or something.  Only when the Beards (after having finished the paintings thing!) mentioned their alliance with the football players I knew there were still there.

I honestly don't remember.  But, if they weren't seen at all in the beginning it could have been technical issues with their camera crew.  Can't exactly make them go back and start all over because you realize you forgot to take the lens cap off:)

[AuntieDiane6]

Quote

I appreciate that, but I also get the feeling that part of his humble attitude may be a side effect of being henpecked by Hung.

Asians culturally respect humility.  There would be no reason for a TALL handsome Asian to be henpecked by that tiny wife with a gummy smile who is only a few inches from being on a Little People show.  (My native Chinese sister-in-law said, partly in jest, that she married my brother because at 5'10" she was taller than almost every guy she knew.) 

[HurricaneVal]

I wonder if Aparna is colorblind?  Or has another sort of maybe even undiagnosed cognitive issue that makes her unable to differentiate faces?  Or.....also very likely......she didn't read the clue carefully, and didn't realize there were only nine portraits with matches, and she kept picking sort-of-close portrait pairs that weren't part of the task?  I figure it is the last one.  Although, I did see her bringing several women wearing similar dresses but in different colors up to the judge, so it could be colorblindness in addition to failure to carefully read the clue.

[Pepper Mostly]

15 hours ago, Katy M said:

I'll agree that it was ridiculous that he was snarking on him.  Unless they edited it out, Leo wasn't mean to them at all. But, he didn't really save them (unless you mean being murdered by the other team).  All he did was pull the car out of the way so the other teams could get by.  If Will hadn't figured out what he was doing wrong, he'd still be sitting at the airport.  But, that's fine.  It's not Leo's job to teach him how to drive.

Because Leo and Alana's goal is not for Will and James to win, silly! Seriously, if the car mini meltdown is any indication, when Killer Fatigue sets in we are in for some real histrionics, weeping, and tantrums. I'll go pop the popcorn. 

I like Leo and Alana just fine. They're young and enthusiastic and they get the job done. They've been excited about every task and have't complained. No one else made a decision to get Will and James out of the way. I don't see how Alana referencing her MFA as an advantage in a task is any different from Will (or James) saying he's a dancer so can ace the bottle dancing. Shrug. 

1 hour ago, AZChristian said:

I think many pro athletes do take advantage of their athletic scholarships to do more than serve as a stepping stone to professional sports.  I once had a high school history teacher who went on to become a relief pitcher for the Baltimore Orioles.  His teammates called him "The Professor" because his favorite pastime in the bullpen (when not warming up) was conducting Jeopardy-like quizzes for them.  

When I worked at Tufts Dental we had a guy in the Masters program who'd played pro baseball for a few years. Then he became a dentist. My boss, the program director, was a huge baseball fan and was so starstruck. Former Red Sox player Jim Lonborg is also a TUSDM alum. 

I was glad to see Kaylynn and Hayley survive. I like them, they have a great attitude and they don't lose their cool.

[meep.meep]

15 hours ago, chaifan said:

 

Whipping all that cream must have been hard! I've only attempted to hand whip cream once, and ever since then have used my KitchenAid.  Did the racers shower after that task?  The blondes were the only ones who looked like they had whipped cream in their hair.  Everyone else looked pretty clean.  Also, a number of the women had problems with the torque hats falling over their faces - that's a detail production shouldn't have missed.  Everyone should have had properly fitting hats. 

 

I've whipped cream by hand - with a whisk and with an egg beater.  If you don't have the appliances, or they are dirty, you learn the old fashioned way.

The blondes weren't wearing their hats when they entered the "delivery" tent.  Thinking they were last, maybe they didn't want to take the time to clean up?

I admire Aparna for sticking to the task when she was having so much trouble.  She was laughing at the next one so not even stewing internally.  Getting over a loss quickly is important when there are many tasks ahead.

[Katy M]

1 hour ago, HurricaneVal said:

I wonder if Aparna is colorblind?  Or has another sort of maybe even undiagnosed cognitive issue that makes her unable to differentiate faces?  Or.....also very likely......she didn't read the clue carefully, and didn't realize there were only nine portraits with matches, and she kept picking sort-of-close portrait pairs that weren't part of the task?  I figure it is the last one.  Although, I did see her bringing several women wearing similar dresses but in different colors up to the judge, so it could be colorblindness in addition to failure to carefully read the clue.

If she's colorblind, then it was silly to pick her to do that roadblock.  I think the thingie before they have to decide who does it was something about an eye for detail.  They should have realized there might be color involved in that.  My best friend and I sent in an application years ago. So, whenever I watch I mentally decide which detour we would do and who should do the roadblock. I immediately pegged her for this roadblock because I don't have good visual recall.  I always say I need to upgrade my facial recognition software. So, if this was something she knew about, I would think they would have flipped who did the task even w/o fully knowing what it was.

[aemom]

1 hour ago, shura said:

Is it me or was there no mention at all of Gary and DeAngelo for the first 25 minutes of the episode?  Didn't see them start the leg, didn't see them board a plane, nothing - all the while everybody else was already driving in Paris and even finishing their painting-matching task.  I thought I missed a minute at the beginning of the episode where the show explained how one of them got sick and they had to forfeit or something.  Only when the Beards (after having finished the paintings thing!) mentioned their alliance with the football players I knew there were still there.

I think(?) that I recall seeing them put their backpacks in the overhead bins on the plane.

[dgpolo]

6 hours ago, Katy M said:

6 hours ago, Zahdii said:

I'm almost certain that at least once in the past, a team hired a taxi driver to drive to their location while they followed behind.

Yep.  I remember that.  Creative and lucky they had that much money left, I guess.

They used to do that quite a lot but I believe it is against the rules now and someone got in trouble for doing it, but I don't remember which season. I also think they can no longer use a 'Fern' to guide them around town.

Found this on Amazing Race Wiki

As of at least The Amazing Race 17, if teams are instructed to walk or drive themselves to a destination, teams cannot hire a taxi to guide or take them through the route. This was confirmed in "I Want to Be in the Circus, That's Where I Belong", where Michael & Kevin were penalized for doing so.

Prior to this, teams were allowed to do so, as long as they weren't expressly prohibited from doing so by their clue.

[Fake Jan Brady]

4 hours ago, Pepper Mostly said:

I was glad to see Kaylynn and Hayley survive. I like them, they have a great attitude and they don't lose their cool.

The pep talk Hayley gave Kaylynn "The sign said Bercy in five minutes and after that you'll never have to drive this car again" endeared them to me, but when they ran up to the mat laughing at the ridiculousness of their day, assuming they were to be eliminated, I kind of fell in love with them.

[iMonrey]

I've heard of being face blind, but is being costume blind a thing? Because maybe Aparna has that. To be fair, you really had to go by the costumes, because most of the hairstyles were not matches. One of the women in particular had nowhere close to the same hairstyle. That said, it looked like Aparna was trying to match women that were wearing completely different colors!

While I'm generally disinclined to like the Barbie Twin teams, I have to give mad props to Kaylynn and Haley for laughing at their misfortunes all the way to the finish mat and being all smiles even when they thought they were going home. That's the kind of attitude we all ask for in our racing teams and rarely get. They may suck at this but they sure are getting a kick out of it.

I didn't understand how the horse race arcade game worked. Can someone explain that to me?

[blackwing]

5 hours ago, AuntieDiane6 said:

Asians culturally respect humility.  There would be no reason for a TALL handsome Asian to be henpecked by that tiny wife with a gummy smile who is only a few inches from being on a Little People show.  (My native Chinese sister-in-law said, partly in jest, that she married my brother because at 5'10" she was taller than almost every guy she knew.) 

I'm not really sure what this means... are you saying that tall Asian men cannot be henpecked because they are tall?  1) Chee doesn't seem that tall to me... when we see them standing next to each other, it looks like she comes up to about his shoulders.  Example, see this picture.  If she is 5'0" I'd say he's maybe about 5'9", that seems about average to me.  2)  I don't understand why just because the man is taller than the woman by a significant amount, that makes him less susceptible to being henpecked.  Because he is physically intimidating and he won't allow it?

I've seen plenty of real-life examples amongst my friends and acquaintances of all races where the husband is significantly taller and bigger than his wife and he is very henpecked.  Even on TAR, we had the prime example of a doormat, Chuck from TAR 4 who was quite tall and his girlfriend Millie the Mole was quite short, and he was about as henpecked as they come.

I stand by my assertion from his confessional last episode when he dourly and robotically stated that they did not do well on the watermelons because he doesn't listen and communicate.  I'm sure in between the time when we heard Hung yelling "you have to talk to me" and that confessional, that she had repeated this over and over and over off camera to the point where it was ingrained on him that he is a bad communicator.  His demeanor and expression made him seem very henpecked.

5 hours ago, HurricaneVal said:

I wonder if Aparna is colorblind?  Or has another sort of maybe even undiagnosed cognitive issue that makes her unable to differentiate faces?  Or.....also very likely......she didn't read the clue carefully, and didn't realize there were only nine portraits with matches, and she kept picking sort-of-close portrait pairs that weren't part of the task?  I figure it is the last one.  Although, I did see her bringing several women wearing similar dresses but in different colors up to the judge, so it could be colorblindness in addition to failure to carefully read the clue.

I'm sure if she is colourblind, she definitely would have said it on the show.  "I can't tell what colour that dress is because I am colour blind, I wish Eswar had done this one."  I think the reason why she failed so badly is because, of course, she is an engineer.  In her mind she divided the room into a grid, and placed each character into a grid.  Then she pictured the grid when she was in the painting room, found the painting she wanted, then went back to the party room, only to find that the stupid characters didn't stay in the grid!  Why not?  That goes against her engineering principles.  She is an engineer and engineers are good at constructing and maths and sciences and analyzing.  If there's anything to be analyzed, then she as an engineer should have an advantage.  In fact, I'm surprised they haven't already told the others to just drop out now because nobody can solve a puzzle better than an engineer!

[blackwing]

4 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

I didn't understand how the horse race arcade game worked. Can someone explain that to me?

You have a ball, you need to roll your ball up the inclined ramp and get it to drop into one of the holes.  I forget the colors but there was one hole, the farthest back one, which will move your horse the farthest.  Then there were a smaller number of holes that move your horse a medium amount.  And the closest and more numerous easy holes will move your horse the shortest.  If you don't get the ball into any hole, it will drop down and not move you at all (kind of like not scoring in Skee ball).  The ball is returned to you and you keep repeating until someone's horse advances far enough to win.

I'm curious to learn how long each team was at that game.  I think Leo told someone that he had lost several games already but the magic of editing made it seem like others won right away.  I wish they had a running clock showing how long each team was at each task.  I wonder if some of the extras were told to lose the game (you can purposely throw your ball too hard so it won't land in any of the holes, or you can roll it gently enough where it would only reach the "short" holes) after some of the racers had been there a while.

Edited November 12, 2020 by blackwing

[bankerchick]

Quote

Not sure why Aparna was struggling so. Speaking of her...she hasn't really developed any clear personality.

Well, in the first episode, she told us they were 'really f* smart.'  That's as much personality as I need from her and allowed me to laugh at her cluelessness.

Didn't like the beards telling everyone in the cream challenge except the nerds about the pie throwers because they 'had an alliance.'  It just seemed so petty, especially since it really didn't help anyone.

Watching the boyfriends get their asses in a knot because a team that they not only U-turned, but openly and rudely conspired against, didn't provide enough empathy when helping them up the ramp, is the kind of thing that ruins the show for me.  They are so unlikeable that I don't really want to watch them anymore.  Which probably means they'll win.

[TVbitch]

I felt the editing was not ideal in this episode. They spend a lot of time on the first flight teams trying to drive a stick, then the whole second group was not seen until they showed up at the first roadblock. Then they got through the first and second road block quite quickly with 20 minutes left in the show and many of the teams already checked in. I thought for sure there was going to be a showdown between the two sister teams at the arcade, but then it turned out no, the one team was way behind and out. 

The whipped cream and pie throwing should have been more fun, but it was pretty easy and just kind of blah. It should have harder ...or the pie throwers should have been able to aim at their arms to knock those pies down.  

Phil should have made the blondes suffer more at the pit stop! He let them know right away something was up. That's no fun! 

Edited November 13, 2020 by TVbitch