Bachelorette Desiree: The Men Tell All Before I Do

Hello, Readers.  I know that many of you are expecting my brilliant advice in response to your questions.  Patience.  That will come.  However, as those of you on Twitter know, I actually did watch the Men Tell All (as much of it as I could physically stand) last night.  While I won't be providing a play by play, I will give you a bit of a breakdown in addition to some thoughts.  

So where in the hell is DP Tells All?  It's substantially complete.  I received a few really good questions late in the day yesterday and I really want to answer them.  Like any good Bachelorette after Fantasy Suite Night can tell you; sometimes it really pays to be flexible.  Speaking of flexible, I noticed a severe lack of it last night when it came to all of the guys' hair.   Good Lord.  Kasey looked like the freaking Slim Jim Guy for crying out loud.  I assumed the Hair and Makeup Department ran out of White Rain and had to substitute Gorilla Glue.  

Slip into a Slim Jim

Kasey

Incidentally, Gorilla Glue is the only product on Earth that works better than advertised.  The stuff is unbelievable.   That's the type of glue that the missing-in-action MH and I used to glue our plates and beer glasses to the table in New Orleans.  You can read about that in addition to my attempted theft of a wooden Indian and an ambush by two Bourbon Street strippers by entering Almost in Jeopardy into the search engine to your right.  I'm sure Kasey would disagree with my Slim Jim comparison.  Hell, he'd probably want to counter-accusate.  I'd win that argument.  He's incredibly inexpressive.  Now, let's get to the big show.

I'm certain it wasn't a surprise to any of you that we began with the standard MTA formula.  At first, that annoyed me but after a few pulls on bottle number one of Lone Star Beer I settled in and realized that it's not wise to mess with what works; particularly if you're earning a jillion dollars doing it.

Keeping with this season's theme of filling the drought of viable footage of Desiree and her suitors with more fluff than a San Fernando Valley porno shoot we pass the first 20 minutes with recaps upon recaps stacked like neatly folded, multi-colored v-necks in a chest of drawers.

Please don't Google "fluffer" if you're at work and didn't get that reference.  I'm already responsible for wasting enough of your employer's time.  I'd hate to be responsible for getting you fired.  Speaking of getting fired (I'm full of them today), this show heated up like the clay "ashtray" we all made in high school art class in the kilns of our pot-smoking art teachers:  slowly, over an extended period of time.  We had to endure the standard party shots of Bachelor alumni swilling cosmos and pretending like they're famous while simultaneously praying for another 15 minutes of pseudo-notoriety.  If we could mash them all together into one person they'd be Kim Kardashian.  Maybe that's why her ass is so disproportionately large.

We saw Ashley and the return of her Fivehead (bangs be damned), her husband J.P. (good for them), Molly and Mesnick and their new bundle of joy who, ironically, did NOT cry on a balcony, and some other folks I vaguely recognized.  Of course, they dusted off the cornerstones of the franchise, Trista and her up-do, sans the squinty-eyed Ryan who I can only image is the only person more sick of the show than the rest of us.

They're obviously not sick enough to stop cashing Fleiss' personal checks, however.  Frankly, I don't blame them.  Ryan can fight all the fires he wants but Fliess is like Abel Freaking Magwich when it comes to their kids.

Fleiss and Trista's Kid

At least they're not accosting me on the covers of magazines in the grocery store line begging me to read about how Trista "got her body back," "looks so young after her latest kid," or "keeps her beach body in tip top shape."  Hell, that's a two word article:  "Plastic" and "Surgery."

Look, I know rampant cynicism isn't attractive but it's warranted here.  The best part about being a constant cynic is that I can only be pleasantly surprised.  Think about it.  Back to the show.

Des is apparently sweating like a fat kid at the park over the prospect of confronting the "Bad Boys" (another obnoxious theme) in the shady (yet artfully lighted) confines of the Men Tell All Studio surrounded by sycophants and a room full of females ready to draw blood in her name.  Braveheart had less support than she did.  What in the hell was she worried about?  Like Braveheart, I screamed for freedom.

Ever ready for camera time, past Bach'ettes Emily (still hot), Ali (still annoying), and Ashley (again) arrive for some girl time.  Considering the fact that 2 out of the three failed miserably (twice) on the show I'm not so certain Des should have been entirely confident in their advice.  Aside from Emily's radiance (let's face it, she's pretty) the biggest distraction dominating that scene was Ali's multi-colored hair.  Talk about Fifty Shades of Grey.  Horrible.  She should fire the San Francisco homosexual who colored that and chose the extensions to match.  She's not EmmyLou Harris for God's sake.  Fix it.

Now THAT's how grey should look. 

Some Guy, of course, measures time in Lone Star consumption.  After about 4 of them, this portion of the show was finally over and Harrison thankfully informed us that we were ready to enter the Secret Lair to discuss Des, confront corruption, beat up on Ben, jump on James, and want Juan Pablo.  "It's finally on," I thought.  Well, it's on after a dozen commercials and some inexplicably unfunny shots of the intern who drew the short straw in the knight suit in various places on the Bachelorette back lot.  "Is this the Men Tell All or Benny F*cking Hill," I wondered aloud.

We finally introduce the guys.  What's always surprising to me is how many of these guys I literally can't remember even though they've been annoying me for weeks at a time.  Brandon?  He apparently stole Drew's haircut (and hair gel) and Zak looked so orange I thought he might have jaundice.

Zak on the Men Tell All

Please allow me to digress before I gloss over the meat(heads) of the show.  I said last week that I wouldn't be blogging about this show because I can't stand the pointless bickering, jockeying for position, and the inane issues that that send these idiots bounding out of their chairs in sweat-filled rants.  Thank God for Axe Body Spray.  It's beyond me why this is appealing to the demographic.  Abe Lincoln one said, "people who like this sort of thing will find this the sort of thing they like."  I suppose that's as good a reason as any.  I'll remain dumbfounded.

Look, Tad.  James is an idiot and Zak looks orange.  I think I'll go to Ford's Theater rather than watch this nonsense.

Finally, if this is the modus operandi of the majority of 23-28 year old men in this country than I'm worried.  I credit myself with being an introspective person with a real ability to be honest with myself about my shortcomings; however, as hard as I try I can never remember being that big of an idiot in my early 20's.  Like my imaginary therapist once told me:  "It's not all about you, DP.  It never is."  In this case, that's the best advice I ever heard.

Here's where I start to paraphrase for the sake of my own sanity.

Harrison earns his fat paycheck (as he should) by breaking down the "bad boys" (no less annoying than it was at the beginning of the show), stirring the pot, and earning his fair share of "spontaneous" applause from the XX chromosome filled audience.

I've said this before and I'll reiterate it now.  I don't think Ben was proved to be a D-bag.  He did a great job defending himself, shutting down the criticism, and not taking the bait when the guys threw low blows at him.  Frankly, the allegations amounted to little more than broad accusations, unsubstantiated over generalizations, and a bunch of other nonsense without any specific examples.  The bottom line is that Ben is guilty of being a used car salesmen.  Period.  The guys didn't like him and D-bags like Michael and Kasey worked the rest of the bunch up into enough of a froth-mouthed frenzy to believe it.  Sure, he's a cheese and he was probably insincere, but he's not what they said he was.  He'd do well to remember that it's nice to be important but it's more important to be nice.  James, on the other hand, is a testosterone filled chach.  His sharkskin suit said it all.  He looked like a greasier version of Ed Rooney from Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

I'm not a bad guy.  I'm a victim.  

Let's talk about the Big Finale now, shall we?

It appears that either everyone is attacked with pepper spray or some other sinister event triggers an uncontrollable, extremely contagious crying fit throughout the entire cast.  Hell, I don't even want to speculate.  My guess is that someone backs out early and Des is forced to deal with the haunting insecurity created by Brooks' unwillingness to say the big I.L.Y. before she's forced to enter the Lair of Seclusion and mull over the pictures of the two remaining guys.  In other words, her safety net packs up and goes home early.  My guess is that Chris gets heartbroken early, Drew hears about the Supreme Court clearing the way for gay marriage and suffers a crisis of conscious, and Brooks realizes that none of this is even remotely permanent and, as such, throws caution to the tropical wind and hops on board the gravy train.   Good for him and good for Des.

Well, there it is.  My reluctant recap of the Men Tell All is complete.  In case you're wondering, I don't care about the Royal Baby other than to say I hope he's healthy and his parents are happy.  Prolonging government financed super elitism is a debate we can have at another time.

Finally, I wanted to send out a special thank you to my dear friends Dustin and Stacey for letting us crash their beach condo in Clearwater, Florida for a few days earlier in the month.  It was a rare vacation for me and they showed us a great time.  Enjoy the SLF's proficiency with her iPhone camera below.  Enjoy the rest of your week.  DP Tells All will be posted in the next few days.  Thanks for rolling with the punches.  Until next time, take care.  In the meantime, if you need me, I'll be Martinizing my sharkskin suit and growing my hair long enough the gel it.  DP