Welcome back, Readers. I’m thrilled the season is in full force but
I could have done without the stiff, stuffing-filled, string-operated
characters and their inane scripted dialogue.
On the other hand, it was nice to see the Muppets.
This week’s well-deserved shout
out goes to the heretofore absent Derek and The Boys. I know I speak for all of the heterosexuals
reading this when I say that your contributions to the Comment section of the
blog were sorely missed. Granted, that’s
a different kind of soreness that I’d imagine you and The Boys experience, but
that doesn’t mean it wasn’t real.
Welcome back to South
Beach
We lead off with shots of the
indigenous flora and fauna mulling peacefully around Emily’s Enchanted Forest ,
Charlotte , North Carolina
Resident chucklehead Chris grabs
the “Be My King in the Queen
City
Ryan packs while the remaining
men “bro” each other in vibrantly colored deep v-necks and bold board shorts at
the pool as if they were male birds vying for the attention of the single
female sitting stoically in the bushes.
Whatever. Emily arrives in her
free Tahoe and picks Ryan up like a 5 year old waiting for the Car Pool Mom to
honk in the driveway so he can go on the yearly field trip to the local
planetarium. All he needed was a sack
lunch and a note containing his home address, food allergies, and emergency
contact number pinned to his turquoise shirt to complete the humiliation.
While Ryan wonders aloud what
excitement awaits him Emily takes him back to her free house and makes him unload
her free groceries . . . for free . . . before baking cookies and slicing
oranges to be timely delivered to Little Ricki’s soccer game. Ryan stews in regret, quietly disappointed
that he’s wasted one use of his turquoise deep v-neck. He should have stuck with the black one he
had on earlier. After all, he’s probably
got a dozen of those in his suitcase whereas the turquoise one is solely for
the purpose of seduction. Sigh. . .
Emily delivers the cookies and
oranges as Ryan is forced to remain---like Quasimodo in the bell tower—out of
the view of Little Ricki and the other respectable citizens in the
community. “Mommy, why is there a giant
Monchichi in a turquoise deep v-neck sitting in our free Tahoe,” asks Little
Ricki as the camera crew steps softly around the other six year olds. Emily tactfully ignores the question before
splitting a juice box with Ryan in her free Tahoe.
I’ll say this: Emily must have driven one hell of a bargain
when ABC was begging her to do the show.
Soccer games, cookie baking, and Muppet plays featuring Little Ricki as
the big finale aren’t exactly what I had in mind when this season began. Again, it appears that Emily’s money is where
her mouth is when it comes to making sure Little Ricki is well taken care of
this season. Now if only the cameras
were where Emily’s boobs are.
Annnnyyyyhooo . . .
After getting screwed out of an
adventure date—although I would argue that making cookies with Emily beats the
hell out of strapping oneself to a bridge and jumping off of it and
subsequently making metaphorical comparisons about bridges and jumps and
obstacles and love—Ryan cheerfully dons his Rainman suit and heads to Osso for
dinner with Emily who looked incredible in her little red dress. I’m convinced that it’s impossible for her to
look bad at any angle at any time. She’s
like the Grand Canyon for crying out
loud. Say what you want about me, but
she’s a beautiful broad.
Dinner seems to go well and I
thought Ryan—odd hairdo and all—actually seemed like a pleasant, humble
guy. He scored major Emily points when
he referred to “Ricki and our other children” and discussing “our” future with
Emily. Note to everyone who follows
Ryan: That’s an example of incredible
pre-date preparation. His days of
watching film in dimly lighted locker rooms in order to bone up on the
offensive formations of his football opponents clearly paid dividends on the
date. The guy was one Axe Body Spray
scent selection away from the Fantasy Suite.
It earned him a rose. Nice work,
Ryan. He managed a first one-on-one
date, an at home cookie baking session, and earned a rose all without drawing
the ire of the guys at the mansion.
That’s much harder to do than he made it look. “Ricki and our other children?” Genius.
Emily chooses some naughty white
oxford shirt and librarian hairdo to tell us about Ryan (she should have
borrowed Aaron’s lesbian glasses to complete the look) and they eventually have
an incredibly awkward dance among hundreds of pre-invited locals at a two song
concert from some alt-rock college band I’ve never heard of before. All in all, it was a solid date.
Ding Dong. Chucklehead Chris gets the Group Date Card
and reads aloud.
Alejandro, Nate, Michael, Alessandro, Tony, Wolf, Jef, Charley, Kyle,
Chris, Eric, Stevie, and Kalon get the “Let’s Set the Stage for Love” group
date card and Kalon hits the closeted homosexual nail deeper into the
my-father-would-cut-off-my-unearned-and-undeserved-trust-fund-money-if-he-knew-I-was-gay
coffin by professing his comfort in and love of the theater. “It is not love
that should be depicted as blind, but self-love,” said Voltaire. If that’s the case, then Kalon is as blind as
that Chinese activist the American taxpayers just paid to bring over here last
week.
The Group Date starts off with a Reservoir Dogs-esque chump walk as the
men arrive at the theater and discover—much to their poorly hidden chagrin—that
they will be performing show tunes and variety numbers to a packed theater with
the Muppets. At first I wondered why
Kermit the Frog was hanging out with Chantal, but then I realized it was Miss
Piggy. Alright, that was mean and
uncalled for but I’ll let you decide if Chantal’s inexplicable,
non-thyroid-induced weight gain during Brad’s season is funny or not. If forced, I’d apologize for that joke. Back to Emily.
I’ll gloss over the rest of what had to be a slow, excruciating day for
all of the participants on the date.
Hell, even the Muppets looked tired.
The first highlight came when an obviously distraught Charley met with
Emily and explained that his head injury caused him significant speech
problems; some of which would prevent him from speaking lines in front of a
packed house.
I laughed when I saw him confessing, but not at Charley’s injury. I laughed because of all of the people who
could understand being purposefully and unwittingly put in a producer-contrived
situation involving the most traumatic event in a person’s life Emily is
infinitely qualified. I half expected
her to laugh and say, “yea, they put me in a private jet like the one that
killed my fiance and then made me drive a NASCAR around a race track.” Instead, a gracious and empathetic Emily
agrees to make the change. I’ll give the
guy credit. That had to be a tough call
for a guy that size and in that situation to make. I’ve changed my stance on him although I
still think he’s going home early.
The second priceless moment came when Wolf dropped the “What’s the
difference between Kermit the Frog and Stevie” joke followed by the “Kermit
would never wear that hat” punchline followed by “I have a rule: if you’re a dude and you have Louis Vuitton
luggage, you’re a f*g,” regarding Kalon.
Solid work, Wolf. Perhaps he
should change his nickname to “Hyena.”
Post theater, the boys retire to the rooftop bar at the Garrison Hotel
“We're no strangers to love
You know the rules and so do I
A full commitment's what I'm thinking of
You wouldn't get this from any other guy
I just wanna tell you how I'm feeling
Gotta make you understand
Never gonna give you up
Never gonna let you down
Never gonna run around and desert you
Never gonna make you cry
Never gonna say goodbye
Never gonna tell a lie and hurt you”
You know the rules and so do I
A full commitment's what I'm thinking of
You wouldn't get this from any other guy
I just wanna tell you how I'm feeling
Gotta make you understand
Never gonna give you up
Never gonna let you down
Never gonna run around and desert you
Never gonna make you cry
Never gonna say goodbye
Never gonna tell a lie and hurt you”
Nice work, Jef.
Ding Dong. A nervous Sean learns that
Joe and the Kermit the Frog hoodie that Kalon got him at the theater gets the “Come
Close to My Heart” one on one. Man, that’s
such a loaded statement. It’s too bad I’m
such a nice guy. Back to the C*ck Block
Party on the Garrison roof.
Before I waste a lot of your—and more
importantly my—valuable time rehashing the cocktail party, let me simply
characterize the entire thing as a testosterone and alcohol-filled exercise in
poor attempts at one-upsmanship. Kalon
has the balls to tell us that he’s never had to compete for a woman while clad
in his white cardigan sweater, blue gingham oxford, and boat shoes. I suppose that’s a true statement considering
the fact that most of the places he frequents don’t allow actual women.
I haven’t researched this p*ssy,
but I know the type. I’d be willing to
bet a year’s pay that he’s a spoiled brat from Houston Dallas
He was unquestionably a member of
some fraternity filled with over-privileged, under-worked silver spooners like
himself named Hunter Something IV or Rex Baxter III or something similar. He drove a black SUV, went skiing in Vail
every spring break and is likely guilty of a host of date rapes, either
directly or by association. At the end
of the day, this guy heads back to his own version of the Red Room of Pain he’s
created in the expensive River Oaks condo his grandfather’s company bought for
him and struggles with the crushing realization that his father will never
really respect him; rather he will simply award him the corner office without
regard to merit because he is his father’s son.
He is materialistic, shallow, and—deep down—terrified of mirrors because
he has to look at himself in the face.
Alternatively, he might actually be the narcissistic prick he appears to
be. Either way, he’s an as*hole.
Eventually, after the d*ck
measuring contest plays out, Jef, who has remained artfully outside of the
controversy earns the Safety Rose and Chucklehead Chris laments Emily’s
choice. Now it’s Joe’s turn.
Joe, although he’s about to get
dumped like a load of West Virginia coal, draws the private jet to White
Sulphur Springs date as he and Emily arrive at the site of many of her
childhood jaunts, The Greenbreir. When I
heard West Virginia
The entire date was more forced
than a Brad Womack pre-rose ceremony toast and we all felt as bad as Emily did
when Joe got dumped. She was right, he’s
a nice guy who simply didn’t fit into her life.
On the up side, he did get to share a swim with Emily in the pool and I
was thankful at the quick zoom in the cameraman executed when Emily
disrobed. The “pause” button on my DVR
has been rubbed blank . . . in addition to certain parts of my anatomy. That wasn’t easy to do without spilling my
Lone Star.
Thank you, folks. My first anatomy joke and beer reference of
the season.
Back at the MAN-sion, Kalon
continues to annoy the men in board shorts and eventually receives a lecture
from the meated out Doug on his fatherhood status. As much as I hate to admit it, Kalon actually
had a point about Doug leaving his kid back in Hug Land
After crying for the sake of Joe’s feelings, Emily returns
home to put Little Ricki to bed before her GILF-y mom helps her into a purple
little number in preparation for the cocktail party. “Mommy, why is guy in black hat who helped
Roz pack her sh*t hanging out in our free house?” says Little Ricki before
fading off into the sleep of angels.
Emily hits the road for the mansion and the cocktail party begins in
earnest.
Again, it’s useless to rehash
these things moment by moment at this stage of the season; however, I think we’ll
all agree that the highlight came when Tony the Lumber Guy was forced to stand
guard while a clearly embarrassed Emily read the seven page cliché filled
missive carefully crafted by Ryan in memorial to their errand running session
that morning. Seven pages? It might as well have started, “Call Me
Ishmael,” for God’s sake. That guy would
benefit if he learned the simple yet elegant structure of the Haiku. Here’s one I thought of:
Ryan and his hair
Sends nice words to Emily
Written in Crayon
See how effective that can
be. Annnnyyyyhooo . . . .
Kalon sits alone and is
ironically insulted by Wolf (I’ve come to love that guy) when the editors allow
him to rehash the now forever classic Louis Vuitton luggage line. Harrison
enters, gray tie and all, to dispense with the tomfoolery and commence with the
rose ceremony. It went down as follows.
Roses
1.
Ryan
2.
Jef
3.
Kalon
4.
Arie
5.
Michael
6.
Nate
7.
Sean
8.
Chucklehead Chris
9.
Give me Hug Doug
10.
Travis
11.
Tony
12.
Wolf
13.
Alessandro
14.
Charley (he was speechless)
15.
Alejandro
16.
Stevie
Sent home were Joe, Kyle, and
Lesbian Glasses Aaron. And so it
goes. With the Amazing count at 12 and
the Journey count at a static 6 we head into next week where the herd will be
thinned a bit more. Enjoy your week and
I’ll be back on Tuesday. In the meantime,
if you need me, I’ll drinking in my board shorts. DP
