So missing it was sort of a win. By the time I turned the TV on, someone was crying. Who was it? Why it was Jenna. She is a “blogger”. Aren’t we all, kid? Aren’t we all? And why is she crying? Because some blonde lesbian with a ponytail doesn’t like her. Well, I don’t like the blonde lesbian! It’s nothing personal, but she is the same age and has the same vacant moon face and irritating eye roll as my ex-husband’s new girlfriend. THE SAME AGE. I know, barf, right? Exactly how I feel. So the eye-rolling lesbian makes Jenna feel sad because the ERL says she doesn’t care about Ben. But Jenna LOVES Ben! She LOVES him! My golly, I think the ERL is not there for the right reasons!

This is terrible news. Someone being on the Bachelor for the wrong reasons is like someone … actually, wait. What? What are the right reasons? To be on TV in a horrific polyester prom dress cut for a woman three sizes smaller than you? If THAT is the case, then they are all there for the right reason. The Bachelor has a 0% success rate. Zero. Of all the seasons of this show, there have only been two successful matches, and they have both been Bachelorettes. I can see why this is, because I am a brilliant anthropologist. Oh, sorry. No, I’m not. I just play one on TV. Or I would, if I were on TV. Which I’m not. But if they ever ASK me to be on TV, I’m going to ask them to write my name at the bottom of the screen and then write “Bachelor anthropologist” underneath. Because all this work cannot be for naught! Am I getting credit for this? No? Then why am I doing it? And how many rhetorical questions can I ask in one paragraph?

Anyway, bearing in mind that there has NEVER ONE TIME EVER been a successful match made on The Bachelor, it is easier to understand why stringy-haired Ben has such darting eyes. He is at a salad bar, but there is no lettuce. It is just BOOBS. He is at a boob salad bar. And his brain is short circuiting. The short-circuiting (and this is true science!) (that I’ve made up) is what causes his eyes to dart in a way that makes him look suspiciously like someone who has just been doing meth in the bathroom. It’s not meth, people. It’s OH THE POSSIBILITIES! He is going to get to sleep with THREE of these women! Which three? WHICH THREE? The tiny marble that occupies his skull is bouncing around so vigorously that I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if he didn’t open his mouth on an upcoming episode and have the marble ricochet directly into the camera. That marble is really having a hard time containing itself. Poor Ben. He may be stringy, but he’s also TOO EXCITED TO SURVIVE.

But! He also understands how nerve-wracking it all is. It is nerve-wracking. I mean, golly. Think about it. There you are in your slutty prom dress on TV, working hard to out-seduce 24 other slutty prom-goers for the attention of stringy Ben. I personally cannot imagine anything more terrifying. No wonder Jenna has lost the plot and the ERL is batting for the other team. Nerves can affect people, you know! They really can.

So the awkward “cocktail” party drags on and the producers work hard with cattle prods to make Stringy Ben pay attention to whatever woman is desperately trying to give him a glimpse of her girl goodies. His eyes dart this way and that like two fish trying to see what other lures are available to hook him. What? That’s a terrible metaphor. Well, I’m out of practice. I’ve spent the last year being bitter and broken-hearted, so this is quite a jarring contrast to me to have to face an entire HERD of women trying to get into Ben’s pants. I mean, heart. Because I have NO DOUBT that true love will rule the day here on ABC.

Oh, I lie. I mean, come on. We all saw the preview. Ben is going to pick someone and she is going to say ‘no’! Zoinks! A plot twist the producers haven’t thrust on us before! I myself can hardly wait. And I swear that in the future, I will actually watch the entire episode to recount it to you properly, even if that means looking at Stringy Ben for two hours per week for at least a few weeks on his search for “love”. Ha ha ha. It’s hard to type for laughing. Really, Ben? “Love”?

Does anyone know if Ashley and JT really tied the knot? I’m too lazy to google it. Please advise at once.

Anyway, here we are in Cape Town, which does look like a nifty place, if you’re into sharks, which I am.  I mean, I’m into them in that they are often in my nightmares and I usually wake up screaming and sweating and lashing out like a person who is trying to punch a great white shark in the nose in the hopes of paralyzing it just long enough that I could be saved, except it’s a DREAM, yo, so invariably the shark eats me like a gingerbread man:  head first.   What?  No, I don’t know.  I just know that the sharks are the single most compelling thing about this episode but NOT THE MOST FRIGHTENING.   How can that be?  I don’t know.  Ask Brad.

So Chantal and Brad have another date that is like all the other dates they have wherein Chantal spends a lot of time tugging at her clothes as though she’s just found out that no shirt/dress/wetsuit in the world could possibly zip over the “little gift she bought for herself” when she once weighed the pros and cons of adult entertainment as a career.  No, I don’t know she did this.  I AM SPECULATING.   Sometimes speculating is mean.   This just in:  Sometimes *I* am mean.  Yes, I hate myself.  Don’t worry!   I have it in the bag.   But that does not limit me from making snark about the “contestants” on The Bachelor, no it does not.

After Chantal gives Brad an embarrassing and awkward gift, I mentally give her an award for “#1 at Putting Yourself OUt There In Spite Of The Obvious Risk Of Rejection, Being Higher Than Average In This Preposterous Situation You Are In.”   Then she meets his family or maybe it was the other way around, I forget, but they are pretty happy to see Brad and confuzzled by his weeping, but then again, they probably have spent a lot of time being confuzzled by Brad.   If not, they should have.  They like Chantal, they can’t wait to welcome her to the family!  It’s Lurve At First Sight!  Or at least until they meet the next option.   Brad sweats a lot and looks perplexed and self-important and it occurs to me that being on The Bachelor has really ruined him for life (not that he wasn’t already pretty wrecked) because he now thinks that all his actions and emotions should be pulled directly from an ABC soap opera.   OVERACTING FTW!  Except not for any “win” that I am familiar with.  Ask Charlie Sheen, maybe this is more his territory.

So now it’s Emily’s turn and she is so excited to go on a date with Brad that she forgets her gosh-durned pants.   Oh, sugar!   Still, she dons her sweetest grin and embarks on a boring tour with Brad.   No sharks.  YAWN.    I don’t know what else happens, but look!  Brad’s mom and assorted sisters-in-law!  They LOVE Emily!  Or “Em” as we call her!  Because she has a dead fiancee!  I have to give props to Emily here because she is able to pull maximum sympathy out of a story that perhaps could be summarized as, “Rikki’s Dad passed away” and then expounded on later.   But no, she sighs the sigh of a long-suffering sage, and begins, “It was a dark and stormy night…”   I realize snarking about someone’s dead fiance is really really really bad form, but I’m not snarking about his DEATH, just the retelling of his death like it’s a Hallmark movie of the week instead of trying to gloss over it in an effort to maybe not make everyone at the dinner table cry.  But cry they do.  And now they HATE Chantal.   She doesn’t have babies!  She wouldn’t understand them!  They like wine and sushi!  What?  They set the bar pretty high for Brad!

Now they are at Emily’s place or somewhere, who knows where, and Emily has the big fat nerve to ask Brad if he’s sure he’s ready to be an insta-Dad to Rikki, and then in a move more terrifying that Jaws, Brad gets FURIOUS.  His own jaw is working like he’s got some chewing tabacky in there that is firmly stuck in his empty-tooth socket.   The HELL?  How DARE SHE QUESTION HIM IN THIS WAY?   Why, suddenly, I am remembering ol’ Flash O’ Rage Jake!   So “perfect” (in his own eyes) but also!  A! Cold! And! Scary! Psycho!   Warning!  Warning!  Do not marry!  Anger issues!

Anyway, he has some water and sweats a lot, is he like the Hulk?  Is he going to go green and get all dumb and large?   I have to say that if I ever considered marrying, I would ask about 10000987 more questions than she did because I wouldn’t want to bring to my KIDS some chump who wants a World’s Best Dad cup at the breakfast table but also wants to never be around teh kids.   Lest we forget, he couldn’t even KISS her with Rikki asleep upstairs, he most certainly will never be able to get it up again, and this will be, in a roundabout way, Rikki’s “fault” and GOD HELP THEM ALL.

Now it’s the rose ceremony and OMG, he picks Emily.  I cannot summarize what he says because it’s all boring and repetitive and frankly, I wasn’t listening, but I gathered from Chantal’s tears and Emily’s toothy grin that Emily is The Chosen One.

Wheee!  It’s over!  Party on my couch!

Except there is AFTER THE FINAL ROSE.   But I am out of words!   Damn it.   And this was so fun.   Let’s summarize:  Thankfully, she seems to have a change of heart about both her hair colour (much better now Emily) and Brad in general.

DUMP HIM, EM.  He can find someone else on the next season, seriously.

PS – Dear Trista and Ryan.   You met on TV.  That was neat.  But seriously, as far as I can tell, you don’t really have the right to be so self-righteously smug about your relationship.   If only everyone could follow in your footsteps!  Barf.  Love, Karen

So here we are and there is Brad and OMG it’s the most gorgeous place EVER, he says, getting off the plane.  That must be SOME airport!  Zoinks!   Brad instantly begins sweating, giving us the impression that it’s hot in South Africa and/or he’s nervous.   We don’t really care which because we stopped caring about this show as soon as it started.   Brad is taken to some kind of nature preserve and fed to the lions.   Hey, this show just got better!  But no, it didn’t, because that part isn’t even true.   I MADE IT UP.   I write fiction, I can do that.   Neener, neener, neener.

Sadly, Brad is not consumed like a steak at a barbecue by any wildlife, but instead is set loose with Chantal.   She is like OMG TOTALLY EXCITED!  They are going on a safari?  IN SOUTH AFRICA?   No, Chantal, you are going on a safari in San Diego, but first you’ll have to get back on a plane and fly there!   She cannot believe her good fortune!   TO BE IN AFRICA AND GET TO GO ON A SAFARI.   Wait, is there much else to do in Africa?  Really?  Because I’m surprised that she is surprised that Brad is taking her on the most obvious date ever.  But I’m cynical, so I should shut up.  On the other hand, if I shut up, you won’t have anything to read while you’re supposed to be working, so I won’t, and I’m doing it for YOU.   You’re welcome.

Chantal is breathtakingly giddy about every single thing and every single thing she says is so inane that I want to start sticking pins in my skin in a kind of self-acupuncture, self-mutilation kind of way just to see if the pain makes me feel alive and/or relaxes me.   Instead, I have wine.  Wine helps this show a lot, both when you are on it and when you are watching it.   Brad and Chantal gulp down several bottles and Brad tricks Chantal into eating a worm and then proves how humorless he is and what a poor sport by not eating one himself.   Then he laughs at her in a way that seems playground-mean instead of actually funny.   This, she concludes is a metaphor for love.  Is it?  Maybe.   I’m pretty down on Love ™ at the moment so maybe picnicking by a river in Africa and your “love” is laughing AT you while two armed guards stand by and a hippo rolls her eyes and wonders if you’re even worth trampling to death IS an apt metaphor for love.   Especially the way that Brad is making you feel so safe!  Except BRAD is not the sniper with the rifle waiting to pick off the first feline to launch itself from the grass onto your throat.  I’m just sayin’.

Brad and Chantal then go have sex in a tree house.   More than anything, I wanted lions to slowly ascend the staircase and at least give them a good scare and then maybe fall about laughing, like lions do.   Oh, wait, they don’t.   That’s Brad.  But whatevs.   What I want to know is whether the snipers filmed the action to later sell on the internet?  I don’t want to buy it, god NO, I’d feed myself to the lions first, I just wonder how much business acuity they have.   That treehouse probably sees a lot of action.   Those rifle guys could make a fortune!  There is money in porn!  Not that I approve of porn.   Wow, how quickly has this post got away from me?  682 words?  Right.   Damn.  Sorry.

Next up, Emily!   Brad wipes his mouth and then kisses Emily passionately because he loves her so damn much.   This is the part of the show that I find the most gut-wrenchingly revolting.   Brad is RELISHING the fact he gets to “honestly” have sex with three women on three consecutive nights and have it be somehow SANCTIONED because it’s on TV!  Is OK!  Is not really cheating!  Except it is, isn’t it?  Yes, it is.  I AM SO OVER CHEATING RIGHT NOW.  I am over a lot of things.   I am mostly over 23 year old blonde women who light candles and do INCANTATIONS and the middle age men who pant after them shouting, “I love you!  My wife doesn’t understand me!”   But enough about me!   Brad and Emily are so boring together that I swear to god, even though I was staring at the screen the whole time, I was able to finish writing my novel in my head as well as calculate the average speed of a sun flare that would hopefully kill us all before the episode ended.   Does Emily have ANYTHING to say?  EVER?  Does Brad?  Do we care?   No?   Where’s the goddamn treehouse already?

Finally the date ends, I don’t know how or why, I think maybe they just mumbled off into the distance and a lion ate them.  No?  Damn.   Well, here’s hoping!

Next up, Ashley!   Poor Ashley.  She has made the mistake of wanting to be superwoman.   The funny thing is that I never pictured superwoman as being a DENTIST.   Maybe a brain surgeon?   Or an artist?  But somehow “dentist” doesn’t work for me.  Sorry, no comic book future for you, Ashley.   Ashley, mistaking Brad for a normal man, goes on about how she could live anywhere and her career is important to her.   If there was a gong, I would strike it.  Oh, Ashley.  The correct line was “I WANT TO LIVE IN AUSTIN! WITH YOU, BRAD!”  and “MY CAREER IS JUST A LITLE HOBBY I HAVE UNTIL I CAN FIND A MAN TO TAKE CARE OF ME!”   In this case, “man” needs two syllables.  ”May-un.”   Brad would like that.   The fact that Brad cannot take care of HIMSELF notwithstanding.  Where, oh where, is his blue-shirted therapist?   Brad has no patience for someone who does not want to abandon her own hopes and dreams and come along with him for the ride on his Brad-plane.   And the Brad-plane makes no unscheduled stops or landings!   NO FLEXIBILITY FOR YOU!

Anyway, they have an overnight date and who cares?  They either do or do not have sex.  I’m betting on “do”.   “Do” is the only explanation for why Ashley is surprised to be un-rose-ceremoniously dumped the next day.   She is SO SHOCKED and her heart “aches a little”.   Wow.   Really?  She thought she was going to marry him and he dumped her and that gave her a slight chest discomfort?  I guess it’s a good thing that it didn’t give her a coronary because Brad said about 87 times in this episode, “I don’t know where her heart is.”  Could be a problem if CPR is required!   Ha ha.  Oh man.  I was waiting to say that for this whole post but couldn’t find a place for it, and even now I’m just shoe-horning it in because it’s funny.  To me.  And not much is, these days.

Next week, boring recrap, with whining!  The following week?  Brad’s family is dragged through the reality TV sludge once again, only this time at least they get a free trip to Capetown out of the deal.    I can’t wait!  I mean, I can, but really, I can’t.  Because then it will be over!   “Over”, like EVERY RELATIONSHIP THIS SHOW HAS EVER SPAWNED.  (Yes, yes, I know, EXCEPT TRISTA AND RYAN.  Fine.)

Anyway, there is Brad, randomly in New York, looking pensive in fall/winter 2010 catalogue clothing.   WHY he is in New York is not explained because last time I looked he was in Costa Rica, he LIVES in Austin (lest we forget), and none of the girls are in NY.    So, the hell?   I don’t know either.  And I most definitely do not care, except the tiny percentage of me that is budget conscious and thinking, WOW, WHAT A WASTE OF MONEY.    I hope for every penny that ABC wastes on this stupid, brain-draining, life-wasting program, they donate a penny to cure cancer.   That would be nice.  I’m just sayin’.

Now we’re off to Seattle!   Where Brad, who was cooling considerably on Chantal O.  and all her emotions and damn annoying “needs”, suddenly fell headlong into love with her (Dad).   Her Dad.  That’s right, I SAID IT.   Chantal O.?   He seriously wasn’t that into you until he saw your family’s wealth and realized that whole Seahawks connection.   I AM NOT WRONG.   Run, Chantal.   Take the dog AND the cats and run.  Except you don’t have to run, you could just stay in Seattle because he will not follow you there because he cannot under any circumstances leave Austin.   Ever.   Except to travel and schtup babes.   Schtupp?   Whatever.   You know what I mean.    The bakers’ dozen of therapy appointments that he bothered to keep did not cover anything to do with “compromise” or “respecting and valuing your partner” so don’t expect Brad to bend to your will.  EVEN THOUGH YOU HAVE MONEY.   Honey, seriously.   What can I do to get your attention here?  Brad is a failing “entrepreneur” whose clubs are quickly becoming “closed”.   Your dad?  Is a success story.   Brad?  Wants to BE your dad.   YOU MUST ESCAPE WITH YOUR HEART INTACT.   Please.  For the love of God.   Maybe her dog will rescue her, like Lassie would if she fell down a well!   Or maybe not.   Sorry Chantal.    Enjoy your marriage to Brad.   I hope you get a pre-nup.   Please.   Get a pre-nup.  I’m not kidding.

Now we’re off to somewhere in Maine!  Which is practically Canada and they eat poutine.   I don’t like poutine.   This is because I find the term “cheese curd” very off-putting.   But that’s me.   I am not Ashley!   But then again, neither is Ashley!   What HAPPENED to Ashley?   She was so serious and old and frowny for the ENTIRE SEASON and now she is like a perky adolescent who is in the first throes of a passionate affair with meth!   She is leaping around!  Full of energy and life!   Snuggling with her equally hyperactive family!   Who are so happy and screechy they are making me uncomfortable!  Notice I am not comparing my family to these people’s families.   Look, I am not ON the show.   Trust me, my family is also deranged.  That is why we cleverly avoid being on national TV during primetime or even on infomercials late at night.   Know your strengths, people.   Brad is in love with Ashley but he doesn’t want to hold her back.   The loose translation of this is that Brad is terribly threatened by a woman with an actual career and a woman who is SMARTER THAN HIM.    There is no way in hell he’d pick her because he knows he is not good enough for her.   Trust me.   I am like a psychic but different in that I don’t have a 900-number and no one ever believes me, even when I later turn out to be right.

Off to Chico!   Wait, why didn’t he visit Chico after Seattle?  Wouldn’t that be closer?   No?   They just want to punish Brad by making him fly back and forth across the country in a zig-zag pattern while nourishing him only with airline pretzels and flat pop?   UNDERSTOOD.

The producers, who are dying from joy about this particular plotline, set Shawntel up to fail with Brad by making her show him things like an “aneurysm hook”.   Brad is freaking out.   Why the HELL didn’t his therapist ADVISE him that people DIE?   HE DIDN’T KNOW!   And!  He!  Does!  Not!  Like!  Death!  Unlike everyone else in the world, who think Death is awesome!   What?   No, we don’t.   This just in:  NO ONE LIKES DEATH.  Except Shawntel, who I really liked up until the point when she said that she thought that most of the people who came to her were HAPPY while planning funerals.   SHAWNTEL.   Seriously.   What?   You may be comfortable with death but you are deluded to think that “most” people celebrate it.   I would hanker to guess that MOST is an exaggeration.   Maybe “some”.   Possibly “a few”.   But MOST?  What kind of people are these in Chico?   Well, we get to find out that a least a handful of them are downright mean.    Yes, Shawntel’s Dad, I am looking at YOU.   I am sure you are a lovely person, (actually, that’s a lie, I am not entirely convinced of this or even slightly sure), but telling your daughter that she LET EVERYONE DOWN because her highschool gym coach’s CHILD died while she was away was just flat-out cruel.   CRUEL.  And if she falls in love and moves away, guess what?   You will have to deal.   I sincerely hope that seeing yourself on TV guilting your daughter into never leaving Chico so she can take over YOUR business so YOU can retire makes you feel tiny and cold, like a small frozen pea that has rolled under the fridge into a pile of gross dust and hair.

It’s obvious at this point that Shawntel will only get a rose if all the other contestants all fall ill to a massive syphillis outbreak, so let’s move on to the World’s Most Painfully Awkward Date, in which Brad awkwardly tries to get little Ricki to love him and little Ricki shows enough gumption to suggest she has better taste in men than her mother, sweet deluded Emily, who sincerely seems to believe that dysfunctional Brad would be a terrific father-figure to her precious baby.   Brad is actually so riddled with anxiety about the presence of the child that he cannot slap tongues with Emily and somehow manages to make this Emily’s fault for daring to have a kid upstairs.  Just WHERE did he think that Emily kept her child?  In the garden shed?   Emily, do NOT accept his proposal!   Except I know you won’t because he won’t propose to you.   Taking on a child is WAY too much for the likes of Brad.   Seattle Seahawks business guy?  Or a child with human needs?   Well, that’s a no-brainer.

OH MY GOD, I WENT OVER MY WORD COUNT BY OVER 200.   The end is nigh!

So, I don’t know, let’s just jump right in, shall we?   The girls fly to Costa Rica!  It’s so super-exciting!  Squee!  Did I mention that I keep forgetting to buy wine?   My marriage recently ended (not funny, but true) and my husband was the wine-procurer.   Every time I go to the wine store to buy wine, I feel like the guy behind the counter is thinking, “Oh, sad, middle-aged woman buying wine, probably an alcoholic.”  WHY DO I THINK THIS WAY?  It prevents me from buying wine and OH MY GODZ IN HEAVEN, this show REQUIRES WINE.   And if that makes me an alcoholic, then damn it, yes, I am one.  I will buy an ENTIRE CASE OF WINE THIS WEEK to carry me through the rest of the season.   Sobriety is obviously what made this episode so painfully unwatchable.  That, and the fact my kids were taking turns throwing up.

OK, fine, so whatever, I was sober, the kids were sick and Chantal (spelled right) got the first one-on-one.   Did you know that her dad owns or owned or something the Seattle Seahawks?   True fact.    Chantal is no ordinary “executive assistant”, my friends.   But hell, I like her.  I mean, I loathe everyone who is on this show for any reason, but I don’t loathe her as much as I loathe, say, Michelle.   For a random example.   Anyway, Chantal puts on her workout clothes for her date and Brad is excited to see if she’s going to be all needy and crappy and cry and stuff or if she’s just going to be fun because he’s had ENOUGH of other people’s neediness, don’t they know the show is called THE BACHELOR?  Not “the girls”.   It is about him!  Brad!  Let’s not forget!   Damn Chantal and her tears!   Of course, they have ALL cried on this program, except Britt, who appears to not even really exist, so why he’s singled out Chantal is a mystery but I suspect Brad has nothing to do with it, the producers just told him to tell her that, so he did.   This just in:  BRAD IS A ROBOT!  It’s true!   OK, I made it up.   But who cares?

They go ziplining.   Ziplining is featured so often on this show that I’m beginning to think that the reason why my own relationship failed is due to the lack of ziplining and rapelling we did while we were dating.   We skipped right to the mortgage and kids!  MISTAKE.   Anyway, somehow ziplining without weeping has reassured Brad of Chantal’s love, and in case he’s confused, she actually tells him that she’s in love with him which is totally off-putting and now I don’t like Chantal.   Seriously, Chantal, WHY would you love Brad?   He’s said and done NOTHING for the entire season to merit love.   Apart from clarifying again and again how serious he is about finding a wife (drink!) and how much “work” he’s done with his blue-shirted therapist (who apparently couldn’t make the trip), he has said NOTHING ABOUT ANYTHING.   Does Brad have any interests?  Who knows?   Does he ever think about anything apart from himself?   Doubtful!   Had he ever had a hobby?   It’s a mystery!   Does he … have a job?   Read books?   Have an interest in current affairs?   DOES BRAD HAVE A SENSE OF HUMOR?   No one will ever know!

I, for the record, do NOT love Brad.

Anyway, blah blah.   Next up, a group date!  Michelle is homicidal because Chantal and Brad had sexy time in the jungle!  Calm down, Michelle, it wasn’t sexy time!  There was rain.   Who cares?  They kissed.  IT IS ALL BRAD KNOWS HOW TO DO.   Anyway, crazy Michelle nearly loses her mind because they are going to be rappelling and he sworesies that he would only ever rappel with her!    He is cheat-rappelling!   What a bastard!   Christ on a bike!   Next thing you know, he’s gonna be making OUT with other women, too!  It always STARTS with rappelling, and next thing you know, you’ve got chlamydia!   I know, right?

So Michelle boringly repeats all her previous craziness and bulges her eyes at the camera and pretends that insanity is sexxxy.   We all start looking for something, anything, with alcohol content in order to make this show more palatable, sort of like how if you pour a bunch of wine into crappy spaghetti sauce, it tastes better.

There is almost certainly an after-party to do with the rappelling but I miss it.   Let’s assume it has hot tubs.   I think one of my kids threw up or something so I walked away and didn’t bother rewinding even though I recorded the show, a fact more shameful than any other thing I know about myself.

Next up, Allie!  Or Ally!   Or Alli!   She gets a one on one!  She’s so excited!   They are going to the altar!   Alli is so misguided that she actually thinks they are getting married!  Or something!  She is giddy!  Doesn’t she know that she’s got the bad date?   Well, she does.   Stupidly, she told the producers that she was terrified of bugs so naturally, she is sent to an underground cave that is full of bugs and bats.   She’s game though because at the end of it, there is an ALTAR!   Except there isn’t, Alli.   Sorry.   It’s some stone steps, deep underground.   And a picnic!   Except… what?  Wait?  I SAW a picnic blanket and maybe I blacked out or fell asleep or just started compulsively playing Scrabble on my iPad because when I looked up, they appeared to be at — if not an actual restaurant, then some sort of restuarant-like place that was decidedly NOT in the muddy, bug-infested, bat-swarmed cave.   Over dinner, Brad tells Alli that he’s really mostly into sexually aggressive girls who don’t eat and lick his tonsils in lieu of bothering with the chicken, and he sends her home, the hardest thing he’s EVER had to do.  Really, Brad?  THAT was the hardest?

Hellz bellz, 1110 words.  That is too many words.   There is a rose ceremony!  Jackie goes home!  Britt, who doesn’t exist for the rest of the time, gets a rose!   Michelle is psycho!   Brad makes her cry!  Except not really!   Because she’s a robot, too!

OKthxbai.

OK, so.  First of all, SQUEEE! They are leaving Los Angeles!  Squee! Squeeeee!  For a few minutes, it sounded like Chris Harrison had walked into the room with fifteen straight pins and started popping balloons.   Oh, ha ha.  How I crack me up.   Anyway, the women are VERY EXCITED that they are now on the hook to act like Las Vegas is rilly, truly the City of Dreams, instead of what we know that it really is, which is the City Where Your Dreams Go To Get Addicted to Gambling, Drugs, Hookers, and All-Day Breakfasts.  But what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas!  Except in this case, where it is boringly broadcast to the nation.

So first up, Brad takes Shawntel shopping, an event that makes him look suicidally bored and in desperate need of a Vicodin.   Which are EASY to get in Vegas, I’m sure.  I’ve never been, but somehow I imagine Vicodin vendors are interspersed between Gucci and Orange Julius stands.   I don’t know why this is what I imagine.  I have a vivid imagination.  Which is why I did not need to hear Shawntel’s description of the “Vein Drain”.   Kill me.  But don’t, because then my VEINS WILL BE DRAINED.   I will need therapy once this show is over and not the kind doled out by the blue-shirted follow who spouts meaningless quotes as though, if added together, they will all combine to actually give meaning to Brad’s meaningless life.   But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Shawntel goes back to the hotel and the women all gang together and stab her to death in order to grab the stuff she got for free, which Brad implied he was paying for, but we all know was just Vegas vomiting out a bunch of crap in the hopes that you’ll want to go there and actually spend $5000 on that bag.   The other women are desperately unhappy because Shawntel once again got to act out “every woman’s fantasy”, which is — as we all know — to be a hooker with a heart of gold and Richard Gere’s credit card.   Oh, the dream.  Dream big, girls!   You are in Vegas, after all.   Anyway, Shawntel gets to see fireworks from the roof of the mall (seriously, let them go to a restaurant for the love of Mike) and the other women all nearly die falling out the window to watch.   (Apparently the show does not permit anyone to leave the room when dates are on, presumably so no one sneaks up onto the roof where the date is taking place and pushes the other contestant off it.)

My battery!  My battery!   Dagnabbit.   1%!  I will type fast!

Next up, a group date!  Contrived by the producers to make Emily cry, thus garnering all Brad’s attention!  Like Pavlov’s dogs, these women learned early that sobbing gets them a helpless looking Brad, patting them on the head like unruly children, but any attention is good attention and they can all practically cry on cue.   The other women cry because Emily is getting the pat on the head that THEY DESERVE because THEY HAVE PROBLEMS TOO!  And the whole idea that this show specifically selected women with mental health issues is proven again and again.

The crying gets boring, so I stop paying attention, and when I look up again, the Ashleys are battling it out for Brad’s love.  One of them wins, which hardly matters because he’s not going to pick either of them.   Trust me.   The younger of the two, Ashley S., is sort of heart-breaking in that too-young-for-this-crap way.   She’s a pretty girl with nice hair, but depressingly strives to be a hooker with a heart of gold, and cannot recover from the loss of her father.  What she needs is a proper therapist and, you know, some career counselling.  She does NOT need an insipid, self-centered dick with a sweat problem and a need to constantly cathart about his “issues”, which means that Brad really did her a favour.   Ashley, send him a thank you card!   For realsies.

Blah blah blah.   After a very long commercial for Cirque Du Soleil’s new show, somehow Brad and Ashley are attached to wires and dangled over the audience.   The Cirque should do a vampire show where the contestants on the Bachelor are dangled and then VAMPIRES SWOOP DOWN FROM THE SKY AND DRAIN THEIR VEINS.   I mean, that would be sick, but really, I’m just trying to liven this thing up with less crying and more dramatic screaming, perhaps.   Something.   Anything.

It would totally improve ratings, too, ABC.   I’m just saying.

I looked away again and when I looked back, Michelle was doing her best vampire impersonation, by trying to suck out Brad’s life-blood via his tongue.   This was so upsetting to my stomach that I had to go find some Pepto Bismol that expired in 2005 to swig like whisky from a brown paper bag.   When I got back, it was the rose ceremony and two women who I had never seen before in my life apparently were sent home.  I didn’t know he could dismiss the interns, but whatever.  Who cares?   This is less than 1000 words.  1% battery power.   WIN.

This was perhaps the most painful episode in Bachelor history, which is saying a lot because we did endure a season of Deanna Pappas, blinking nervously at America while simultaneously making shocking bad choices.    It’s possible that just watching this gave me TWO black eyes, which means I trump Michelle and get the one-on-one date!   Yippee!  If by “yippee!”, I mean, “I sure hope the producers took note of the fact that my biggest fear is being eaten alive by feral house cats and soon I will be dead!”

Michelle is really doing America a service, a really big, in-your-face PSA, about the dangers of having an eating disorder.   SOMETIMES when bulimic girls purge too hard, guess what happens?  You know, I know, the world knows, but Michelle still is mystified.  What caused the black eye?   MYSTERY.   Eating disorders are not funny and I’m not keen on snarking them, so I’ll stop, but COME ON.   Also, at least half of that black eye was makeup because apparently most of it washed off when she finally had a shower.

Anyway, I’m getting off track and already have wasted a third of my valuable words on Michelle.  Damn it.   But that’s fair because she wasted a third of the show on herself and her angst about the date and oh god her black eye and SHUT UP MICHELLE.

Chantal gets the first date and Michelle scowls so hard I believe that one of her eyebrows actually snakes down across the table and steals the fruit from one of the other girl’s drinks.   Did that make sense?  No?   Tough.   Chantal’s biggest fear is the ocean so the producers have contrived what amounts to the least fun looking date of all time, which involves donning heavy suits and walking on the ocean floor.   Let’s overlook for a moment that the waters off Catalina Island are teaming with sharks who would prefer it if their food didn’t have too many chemical additives, such as those manufactured by The Mentor Group (a manufacturer I had to actually Google because I have no idea who is making giant boobs these days).   It’s possible that The Mentor Group saved Chantal’s life!  Because no one got eaten by a shark.  I was rooting for Brad because I’m sure as the shark dragged him away, he’d look sadly into the camera, mournfully whimpering, “But I’m a changed man!”   Then his therapist would appear, also on the ocean floor, but sporting a crisp dark blue shirt lending him an air of credibility when really he’s just Brad’s drinking buddy from Hooters, and he’d talk Brad through it by reminding him that this could be “fun”.

After the “fun” of wading through six foot deep murky water and seeing at least one “big fish” (NOT BIG ENOUGH THOUGH, WAS IT?) that wasn’t interested in eating them, Brad and Chantal lay down on a bed wearing their jackets and boots and got rained on.   I like Chantal well enough, she seems nice and knows how to smile.   Brad says that being with her is “just like having a girlfriend”, which in his vernacular means that someone is “keeping him in check”.   If only his therapist was there NOW.   Brad, Brad, Brad.   Love is supposed to set you free!  Don’t you listen to Mumford & Sons Sigh No More on repeat while you’re in your car?  I’m sure it doesn’t say, “Love will keep you in check.”   This could explain a lot of the whole Commitment Issue that we must hammer out at least forty seven times in a forty minute show.   Because Brad really has nothing to say, the date ends with making out and I go pour myself more wine and think about how Mumford & Sons are awesome and how I wish I had some cheese or maybe French bread.   Bread is good.  Lately I’ve been eating too much bread.

Next up is a group date and I really wanted to fast forward through this and maybe I did because I actually can’t even remember what they did although I remember a damp-looking Ashley weeping and thinking that Britt is really pretty but needs to donate at least three feet of her hair to Locks for Love.  Then I started looking at dogs on the internet.   I’m looking to adopt a rescue dog and every time I read the story about why a particular dog needs to be rescued, I cry.   Yes, I realize that I was supposed to be snarkily judging The Bachelor but I got intensely bored and I’d rather cry about stray canines, OK?   FINE WITH YOU?

OK then.

Oh, right, that thing with Dr. Drew.  I won’t comment except to say I saw Dr. Drew’s face at the start of the interview and it was a face that said, “That’s it, I’ve finally sold every last shred of my soul.   I hope Hell is more like Palm Springs than an ACTUAL burning inferno!   People DO always exaggerate heat, don’t they?  It might not be so bad.”   Brad interprets the date as a way of breaking down the girl’s walls and blah blah blah OH GOD WHY DO I WATCH WHY WHY WHY?

Next up, bat-shit crazy Michelle, who earned her date because she gave herself a black eye, is ready to go.   But Brad isn’t!  Because he’s found someone who is as messed up as himself, Ashley H., and he is DETERMINED to start a relationship with her that will involve a lot of crying and finger pointing!  Because LOVE WILL SET YOU FREE is not his adage, he prefers LOVE WILL PUNCH YOU IN THE STOMACH AND THEN BLAME YOU AND THEN CRY ABOUT IT.   Typical.    Michelle is so enraged, I’m surprised there isn’t a body count, but happily the producers have been reading my blog and made my own fantasy come true:  A tall building!   And Michelle!  GOING OFF THE SIDE OF IT!   Awesome!

Michelle will do anything for love, in the way that vampires will do anything to suck your life blood from your body and leave the white sleeve of your corpse behind to rot, so she gamely performs the stunt.   I’m beginning to believe that if you ever want ANYONE to fall in love with you, you just have to make them do something involving heights because for whatever reason, people bond with people with whom they endure something terrifying.   This is why so many romances are borne from plane crashes.   True story.   I’m not making that up, it’s real.   If you survive something crappy with someone, you tend to fall in love with them.   So Brad, who is completely non-self-aware — sorry Brad’s Therapist! — falls in love with Michelle, even though she’s terrifying, and she proceeds to stick her terrifying tongue down his throat in a hot tub, whereupon she implants her terrifying alien seed and a terrifying tiny alien baby bursts from Brad’s abdomen!   Except not that.   That would have been better than what happened, which was just a bunch of misguided rambling about the wonders of Michelle as Brad tripped over himself to give her a rose to make her his forever.

I’m out of words.   SORRY.   You don’t get to know who he picked!   My bad.   You’ll see next week.   STAY TUNED.   

I’m sorry that these women have sad stories, but REALLY?   Because I have been on an awful lot of first dates and never once have I wept on my date’s shoulder.  Oh, wait, the fact I’ve had a lot of first dates does not make me sound very awesome, but actually, I don’t care what you think of me!  Because I am VERY BUSY over here, judging the women (and man) on TV!   So, hush!

The premise of the season, I suppose, is that Brad has been so therapized that he now is practically a therapist HIMSELF and so all these sadly misguided female creatures should pour their pain out all over him, kind of like he’s a roast beef and they are gravy.   And then he will SOP UP THEIR PAIN and make them WHOLE again!   Which means that actually, he can’t be the roast, he’s sort of the bread.   Or, you know, Jesus.   WHICH HE ISN’T.   Because of Womack is the second coming, I volunteer to go directly to hell.

The first date sees Ashley S. and Brad singing at some world famous studio that I’ve never heard of and I realize while I’m watching them sing, torturously, for at least seven minutes too long, that my wish has already come true and I AM ALREADY IN HELL, a hell in which Brad continuously calls someone Ashley S. If someone ever called me Karen R., I would actually drop-kick them.  Like you have so many Ashleys in your life you have to call me by my initial TO MY FACE?   Lame.  SO LAME.   EXTRA LAME WITH A HEAPING EXTRA HELPING OF LAME.

Speaking of which, didn’t Seal used to be awesome?   And when I say “used to be”, I mean “right up until the very second he agreed to be on this show”?   I am disappointed in you, Seal.   So, so disappointed.   You have Heidi Klum!  You do not need The Bachelor!   I don’t know why that makes sense to me, but it does!   If I ever hear that song about the rose again, I’m going to commit a major felony (TBD)!

Anyway apparently unbeknownst to you, me, Seal, and the rest of the world, Ashley S.’s dead dad orchestrated this whole thing and when I die, which will likely be soon if I continue to be subjected to this crappy show which is costing me my will to live, I am going to find him in Heaven and ask him what the hell he was thinking and then I will remember that he had nothing to do with it, it is not a sign, some savvy producer in the bowels of ABC in a 4000 part questionnaire, read something about Ashley attributing meaning to this song and forced Seal at gunpoint to sing it ONE MORE TIME for America, thus making this segment “meaningful” in a way that was entirely not “meaningful” and did nothing but make me feel sorry for Ashley S., who does not need Brad, but rather some time to get over the loss of her dad.    ASHLEY, IT IS NOT A SIGN.   THE SIGN WAS PRODUCED.   DO YOU UNDERSTAND?   YOU ARE BEING MANIPULATED.

Poor Ashley S.

The next date is one wherein we see that apparently the auditions for The Bachelor included a section on fitness because these girls are ripped.   Nice work, girls!   You all look pretty awesome, except for the boobs which, frankly, I find terrifying, but you aren’t trying to impress me, so why do you care what I think?   Watching this made me want to take up yoga or kickboxing or plastic surgery or something.   I don’t know what.   I didn’t understand the action movie whatever and were they raising money for orphans or was this just for fun?   It’s a mystery, but a mystery that gave Michelle a lot of opportunities to act like she is completely off the rails, which was lucky, because she is.   Apparently her strategy is to terrify Brad into picking her, which may well work, as Brad is a delicate flower prone to being pushed around and he’ll almost definitely offer no resistance.   There is some kind of rooftop party which makes me actually wonder if ABC forces all the people on this show to dine on rooftops with the hope that someone falls or jumps just to improve ratings.   Let’s hope it’s Mich… Oh, let’s stop talking about Michelle.   Even typing her name repeatedly is making me nervous, like if I open the coat closet, she might jump out, wielding a large knife or a boiled bunny.   And you know that one day she will.  Not MY closet, but someone’s.   Probably Emily’s.

Emily is everything Michelle is not, in that she is exactly what another contestant described her as: Mother Theresa, if MT was, in fact, a Barbie.  Excellent.  I don’t know about her relative sexiness because she certainly looks factory-built as opposed to human and squishy, but I started to feel jealous of her kid.   All wrong, right?  But I bet she’s a good mother.  She’s fun and she’s sweet and appears genuine and obviously loves the hell out of her kid.   A lot of kids have a Barbie AND a mother, but having a Barbie AS a mother is one step better and seriously, I like Emily even though she seems to lack any and all conversational skills, unless that conversation is about Ricky’s demise and her teen pregnancy, so I can’t even really be mean to her, and let’s hope she gets released from Womack’s scary clutches soon.    They have an awkward date in which no chemistry at all is evident but even Brad, who is seriously obtuse, is able to recognize that she is as adorable as a kitten wants to keep her anyway.   I get the feeling she won’t buy the bullshit he’s selling, or maybe I’m giving her too much credit because she’s as adorable as a kitten.   Who can say?

Not me.   I am just an ornery blogger who has once again gone over my 1000 word limit and I haven’t even had a chance to mention yet that if you drink every time someone (BRAD) mentions “walls” in any context, you’ll have alcohol poisoning by the first commercial break and be dead by the end if you make it that far.  And also:   Madison.   Discuss.   And!  Do they play music during rose ceremonies or is it all just the hollow clunk of high heels teetering on the wood floor as women rush giddily towards the outstretched rose?  AND if there is a song, is it SEAL?  IS IT… KISS FROM A ROSE?

See you next week! 1300 words.   God damn it.  I need an editor to live in my pocket and cut the excessive words out of my Bachelor posts just so I can retain a tiny shred of my dignity while continuing to snark this show.   A tiny shred, people, that’s all I ask.

In fact, I have been thinking about abandoning my Bachelor blog but then I was at the hairdresser turning my hair from something long and brown into something short and red that I’m not convinced doesn’t make me look like a bitter school marm, and a girl I know because she is engaged to someone who works for my husband told me another girl that I know very vaguely read my blog and said it was hilarious and THAT IS ALL THE VALIDATION I NEED TO KEEP GOING FOREVER AND EVER AMEN.   Truth.   So here I am.   Except I missed most of this particular episode and I don’t have a reason why.   I think I was talking.   I was probably talking.   To myself.  To a plant.   To the lint that accumulates in a frightening way in my belly button that I can’t get out because I cannot touch my own belly button without fainting and if YOU TRY TO TOUCH IT I WILL PUNCH YOU RIGHT IN THE MOUTH.

If I ever date again, which is highly doubtful, I will put on my dating profile (because I assume all dating includes the internetz) that I have belly button filth.   Then those smileys will start adding up!   You know it.   Nothing says “hot sexy babe” like someone who admits they have a problem with lint build up in one of their body parts.

Where was I?  Oh, the bachelor.   The damn bachelor.  I really think that Womack is perhaps the geekiest of the bachelors because he is.   Let’s examine the evidence:  1.   The way he runs, shirtless on the beach, with his toes slightly pointing out like a girl whose foot development was forever destroyed by learning fifth position in ballet class.   2.   His voice.   I don’t know, Womack, the voice, the voice.   Maybe it’s not The Voice itself but how The Voice is always uttering the words “I’m sorry” and how The Face is going along with The Voice and looking dejected and remorseful.

SERIOUSLY, you have nothing to be sorry FOR.   You didn’t fall in love!  PEOPLE DON’T!   I mean, some people do, but most of them DON’T on TV shows cast by sadists who are hoping you pick the most batshit crazy contestant ever in order to make this THE MOST WATCHED SEASON YET!   In fact, NOT falling in love was the only truly non-geeky thing you’ve done, to date, by my estimation.

Anyway, here we are and we’re all dating Brad, as a nation, and I can tell you that this situation is pretty depressing.   Is there REALLY no one else out there?  Because you girls can have him.   Ashley can have him.  Which is happy news, because she wants him!   He takes her on the single creepiest date that I’ve ever seen on this show, leading me to believe that there is not a single venue in Southern California that is willing to be associated in any way with this embarrassing franchise.   The non-brand-name fair is set up in a deserted farmer’s field or abandoned lot that the producers cleared the needle-junkies out of before filming.   Ashley is forced to look happy about getting dizzy on rides and playing unwinnable games (although all the prizes appear free for the taking anyway) and is probably filled with dread about how stupid FAIRS always force you to act like an IDIOT because you are meant to be expressing “childlike delight” at everything involved, an act that is both exhausting and a lie because I’ve taken kids to fairs and I know there is a lot more crying than there was on this date.

Ashley and Brad get on like a house on fire because she’s a dentist who fears abandonment and he was once abandoned and likes nice teeth and kissing.    So there was kissing and this is where I started to lose interest, an act that was completed when the Group Date was announced and turned out to be an entirely confusing and misguided attempt at encouraging people to give blood.   Dear American Red Cross:  Showing pictures of people who need blood is 1000% more effective than having sluts make out with a sweaty geek in a variety of porn-ily embarrassing scenes, edited by a bored reality TV producer with self-loathing issues.   Love Karen.

All I felt after watching the finished PSA was ashamed of myself and worried about the massive amount of plastic that swirls around in the oceans, killing fish and destroying the environment.   What made me think about plastic?  Oh, I don’t know.   Then I started thinking about all those dead birds and whatnot and got anxious about the future or LACK OF FUTURE THAT WE ALL HAVE and I immediately stopped caring about Brad Womack and the histrionics of the pack of feral and desperate women who, even after 59 seasons of this show proving that LOVE and REALITY TV have nothing to do with each other, want to claw each others’ eyes out for a chance with a sweaty man with a chronic over-apologizing tic.

Then I got depressed.   I think I missed a lot of what happened next, but the next date involved a Pretty Woman-type scenario, according to Brad, who is probably plenty used to not kissing hookers with hearts of gold and then buying them stuff.   The girl seemed nice but was obviously off her meds because she interpreted what was going on as an event that marked her as “the luckiest girl in the world”.   Oh honey.  Then I started to cry because OMG, what?   NO!   Then, out of nowhere, Train appeared and I was forced to google them to see if they were still alive and what dire straits they must be in to need the money that ABC was willing to shell out so that they could endure the awkwardness of serenading two people who are trying to look romantic.

Then I realized that Joshua Radin, who I am listening to RIGHT NOW on my iPad was once on this show.   Then I died inside, just curled up and died, because that is so wrong, almost as wrong as my recent realization that every song I like currently has once been featured either on Scrubs or Grey’s Anatomy.   Which dovetails nicely into …

Actually, nothing.   It started to rain just now and I looked out the window and whatever that was going to dovetail into got wiped out.

I DID miss the “who did he pick?  who did he pick?” part of the show and also the Ali part of the show, which is good because I’m over 1000 words already and I have made a series of promises to myself that I’m unlikely to keep, including the one where I drink 8 glasses of water in a day (or at least a week) and learn to let go of control, and the third one is that I won’t spend more than 1000 words on Brad Womack and his happy harem of harlots in any given week.   Because, you know, it’s important to set limits.

1256.   Damn it.

Know what I mean?  No?

OK, well here you have Brad.   He’s a rich-ish guy who is semi-successful and has dated a series of bimbos, at least one of whom has been a Bachelor contestant herself.    By all accounts, he’s pretty popular and he does not “need” TV to snag a babe.    But he goes on TV anyway because back in the day ABC was paying Bachelors half a million to show up and tongue dance with a variety of busty, willing “ladies”.   At the end of the show, he wisely decided not to propose marriage to some babe who a) was wiling to prostitute herself on national TV and b) who he had only known for 8 weeks and c) even then, only in the most contrived of circumstances.   That was probably the single most sensible thing I’ve ever seen a bachelor/ette do on this show and he wasn’t even the first, didn’t Jen, way back on Season Early On do that, too?   I notice that she did not become “the most hated woman in America” for that, yet he did?   Qu’est-ce que c’est?   Pour quoi?

The mystery begins when apparently upon leaving the show, Brad had a crisis of faith and something about hitting a wall or rock bottom or the wall at the bottom of the rocks or some sort of rock wall in a well that he fell down and had to be rescued by Lassie or some other famous dog or maybe just a large-breasted woman.   Then he entered into therapy.   INTENSIVE THERAPY.   Isn’t that a moisturizer?   Because his skin did look very moist.   Especially while he was showering.   Question:  Why do we always have to see the bachelor in the shower?   We do just go ahead and assume that he washes himself regularly.   We don’t need to see it.   There is nothing hot about a man in a shower unless you are a gay man and I don’t think that gay men are the demographic of this show.

So, anyway, there is Brad, having been rescued from the pile of rubble that was his shattered life, in Intensive Therapy because he did not WANT TO MARRY A BIMBO FROM TV.    What kind of therapist would take this on and eagerly counsel someone to TRY AGAIN?    Are you KIDDING ME?   Double-You Tee Eff?   His odds of “success”, if you define “success” as “marrying someone you barely know who was willing to marry whichever guy happened to be standing there when they got out of the limo”, are NEXT TO NIL.

The Biggest Loser has a better success rate than The Bachelor.   Hell, SURVIVOR has a better “success” rate than The Bachelor.

So this idiot is counseled to believe that, actually, lifelong abandonment issues be damned, finding love on TV IS the answer!   Does the therapist work for ABC?   Just curious.   But anyway, now Brad’s all a “better man” and “insert trite cliche here” and actually ABC is now paying the Bachelors much much more, in fact, rumour has it that Brad himself is pulling in seven figures because ABC was just that desperate to create “the most shocking season ever”.   (I bet Jake is pissed.   In fact, I heard he was back flying the friendly skies again.   He could certainly use the money.)   But what is shocking?   That Brad can be bought?   That Brad possibly really believes that ALL OF AMERICA judged him for not picking one of the other chicks and now ALL OF AMERICA is going to love him if he fake-falls-in-love this time around?   That Brad’s therapist really, seriously told him this was a good idea?

Je ne comprende pas.

So after way too much hashing and rehashing and hash-browning (no, that isn’t a word) about how Brad will never forgive himself for not marrying someone he didn’t love and how deeply sorry he is to everyone in the world, we got introduced to some of the top contestants obviously chosen because ABC is proud that they got a dentist, a mortician, a car dealer AND A VAMPIRE to appear on this season.   Boy, you know they are excited about that vampire.   And really, who isn’t?   I hope the dentist pins her down and files her teeth at one point in the season.   Or that the vampire and the mortician get into it over, um, crypts or something!    That’s just made of controversy, ABC!   Congrats!    I missed some of the next ones because I was staring off into space, contemplating how I am going to resolve something that there is no way in hell that I’m going to do, like “run a mile every day” seeing as I can’t run because I have a fused ankle and blown disc and whatever else I have that makes running impossible.  But in that moment, while bimbos were flashing across my screen talking about how their dead dad would be thrilled to see them hooking up with an idiot on TV, it seemed like The BEST NEW YEARS RESOLUTION EVER.   So then I spent some time online mapping out one mile routes from my house and actually one mile isn’t very long, surely I could do that.   Then I gazed into mid-air and imagined how super-awesome my life would be if I had more muscle tone in my legs.

Then I ate some Toffifee.

So then the thirty girls — laydeez — dressed in ill-fitting shiny prom dresses paraded themselves in front of Brad and giggled and sighed and instantly “forgave” Brad for not actually being in love with Deanna or Jen, or they slapped him in the face, or leapt into his arms or said stupid and humiliating things that suggested they had zero self-esteem and were willing to blow just about anyone for a tenner.   I had a hard time watching the whole limo-disgorging scene because, well, AWKWARD.

Anyway, apparently ABC has a bunch more cash this year because after I missed the next chunk of this gripping glee-filled episode researching Bach’s Rescue Remedy For Kids because my five year old was still awake and knocking on the floor which he does every ten minutes for about five hours after I put him to bed, I looked up to see that they were in Costa Rica or South Africa or something and blah blah blah …

Hey, let’s just pretend that I’m reading this out loud and my voice just did a slow fade, like at the end of a Dire Straits song, mkay?