Wednesday, January 28, 2015

Kate on Wendy Williams, Jan. 28

Kate pays a visit to one of her biggest critics today as Wendy Williams hosts the finally fired Apprentice dud.

http://www.wendyshow.com/2015/01/23/celeb-apprentice-cast-off/#.VMjxz1rjZCg

Tuesday, January 27, 2015

Kate Plus 8 "The Room Project": Discussion Thread

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10152663782660678&set=vb.33660480677&type=2&theater


Monday, January 26, 2015

Celebrity Apprentice Episode Five: Discussion Thread


“It’s Like A Booze Cruise With Knowledge" The Celebrity Apprentice teams must create and host an original boat tour of New York City for Circle Line. 

Saturday, January 24, 2015

Recap: Kate Plus 8 "New England Adventures": Maine-ly, Kate is a #dolt

Coming up on Kate Plus 8, screaming, crying, screeching, whining. Which is usually what's coming up on this god-damned show. There's normal familial disagreements, and then there's an unhappy family. There's a difference.

Cool drone shot of the kompound. You can tell it's probably GoPro because of the fisheye. Not that their property isn't already out there, but it seems to me this is kind of reckless. It would make it really easy for anyone to find it on Google maps who maybe already doesn't know. They used to only film little snippets of the property, such that it would be very difficult to pin down its location based on the footage. I don't get the sense anyone cares about common sense anymore, least of all Schmoopy here.

Kate has discovered, Chris Columbus style, that they have never been to New England before, so that would be a great place to get TLC to pay for a trip to.

Hm. But they all went to Connecticut in 2012 to run a race together. Maybe she thinks New England is its own state.

Kate tells Zorro she's going to miss him while they're away. He bites her. Heh, I imagine he's a fan of Vivica Fox this season on CA. A long, boring explanation about how they will all get packed. Schmoopy's in her element when she incessantly drones on about pointless things about herself and the things she does nobody else cares about. She treats her show sort of like a video version of Facebook. Next she'll be showing us the green smoothie she is about to drink and the cute little booger in one of the kid's noses when he woke up this morning.

More long, boring shots of the kids packing. Much to the dismay of Doofus, who rolls her eyes like a child, the kids, who are getting older and wiser by the day, actually want to pack their own things and choose their own clothes, which makes packing a nightmare for a control freak.

I love this part! Hannah says Mom used to try to make them wear all matching clothes, and quote, "that is so annoying." I remember many a debate back in the good ole days between the haters and the sheeple, with the sheeple saying just let them wear matchy-match clothes they probably like it! And us mean haters saying matching clothes are silly they are not toddlers, they should be allowed to be their own people and express themselves and choose their own damn shirt to wear.

Now, the golden child herself tells us that it turns out the kids hated doing the matchy-matchy thing! I feel validated, and I have a funny feeling we're going to continue to be validated as the kids get older and find their voices and confirm many of our wise speculations.

As so many have pointed out, the boys have shaped out to be so awesome. They just sort of go with the flow of packing as Kate barks orders, is over-the-top unreasonable, and tries to get a rise out of them. They're just like sure whatever you want Mom, I'm sure you know best. If you just don't engage with Kate, it's the same as cutting off her arms and legs. A histrionic narcissist craves somebody to engage with, and they won't do it.

As per her usual, Kate won't tell them where they are going. Then she teases them by using the words "main" or "mainly" in every sentence. Hannah's like no we didn't pick up on that because she always says that. Lol. And you mainly ignore her usually anyway, right kids? Actual research shows you get the biggest boost of happiness from planning and anticipating your vacation, not from actually being on it. This boost can last almost eight weeks! There is virtually no boost in happiness either on the trip or after you get home from the vacation. It's always grated on me she takes away the fun of anticipation from them. Instead they're always packing in the dark and headed down the road to nowhere, completely clueless. Poor kids.


Packing was such a struggle for this trip, and was half a day of their lives they won't get back, says the problems of the 1%. This is like Facebook, or Pinterest! Now Kate is shredding zucchini! Kate has confiscated Mady's phone again, but neither Kate nor Mady can remember why. Well, that's an effective punishment.

Mady describes the phone thing as Kate thinking, "I'm so cool, I have all the power." I think that child is pretty darn insightful.

The next morning, it's so early it's dark. Mady is still begging Kate for the phone back. I get that, it sucks not to have your phone on a long traveling day and vacation shouldn't start out on the wrong foot like this with you still being punished (for a reason no one can remember, apparently). Kate kind of gives her a "maybe, we'll see," type thing, then turns around and tells the cameras she's not getting it back. Mady's right, it's a power thing.

Mady and Cara are bringing a friend with them, Marley. Cara asked if she could bring a friend. I.e. Cara refused to film unless she gets her way, eh, Kate? Heh, I quite like these kids.

They arrive in Philadelphia airport and head to the plane. They don't want to road trip this one? It's not that bad of a drive. Ha-ha, schmoopy's slumming it in coach with the kids. Poor thing has to use her own hand as a headrest to doze. All the kids are glued to their iPads and iPhones the whole flight, quiet as mice. I think on the one hand it's nice you can just stick an iPad in front of a kid and they shut up the whole trip. On the other hand, what has happened to us?

There's a lot of filler in this episode, and I don't mean the kind you get in Beverly Hills. It's a lot of little unnecessary flashbacks to other trips, other flights, other griping. I could do without the history lesson.

Do you guys like flying? the producer asks the boys. Does anyone care? But incidentally, yes they like flying.

Kate rents a sprinter identical to the one they have at home. "Same seats!" she orders. For pity sake they are ten and fourteen years old, they still have a seating chart?

They head right to Plimoth. Did you know your very own Admin is a direct descendant of Pricilla and John Alden, two of the original pilgrims to settle here? I think I have my great-grandmother's nose.



They get dressed up as pilgrims, which strikes me as rather babyish, but the kids really seem to be enjoying this, so fine. At least a few people have mentioned that the kids may be more willing to participate in whatever, even babyish things, just because at least they are getting a chance to socialize and get out of the house. I think that's a fair point. Collin especially is so cute all head to toe in stockings, wool and brass buttons. It's nice to see the boys so much more relaxed and happy than in previous updates where they seemed frighteningly checked out. Kate too gets dressed, complete with a corset. The woman assisting her is too nice. Too bad Frances Fisher couldn't help her lace that one up.



He-he, Kate looks more like The Flying Nun than she does my great-grandmother. She's upset the stiff pilgrim shoes don't have Nike technology. She says they were so stiff a dog's teeth could have been broken on them. Tee-hee, that's what she said.


They meet up with one of the Pilgrim reenactors. I was last here when I was a teenager and being the history nerd that I was, I loved it. These people never step out of character. If your cell phone rings they act frightened and want to know what that is, that's how much they are into it. Viewing it now from an adult's eyes, it's sort of cheesy to have a bunch of actors everywhere pretending they are in a time warp. But on the other hand, it's obviously a great way to get kids interested and excited about history, and that I love.

Kate takes hobbling harridan to a whole new level as she stumbles after the kids who are gathering hay, carrying water, and other chores. Post trip, mostly all the kids can talk about was how hot it was. They need air conditioning, Collin says. I'm sure William Brewster will get right on that. Did they clear the entire Plimoth Planation in the middle of high tourist season for this family? It's utterly empty. A pilgrim ghost town.

Kate's really taken aback by the sheep and how vocal they are. You would think she would be quite comfortable amid dumb sheep by now, even vocal ones.

The kids help one of the pilgrims making some food, like eggs and mussels. In keeping with how she usually checks out an hour or so into the task on Celebrity Apprentice, Kate goes off to take a nap. Somewhere up there in heaven my grandma is snickering at this doofus. I come from a long line of both patriots and humorists.

The next day they make the long drive up to Maine, stopping at a little town called Bath for lunch. For some reason this name seems to really entertain Kate. She knows it was likely just named after the famous spa town in England, right? Lots of Northeast states have a Bath, including PA and NY. For only being on the road one morning Kate sure has a laundry list of complaints about the drive, including the Dolt giveth and the Dolt taketh away iPads. Aw, this restaurant looks like just about every little family restaurant you can find in any little Northeast seaside town. The kids seem too old for those plastic cartoony kid drinks. Maybe I'm getting out of touch with ten-year-olds.

Mm, fried pickles and calamari. And lots of other deep fried goodness. I love summer and small little coastal towns. Hehe, Mady orders lobster. The kids, being ten, are kind of forgetting their manners, playing with the food a bit, but since it's all about the details for Kate, nothing is allowed to just be let go on vacation. They even have to use a knife and fork to eat calamari. Stupid.

Mady ordered the lobster both because she was interested in trying it and because she knew it would piss Kate off because Kate finds lobsters gross. I find myself thinking Mady is my new favorite character on this show, then catch myself because that's just weird to think. She's a young woman for pity sake. A real person, not an actor or character. And yet the poor child is being discussed on the inter webs as if she were a "character", and I see how it happened. I fell into it too.

Predictably, Kate has to get in a slam about her upbringing saying she never got this sort of opportunity to try lobster so have at it, Mady. I daresay many of our parents could not afford this sort of nonsense and would not allow us to order it even if they could afford it. Especially when we're far too young to appreciate the delicacy and would, nine times out of ten, leave 90% of it on our plates to waste. I think we turned out all right despite being deprived of such a fine crustacean. Why is everything about her kids directly related to her own perceived bad childhood? Maybe a therapist could tell her. Hehe, now Lexi wants a lobster too. Well, that's what happens when you allow your children to go down this rabbit hole.

Mady loves that she's found something Kate hates. She wants to put lobsters under Kate's pillow. Hehe, the next four years are going to be long, very long, for poor Doofus.

They hit the road again and end up in Lincolnville where their beach house is. This is more than just a shanty. It's a beach-mansion. It also doesn't really appear to be on or near the beach. Maybe it's off camera somewhere.

Mady, being a teen, is mad there is no cell or wifi service. It's gonna be a long two weeks for a teenager.

Dramatic ensue because Lexi doesn't want to sleep on the couch. Well, I get that. It's kind of unfair the other two girls get nice lush bunk beds and she's stuck on the couch. Not sure how that happened, but poor Lexi is promising, tears welling in her eyes, that she'll be quiet if she can just have a bed. Aw, that's so sad. Maybe they need to at least take turns. Remarkably even Hannah suggests that if Leah and Lexi both really want that top bunk maybe they could just trade off each night. That's reasonable. Kate is dismayed the children have minds of their own. Heh. Kate shuts the three younger girls in a room and tells them to figure it out. Eh, I know this is Kate just being lazy, but at this age, they need to figure out such trivial things among themselves and stop running to Kate to solve it and betting she'll do something unfair that will end up in their favor. Interspersed with all this, the girls are giving each other random little pushes and shoves. That is so bizarre to watch. I've never seen such a thing except among preschoolers. It's like a second form of communication for them other than their words. They are ten for gosh sakes. And Kate just stands there, doing nothing about all this physical violence.

Hannah, bless her heart, volunteers to sleep on an air mattress so that Leah and Lexi can both get what they want. Well, that was nice of her, and mature. Good for her.

Commercials, and what a coincidence they are showing the trailer for Paddington, which Kate just happened to tweet about. Another grift?

The next day it's pouring rain as it tends to do in the Northeast during summer exactly when you're planning to go to the beach. I think it's nice that they put rain gear on and head to the beach anyway. The beach can still be fun even in the rain. They tackle the rocky shore and explore, finding some little crabs. I hate screamers. I think her screaming is getting worse as the years go by. More shrill.

After the beach, they hazmat the house to do some painting like they are two. If you really watch closely, the kids are constantly smacking each other. I mean it is non-stop. In one little clip, I spotted Alexis smacking Aaden and then whipping her easel toward him like a bayonet. This sort of thing goes on all episode long. Geez.

When all is finally set up the kids finally calm down and concentrate on their paintings. None of these are very good even the twins', except maybe Collin's, of a whale. Somebody should have told them to paint a base color on their canvas first. It would look so much better.

The next day they head to a ropes course. That's really cool, and Kate is right about it being difficult to find activities the two different age groups both like. I give the producers credit for really trying to find activities that appeal to the whole crew. I like ten-year-olds because they look at a sheer vertical wall with like two dozen teeny tiny little plastic peg things to hold onto, and they're all about it, can't wait to tackle it. They don't have the stupid fears and reservations and logic us silly adults have.

Doofus can't figure out something as simple as how to clip on and off. She even admits she felt sort of stupid. However I think she thinks being a #dolt is cute, which it's not. Alexis and the boys especially loved this activity, aw! Kate is being one of us adults with stupid fears and reservations and won't do most of these. That's fine, but don't teach your children your fears.

Nice, the only good flashback clip they've shown so far, to when our favorite Kiwi and honorary blog husband, pushed her off a tower and laughed at her. Hehe, nice one!



On a side note, splicing in a bunch of flashbacks into the episode makes these episodes so much more low-budget. All these flashbacks add up, which means you don't need nearly as many days of footage to make one episode. Money saved. I think that's just an interesting thing to ponder about TLC's game plan here. Showing incredibly long, drawn out clips of the kids swinging across ropes also saves money. A couple of the kids have GoPros on their helmets. Fun.

Collin and Aaden are so cool. They encourage each other and Collin tells him it's nice spending time with him, "we're the boys!" he proclaims. Aw. I'm so happy they've found their voices. They close the place out like you might a bar, lol.

After just having watched the RV episode it's nice to see a relatively less stressful vacation, at least so far. I suspect a big factor in that is that Kate hasn't brought along any hired help who is over her and primed to call her out.

Next up, my DVR has also decided to record the oh so educational My Big Fat Fabulous Life. Whitney's fat girl dancing Youtube video got 5 million hits. And, I'll skip recapping that.

Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Recap: Celebrity Apprentice Ep. 4: Abandon ship, Captain!

Last time on Celebrity Apprentice! Geraldo turned a hairy lemon into silky smooth lemonade by leveraging his creepy shirtless selfie from last year into a halfway decent campaign for Cosmopolitan, and the men won it. Due to some other circumstance, Jamie was fired instead of Kate, who contributed nothing to the task except picking up a few more tchotchkes from Bed Bath and Beyond. Trump then mixed up the teams, and with Geraldo at the helm, Schmoopy here came alive, cozying up to Geraldo her newest father figure and giving slightly more than her usual 10% effort. Ian turned out to be a Hollywood fruitcake, and once Geraldo knew the target number Ian thought Ian could raise (oops), Ian's team was toast. Terrell was a dud who was raised to think it's rude to ask people for money. That's fine in real life and he could sure teach Kate a thing or two, but that won't work on a D list reality show, something his mother never anticipated when she was bestowing a fine value system on him. So he got fired.

Kate calls Vivica "Viv." Well, isn't she just one of the girls! She claims the drama in the boardroom made her tense up. For someone who has made a career out of surrounding herself with drama and a half, she sure claims to hate it a lot. She should stop doing things she hates.

Ian has figured out that if he keeps going back to the boardroom, he increases his chances of getting fired. Oh, no, he's dumb, too. Sheesh, that's the sort of stupid comment I'd expect from somebody like doofus over there.

The crab fisherman is smarter than most and has done the calculations and figured out they all made it to the halfway point. Shawn is shocked she made it this far. Me, too. And that attitude is why Shawn is an Olympic dud. She's far too negative and a real wuss. I've never seen an Olympian act this pathetic on a reality show. Successful people are not shocked to make it to the halfway point or even to win, because step one of success is believing they should win. If Shawn doesn't even believe she should be halfway there, she has no chance of ever winning. At least Jonas brother, tool that he was, believed he should be there. Even when he was fired he still believed he should have won.

I haven't said much about the credits but they have always been top notch on this show. I love the heavy saturation and clarity. Leeza is adorable. Some of the montages are really artful, like Jamie's snow and Brandi throwing vodka out of a glass or whatever, which if you know the Real Housewives show you would know how perfect that is for Brandi.

The great Joan Rivers is a Trump adviser! I heart her. Or hearted. :(

They're in the showroom of the Ivanka collection. Whatever Ivanka touches turns to gold, Trump explains, she's a perfect child. I don't find his parental bragging obnoxious because it's true, Ivanka is phenomenal. She's so beautiful, so classy, and so intelligent. She develops things as effortlessly as putting cheese spread on crackers and they are a success. And she's a 90210 super fan in her spare time. I wonder why no one here is "just jealous" of a woman so perfect. They're going to create a marketing event to promote Ivanka's shoes for Nordstrom and their campaign "Power Up." I love Nordstrom! The fact that they have teamed up with Ivanka speaks volumes about the quality of Ivanka's products. She ain't no Kathy Lee.

Crab fisherman is a little disconcerted, all the tasks have been so women-oriented he can't find his penis in the morning. He says this. Kate shushes him, as she is a paragon of virtue. After all she has eight kids she is the role model for, and that comment was inappropriate. Kate totally seems like one of those women who can't stand words like penis and vagina and still call them pee-pee and cha-cha because she has never grown up.

Shawn puts her gymnastics skills to good use by bending over backwards to avoid PM. Shawn doesn't know anything about this, she insists. What does she know about? The most she's ever done for her team is complain about her period and invoke her good sense of balance to scale a wall to hang something. Vivica is like whatever, I'll do it, I've done it before and Shawn needs to step up (and I'm still bitter about her insinuation I'm menopausal), but whatever. I like Vivica. I never expected to dislike Shawn this much. Step up already, even Kate has stepped up. Sheesh!

Ha-ha, Kenya is going to be PM for the other team! Oh, this is going to be tough, Trump says. And good, I predict. Leeza needs to step up and soon but since she pulls her weight so much on every task I'll forgive it. And this is where Shawn's strategy is going to backfire because it could very well be her and Leeza as PMs next task and she has no business going up against Leeza, she'll be done for if she does. Stupid.

Kenya has a brilliant idea to use a piano.



Kenya puts Brandi on this, so she can blame Brandi when it goes wrong. Leeza doesn't like it, it's too old school Nordstrom and they're supposed to be targeting younger women. Again though she really isn't that forceful about trying to take her team in a different, and better direction.

Over at team Vortex, Kate's all gregarious again this fine morning because for some reason Geraldo brings out the best in her. She loves everything about his ideas so much she can't help herself interrupting him to tell him how great he is. Geraldo is similarly amazed by how wonderful and amazing he is. Color me surprised two narcissists would get along so swimmingly.

Oh, no, they put Kate on interior decorating. Have they seen her Christmas tree?

Shawn sucks but at least she throws out some decent ideas on most tasks, including this one. Kate throws out nothing this time but is vigorously taking notes again in an oh-so-helpful manner. You know in case they forget all this. Even Vivica is like I don't get Shawn, she has good ideas but refuses to step up as PM. By the way Shawn explained earlier her strategy is avoidance. That's fine for the first several tasks but you can't do that the whole show! Avoidance is a great strategy to get you into the thick of it, but as Crab fisherman explained we're halfway there now. Avoidance will backfire on you and big time if you try to use that tactic in the second half. You have to step up in the second half, there's just no way around it. And frankly you're better to do it as soon as possible when there are still weak players left as good options to fire. With a team as decent as this one and some duds still over on the other team, Shawn should have just gone for it on this task, now or never.

Commercials! My favorite timelapses are back, with an awesome skyline morning shot and some fun street shots.

Team Vortex gets to their mobile truck for their set up and yowser, it's tiny! Like only two or three people can comfortably be in there tiny. Lorenzo wisely suggests setting up things outside. Geraldo suggests a coffee bar outside. Well, that's good.

Shawn and Kate are dismayed at this change in plan. Dismayed. Well, but they're off in some fabric store where all good PMs send their most useless contestants. Shawn and Kate can't see the set up to realize how small it is. You have to trust your team that the set up is too small to go with their original plan of couches or whatever. Vivica is trying to explain to the doofuses that the setup ... is .. .too .... small .... for .... their ..... original ..... game plan .... to ....work. They're not getting it of course. They already cut and paid for the fabric. Whatever, Vivica says, scrap it.

Kate's shocked. Shocked! 

Shawn says Vivica is "sinking" their entire team. What the hell? No, Vivica is saving it. How difficult is this to understand? They came up with a nice concept with couches that suddenly didn't work because the space was smaller than one of those popular tiny houses. Vivica quickly changed course to an outdoor coffee bar. They're going to have to eat it on the 500 bucks, who cares.

Vivica's just had enough of Shawn being so contrary and hangs up. Story of our lives folks, because of some other circumstance, Shawn just driving Vivica and viewers bonkers, Kate's gonna skate by. I feel it coming and I'm prepared.

I really love the Apprentice editors, they are the best reality T.V. editors in the business. They must have loads of fun in those editing bays. They play sort of "dopety-dough" type music I would call it, sort of a little tuba, you know the kind of music that lets you know the current subject in front of you is an idiot. Kenya is puttering around in their tiny house pointing out where things will go, spliced in with shots of Leeza looking really skeptical. Lol. Leeza doesn't think they have a cohesive concept, which incidentally was their problem on Cosmopolitan, too. Uh-oh, Brandi is worried about this too.

Kenya think the team knows she's the strongest player creatively. Hehe, well what she dreams up about what others think of her is creative that's for sure. Kenya says this is about Brandi being bothered by Kenya's intelligence and creativity. Eh, no, it's about Brandi being worried they don't have a cohesive concept.

Haha, there's so much tension now on Kate's team between Vivica and Shawn and also Vivica and Kate, because Kate has sort of aligned herself with Shawn and is doing negative body language like crossing her arms and looking at the tiny house with scorn. This is wonderful. No more "Vivs" for you, doofus.

Kate doesn't get the concept of shoes and a coffee shop. Of course she doesn't, she was asked to get something within a matter of minutes, and that's far too much for her. Kate and Shawn go off to another room to stuff their faces and lament how much Vivica sucks. Lol. I think all this is about is Kate and Shawn both being so damn immature that they can't stand the fact that Shawn's brilliant concept of couches had to be scrapped. Everyone liked Shawn's idea. Until they saw the space. Turns out, the space was too small. Shawn's idea had to be eighty-sixed because it wouldn't work. It had to be. It's not personal, girls. Now go finish your gyros.

Commercials again. Another lovely rainy morning in New York. That sucks though, since a lot of things are going to be outside. They didn't think to check the weather report? Kate should have checked the weather and pointed that out if she wanted to get what she wanted. Dolt. That said, a rainy day is perfect to attract people who want hot drinks, so maybe this will work out after all.

Kenya's spending large amounts of time on the chandelier and piano. Everyone else is scrambling unwrapping shoes, hanging mirrors, wiping things off, etc. I wish I had a broom, Leeza says. Why don't you ask Kate, she surely has one. Leeza is not above crouching down and scrubbing floors with a paper towel. I wish I had a project manager, Brandi quips, which ends up being the title of this episode. Heh.

Ha, Lorenzo thinks it's a great day for coffee, too. Aw. My new fav team member.

Kate is still going on about how do shoes relate to coffee. I don't think that's that weird. Pop-up coffee shops are everywhere now, including department stores, grocery stores, drug stores. But Kate insists this is the most bizarre thing she's ever heard. When your assistant/bodyguard/nanny is always the one fetching your coffee for you, you can easily get out of touch with coffeeshops these days. The one thing I think Kate's right about however is that they have all the shoes inside the tiny house and no shoes outside. There needs to be some kind of flow and transition from the outdoor cafe inside to the tiny house, tying it all together with the shoes. In other words, some shoes should be outside to draw you inside. But does Kate articulate this to her team and insist they make this relatively minor change? Of course not, unless it was edited out. She'll just put it in her pocket and save that one to throw Vivica under the bus in the boardroom later. Classic Krieder.

Promptly at eleven people start pouring in, getting their coffee and checking out the shoes. People seem to like it. There's even a line. Sounds like the concept is working. The legend Joan Rivers stops by, grabs a coffee, checks out the tiny house and, aww, says they actually did a great job. She loves it. You know, the idea Kate and Shawn hated. Ha, Joan Rivers calls Geraldo "my cookie." That's great.

Over on Kenya's team, they're doing shots and massages. Lol, and that's the Real Housewife vision of this concept. Leeza and Kenya show Joan around and Leeza is surprised that Leeza is actually sort of feeling their concept now, it's grooving. Hey, a few drinks does tend to get things going. Joan likes their set-up too, and wants to know if Leeza has those particular shoes in a "Six Bunion." Haha! Joan, you are greatly missed.

Ivanka shows up and Brandi advises her to watch her head on the chandelier inside. Watch her head? Sure enough inside the tiny house the chandelier is hanging about five and a half feet off the ground. It's eye level with Kenya. That's hysterical. Everything looks even smaller as a result, like the way some little people modify their houses so everything is two feet lower. Good idea, Kenya, hang it right about the level you would hang a pinata at a six-year-old's birthday party, that's where that should go, perfect! If there was one thing I did not quite anticipate coming into this show is that there would actually be as big or bigger idiots than Kate among the fleet.

Ivanka gives the chandelier, which practically blocks some of the people she is talking to from her view, a sort of "hmmm, interesting choice of decor" look. Which is a classy woman's way of saying what in the f--ckity f--- is that? Kenya doesn't see how she could possibly lose.

Over on Kate's team, Lorezno takes over trying to sell their concept to Ivanka. He does a great job and should step up as PM soon, but their set-up really is lacking that transition from coffee to shoes. It seems to me a lot of people are just there for the coffee and are skipping the shoes. That can't be good. Ivanka steps into the tiny house and Kate manages to explain the set-up well enough with help from Ivanka who prompts her with questions. There's that thick PA accent back again, the 9-5 shoe is in "vaa-rious" places in the tiny house. Hehe.

Well, Vivica is just as confident as Kenya is in her team that Vivica's team won. Whenever she is project manager they always seem to make a mad dash for the finish line! Hehe, you mean that one time before when you were PM? Yes there is a definite pattern here.

Boardroom time! Trump praises Joan for a bit, calling her a champion, which is a nice tribute. If you haven't seen Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work, make sure that you do. In my review of this fine documentary for the blog I said it was "full of all kinds of layers and insight into the world of celebrity, women entertainers, groundbreaking comedy, workaholics, and the self-absorbed." Worth your time.

Kenya feels they really nailed it and admits even Brandi did a good job. Aw, I love a good make up. Of course she takes credit for Brandi shaping up, claiming she worked a bit of magic on her. Lol, ladies and gentleman we have another narcissist in our midst. Brandi thinks Kenya did well, but to me that just sounds like Brandi being diplomatic because she's not stupid and has a good feeling they've won so there's no use trashing Kenya right now. This reconciliation is so epic Geraldo suggests sending them to the Middle East. Heh. Leeza however was underwhelmed, she thought Kenya was disorganized. I agree with that and I'm not surprised a journalist would notice that since organization is paramount to the profession. From what we've seen Kenya flutters around blurting out random ideas and then chasing after them full throttle, not really seeming to have a clear plan of attack for the big picture. She also tends to get married to ideas really fast and never lets them go, even bad ones, which is generally not a good thing to do in most business scenarios. You can tell who has taken any kind of business class or read some books and who hasn't, and Kenya hasn't.

Ivanka liked Kenya's "Power up your sole" slogan because it was playful and direct. Vivica's "I am ...." listing various attributes was kind of all over the place. Uh-oh.

Vivica pegs Shawn and Kate as the problem on the team, lol, of course they were. Kate was out doing her usual shopping when Vivica had to change up the concept, and they didn't like that and that caused problems. Wow, did Kate ever go from "Viv, girlfriend!" to Ms. Fox's "lack of leadership and delegation" in two shakes of a sheeple's tail. Although she's heavily coached, I hate to say it she does a good job turning this right back around and making her, and the doofus's next to her, total lack of energy, creativity and overall effectiveness into all Vivica's fault. Well played. Strangely, she does think they won. You know, like, despite the utter idiocy of everybody else on the team but her and doofus. She's such a bitch. And delusional.

Kate explains her contribution to the task was recognizing that Lady Ivanka would never stand for plastic flowers, and going out and getting both plastic and fresh so Vivica had the option of choosing the much better fresh. Baw-hahahaha, Vivica flat out mimics Kate under her breath, mouthing "I got plastic and fresh!" like a Valley Girl would. Haha, Vivica hates her. Why? There's so much more to this we never saw, and that makes me so sad. I wanna see!

Vivica's pissed now. She's like congratulations, resting-bitch-face, you brought us fresh flowers, but this was about the overall package on this task and I brought it, Trump. Ha. Blech, Ivanka begrudgingly has to admit that fake flowers would be a bad choice. I mean, I hate fake flowers but have you seen fake flowers these days? The good ones? I am telling you, you cannot tell the difference. They are amazing. Not your grandma's fake flowers. And an argument could be made that's better than wilting flowers by 3 p.m., I suppose. I can't believe Ivanka thinks fake flowers or real ones are that big of a deal on this task. I would have put money on her saying that had all but about 1% to do with my overall impression of your set-up. Sigh, now Kate's gonna be smug for days 'cause Ivanka backed her up. Doofus, purely by accident, hits a home run yet again.



Wow, Vivica starts crying as she very reluctantly admits that Shawn sucks and should have been PM. I get the sense everyone feels like Shawn is or was America's sweetheart and it feels wrong somehow to call her out for the doofus she is. Like attacking your own daughter or something.

Ivanka loved many things about Vivica's team, including the coffee shop (the one Kate and Shawn hated, in case you forgot), but something about the way she is setting this up tells me there is a big but coming and they lost. Sure enough she says they didn't emphasize the shoes enough. Even Joan chimes in to say the coffee shop idea was brilliant. Ha, suck it, Kate. All that whining over changing things to a coffee shop and turns out it's the one thing the advisers did like, hehe. As for Kenya's team the whole thing was totally off brand, Ivanka's like, stopping in the middle of the day for a foot massage is just strange. Lol, so true. This is interesting, sounds like they both had major flaws. Who will it be? I would have to bet Kenya, since at least she emphasized the brand. And the winner is? Kenya! But it was a hard decision, Ivanka admits. Her charity is Detroit Public Schools. That's a good one.

Oh, brother, back at the suite, Kenya wants to be crowned the greatest contestant of them all and is so overwhelmed she's having an out of body experience, lol. She couldn't be more obnoxious and over the top, but I like that she and Brandi were able to just get along and pull off a win.

Kate tries to pull with Vivica what she pulls on Twitter about her kids, you know telling us what they say and think and such. But this is the boardroom, not Twitter. Kate says something about how things were disorganized and how she had to tell Vivica to use her words. Like what you would say to a three-year-old? Use your words, Krissy baby, so Mommy can help you? Wow, what a patronizing hag. No wonder Vivica looks like she wants to punch her straight in that overly-lipsticked mouth. Kate says Vivica begged her to "rescue" her at one point. Vivica leans toward her like she's not sure she heard Kate right. She finally jumps in: Rescue me? Nope, hag, never said that. Bitch, don't put words in my mouth. She orders Kate to tell the story correctly! Lol! Kate's all stammering now. It's the big girls, Kate. You must have forgotten. Welcome back.

Much like naive is a nice way to call somebody stupid, "energy level" is a nice way to call somebody lazy, and Ivanka says Shawn's energy level just wasn't up to snuff. I never imagined an Olympian would have a problem with laziness on a show like this. It's simply never happened before.

Joan starts saying something and Trump gets bored as he often does when people talk for awhile and interrupts her to talk about how great she looks at her age and what a champ she is. Joan has bling on her finger the size of a new Duggar baby.

Vivica oh so very wisely brings back Kate and Shawn. Has Kate been in every single boardroom on every task her team lost on? Blog historian? I think so! LOL! Weirdo Geraldo says something about how this is just like sausage. Mmm, sausage. Everyone back in the suite says Shawn is toast. Nobody seems to think Kate is in danger.

When we come back, the editors have completely cut out the three women going back into the boardroom while the synthesizer drones on and the piano tinkers the usual ditty of impending firing, and they're already sitting there in front of Trump, which is fine since that is an unnecessary waste of time that I'd rather see spent on showing viewers the task itself.

Ivanka asks Vivica between the two of them, Shawn and Kate, who would be better to keep around, an asset. Lol, Shawn, Vivica says. For the complete dud that Shawn is, even for that wisecrack about menopause toward Vivica, she's still better than Kate. That's great. Only problem with this is that I think Trump is going to give Kate a few free points for having stepped up as PM before, and early. Shawn never has, and that's really bad in this situation. You can't play that game this late in the competition when it gets down to the wire like this if you don't have something else going for you, like Leeza or Lorenzo do. Another problem with never stepping up is you never win any money for your charity and risk going home empty handed. You wouldn't want to leave something like global warming to run amok all because you couldn't man up. You might as well jump into the fire sooner rather than later.

Kate's making so many faces even Trump has to chuckle at her. Oh wow, Vivica is pointing out what we pointed out, that Shawn isn't half bad on her own but gets influenced by some of the ladies. I.e. Kate making her and Jamie her minions. That's so spot on, Vivica. Exactly what I saw.  

Interesting, Shawn explains she is well aware she has taken on sort of the minion role but was just playing a part. She's been well aware what some of these women were using her for all along. I did not expect her to say that. To what end she is playing this role however I don't quite understand. Why is Kate all nodding and mm-hmming when Shawn is explaining that she's basically been playing you this whole time? Lol, what a doofus!! Predictably though, the Trumps don't like that Shawn wasn't ever PM, and like that both Kate and Vivica have won as PM before. They leave out the fact that Kate won because of Brandi and Leeza, but I guess you can't start getting that far entrenched in the history when trying to sort this stuff out. Kate's bobbling away like a maniac trying to back up Shawn but Shawn's so done. By the way is it just me, but I seem to distinctly remember in prior seasons Trump saying definitively he cannot judge you on prior tasks, he can only judge you on what he has before him, on this particular task. So your history of doing great is irrelevant to the one screw-up currently. Unless I'm just making that up, that little rule he had seems to have let completely fall by the wayside since now both Kate and Vivica are getting all this credit for prior performances. Odd.

Due to other circumstances, like for the first time in the history of reality shows an Olympic contestant was lazy, Kate is not fired. Shawn, you're fired. This is so funny. Every time she skates by. Every time. Nine lives I tell ya.

I usually find the car rides home boring but I have to note that in the car ride home Shawn laments how she was only 22 and just getting out in the real world. Again Shawn, please read Malcolm Gladwell's David and Goliath or really anything by that brilliant man. It's simply not true that you are at some wild disadvantage just because you are young and inexperienced. You were going up against the likes of dolts like Kate and Jonas brother for pity sake. You're an Olympian! You've had more experience with the world, hard work, business and marketing than most 22-year-olds. Get a grip. At least Jonas brother never saw himself so negatively. He actually viewed his youth as an advantage. It's all about how you frame things for yourself. Yes he was fired early but I would rather go out owning it than get knocked out this way in some pathetic little heap. I worry for Shawn. Not just on this show but long term. She's never going to be an Olympic gymnast again, nobody is at her age. What's her life plan now? She needs to stop with the woe is me and get out there in the world, make a way for herself. Surely there are a myriad of ways to combine her professional athlete experience with a career. She's done a bit of sports announcing that went fine, but she strikes me as the type that will never be happy even with somebody else's dream career unless she's back on that balance beam. Shawn, it's over. Until you accept that you will always be this down in the dumps.

Back in the suite, Kate's pouting because she doesn't feel Shawn should have gone. Eh, yes she should have, if not Kate should have gone. Kate's just mad she lost somebody she can beat. Had to happen sometime. Vivica was never even close to being fired on this one, no way is Trump going to fire her when it was that close of a call and the PM really should have been Shawn but Vivica just stepped up because Shawn absolutely refused to take it. Poor schmoops lost both of her minions now and all that's left of the women are Leeza and three gals who hate her. Vivica's worried Kate, who is giving her immature bitch looks the whole time complete with a raised eyebrow of bitchiness, will be an even worse problem than before now that she's so pissed Vivica wasn't fired, which is probably a real fear. When even Geraldo, king of not getting over things, is telling you to get over it, that's bad.

It's the next morning, and, oh, good, crab fisherman will be happy this task is finally about nuts. They're going to make a viral video promoting single serve coffees from a local brand called Chock Full o' Nuts.  Oh no, Celebrity Apprentice "viral videos" are rarely funny, interesting or worthy of going viral. Very cool, they're using GoPros. Trump is a rather sickening shade of yellow this morning.

Woo-hoo Leeza is finally PM, versus the beautiful Lorenzo. What a wonderful showdown! They are both perfect for this and might I say quite evenly matched. Nuts on.

I rarely think of my own ideas for these tasks, I'm not that much of a CA nerd, but I'm thinking since this is a GoPro they should take advantage of its capabilities. Maybe track down an extreme sports athlete, or someone who scales tall buildings without equipment or something, and figure out how to get that in their commercial. Just using a GoPro like a regular camera is uninteresting.

Instead Lorenzo goes in a rather boring direction of having Geraldo do a jingle rap. Geraldo says he's the only one here who drank this brand in the sixties. That's probably because he's the only one here old enough to drink coffee in the 60's. Schmoops here wasn't even born yet. But like everything about him, he just owns it, including his age. Kate suggests she and Vivica be his backup rappers. She's really excited she hit on this fantastic idea. This has the distinct feel of a brainstorming session for your group project on modern writers for 11th grade English class. The one where you did a super amazing and awesome Academy Award winning short film with your best friend's camcorder and a mic borrowed from their dad who used to have big dreams. The kind of video you look back on today and it's just not what you thought it was then, now it's mostly just cute. Kate's contribution to this is just basically like yeah, yeah, this is great, do this, do that! Lol, schmoops, calm down. Lorenzo is like sometimes Geraldo's ideas are great....annnnd, sometimes they're not. Hehe, I love him.

Leeza is predictably fantastic. She's got this all figured out how she will manage the various perosnalities. Ian really is cute. He called me up yesterday and he's like, I still love you. And I'm like, I'm justI mean this is exhausting, you know?  Like, we are never getting back togetherlike ever. Taylor Swift reference for Kate. Hey, why didn't she call up her BFF Taylor to donate? Kenya actually says they have four hours to do all this, is that accurate? That seems an absolutely insane amount of short time to shoot a video. Ian is his usual fruitcake self. You know he's being a fruitcake because the music is lighthearted and silly. Ian's idea is a gorilla climbing a building or something. I think the gorilla is a bit ambitious in four hours what with the permits and all but I think he has it right they have to do something extreme.

Leeza has a decent idea to leverage the skirmish between Kenya and Brandi and make their video about that. I think given the Real Housewives fans out there, that very well might work. It's as good of an idea as any.

Kenya finally explains that their little spat is about some comments Brandi made about her in the press. I don't know what those comments were about but sounds like Brandi being her typical self, blurting away and alienating folks as she goes. In fairness, Kenya makes comments in the press too, like saying that Steve and Kate shared a hotel room during the competition. Not that I have a problem with her doing that, she should say what she likes about a situation she was there for, but it seems kind of hypocritical to be upset at Brandi for what sounds like something similar. 

The idea morphs into something I think is rather good, such that the video is going to show Brandi and Kenya cat fighting, and then show what a guy sees when he sees women going at it like that. Which I assume they mean something a bit more sexual. I can't picture Kate being on this team and having the foggiest grasp of this concept. It would be way too much for her to digest in only four hours. Good thing she's over on Vortex where they're just rapping.

Geraldo is happy to offer his endorsement of this coffee for free when normally he would charge millions for such a thing. He's such a generous man. Kate is off by herself getting her hair done in a June Cleaver style that looks like it's going to take hours. Good place to put her. We all know the pool girls and lawn boys, but did you know there are Ted Gibson girls? One of such girls came to do her hair, Kate explains. We may need to add one of those girls to our staff one of these days, she seems like she would fit right in. Ted Gibson seems like a nice guy for helping Kate out so much like this. Hey, who is going to do Vivica's hair? I thought she was in the video, too.

They finish filming some of the shots they need and now they're waiting on Kate. Just as expected this hair thing is taking forever. Vivica comes over in a similar manner to the shopping incident and is like okay schmoops let's get the show on the road here. Somebody had just said they have to film and edit this whole thing in one day. That's just nuts, chock full of 'em, and doing a whole fancy hair thing like this doesn't seem like the best use of time.  Wow, Kate says people think Vivica is more capable than she actually is because she's always looking busy. Holy projection, batman! She, Kate, of course knows the truth about Vivica. Wow, Kate's a real bitch. I like the sort of alternate universe thing going on here where all the contestants the editors obviously don't mind you really liking end up as people Kate hates, and everybody Kate just loves are real dolts. Hehe.  She's an actress, Kate mutters with scorn, chomping away on her gum. But you're a reality T.V. star! Lol! The way it's edited makes it look like Kate ignores Vivica when she tells her to hurry the hell up and asking her what the holdup is, which is pretty damn rude if that's the case. I have never seen such an utter lack of self-awareness. There's Kate, all relaxed, who can't believe that any of this would make Vivica so stressed out and raring to get this done. Yet that's all Kate does on her Kate Plus 8 show is act like that. Just watch the RV episodes. It's go here, go there, now, faster, if we pull up somewhere you are to disembark from the bus on my count, quick march! No potty breaks, no poopy breaks, no crying for your mommy!


Kate's is usually all stress and drama all the time. How can she not see this? At least Vivica is anxious to get going for charity.

If Kate needed such an elaborate hair and makeup thing, she should have been in the makeup chair at 5 a.m. like every other celebrity in the world. That's because this shit does always take forever so they stick you in there at 5 a.m. Or do a hairstyle that doesn't take so long. Simple.

Leeza and Ian are starting to butt heads a bit, as diplomatic as Leeza always tries to be. Ian thinks he has more experience than anyone, so it's an ego thing. I think his experience and Leeza's could compliment each other quite well but someone like him won't see it that way. Some hotdog scene they are doing staring Ian is taking forever as scenes tend to do when you're channeling Shakespeare. They butt heads some more. Kenya thinks Leeza needs to reel this shark in and get on with it.

Kate is finally done and the hairstyle is cool but hardly worth all the time they spent on it. Lorenzo is nice and says he likes Kate but they wasted a heck of a lot of time on the stupid hair and now he has to cut some shots, thanks to Kate. That sucks. Good job, doofus, another f-up is all thanks to you. Kate wants to do this and that shot but Lorezno, who understands the time thing when it comes to making a film, is like it simply is not possible under these time constraints, we're losing the light, etc., all things somebody who actually knows how to make a film would be realizing. She just got out of hair and makeup and they're already losing light, how long did that Gibson girl spend on this anyway and what time did doofus finally roll out of bed this morning?

I don't understand how the rap got transformed into Lassie without the dog but here they are.

Back at Leeza's team, I like Brandi's glasses, she is one of the few people who looks prettier with glasses than without. Somebody said Brandi has some odd angles and I agree. Catch her at the wrong angle and she looks so strange. I think it's her bone structure. But with the right angle she's really pretty.

Brandi's excited about this, she would love to beat the sh-- out of Kenya. Heh. The fight is, well, odd. They're kind of whipping their heads back and forth like a washing machine. Okay then.

Over on Lorenzo's team they have an hour and fifteen minutes to finish up the shoot. Oh no. Lorenzo scrambles to get their outdoor shots. He is a wonderful director, doing a good job explaining to the "talent" what to do. Oh, here's the rap. Or dance I guess. I get it now, sort of. Geraldo reminds me of Mr. Peanut from Planter's.




Kate more like a little Dutch girl, with apologies to Dutch girls.


They look like they all raided the family Halloween costume box and put on whatever struck a chord, like what we used to do at kids on a boring rainy afternoon. The whole thing is just as odd as the other team's video, but in fairness you can't throw together anything halfway decent under such ridiculous time constraints. These time constraints are over the top even for this show. Nobody is going to turn out anything but garbage under these conditions.

Geraldo is kind of struggling to get the rhythm right. It doesn't come to him as easy as his huge ego does.  For a Latin, I'm surprised, Lorenzo says. Lol. Lorenzo must never be fired.

Lorenzo is not that impressed with crab fisherman, who tries to offer his two cents on some of the shots. Lorenzo thinks all crab fisherman does is put a metal cage in water and pull out crabs from it. I think that was a little harsh from my dear Lorenzo. Fishing the Bering Sea is one of the most dangerous things you can do. And he's not just a line fisherman, he is captain of a boat. That requires an incredible understanding of everything about the weather, the ocean, the huge machine you are at the helm of and all the computers that run it, and so forth. You are also responsible for the lives of those men, and those boats can and do go down and crews are killed if you don't understand what to do in an emergency or even if you do. And at least crab fisherman doesn't exploit any kids and if his reality T.V. series ended today and never came back, he'd still have his normal job and could just go back to normal life. I don't know, I think it's fair to say crab fisherman is probably a bit too quiet on this show and doesn't take the lead enough to see what he's capable of, but I would never, ever insult the work that he does on his boat like I freely make fun of Kate's silly "job" being a reality T.V. mom and D-lister. I still love you though, Lorenzo. I think crab fisherman has his first good point of the whole series other than his comments some time back about what a dolt Kate was. He says they use GoPros left and right on his show, he knows what he is doing with GoPros, and it really gives it a nice viral look. He is right and I said this from the beginning. They should use these GoPros the way they were intended. I don't know what that is, that's for them to figure out.

They are using the GoPros, both teams, like just a regular camera. The problem is this camera isn't designed for that. Use your iPhone camera if you want to just make a regular video. Look at some of the footage they have shown us so far. See how it looks so fish eye? That's because GoPros are a fisheye lens, made that way on purpose because that is the lens you usually want for sweeping, grand shots, a sense of scale, and intense movement. When you use fish eye just for regular shots it looks like something is wrong with your camera, either that or your nose is too big.

Leeza's team is filming the sexy part of the shoot. Brandi and Kenya roll around in a hotel bed while Johnny watches. Wow, I nearly forgot about Johnny. Yikes, I feel like he hasn't said a word in like three episodes. These tight edits can be hard on somebody quiet like him. I never got the lesbian thing for guys but I can sort of try to imagine why men might find this little scenario quite "interesting." I think Leeza is right that this isn't so racy the executives are going to be horrified. She is hopeful they struck a good balance.

Seeing Leeza up close I don't think she's had that much extensive work done, other than on her lips, which aren't even that bad. I'm not counting the odd nip and tuck, bit of botox, filler, here and there. For some reason her eyes get all squinty when she's out and about which gives the illusion she's had more surgery than I think she really has. When she interviews and is relaxed, they don't look like that at all.

Leeza's team is in the editing room and Ian's tackling their edit. It's stressful and taking forever. He doesn't want to hear from anybody else. Brandi thinks they're not branding enough. Ian is getting annoyed and kind of flips out on her. He just wants her to shush. I do wish Leeza would step up here and insist he knock it off.

I-an's name make sense because it's all about "I" to him, Brandi gripes.

Lorenzo takes on the edit for his team. He knows what he's doing here. Do Geraldo and Kate know they can take off their costumes now? Shoot's over. Surprisingly their little rap dance didn't turn out half bad when all is said and done. Lorenzo is such a nice guy and praises the whole team, even Kate.

Time to show the videos to the executives. Leeza's video turned out as they envisioned it. Johnny and Ian watch Brandi and Kenya have a bitch fight in the street, and soon they start seeing them doing sexy wrestling in the bedroom. Then they all enjoy coffee together in bed. This is actually really good for the time constraints, one of the best videos I've seen on Celebrity Apprentice. There is an added layer of goodness to it because Brandi and Kenya have a real life feud that many fans know about. I'm definitely surprised how well it turned out.

Lorenzo's video features Kate and Geraldo doing a retro breakfast with coffee and singing his jingle. Kate can sing on tune, wow I had no idea. They really highlight the branding so much better than the other team, but I think the last half of their video with the dancing in the streets is ultimately sort of pointless. Because the other team's video had a cohesive storyline that was funny and interesting, I think they will win despite maybe falling down about the branding.

Final boardroom of the night!

Trump's feeling especially bored tonight and can't even bother with complete sentences. Weak link, who?! he demands. Hehe. Brandi says Leeza has basically been defacto PM on every task, she's great. Leeza said they spun the feud between Brandi and Kenya into gold. Like Geraldo, this is just what successful people do.

Trump likes her form and presentation. Well, she has an Emmy. This sends Trump on a rant about how he cannot believe he lost when he was up for an Emmy. He walked out. Lol.

Kate starts puttering around about who is the weakest player and takes so long to say something Trump gets bored and moves on to ask Vivica. Well, Kate, of course, Vivica says. Kate lets out her usual sigh of shock and dismay. Vivica's like what? The damn hair took too long. Lol, she hates her. Hates her. I wonder if Kate came into this competition expecting no one to ever throw her under the bus. It's going to happen to almost everyone, why does she think she's above it?

Kenya was mad that during the filming Brandi kept making snide comments to her. Either I don't remember that or it was cut out or it didn't happen. Of course she gets in some backhanded slams at Brandi about how her husband left her for somebody younger and prettier. I really don't think LeeAnn is all that prettier and she can't be that much younger. Brandi and Kenya are both a piece of work.

Lorenzo's video had good branding but it was more like a commercial and not a viral video. As for Leeza's video it really nailed the "viral" aspect of it but the branding wasn't heavy enough, they missed the single serve coffee, but it wasn't even close Leeza's team wins it. I agree, it was a much better video. I'm not surprised Leeza has her own charity called Leeza's Care Connection. I know all about this from back in the day when my old employer was a friend of hers. If I'm not mistaken said employer went to an event or two about it. It's to support caregivers for the ailing, which hits home for me since my family is caring for my dad with Alzheimer's. Leeza too has a parent with Alzheimer's.

Vivica thought the other team's video was too racy. It's pointless to go on about the other team, they won. Vivica would fire Kate because they didn't get the shots they needed because Kate's stupid hair took forever. That hair was dumb. Nobody cares about the hair, it wouldn't have helped them win. Their weak story and concept was why they lost, not the hair. Kate says she is always focused on the details because the devil is in the details but that's just not the case usually. The devil is not in the details. It's not in the hair, the flowers, the heart-shaped cutting boards or the note taking. The devil is in the overall big picture. I cannot believe she is still sitting there with this sort of stupid viewpoint on the competition.

Sigh, it's always me, Kate says. Yeah, ever wonder why you're always the common denominator? I really can't stand the sort of "they always pick on me, I'm bullied" tone in her statement. Much like how she tries to paint the "haters" as just one day they all started to pick on little ole me, she is doing that here with Vivica. Just one day, out of the blue, Vivica decided she hates me! I don't get it, Mr. Trump! Little tear. Bitch, please. Kate is still trying to say that Vivica just appears busy but isn't doing actual work. Projection just dropped an anvil on Kate's head. Vivica is just sort of smiling in disbelief.  Kate says in life Kate either does it or kills it. Well that's true, most things she tries she sucks at and they bite the dust in short order.

She moves stealth-like. Lol, what incredible spin. Stealth-like, lol. Edward Kenway is stealth-like. Not Kate.



I think Kate must have meant sloth-like. Malaprop.

Oh, now Kate wants Lorenzo fired. She was all about their concept, cheering and woo-hooing the whole time. Now the concept is shit? And yet she says ultimately Vivica should not be fired. Huh? Then what was the point of all that ranting but to drive a further wedge between them making it impossible to work with her on future tasks? What a doofus.

Poor Lorenzo is having the worst time trying to decide who will he bring back. He feels everyone pulled their weight. No they didn't! What?! Everyone in the suite is like no, Lo, don't do it. Bring somebody back! Anybody!

But Lorenzo has too much honor. He was PM, and he must bear full responsibility for the team. No, Captain, abandon ship, abandon ship! Jump now while you can! There's still time!



Here we go again!!! Due to some other circumstance, a celebrity just not willing to bring anybody back even terrible players, because their incredible honor and moral code commands them to fall on the sword if they were the leader even if a complete dolt is on their team, Kate isn't fired. If Kate had any honor, she would own their time constraints as being all her fault due to her hair, and suggest perhaps she should take the blame. But that will never happen.

Lorenzo, you're fired. Sob!!!! How is Kate still here????

Back in the boardroom the Trumps still can't get over Kenya making that snide remark to Brandi about the younger and beautiful woman. Lol, too funny. None of all this drama that just happened interests them as much as that bitch fight. Even the Trumps can't resist a good Housewife feud. Guess it can suck anyone in.

Aw, a nice little "In Memory of" thing to Joan at the end. Rest in peace, Joan Rivers.

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Kate Plus 8 "Rocking the Boat": Discussion Thread

The family takes a boat ride and learns to trap lobsters; enjoy shopping for souvenirs; gather for a family tradition of an ice cream family dinner.

Monday, January 19, 2015

Celebrity Apprentice Episode Four: Discussion Thread




Joan Rivers returns as a Trump adviser on "I Wish I Had a Project Manager." Jan. 19, 9 p.m. EST.

Wednesday, January 14, 2015

Recap: Celebrity Apprentice Ep. 3: Mrs. Rivera's check is real.


Editor's Note: Guess what? This is our 1,000th post! I can't believe it. The thanks all goes to you all, who have stayed here, some of you many years, through thick and thin, good times and bad, the world falling apart and the world coming together. The hysterical times, the snort your rumspringa times, and sometimes even tears. A special cheers to my attentive staff, the pool is always clean and the lawn tidy thanks to you. The porch we've all helped build throughout all these 1,000 posts is quite nice, thank you everyone.

Last time on Celebrity Apprentice, a montage of Kate Goz-land stuffing her face. The ladies were "starved" for direction with that doofus at the helm so Brandi and Leeza had to take over as the defacto PMs. Nice pun, writers. Because of some other circumstance, Kate skated by on both tasks, even though she stunk both times. Remarkably, even though Kate was PM, they won the Neat challenge. Despite Kate. It's become sort of the running joke on the blog that, as PJ here so eloquently put it, Kate has horseshoes shoved up her ass. Even though she undeniably sucks at this game, each and every time something else will happen that has nothing to do with her, somebody else needs to be fired as a result, and there she is again, veneers twinkling, to live another day. You can't get mad about this stuff, you just have to laugh.

Shawn is still upset that Vivica told Trump on national television Shawn got her period. As I said last time, that is a pretty clear violation of the girl code, except Shawn was the one who disclosed this information on national television in the first place, so this is sort of bizarre. She could have just said she felt the flu coming on. Shawn compares this to talking about one of her teammates going through menopause. Is she suggesting these ladies are old enough for menopause? Vivica gives her a well-deserved look. Shawn's kind of a bitch. There, I said it.

Whoever did the makeup for the women's interviews I have to agree it's kind of creepy how different they look. They look like they're wearing a painting of themselves. Shawn looks like a completely different person. I think it's great the way makeup can help women feel good and give them a pick-me-up, but if you look so different you're not yourself what's the point?

Geraldo appreciates the love from the ladies but the reception from the men upon his return is a bit icy. I think they were all very fond of Gilbert so this was a blow. He is right that the men's team is working against themselves. (For that matter, so are the women at times.) Geraldo is annoying but he's a strong player, and they need to just embrace that and move on.

Trump gathers the contestants in a grand courtyard.

I am happy I actually recognize these iconic steps as part of Central Park and a quick Google search pinpointed this particular area as Bethesda fountain. I have only been to NYC three times in my life, so I recognize almost nothing usually. What a beautiful setting! Production takes their roles seriously on this show, and I appreciate it. The production values are above average, like the time and effort that goes into the locations we see. Seeing what a great job production has done capturing it this season makes me wish for the first time I knew this city better. It's really blossomed.
The teams are going to create a four-page fitness editorial for Cosmopolitan magazine. Doofus over there is blown away. Wow!!! she exclaims. Yeah, not bad for Wyomissing, PA, right Goz-land? Seriously, she's so out of place here. What is she even doing here?

Johnny the cute baseball player and Jamie the snowboarder are going to be the PMs. I think that makes perfect sense and it's nice to see both of them stepping up immediately when in past weeks everyone has avoided this role.

Jamie's charity is to protect our winters. It's going to be hysterical if her team wins because then Trump will have to give the show's money to something he has called the "GLOBAL WARMING HOAX." All caps, lol. He caused this big ole dustup on the inter webs last year during the polar vortex with tweets like that, remember that? There is some real science behind the belief that global warming is not really happening or if it is, it's just normal temperature fluctuations that have been going on since time began and certainly long before pollution, but I'm guessing you're probably not going to get anyone to listen to an idea different than the mainstream just by hitting that caps lock and labeling all the other side's views a "hoax." At the very least, some of the most prominent global warming theorists are acknowledging there has been a "pause" in the warming trend for at least fifteen years, some admitting even longer, that they've been struggling to explain. But it's Trump, so he's never able to present what might be a good point in any kind of reasonable fashion let alone at a normal decibel level. How in the world Ivanka was sired by him is also a great conspiracy. Perhaps even a HOAX. I myself think she really must have been conceived by velvet and cream puffs and I'm sticking to my theory.

Jamie has a sort of "the devil made me do it" look in her eye when she talks about her charity that makes me think she knows full well Trump doesn't believe this shit, but she's going to pry that money away from him and give it to a cause she loves and he despises because that will just be fun. So far, I like her.

Okay, these editors are amazing. As Jamie crows about how their cover should focus on natural beauty, they cut to a shot of Kenya, then Kate, then Brandi, the three most plastic members of the team. Haha, so well done. Why does Kate still look confused? No one is asking her to understand the concept of a scanner scanning in a receipt or bake a pie or anything difficult like that. It's a magazine cover for pity sake.

Shawn has an idea to feature the two Olympians on the team with the theme "coached by an Olympian." Not bad. Kenya points out though Cosmopolitan is a very sex-focused magazine and so maybe they should be sexier. True, but the executives didn't say anything about sex, unless it was edited out. They want a spread about fitness. Bless her heart, Jamie's goal is to just keep the peace on this team. She is one of those naive PMs who thinks she can both win and keep the peace. At a certain point though she is going to have to stand up for herself and her fate as PM if something is happening that could cause them to lose. I'm worried for her on this task.

Lol, Brandi makes a joke about how Kenya could just "buy" more booty rather than do squats and Kenya's death glare is priceless. Brandi just can't help herself, can she?

Over at Team Vortex, the men are once again looking much more organized. They are quietly studying old Cosmopolitan magazines like it's the GMATs. They quickly realize that Kenya is right, the magazine's focus really is on sex. My boyfriend has a wife???? But he's never mentioned her before!

The boys have this idea for some kind of spread invoking the popular "selfies." I love that Geraldo boasts about how he had a very successful "selfie" a short time ago. Well, right, as the butt of the joke, Geraldo. I will certainly not link to that particular selfie or post it here, because I care about you all. If you are a disturbed person and really want to see it again, I will leave you to find it on your own or ask our blog historian. What I will say is that when that selfie came out everyone was making fun of him for it, but he either doesn't realize this or just doesn't care. And this is the beauty of successful people, bad things slip right past them like they're teflon and not only that but they have an uncanny ability to just embrace the bad or even turn it around into something good, like on this task. Dare I say we could learn something from Geraldo and the selfie that America will never be able to erase from our minds.



Johnny is going to bring in his wife who is a model (of course she is) for the cover. I think Johnny is really trying to say something else, but the way it comes out is that women who read Cosmopolitan are perfect women. I imagine some men feel we should all be reading this. Maybe so ... or not. I don't read it and I don't feel I'm missing anything. I don't get the sense this guy is that bright but he seems pleasant enough.

Geraldo has some creepy ideas where he and Johnny will hug and be naked and take a selfie. Johnny and Ian are doing a Kate "ummmm" face. Which is all you can do in this situation. Ian thinks Johnny should have at least gotten Geraldo dinner and a movie first. Lol.

Jamie sticks Kate on the useless job of "counting, time management, etc." Et cetera, lol. These are the jobs you don't really need someone on but you have to assign to someone on the team who is a nuisance to your progress to keep them out of you and your team's hair extensions. Yea! I think she's finally on to her! Great idea, Jamie, stick Kate on counting, lol. Here Kate, count these sandwiches.



Kate's bored of counting already, instead she's texting. Naturally Kate wants to get rid of Brandi, the second strongest member of this team, because Brandi has conflict with Kenya and it's a side show. And Kate would know, she's been the ring leader of an eight-ringed circus since 2004. But Brandi is right, the model should not be Kenya. Kenya doesn't make sense for their theme. Brandi correctly suggests that the models should be their two gold medalists and then a third random male model. That's not conflict that's just stating the facts. Also quite honestly it's on the PM to tell Brandi and Kenya to knock off this little feud for the task and get down to business. Butt out, Barnum. Everything Kate says sounds like a question. 

Commercials! This question thing is not a regional thing, it's an American thing. And it's gotten worse by the year. Especially people under 30, it's like they must never have any certainty in their lives. We need to stop doing the little question uplift at the end of every sentence. Ask anyone British how an American sounds to them these days and they will tell you to please stop asking questions. If it bothers an American it must sound just infuriating to them. Awww, they're going to train guide dogs on the Today show. A friend of mine got a dog last year who detects when she's going to have a seizure, and he has changed everything for her. For the first time in her life she's not afraid to be left alone in her house, or go out on her own. She can have a social life now, even date. Dogs are beautiful, wonderful creatures.

Ohhhhh, now the girls want Brandi to be the model. In Brandi's defense, she never suggested herself. She's basically like well whatever you decide, if that's really what you want, but I did say it should be a man. This is all really pissing off jealous Kenya, who has to take a breather.

Johnny's wife arrives and she is indeed gorgeous, but please, no more duck lips photos. Lorenzo is so sexy when he directs. Even Lorenzo, who is so nice, admits that Johnny really isn't much to write home about of a project manager so everyone else is stepping up too. I really never got the sense Johnny is anything special. You have to be careful going on a show like this if people don't know you're not special. You don't want to accidentally let the cat out of the bag. I think despite his slow start, Lorenzo is shaping out to be one of the strongest players on the men's team and certainly one of the smarter ones.

The women modeling are going to wrap themselves in a flag and it will look like they are naked. Oh, well Kate knows about that. Kate feels this is "spot owwwwn." I don't know, wrapping yourself in a flag has been done only about a million times before. Seems kind of unoriginal. And also, maybe a bit disrespectful to imply you're naked under there.

Jamie's got this, she sends Kate and Vivica to get props and is like, one hour max, people. Lol, after last task's shitshow that's wise. Based on this and the way she's marginalized Kate, I think it's safe to say Jamie is now up to speed on what this doofus really is all about. Welcome, Jamie. I can't picture Kate puttering around with a "superior" Vivica glaring down on her for more than an hour so that should be okay. I think it's hysterical that we so accurately predicted that Kate will always be the one sent off on little mostly unimportant errands and such just to get her out of the way. Called it.

Kenya is trying desperately to make Brandi's butt pop but I'm afraid Brandi is, well, not Kenya. I can't believe this. Kate's useless to this task, so useless all she can do is count sheeple, but there's all this tension and conflict between Brandi and Kenya, and sweet Jamie can't really handle all this big dog fighting that well, so once again some other circumstances that have nothing to do with Kate, like really nothing to do with her, are probably going to keep her safe, again. Lol, this is just too much.

Ian is rather fascinated with how ripped Terrell is. He can't stop talking about his bumpy road of muscles. Simmer down there, Milo, or we'll turn those lights right on out. Hey, that's my camera! The Canon 5d Mark iii. It's the most perfect camera ever made which is why it's probably responsible for most of the photos you see these days including these ones. You could buy a nice used car with the same amount of money it costs, but it's the only electronic I know out there that is actually really and truly worth that kind of expense.

Kenya is not happy with Jamie's PMing because she's asking everyone else what to do. Kenya really hates Brandi's shoot and wants it to be sexier. Take it off, take it off. Brandi is obviously uncomfortable with this, she's like I've had two kids, I haven't worked out in months... But finally she says whatever fine I'll do it, it's for charity, and strips down to her bra and panties. Good for her. Jamie suggests Photoshop. Lol.

Commercials. Did time-lapse guy get fired? All my favorite time-lapses are missing from this episode. A little too much horsing around with the tilt shift lenses and not enough work? Kate and Vivica come back from shopping after "forever" according to Jamie. Oops, should have kept Kate on the counting job. At least Vivica has a pep in her step as she rushes back to the group. They quickly finish up the shoot with the Olympians wrapped in flags and then begin assembling the magazine.

Leeza, the strongest member of the whole team, is worried that they have two different themes going on here, one being sex and "touch me," the other being the athletes and exercising. Leeza, now sex and exercise do go together. You can burn a hundred calories having sex. If you're Brandi maybe even 200.

Ian wants to include a story in their magazine spread about his wife taking pole dancing classes. I really resent hearing about his wife much less her pole dancing. I guess this magazine does sort of feature stories like that. Geraldo thinks the story is too long. He thinks the photoshoot that goes with it is boring and cheesy. They need something to spice up this spread or they're toast. Geraldo to the rescue. Solution: Geraldo in only his socks, shoes and underwear, pumping dumbbells. Genius.

Geraldo thinks he started the trend of selfies. Heh, no, Geraldo, it's amazing you didn't stop the trend of selfies. I imagine he also takes credit for inventing spot news reporting, and talk shows. Certain shades of narcissism are more amusing than anything and mostly harmless. Lorenzo thinks all joking aside Geraldo is just too old for their target market, which is mostly 20 and 30 somethings.

Johnny does an okay job presenting, and good for him getting up there instead of leaving this job to a more obvious choice like Geraldo. Interrupting the presentation to take selfies is awkward, but at least they were trying to tie the presentation into their spread. Their spread looks professional, but the selfie of Geraldo doesn't fit. And is creepy.

Jamie also presents, and she's nervous and a bit stumbly, but again, good for her when she could have just passed this off on Leeza who is always phenomenal at presenting. I'm not quite understanding their concept but their spread is just as professional looking as the men's. The photos turned out beautiful, all of them. Then again, both teams had several unknowns sitting around computers and operating cameras for them on this task. It's not going to look like your fifth grade English assignment with staff like that. It's kind of questionable how much of this can be attributed to the teams and how much to the helper elves.

Boardroom time already again! Another problem with these fast edits this season is that you don't really get to see much of who and what were really the problem on the tasks. 30 second snippets here and there just aren't enough to delve into and analyze all the weak points, which is one thing that is so fun to do as a viewer. What a shame.

The men had a disagreement over what the title of the project would be and felt maybe they were all a little old for this demographic but overall my boyfriend thinks they won. Jamie also thinks her team won, and Kenya thought she was the star of the team. Well, she did work hard to get that booty of Brandi's to pop. Jamie actually agrees Kenya was really helpful here, she claims she did a lot of the work on this project. To me that didn't really come through that strongly in the edit I saw. I mostly saw her picking at Brandi and at one point even excusing herself from the room. I find it admirable though that Jamie can just move on from the little spat she had with Kenya last episode, which in her time was probably only just yesterday, and admit it when she feels Kenya did a good job and was helpful to her. That said, for all her praise, she probably just found out when she saw this episode that Kenya was talking poorly of her to the cameras throughout the task. That's Kenya.

Trump is pressing Brandi to throw Kenya under the bus because the producers I'm sure told him about their conflict during this task, but good ole Brandi is like I want to be a team like the boys so my answer to that is, I think we won! Lol, she's cute at times, oddly enough. Why is Kate making a shocked face when Brandi says they won? Way to back up your team. Kate's probably not going to be on the chopping block this time around, due to this other circumstance, of course. As usual.

Brandi can't help it, she says Kenya is "evil." Yikes, evil? Kenya is explaining Brandi has been way out of line with her since day one and Kate is sitting there nodding wildly and saying "I agree." Shut up, Kate. This has nothing to do with you. What's more, this feud obviously started way before this show, so what do you know about how it all went down, who started what, and which side to pick? You just hate Brandi because she is on to you. You hate her so much you'll support somebody who is obviously equally a basket case if not more. Everyone else is smart enough to just stay out of this one. Does Kate not understand the second Brandi is gone Kenya will just find somebody else to throw under the bus, and it could be Kate next? Guess what, sure enough nine months later Kenya was the only one to directly rat you out about Steve sharing your hotel room. And here you are wildly supporting her, lol. Doofus.

And just for the record, it is simply not true, Kenya (and Kate who is nodding), that Kenya never does anything to provoke this and always just ignores Brandi. This episode was crammed full of Kenya picking at Brandi and making equally snide and immature remarks about her booty and other things, making her take her clothes off in an obvious attempt to humiliate her (which backfired, Brandi looked great), etc. That's hardly ignoring her. She is no innocent here. It's a bitch fight, and they're both guilty.

The executives overall liked a whole lot of things about the men's "selfie" spread but felt it lacked in a specific takeaway. Fair enough. As for the women, the executives liked their buzzwords, but just like Leeza pointed out ages ago, the spread wasn't cohesive, it kind of jumped around. If they want to win these tasks they really need to talk to Leeza more. She knows how you get a message across, that's her entire career. Maybe Leeza needs to speak up louder when they're screwing up, like Geraldo does. The men win it.

Johnny's charity is a charity he started and helps out in a variety of areas, like wounded warriors. He chokes up, as he is a celeb who truly believes in this stuff. Well, he gets credit for being sincere.

When Trump tells the men to get outta here, he makes a grand sweeping gesture like he's a conductor wildly cutting off the French horns. He's so flamboyant and doesn't care.

Trump wants to know whose fault this was. The Housewives, Jamie explains, because they wanted the attention of being the main model. I'm not really sure what in the world she is talking about. Brandi was very clear she did not want to be the model, and had to practically be dragged kicking and screaming into the shoot. For a couple minutes Kenya did want to be the model but once it was decided that wasn't going to be the case I don't recall her ever mentioning it again. Jamie may be smart however to twist her way into a pretzel to blame this on the Housewives. They both hate each so much they're sure to blame each other in the boardroom and take the heat off Jamie. Well played. Ivanka explains that really Jamie is ultimately responsible for missing the boat on not having the four pages relate to each other or showing what the result will be. Oh, now Kate's all nodding at all this?? She used Jamie for what purpose she could, now it's see ya sister, anybody but Kate. Also she seems to have made a few inroads with Kenya by taking her side in her silly feud with Brandi, so the minions are no longer as much use to her I suppose. What a transparent, fair weather friend she is. It's kind of interesting most of the other women aren't really saying much or even defending themselves when Jamie blames them. I think they all know Jamie is done for and it's best to just try to stay out of it. Mel here on the blog pointed out that Kate always makes sure she's sitting or standing near the strongest player so she can bobble her head and act like it was the two of them versus all the other dolts. It's so true. I'm sure the producers must arrange them sometimes, but Kate surely has a role in where she ends up at other times, and it's just too coincidental how she's always right there in the thick of it, having done absolutely nothing of significance to contribute to the task but still bobbling away like she was all part and parcel to everything. What a doofus.

Wow, amazingly enough Brandi decides to swim upstream and wants Kate fired! Lol! She's all like not withstanding all these other issues all Kate does is shop and zone out and how is that at all helpful? If you want to know how I feel about it fire Kate, Trump. You know, if the team got together on this they could make this Kate thing happen but once again, because of all these other things going on distracting people from the fact that she's a doofus, Kate is pretty much sailing on through these tasks and boardrooms giving 10% effort but for Brandi calling her out. How embarrassing it is that despite Brandi's nasty feud with Kenya, she would still fire Kate? How bad is she anyway?

But, but, "doing errands with Vivica and 'et cetera' was assigned to me," Kate says in her defense. Lol, she's so damn literal. Et cetera, lol. Kate, you forgot counting. I want to know how that went, that was assigned to you too.

Trump gets bored with her before she can even finish her sentence and cuts Kate off to ask her who she would fire, haha. Predictably, she would fire Brandi. Because Brandi is on to her. Haha, Trump gets bored again and cuts her off to ask Vivica something. Vivica says quite honestly you know who drives me nuts? Brandi and Kate.  Fire them. LOL!

I think a lot of stuff was left on the cutting room floor on this episode. I mean, we didn't see any of the entire shopping trip with Vivica. That's a lot of time to drive Vivica bananas we weren't privy to. We didn't see much at all of Kate but she must have done something to have these women tearing their extensions out over her when really they should point to Jamie since it's obvious that's what Ivanka wants. Jamie's a shoe-in, but the women are still going after Kate! Hehe.

Kate manages to sound like a tool when she responds to Trump demanding to know why she isn't stepping up, by saying the reason I don't step up for certain roles is because I'm comfortable in all roles. I.e. the other ladies are only good at some things so I wouldn't want to step up and grab something and take it away from such-and-such if it's going to be the only thing that such-and-such is good at, so I'm just being accommodating to all of their shortcomings, your honor. What a narcissist, and what incredible spin, Steve. Trump really can't stand to listen to her for more than a few seconds before he cuts her off again to move on to someone else. Leeza's shaking her head when Kenya's trying to throw Brandi under the bus saying she's toxic to the team. Leeza says she thinks Brandi's great. I'm going to trust Leeza on this, she's the best player here. Ohhh, Jamie brings back Kate and Kenya. That's really not a bad choice at all. Kenya was responsible for so much on this task she could try to blame the failings on her, and enough people have thrown out some ammunition about Kate tonight she could use that as her backup plan.

The men are baffled why she won't pick Brandi. Eh, Brandi's not going to get fired at this stage. She's too hard of a worker and there's nothing about her feud with Kenya that had anything to do with the outcome of this task. Oh, man, Kenya is pissed that Jamie brought her back. The only problem with this is if you get somebody like Kenya mad enough she's going to fight ten times as hard as you ever will, the boxing gloves are going to come out. Eek.

Oh no, Jamie actually tells Trump maybe she made a mistake bringing Kenya back. Oh, no, oh, no. No you didn't, Jamie, you made a great choice because Kenya did all the layout of this project and was very involved with everything they did wrong, and now you just look indecisive, and bullied. Bonehead move. Sure enough Trump turns this right around on her and says this is just part of the problem, you're indecisive. Sigh.

Oh, how nice of Kate to say Jamie sucked so badly at this because she just loves everyone. She's so patronizing and she's not fooling anyone, least of all I would hope Jamie, playing this off like oh I'm so disappointed my minion just isn't up to snuff but I love her anyway, oh well, keep in touch! Bitch, please. Ivanka acts like maybe bringing Kate back wasn't the best move either. Ivanka! She kind of sounds like she has a head cold, so I can only assume that was some momentary lapse with reality.

Jamie finally says I guess I brought Kenya back because she was so involved with this project. Yes, yes, yes, now you're getting it. Unfortunately she should have been pounding away on that two hours ago. It's too late now. She wants Trump to change the rules and fire Brandi but he acts like, change the rules, what, never! Even junior jumps in to say come now, Jamie, you can't be serious. Heh.

Trump says look I could spend time asking Kate and Kenya who he should fire, but that would make him want to tear the rest of his hair out one strand at a time so let's just skip all that shall we? Thank you, Trump. Jamie, you're fired. Trump seems relieved he doesn't have to give a dime to that global warming hoax charity. It's incredible the way Kate tries so hard to act like something she's not. She is so fake. She gives Jamie this awkward bear hug, swaying her side to side like you would your daughter as she goes off to college, stay positive you're just so wonderful and I love you blah blah blah. Stay positive, lol. It's a reality show for gosh sakes. You knew this woman all of what, a week? Good grief.

Jamie doesn't understand that her mistake here was not that she didn't bring Brandi back. That's irrelevant. The mistake was in not explaining why this was all Kenya's fault, as she was more or less in charge of exactly what they screwed up. She should have used Kenya's own words against her! Before they found out they won, Kenya herself said that she was the "star" of this task. She gave herself all the credit. Then it was revealed they fucked up. So who do you blame but the self-proclaimed star? It's so simple. Why no one else seems to get this except Leeza is beyond me, but I think quite frankly, Kenya intimidates a lot of them. As is her right, bullying is part of her game play.

In the car ride home Jamie says this was "almost" her first time being fired in life. Almost her first time? Hehe, I want to hear about the first time!

Oh thank goodness, timelapse guy is back with some cool night shots of city traffic.

Predictably, Kenya just gets cockier about herself having made it through the boardroom. You got through because some 25 year old or whatever couldn't get her thoughts together. Big whoop, doesn't mean you're any good. Look at, Kate. This is her second boardroom and she still sucks at this game.

It seems to me a good many of the players here like Kenya, or at least don't mind her. Terrell touches her ass and discovers it feels real. Brandi thinks it's quite interesting the way she's manipulated them. I don't know if that is the case. I think it's just not the best idea to go around picking fights with people on a show where everyone has a say in who is getting voted off. I think it's as simple as that. Surely at least some of these ladies darn well know, at least Leeza, that Kenya was more or less in charge of a task that utterly failed. I mean pretty much everyone has been shaking their head about Kate, but only Brandi has been actually actively picking a fight with her to her face. That's just game play. Somebody might drive you bonkers, but you might put up and shut up about it because you don't want to call attention to yourself.

The next morning it's pouring rain, who doesn't love New York in the rain, and they meet at the gorgeous Central Park Boathouse. I love it, it's so Dirty Dancing. The task is to sell wedding dresses and raise money for charity. They can charge whatever they want for the dress.

Trump mixes up the teams and the new teams are Kenya, Brandi, Leeza, Johnny, Terrell and Ian as their PM. (Leeza? You're going to have to step up sometime if you are serious about winning this.)

The other team is Kate, Vivica, Shawn, Lorenzo, the crab fisherman, and Geraldo as PM. Geraldo sounds a little bummed he has to step up as PM again so soon but he's like look, I looked around at my team (especially at Kate, right?) and realized I am really the only one who has any business stepping up on a fundraising task. True enough. I am mad Kate got separate from Brandi, the only person willing to call her out to her face. Crab fisherman's lucky if he can figure out how to set an oven timer correctly let alone worry about giving Kate a hard time. Nobody else here is going to give her much grief except Geraldo but chances are he'll be too busy doing actual work and such to bother.

Vivica is so relieved to get some "new energy" on her new team.

If Jamie was a Type B personality, just get along with everybody I don't even realize when someone is upset with me, Geraldo is such a classic competitive, type A personality that you just have to laugh. You cannot stop people like him. Getting mad at them just makes them work against you harder. As Geraldo explains, having Ian on the opposite team, Ian who used to be aligned with Jonas brother, just motivates Geraldo to work harder. I guess Geraldo strongly associates Ian with his nemesis Jonas brother. That feels like ages ago but Geraldo has not set things right yet about that in his psycho mind. It's not really about his charity as much as it's about showing Ian because he is just wired this way, he simply must show Ian. And that's the mistake boyfriends like Ian make. They get in a game with that nut thinking it's poker on a Friday night with the boys, meanwhile Geraldo acts like it's Vegas and the world series and it's Doyle Lawson on his left and Ian on his right and a quarter of a million dollars posted as the small blind. He's just playing this completely psycho competitive crazy thing that nobody else is or ever has before on this show and he's smoking everyone as he goes.

Geraldo is getting the game plan together and there's Kate right next to him sort of in the Barney Fife role, vigorously scribbling down notes for him as if that is at all helpful.  Geraldo wants to know estimated fundraising numbers from everyone.

"I'm pretty comfortable saying 50," Kate says with a straight face. 50, what? 50 bucks, it has to be. Surely not $50,000. Baw-hahhaha. Baw-hahaha.  How do you go from zero on the first task to $50,000 three days later? Rat Claws better have inherited the DuPont estate in the past three days or she's lying.

Ew, Geraldo is one of those men who doesn't cut their nails that often. I have always found that so gross. A man should not have nails unless he plays guitar.

Ha, the crab fisherman, Shawn and Vivica, who are all in the other van, have the same reaction as me! They're just like, 50 grand? You've got to be joking, Goz-land. I love that she's the butt of the joke for just about everyone, even if most people don't feel like saying it to her face. Other reality stars are making fun of her, like crab fisherman and Brandi. She is a joke even among jokes, it's so bad.

Vivica lets us in on the fact that in the Pie Face episode Kate had promised to bring in $25,000 and nothing showed up. That's great information that they never told us before. So Kate was telling everyone that mythical check was for 25 grand?? Hahaha. Kate's not above lying to act like she has any business whatsoever among these real celebs. It's pathetic, sad, and most of all hysterical. Color me shocked that crab fisherman seems to be implying that if Kate pulls that kind of crap again.....you fill in the blank. Sounds like he means to see to it she's fired. Wow, and I was just saying I didn't think he had any interest in her. This is awesome. Carry on!

Ian is talking to his team like he is William Wallace, trying to get them all motivated. The goal is to raise money. The plan is now. His charity is for children who have a genetic disease that causes sores on their skin. Why did he pick this charity? Because he loves skin care. And kids. Thus, a charity about skin care and kids. Ian's even dressed in plaid. Braveheart's army never looked this bored.



And dying in our beds one day, Brandi, will you trade one chance, just one chance, to beat Kate Goz-land at the wedding dress challenge on Celebrity Apprentice? Brandi's eyes glaze over. I had no idea my boyfriend was such a Hollywood fruitcake. I think we may be breaking up in this episode.

Holy shit, Ian has almost $200,000 locked, loaded and ready to go! Way to barely bring out hardly any of that in the Pie Face challenge, geez Louise. There was more game play going on in that Pie Face challenge than I gave these dumb clucks credit for. There is no way Geraldo is going to anticipate Ian has that much he could bring in, is that real? This is the best episode yet so far, mixing the teams around was like a double shot of espresso. I'm ready now.

Commercials!

Ian's team, every single one, are all working the phones like crazy. Exactly what you should do on a fundraiser challenge. There's a ton of food around and everyone is chowing down but the editors aren't editing this to make fun of anyone for eating. That's just saved for Kate. Brandi is ten feet away trying not to have drama and have some quiet for her phone calls. Ian wants her to rejoin the group, like I said ten feet away. She's like eh, no thanks. Terrell gets bored after a few phone calls and stops calling, eats a sandwich, yawns, and so on. Kenya tries to encourage him to get back to it. I think he is one of the biggest duds but I haven't heard a single person flag him as a weak link. Odd.

Over at Geraldo's team he too is on the phone. Kate's in the background sort of playing with her phone but not actually talking on it. Even Lorezno, Sig, and Shawn are making calls.

Kate is worried that her nonexistent money might not come in again. Why? It's not snowing anymore. It's not even raining. Maybe the abominable snowman melted along with the check?

Oh God, I hate what a good idea this is. Ted Gibson stops by and Kate sets him up to agree to give a free hair consultation for those buying dresses. Was this all Kate's idea? It can't be, it's too good. I'm skeptical about the responsible party. Kate claims it's her idea. She also has this idea that she and Geraldo will dress up as a bride and groom and stand outside getting people to come in. It's better than just a boring sign. I would have bet money on that being someone else's idea to just get her out of the way. Who is this woman and what was in that coffee Steve gave her this morning? She's actually contributing something more meaningful to the task than her usual shocked and appalled faces and knick knacks from Bed Bath and Beyond. I get the sense it's really important to her to impress Geraldo. I know he's PM and all, but she seems really overly eager to please him, almost like a strange sort of father figure type psychology going on here, you know what I mean?

You know the sad thing about this? This just proves Kate does have it in there. There are good ideas to be had in that little noggin ready to go and she can work if she would just apply herself once in awhile and not be so darn lazy and zoned out all the time. Aw, Geraldo gives her some nice encouragement, calls this sudden brainstorm session quite enterprising of her. I guess you can't fix stupid. Kate doesn't know what enterprising even means, lol. Shoulda asked her kids, I'm sure they could tell her, they've lived it.

Kate's thrilled they finally have men on the team so they can do all the heavy lifting of carrying the dress racks inside and she can assume her usual role of ordering others about. If those are what I've lifted before, those racks are darn heavy. Team Estrogen, the crab fisherman mutters. Hehe.

No one can find Brandi. Oh no, she took off. She calls Ian and said she had a panic attack and went back to the hotel and will work from her bed. Oh, dear. Kenya thinks this is because Brandi is all intimidated by Kenya. Nah, I don't think so. I do think it's because she has difficulty controlling herself at times and shuts down. She doesn't want to explode on Kenya or anyone and cause a problem so she checked out.  She's like this on the Real Housewives show, too. She slips into bad places and does unwise things and makes unwise comments. I've thought at times she is the survivor of some kind of abuse, I don't know by whom. She needs a lot more therapy than even she already has gotten, but I do think she means well under all these issues. And, why do I feel like once again some other circumstance that has nothing to do with Kate is going to result in somebody else getting fired other than Kate. Yep.

Lorenzo the rat tells Geraldo Ian has told them his number is $180,000. I like that Lorenzo's the narc here. This is his new team now and if he is not here to win why is he here at all? Ian was a real dummy to tell anyone that number until he absolutely had to. Of course all this information does is motivate Geraldo all the more. Now he has a number to aim for, and that's bad news for Ian. The only way this could ever work out for Ian is if Geraldo did not know his number. Now that he  knows it? Game over for my boyfriend and I'm breaking up with him, too. Kate's all giddy because she's sitting front and center and being treated like a real live team member and confidant. Geraldo doesn't have time to do anything but just act like he's accepted her, he has bigger fish to fry and a sleepless night ahead coming up with more donors.

It's the morning, and look at how peppy and talkative Goz-land is this fine morning. She is finally in her element. She's self-appointed herself Geraldo's assistant and loving the ego inflation from it, Brandi's not in her hair extensions anymore, a semi-real celebrity Ted Gibson is on his way over to help her win and so is a big fat check she hopes. Look at her out there in the wedding dress, laughing and joking with Geraldo about her eight kids and so on. This is just nuts the way she came alive. She's been hibernating this whole time.

Brandi is back and dressed up all nice and looking much better and already bringing in some donations. Good, I hope that's all over with. But Geraldo's team brings in a $100,000 check early. Good Lord, that is so much money. All kidding aside, can you imagine writing a check like that? Rich people are another world.

Ian brings in the Chip 'n' Dales. Hello.

Kate's being all clever and stuff. Kate must have an earpiece in her ear, she has to. She's like Sig was wrestling in women to the store like he must wrestle fish. Well, crabs are better described as crustaceans, but I'll let that go since at least she's making an effort to say interesting and funny things. Guess what, if you make an effort to be cute and clever, you suddenly get edited into the cut a lot more.

Noooo, Ian gets a check for $165,000. You know, I have to say for as silly as this task is I'm almost tearful here. Man alive, the generosity out there makes you really want to believe in the human race again. Who throws around that kind of money at charity? A lot of people, apparently.

Eric Trump comes over to check things out and wants to know where Kate's check is she promised. There's only minutes left. On it's way, she says. Lol. I wonder if Kate ever thinks about this idea that whoever her donor is obviously isn't taking her all that seriously to flake on her the first task and cut it down to the wire on the second. That's not very respectful of her.

Terrell sucks, some of his donors are falling through. At least Kate is hustling on her phone trying to get an ETA. Terrell explains that the reality is he really isn't comfortable begging for money. I see. I mean, I get that. It's the last thing I would want to do. But I'm guessing a lot of people don't like doing this, but they've done it because it was for the team and for the win and it's what was expected of them. If this is really not something you're willing to do then you shouldn't have bothered with this show.

Like a knight in shining armor Kate's donor pulls up in a beautifully crisp Mercedes. Who is this guy? He looks cool, like I own a minor league baseball team and a software company in Austin cool. I skimmed some mutterings about who he was on the blog but haven't had a chance to read most of the comments so I'm in the dark still.

Somebody pointed out a common theme when editing this show is to show some kind of dud contestant making a real turn around, and this was indeed Kate's redemption edit. That was the cliche storyline straight out of the playbook, and they fit her into it. Life's a funny thing.

Final boardroom of the night! Ian sells Brandi out about her little incident, and says it was because of Kenya. Brandi said it had nothing to do with Kenya, she just had a panic attack and felt really sick and even threw up. That does sound like symptoms of a real panic attack and they really aren't necessarily triggered by something big like some huge feud with Kenya. I find it hard not to believe Brandi when she said she would continue to make calls from her bedroom and then once it was over was right back there ready to work the next morning and bringing in money without skipping a beat. It's not like she was checked out the whole task as Kenya loves to spin it. Even Trump said a panic attack is not really "checking out," that's hardly fair.

This is really being set up as Kenya vs. Brandi, and someone will have to go and soon.

Barney Fife just loves her boss. She's in awe of everything about him, it was an honor to work for him. He's marvelous. Lol, what is Trump's response to all this ego stroking? Do you have a boyfriend? Haha, he just blurts it out like your grandfather would in front of everyone at the Thanksgiving table. Kate's like uh, uh, well no, but I'll be Geraldo's next ex-wife. Lol. Oh, Kate, it's not as much fun to make fun of you when you're joking too.

It's amazing what a little self-deprication and loosening up will do, Goz-land. I will never say I actually liked her in this episode, but she didn't grate on my last nerve and I wasn't bringing out the doofus term as much as usual, which is saying a lot. You know what, I think she's so intimidated by other strong women she just can't hack it. She shuts down, can't control herself when provoked. She gets along with people like Geraldo because she responds to people who either are much younger and she can mother, or those so much older and wiser they take on a fatherly role toward her. Nobody was going to mother or father Kate on the women's team, that's not how women are in this competition usually. Thus, she reverted to an ineffective doofus. I have a sneaking suspicion this is why she loves Steve so much, he too fulfills that fatherly role for her she responds to so well, and brings out the best in her.

Trump's still playing the grandfather. He's like hey you over there, Shawn, you've really grown up! Haha, that's all he says to her. Poor Shawn.

Trump said there was $600,000 raised with only about a $2,500 difference. Wow! That's unbelievable! His solution to this is to allow the project managers to each keep their own money or go for broke and stick to the deal with winner taking all. There's no way they're not sticking to this deal, they're both too psycho and Type A, and splitting the pot will always make a Type A feel like they didn't really win even if they did.

Geraldo admits that going for broke would just be an ego move, which is entirely true, and begrudgingly he will have to put that aside and just split it. I'm shocked. Good for him and nice for the charities. How wonderful for both charities. I can't even imagine what a small charity like Camp Barnabas would do with this sort of money. I mean it would change everything for them. You could make a freaking endowment in perpetuity with that sort of money and never have to worry about fundraising ever again. As much as money doesn't have to be important in one's life, it can also do a lot of powerful, amazing things.

Geraldo's team wins. Wow. Geraldo says artistic again to mean autistic. So that wasn't just a fluke, I think he thinks that's how it's pronounced, hehe.

Oh this is so sad. How can Trump fire anyone on a team that brought in almost $300,000? How crazy. Geraldo knew they won because he could actually just add in his head and the numbers Trump was throwing out plus the number he knew he had told him they won before it was announced. I was thinking that. Anyone who can add in their head would know the result of this. But of all these dolts only Geraldo could figure it out. The rest were just sitting there waiting in suspense. Hehe.

Trump agrees to round off both men's numbers to $300,000. Ian admits Brandi raised about $40,000, even from bed at home. Based on that, I say her panic attack is a complete non-issue at this point. Kenya only raised $30,000 without a panic attack, so. Leeza raised a respectable $20,000.

Geraldo says based on those numbers you can't justify firing either Brandi or Kenya. Lorenzo thinks Leeza is safe too. Uh oh, that only leaves Terrell and Johnny. Either one of them is a dud so it doesn't matter to me. Trump is confused how people like Terrell and Johnny with their contacts can't come up with much of anything. It's pretty simple, because some people are shy about cold calling asking for money even if it's for charity even if it means they'll be fired. Ian is absolutely correct to bring back Terrell or Johnny. I imagine these men are shocked he would bring long-standing team members back over the women they just joined up with, but Ian is playing to win so you can't blame him for that. If he does something stupid like bring someone back who raised $40,000, next thing you know Ian will be gone. One of them is done and Ian will be safe, but I'm afraid Ian and I? We've broken up. I'm fine. I'll just box up his stuff and he's going to pick it up tomorrow when I'm not home. Really, I'm okay. Ian is in disbelief that one of Terrell's donors that fell through would have been enough so that they won. That is crushing. Terrell seems ready to go, I think he's had about enough.

My ex has his moments where he's a real nut. "Inspiration" is how he raised this kind of money. Huh? Freak.



Terrell, you're fired. Dud from day one. See ya.

The future will deliver, William Wallace says in his plaid suit as he gazes into Terrell's eyes. It's inside of you. Freedom!!! You know Beverly Hills High was built on an oil well. It pumps $300,000 in profits a year of that stuff believe it or not. Maybe the fumes have finally caught up to him.

Aw, next week the great Joan Rivers will be an advisor on the show. What sweet justice that one of her final acts on this earth is to take Kate Goz-land to task.

Fun fact. Kate and Vivica are the only women to have won their tasks as Project Manager so far. Fun fact, Kate has been to the boardroom twice and come out alive twice. We live in a parallel universe, folks. Happy 1,000th!