The Amazing Race

If only C/E had kept their original flight (well the one after the travel agents mistake) they would have been on the same flight as OK and the Beards (though them switching flights might have opened up the seats for OK) and than Marie would have been eliminated. Her utter disbelief in the Baseball Wives finding a way to get on the standby list was so condescending, hell if you had given them the EP last leg they most likely would have used it right then and might have given the heads up about how to get on standby!

Maybe casting spoilers for the spring all-star season:

Spoiler:

Ugh.  There is no one on that list I have any interest in seeing again (the best that I can say is that a handful of them were inoffensive), and several that I would have paid good money to get them off my tv the first time.

I do not get

Spoiler:

Places I've been show up on TAR, woo!  I've been to the Bodo airport. [Pro tip -  don't make friends with someone when you're 10 years old that 17 years later marries someone from Norway and then has a baby 3 years after the wedding asks you to be a godmother.  You will end up at a Christening in Norway in December.  You will freeze your ass off.]  And we did go up to the Arctic Circle.  Pics or it didn't happen.

But in all seriousness there were two big takeaways -- I loved how much they showed the racers marveling at the scenery because I have gone all over the US and seen many things that were truly majestic but Norway was sooooo beautiful.  If you can imagine land as if it were aluminum foil that was crumpled up and not quite flattened out, that's what it looks like.  That description doesn't give it justice but the power of time and pressure is absolutely awe inspiring.  And also Phil pronounced it beau-deau but the Norweigans said Buddha.  Makes me wonder how many other things I've trusted with Phil's Kiwi accent, hee.

Makes me wonder how many other things I've trusted with Phil's Kiwi accent, hee.

I am now incapable of pronouncing "spa" as anything other than "spah". Same with "mah-ssahge". I love his accent!

I was thinking during the episode "I have GOOOOOOOTTTTT to go to Norway, it looks SO beautiful." So I'm pleased to hear that it really is! One day. It was very surreal to watch them walking down the street in broad daylight and hear "well, it's 1 am so there are no cabs."

Those beardy weirdos are growing on me.

I didn't understand the climbing up racks of cod challenge; I must have missed something. Why didn't they just take fish from the bottom? Those were incorrect fish, I gather?

Yeah you can hear one of the OK boys ask the other if they have to to take from the top three rows, I imagine it would be too easy otherwise but it seemed the challenge was much more difficult.

Considering they still had to MAKE FISH JERKY after getting all the fish and hauling them back to the jerky-making place, yeah. I guess maybe the race-makers didn't realize how heavy the fish were? Even the oil guys were having a hard time just holding them. That one seemed very clear with which choice was faster, and it was one of those cases where it seemed obvious from the clue which would be faster, and that turned out to be correct. (Sometimes I'm like, "OMG, Choice A is SO much easier" and they end up being fairly even.)

The Vienna Boys' Choir task was hilarious and cringey.  I felt really bad for the people who were seriously tone-deaf.    

Could have done without the extra special whinefight at the pit stop.  Ugh.

If only Providence Amy had made an appearance we could have seen how the show would have dealt with actual physical violence between teams!

So the previous list of teams for next season was not entirely accurate:

Spoiler:

So just a quick note to the husband of the third place team tonight.

Travis, just because you claim to be a Christian and don't lie, doesn't mean you get to be an asshole to your wife. Shut the fuck up.

Yeah, I didn't think there was going to be someone I disliked more than Marie, but he made a last minute surge.

I guess least worst team of the trio won? Yay?

Yeah, Travis has been ridiculous these last few legs. I never was a huge fan but he went to become one of my least favorite contestants ever.

If I were Marie I would have said "fuck you" to the high fives over being just how they all planned it being them in the final three, given that Amy and Nicole refused to show her where the model was and Leo easily gave up that information.

I know!! I was more or less rooting for them until a few legs ago and then suddenly Travis turned into a complete ass.

I think this is the first time in history I didn't hate the "fighting" team at the end. I actually would have been OK if they won, at least over Travis and Save Nicole. But I guess I'm glad whatstheirnames won. They seemed nice. I guess. Can we please have some less bland teams next time? And, does every female on the show have to have been in one of the professions where looking hot is a qualification? I don't have anything AGAINST former models/pageant queens/strippers/cheerleaders/dancers/actresses, but they seem to be just A TAD OVERREPRESENTED in TAR casting.

No kidding. If you're a female Racer, you're either young and hot or you're a middle-aged farmer's wife - there is seldom any middle ground.

Count me in on the Travis hate. What happened to him? I think Leo & Jamal nailed it when they said something like "Travis & Nicole will be fine so long as they don't encounter any real adversity - but the second they do, they'll fold like a house of cards."

Count me in on the Travis hate. What happened to him?

They started not doing well, he acted very similar in Chile at the beginning of the race when Nicole was having issues with riding the bike and also in Dubai on the fish netting task when she made a mistake.

According to Tim from Team Oklahoma, Tim and Marie got engaged over they weekend. Have someone review that prenup Tim! He posted a video of it!

That was about the best outcome for first boot I could have hoped for. Adios, bickering shriekies!

Good God, Dave, you're 60. We get it. Why do you seem to think that's a get-out-of-Racing card? Brenchel are just playing the game, and U-Turning is part of it.

Racers who treat being U-Turned as a personal insult always piss me off. Get upset about having to do the extra Detour option, sure, but don't be a big baby about it.

Well, here's the thing on that. I understand using a U-Turn, but Brenchel were first and EVERYONE was behind them. It sounded like they were much more concerned with being first in this leg than anything else, which could be the main non-personal reasons to U-Turn D & C, rather than the Cowboys. I guess I found Brenchel's smugness about their supposed tactical masterfulness in using the U-turn the way they did more annoying that Dave's frustration at it. To make sure they finished the leg not in last, it would have been much smarter to U-Turn the Cowboys or any other team further back.

What I didn't understand was why D & C didn't U-turn the Cowboys. Maybe they found it harder to do it to someone standing right there with them.

Well the Cowboys had an express pass that they had to use so uturning would not have delayed them at all. I did understand them being upset that the team in first place used it, but the whining about being sixty and everyone being like how could they uturn them was beyond annoying!

Sigh, I know. I like Dave and Connor, but they are starting to get shrill and self-congratulatory, and then they went to the BUT HOW COOOUUUULD THEEYYYY place with the U-turn, which is always so annoying, and was double as annoying because AS THEY WERE MOANING ABOUT BEING U-TURNED THEY WERE ALSO U-TURNING SOMEBODY ELSE, BECAUSE THEY HAAAAD TOOOOOO, like of course for THEM it was a special circumstance but it didn't cross their minds for an instant that it could ALSO have been a special circumstance with Brendan and Rachel. No, the only possibility was mustache-twirling evil and poor sportsmanship and hatred of the elderly. I mean, I think Brendan and Rachel are kind of annoying (although much MUCH less so than the last time they were on), but the instant express ticket to super butthurt was offputting. They got U-turned because they were the closest. Whether that makes sense or not, strategy-wise, is debatable, but it wasn't personal.

It WAS nice of them to help the Afghanimals after U-turning them, but I think that has as much to do with not wanting to think of themselves as "bad guys" as actually wanting to help. You don't HAVE to help people on the Race. IT'S A RACE.

And then when he started in about Rachel's FACE? You lost me, buddy. You lost me. Really, a 60-year-old man is stooping to making fun of the appearance of the 20-something woman who did a completely legal move in a TV gameshow that made them fall slightly farther behind? A 60-YEAR-OLD MAN?!?!!?! Just, oy. I suspect when he sees that he's going to be embarrassed. (That might have been in the previews?)

And then when he started in about Rachel's FACE? You lost me, buddy.

Totally. I thought "You keep harping about being 60 ... isn't maturity supposed to be part of that package? Now you're doing the 'You're ugly and your mom dresses you funny' routine?"

I winced when he said that, actually, because I remember how Rachel cried in her original season at the prospect of shaving her head. She said tearfully "I know that (Joyce) did it, but she was cute and skinny and pretty." She's obviously insecure about her looks, and nasty comments like Dave's won't help.

DAMN IT, the blondes get saved AGAIN by another Non-Elim Round? If they end up winning the million bucks I am gonna be SO pissed.