I Survived a Japanese Game Show - Switch up

I apologize that I am a week behind. I hope to rectify that by tomorrow! So on with the show.......Since the green monkeys only have 2 contestants, the yellow penguins have to decide who will go over. Donnell immediately says it will be his pal Justin and Justin says (to the camera) that he wants to go but Cathy volunteered before he could say anything. I'm thinking he wouldn't have gone anyway. Cathy vows to kick butt and they're off to the challenge.

It's gets hard to describe some of these challenges and this is one of them. Picture this - one team mate is wearing a velcro suit while suspended above the floor. One team member throws rubber balls at the suspended person while the other team member fires tennis balls at same both trying to get the balls to stick to the suit. Here's the kicker, two of the opposing team members have cables attached to the suspended one and try to yank him/her out of the way of the balls. Which ever team gets the most balls on the suit wins. Got it?

The yellow penguins go first with Bilenda in the sticky suit. I love it when Rome tries to say penguins, it always comes out pagens. Donnell and Meaghan get too predictable in their pulling of Bilenda so Andrew and Justin target the balls and Bilenda easily catches them and sticks them to her suit. Meaghan complains that Bilenda is a lot heavier than she is and is hard to pull while Bilenda says her weight has finally come in handy. It looked like Donnell and Meaghan were trying to rock Bilenda to sleep or something. Bilenda catches 24 balls. It could have been more but Andrew kept aiming for Bilenda's head instead of her suit.

It's green monkeys turn with Cathy in the suit. Justin & Andrew yanked her around like a rag doll making Cathy elude almost every ball. Poor thing I thought she would get whiplash! Donnell was throwing balls like crazy and Meaghan, firing the tennis balls, didn't do squat. She spent so much time trying to aim that I thought she was surveying. The green monkeys only get like 6 or 7 balls and the yellow penguins continue their winning streak.

The green monkeys have to make mochi balls for their punishment. They have to use huge mallots to pound the rice then make it into a dough. The dough is so sticky that they all ended up making what looked like mochi cookies. Their instructor gives Donnell a green wasabi mochi ball which he promptly spits out saying it tastes like ground up cow nose hair. I'll take his word for it.

Meaghan is adamant about not going into elimination and starts scheming. If the monkey team can't decide who will be in the elimination, then it falls to the yellow penguins to decide for them. Knowing this, Donnell gets cocky saying he won't be in the elimination game believing his secret alliance buds, Andrew & Justin, will put up the girls before him. Meanwhile, Meaghan gets Andrew to agree to put up Donnell. At the studio, Meaghan pulls the "boo hoo I can't decide" thing so the yellow penguins put up Donnell and Cathy. Donnell is really pissed off because his secret alliance didn't hold up. I guess he should have let Andrew and Justin in on the secret.

The challenge is to swing on a rope into a wall of seven doors and find three solid doors. If the door breaks, there are two people, one in a panda suit and one in a gorilla suit (don't ask me why), waiting on the other side to pummel the contestant with giant powder puffs. Whoever gets the fastest time wins. Cathy goes first and hits all seven doors (and gets powder puffed) before she finds her three solid doors. With a time of 2:07 she thinks she has a chance since Donnell is all pissed off about being there in the first place. Of course being mad just makes Donnell want to win that much more and flies through his doors (also getting puffed), even putting his foot through one of the solid doors! Rome just loved that so much he had to show it again. I swear that man lives for replays. Donnell wins with a time of 1:07.

Just when we think we are going to say sayonara to Cathy, the Japanese good fellas come out and sweep up a very confused Donnell. No worries, the guys in the booth yell out that the "idiots" have the wrong person and they return Donnell, pretty much as they found him, and whisk Cathy away. Maybe they should take off the sunglasses. Until next time, MAJIDE! Double D

The Next Design Star-Finale

Matt and Jen's final challenge is to design a living room, dining room and kitchen for two families that went through the Katrina disaster. Both houses are still in complete disrepair from the flood and it amazed me that people are still dealing with this disaster. I felt kinda of seasick in one of the houses that still had stuff all over the floor. I don't get it, I know they are probably busy, but wouldn't they go through that stuff two years later? Well luckily for both families, design star chose them to do a challenge for. Both designers get help from Trish and Mickey V. Matt got to chose first and generously said that he would give Jen Mikey V.'s help since Jen would need help with her kitchen cabinets. Ok that made me want him to win it. What a generous spirit and kind soul he is! Jen even said that would garner him votes. You betcha. Both designers get 36 hours and $20,000, nice! I don't think a recap is necessary at this point, in the end, I tried to be non partial in my review of each house, and came to the unadulterated conclusion that in my non biased, non judgemental point of view, I loved Jen's house much better, noticed that's just one love! I like her living room with the leather white sofa, which at first I thought, white? Guess you don't have dogs or kids. I can see muddy paw prints all over that thing honey! But it worked along with her fire engine red kitchen cabinets. Can I live a lifetime with those fire engine red cabinets? Maybe, if I don't watch too many slasher movies. I did however, loved, loved Matt's dining room with that crystal light fixture. Can I just wear that thing on my head? Nothing says class like sparkle! And speaking of sparkle, don't you love watching Sparkle's Vlog-video blog, on HGTV? He's so funny, like he said, Sparkle's the new black! Back to Matt, I think his kitchen was too plain on the side that he didn't put cabinets on. I know he's a minimalist, but it's a kitchen, it needs storage, shelves, spice rack, tile, something to give it that wow factor, because Jen's red cabinets definitely gave her kitchen that punch with that red and those black granite counter tops. Matt definitely had the better hosting skills but Jen had the better design. Let's see, can we fuse those two together?-Single D

Big Brother-Keesha in Charge

Who knew, Keesha wins HOH. April wants to put her hair in piggy tales to celebrate! Gee, I can't wait to see what she wants to do when she wins HOH? Keesha is talking the talk. Talking all mr. big stuff. Well, that remains to be seen. Renny has assumed the role of the sorority residence mom, which I'm sure just suits her fine. In Keesha's HOH room, she only has eyes for her lover, Gizmo, her pet Maltese. Keesha immediately knows she wants to put up Angie to get back at her for the whole Brokeback thing. The Portuguese Princess is ranting about how she loves pork and that they do the dancing with the pigs thing in Portugal. Weird! The food competition is a sock hop which was pretty lame and really got on my last nerve, listening to Renny's high pitched squeally shrill voice. Put a sock in it, Renny!! I guess BB thought it was time that the house gets to eat real food this week. Renny was disappointed that she and Dan lost their chance at winning wine. Does she need any more, looks like she's always three sheets to wind anyway. Of course our Portuguese Princess was happy at winning the pig's feet. Guess she'll be the only diner for that one. I was wondering when Jesse was going to make his move on Keesha for the nominations, when he pays a visit and tells her to put up Libra and Dan and Libra is gone. Just that easy he says. Easy? H*ll hath no fury like a woman put up on the block and that would be Libra! In a surprise turn, Keeshe says she is going on gut instincts and nominates, Angie and drum roll please........Jesse!!! Jesse is taken by surprise and says it's on like Donkey Kong-whatever that means!-Single D

Keesha, as HOH, decides to shake things up. Careful girl we know what happens when people get shaken! She has a hate on for Angie so that was a no brainer.

After everyone gets in their sock hop duds, April says how she just loves the 60's with all the poodle skirts. 60's? Not a real exciting challenge as the girls have to match socks with the guys to determine what food they will have for the week. The guys couldn't keep their socks in the laundry basket and Renny sounded like someones accordion that needed a tune up. Every time her and Dan were up, Renny kept going for the drinks. She just knew there was booze up there somewhere.

Later, April and Ollie are discussing books they have read and talk turns to the subject of relationships. Ollie is obviously not ready for one and he says he sees road signs which leads April to tell him maybe he should look for the construction signs like rough road ahead. Leave it to these two to equate love with road construction. We'll have to wait and see if there is a merge in their future.

When Jesse goes in to talk to Keesha about the nominations, he SO checked himself out in the mirror as he walked in. Get over your overly muscled self! Jesse tells Keesha who to put up (Libra and Dan). Oh no he didn't! He might as well have painted a target on his big ol' muscle head! Keesha puts up Angie as expected and throws in Jesse for good measure. Double D

Ghost Hunters International - Ireland & England

The first stop this week is Charleville Castle in Tullamore, Ireland. The main report here is that a little girl named Harriet fell to her death on the stair case after trying to slide down the banister. She has been seen and heard many times in the castle. Barry is so happy to be back in Ireland that he makes the team a traditional Irish stew before getting down to business. That stew looked so good but there would be no ghost hunting for me after that, I would be sound asleep!

Barry & Andy find a hot spot in the original kitchen area. It started out with thumps and bangs then Andy hears a child's voice say I'm hungry (hey, you are in the kitchen after all). Barry asks the spirits to show themselves and he gets a piece of wire thrown at him and their radio equipment, which is set up on a nearby table gets knocked over.

On Harriet's staircase, Brian & Rob both see a white light near the top of the stairs but no one is there. After reviewing the tapes, they hear a child's voice in response to Barry asking the spirit to communicate. Barry had taken some photos with a 3 second interval between shots. Two of the photos show a door closing on it's own.

Rob still hesitates to say the castle is haunted as he wants more evidence. Last season, he said everyplace was haunted and this season he is really holding back.

The next stop is Samlesbury Hall in Samlesbury, England. The hall was built in 1325 and, as Dustin said, looks like a gothic gingerbread house. There is a lot of history here as well as a ton of stories as told by a much too lively tour guide. This guy could make you believe it was 12 midnight when it was 12 noon! He says the hall is the most haunted place in Great Britain. I don't know about that, I'm pretty sure I did a blog from last season on a place that said the same thing.

The team does their investigation and comes up empty handed. Nothing, nada, zilch! For a place that is supposedly the most haunted, it was a dud. I guess the ghosts needed a night off. Dustin did some research which pretty much contradicts the stories told by the tour guide. Rob & Andy present the findings of that research to the tour guide and he was visibly taken aback but managed to rebound by saying that the stories had been handed down for centuries. Considering one of the stories was about a police car that had a collision with one of the ghosts, I don't think all of the stories go back as far as a century! Double D

Next Foodnetwork Star-Finale

I'm jumping up and down on my couch in protest, can you see me? Boo Hoo, hiss, hiss!! No, no, no...what are the judges THINKING!!!!! Can you tell, the one I wanted to win, didn't? HISS!!! Since the judges couldn't decide on who would be the final two and didn't make the right choice for the winner, but more on that later, we meet up with the final three in New York, Lisa and the two A's, Adam and Aaron. The final challenge will be a short 4 minute pilot of their show, with producer Gordon Elliot at the reins. Doesn't Gordon have that smooth voice over announcer thing going on? Lisa, a woman of apparently many talents, brings in a cart loaded with 3 different presentations. Obviously, this woman is very organized and is very creative, move over Martha! I was impressed, I'm like I don't even need to see what the others are going to do..... you're like hired! Next walks in Aaron, with just himself to do his pilot, where he keeps thinking I'm missing something?? Ya, like maybe a good idea for a new show? Gordon says backstage that Aaron looks like a deer caught in the headlights. Adam goes in with his handwritten notes for his show. Typical, that's exactly what I would have expected from him. They come up with a show idea of a person emailing him their cooking problem. Right then, they cut to commercial where there's a clip for a new show, Ask Aida, based on the same premise. Adam doesn't look too comfortable working the show, cooking and talking to someone online. I think Lisa's pilot worked the best and didn't that cod and zabaglione sauce look scrumptious?! Adam cooked beer can chicken, hasn't that one been done already? In the deliberation room, it seemed like Bobby Flay, in his peppermint tie and gingham shirt, was for Lisa, he knows talent. Ok so it must have been Susie and little Maltese, Bob (tushie)man that made the choice. All we heard was they need someone to star in their own show next week, so whose ready to work? Well, I guess it was Aaron. Aaron wins the crown and his own show. I know at first, I was rooting for Aaron, but became a fan of Lisa's, for her recipes, and because she's a mother, wife, and chef and is so creative and talented, even if she does look comical. In the end, the judges still said her performance was wooden. Well, being Gepetto's daughter and sister to Pinocchio, I guess she should of asked the Blue Fairy to turn her into a human! Interesting to listen to Susie's video after the show. Susie looks more relaxed and real, throwing her wavy tresses constantly and moving her hands around like an Italian mafia princess. Well, another good season comes to a close. Hopefully Aaron won't disappear like Amy Findly, last season's winner. Whatever happened to her? She must have went by way of Jimmy Hoffa and the Lindberg baby!-Single D -- Aaron McCargo's winning recipe-Jerk Ribeye with Honey Plantains and Collard Greens! 1 (12-ounce) rib-eye steak Jerk seasoning, recipe follows Plantains, recipe follows Collard Greens, recipe follows Preheat grill or grill pan on high heat. Rub jerk seasoning on steak. Place steak in a plastic bag to marinate for 1 hour in the refrigerator. After marinating for 1 hour, remove steak from refrigerator and let sit for 15 minutes. Grill steak for 12 minutes (6 minutes on each side). Remove from grill with tongs and let rest for 8 to 12 minutes. Serve with plantains and collard greens. Jerk seasoning: 1 tablespoon allspice 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/4 cup light brown sugar 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin 2 teaspoons salt 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 2 tablespoons canola oil In a medium bowl, combine all ingredients with 2 tablespoons of canola oil. Plantains: Canola oil 1 ripe plantain 4 ounces butter 1/4 cup finely chopped fresh scallions 1/4 cup honey 1/4 cup finely chopped fresh parsley leaves Preheat a medium frying pan and coat with canola oil. Slice plantains on bias, then saute until brown. Mix in butter and scallions. Then remove from the heat. Stir in honey and parsley with a large spoon. Collard greens: 12 ounces fresh collard greens, coarsely chopped 1 tablespoon butter 1/4 cup finely diced onion Crushed red pepper flakes 1/4 cup chicken stock Kosher salt and freshly cracked black pepper Wash collard greens thoroughly. In a medium stock pot, place collards in hot water for 3 minutes, remove and drain. In a large saute pan, melt 1 tablespoon of butter, then add onions and crushed red pepper, saute. Then add collards and chicken stock to saute pan. Cook on high heat, stirring occasionally for 5 to 7 minutes. Season with salt and pepper, to taste.

Project Runway-Suede Seduction

This time the challenge is to make a cocktail dress, but wait, don't whoop it up too much, cause you know there is always a twist. Yes girls, your models will be doing the shopping and buying fabric. They will have to buy "green" fabrics. Yes dearies, environmentally friendly. I guess there's tons of stuff they do with recycled plastics?? Dominatrix is afraid that her model will buy the wrong fabric, hey Stella, anything is a step up from the garbage bags from last week! Three models buy some shiny brown fabric to the horror of their designers. Stella's like, my model wants elegance and class, which she doesn't do. She does urban (in other words, scary and raunchy!). Suede, we discover has the third person syndrome, talking about himself in third person. You remember Elaine from Seinfeld when she fell for that guy at the gym who kept talking to her about him in third person, Timmy would like to go out with Elaine, Tim likes Elaine. Suede's outfit looked like some kind of rag rug with crazy bits of striped fabric sewn together. Stella has the, I only want to work in leather syndrome. Someone calls her leatherface, wasn't he the serial killer in Texas Chainsaw Massacre? When Tim comes in, he takes a look at Korto's outfit with her exposed seams and he thinks it inside out, which she tells him it's not. Tim does manage to keep that look of bewilderment under control. I would have been like, what are you crazy? On the runway, Michael Kors said it looked like the dress had butt wings! Nothing like accenting your rear. Would be good for a female superhero, up, up and away! My favorite was that black little number by Daniel. I think this is my second favorite by him, maybe it's just him? He's cute in a bad boy Astin Kutcher sort of way, yummy! Suede wins the challenge and a very sweet Natalie Portman, who looks like she's ten, says she would wear that. I think she has a penchant for strips of fabric just look at her green cocktail dress. Reminded of me of those chinese enamel fishes that bends at the gills. His reward, selling his dress on Bluefly. Speaking of Bluefly, do you get those Bluefly commercials where the woman who is wearing nothing goes through the airport screening? First of all she'd be arrested and second, what it is that Bluefly sells? It's like have nothing to wear, then think Bluefly. I have no idea what kind of stuff Bluefly sells. From the show, it looks like just accessories. The commercial doesn't tell us anything, but I digress! The two worst dresses had one thing in common, they were out of the same shiny brown fabric, which screamed cheap, cheap, cheap! LeAnn made a dress for Peter Pan, what were those flappy things? And Wesley's brown home economics dress. I think Welsley home ec dress was so poorly made, that the judges probably thought he needs to go back and with that he is aufed. As usual, this one was fun and I hate Heidi Klum, why does she always look so perfect?!-Single D

This week the designers have to make cocktail dresses out of "green" fabrics with the models doing the shopping. Stella immediately starts complaining about sending out someone who has no idea what she is doing. Hello, weren't you the one who bought trash bags? They send their models on their way with some of the designers yelling, "don't forget the closures"! I can see it now, the dress is fitted, almost done and OMG where is the zipper?! Half the designers threw away at least one piece of fabric right away and a few of the girls came back with the same brown satin stuff. Since when is satin "green" anyway. As Tim says, make it work!

Stella starts complaining that her model wants a dress that she just doesn't do and decides to make her own thing. Fortunately for her, her model ends up loving it. Biker chic is not particularly my thing since I'm not exactly a 90 pound, young 20 something.

Suede is emerging as this season's Christopher poodle dog. He has even dubbed himself Team Licious. His dress, so far, is anything but, looking more like a road map exploded with all of those fabric strips. He indeed made it work and managed to clean it up and comes out the winner of the challenge.

I thought sure Kenly would win with her simple elegant dress with the high collar. She got so many complements on it that it looked like a sure thing. It was one of my favorites for what it's worth.

Leanne and Wesley end up in the bottom two. They both had the same hideous brown satin fabric and neither one did anything good with it. Even the models looked uncomfortable wearing the dresses. Leanne gets lucky as Wesley gets aufed. Now go recycle those ugly brown dresses! Double D

Big Brother-Driving Big Brother Crazy

Jesse reminds me of a white looking incredible Hulk and is it a requirement that one must enter the diary room shirtless? This episode is the veto competition and it's BB DMV which I thought was very clever. I want to be one of those people who sit around a big table throwing out ideas for challenges. Where do I sign up? I think they could take a few brainstorming ideas from the Japanese, see Double D's posts "I Survived a Japanese Game Show" Hai Majide! Ok my daughter and I say Hai Majide every chance we get. At least this game required BB house to think alittle, use their brains and not their brawn. Unscramble the license plates to reveal a phrase. I thought it was cheating that they had the phrase above, all one had to do was to find it, how hard was that? Ok, they're not rocket scientists! Michelle, Portuguese Princess from Providence (say that five times) wins and gets the coveted POV. Brokeback is campaigning hard and him and Keesha become BFF's, will you be my new best friend? Oh pleeze, he played on her sympathies. Were you an orphan eating fish and rice? I can't decide if Keesha is going to get on my last nerve, but someone who is, is Libra. I thought at the beginning Libra would be the smart player, but she showing her screaming diva side as Jerry confronts her with what she said about the slow old people. First all, I didn't think Jerry would succumb to the masses and start shouting like a barking bull dog.

We were discussing at work who we liked, and it's like I said, it's easier to name who you don't like. Liking has to earn your respect and no one has done that yet. Jeff said he's ashamed of April wearing that Nebraska Tee-representing the cornhusker state. Not! Have you noticed how one minute April looks cute and then in the next ugh? Guess her showmance, Ollie likes it. In the end, Brian's scrambling didn't win Michelle over and she didn't use the POV to save him.

So Brokeback continues to campaigning hard against Catholic Boy. Dan keeps saying that he will keep his word and so far, he hasn't succumb to the devil's play, but I'm sure by the end of the season, he will have to go to confession and say lots of Hail Marys, because he will break his word, everyone does! It seems that the house is getting divided with Jesse and his posse of Michelle (are they an item?) Angie, Memphis & Dan with Libra, Keesha, Ollie, April and Brokeback on the other side. What they didn't show were the wild cards, Renny and Jerry, in fact they were hardly given any air time. Maybe they were attending an AARP meeting? And it totally confirmed my suspicions, Jesse does have little man syndrome. His parents say that Jesse was small for his age, ding, ding, ding! There you have it! That's why the muscles. In the end, Brokeback was voted out and for someone who doesn't announce he's gay, he sure gave a "gay" exit speech by saying, "suck it b*t*hes! What was that about? There ensued alot of filler nonsense with that alien stuff, they could have left that out but they tried to tie it into the HOH competition about alien abduction and missing items. Didn't BB use that abduction word previously? Seaduction? In the end, Keesha wins HOH mostly by not ringing in the wrong answer. Maybe the girl's smarter than we think? Not!-Single D

Big Brother-Muscle Head HOH

I think Brokeback was going to tear up after the departure of this season's first eviction of Brian and it looks like Brokeback, Catholic boy and Renny will have to dodge muscle head for candidates for eviction. It looks like Brokeback on purpose didn't go up to see muscle head's HOH room, which Jesse says was disrespectful. What was there to look at anyway, a zillion pictures of Jesse in muscle head poses. Ok maybe Jesse is a muscle head, but he did put on a good french accent during the food challenge of "Stop your Whining". Libra was complaining that it wasn't fair that the two old people were on her team. Hello, you'll be old one day! This was right up Renny's alley of catching wine in a glass, I was surprised that she just didn't open her mouth to catch the wine! I think I am forgetting most of what happened this episode because the next thing I remember is that Catholic Boy Dan wants to get Jesse alone to do some damage control and ask Jesse if he could use his restroom. Dan waits up there clicking on the monitors, but Jesse is not moving. Sometime later, Jesse and Ollie come up to the room and Dan makes a quick bee line for the toilet, flush! When he comes out a few minutes later, Jesse had that look of why are you in my room? Duh, I'm confused! Hello, you did say he could use your toilet! I think all those steroids have clouded his brain, either that or he has selective memory (or in this case no memory!). Jesse wants to put up his irritant, Renny, but is talked out of it by the group and so it's brokeback and catholic boy on the block. Brokeback was hurt, all I can say is what my BFF Terri, in Jersey would say-"grow a set!". At least Renny had the alcohol soaked brains to keep her mouth shut this round! -Single D

HOH has created a monster and it's name is Jesse! He invites everyone to see his "Jesse" room, all Jesse all the time. I'm sure he strikes posses in the mirror when no one is looking. The anti-Brian group moves in on Jesse first thing to have him put up Stephen and Angie but Jesse really can't stand Renny and won't give her up.

Stephen was educating Dan about the gay life while Keesha added her remarks on the gay life. I guess Keesha knows more about being a gay man than Stephen does.

In the food challenge, teams had to plug holes in a giant wine cask to prevent the other team from getting their wine. Renny was the self proclaimed wine catcher, I'm thinking wine drinker, but it's all good. Renny wasn't half bad actually. She figured out to catch pouring wine in a glass to put you hand over it and more will stay in the glass. Leave it to a wine drinker to figure out how to keep more in the glass! April's job was to throw the corks to the people in the cask. Now, this cask is huge and April couldn't get a single cork in it. She overthrew, under threw, they need to throw her. The same people from last week will still be swilling slop this week.

After the restroom debacle, Dan finally gets muscle head, ur Jesse alone and pleads his case not to be put up for eviction. Poor Dan is sweating bullets thinking Jesse had him pegged for eviction from the get go but after his little speech Jesse seems OK with Dan and everyone is happy.

Dan's happiness comes to an end when Jesse nominates him and Stephen. Talk about petty, the only reason Jesse put up Stephen is because he felt disrespected for him not coming up to see his HOH room. God help anyone who is not in love with Jesse. Double D

I Survived a Japanese Game Show - Oh Baby!

The teams have to dress like babies this week complete with diapers. That is just wrong in so many ways! Rome is smitten with Meaghan saying how sexy she looked in her baby costume. Even if Brad Pitt showed up on my doorstep wearing a giant diaper, it still wouldn't be sexy. Sorry Brad. Anyway, some of the team members were really getting into the part even throwing tantrums.

The challenge is to see which team can get the most milk into a large bottle after being spun around in a "crib", filling the milk cups, stepping on spinning disks and climbing over various objects. The yellow penguins get to go first. After watching everyone spin around I thought there was going to be more to clean up then spilled milk! Cathy is up first and gets her cups filled but loses it on the first spinning disk. She has to complete the obstacle course before the next contestant can go. Andrew and Justin tried to keep their heads from spinning by looking at one thing for as long as they could. Looked like they were trying to give themselves whiplash. It seemed to work and they both didn't get as dizzy as they thought they would and both managed to get milk into the bottle.

The green monkeys are up next and Rome says, in Japanese, he just likes watching everyone fall even showing it again in slow motion. I wonder what else he says to the audience? He is really liking Meaghan as he says she looks cute and dizzy. Donnell takes a header and loses all of his milk. Meaghan holds on to a splash of milk and Mary gets both of her cups to the bottle. It wasn't enough to beat the yellow team who is on a serious winning streak.

Back at the house, Donnell starts stirring the pot about Meaghan's immunity deal trying to get Mary to go back on the deal. They have a while to think about it since their punishment is to shuck clams. Those little clams pack a punch of a smell! Poor Mary looked like she was going to heave any minute and Meaghan had her shirt pulled over her nose. They get a quick lesson on shucking and Meaghan realizes the clams are alive. OMG! Meaghan finally gives the clams a swift death while Mary keeps gagging. Most of the Japanese "shuckers" find the Americans entertaining except the one who keeps saying you keep working! She is going to get the most of her free labor!

The winning yellow penguins get treated to a soba noodle dinner. They go to a beautiful temple where Japan's best soba noodles are made. They get a noodle making demonstration and all the noodles they can stuff themselves with. That's my kind of reward!

Back at the studio for the elimination challenge and Donnell is working Mary to go back on the deal. At the very last second, Mary decides to keep her word and it's her and Donnell in the elimination. The challenge is called chicken butt scramble. That would have frightened me especially when they told Mary and Donnell to take their clothes off. They are conveniently wearing sports "undies" and they are given chicken heads to wear. They have to cover themselves in oil, slide down a ramp, roll around in feathers then pop giant "eggs" using only their butts. That challenge looked painful. Mary went first and after popping a few eggs, which made the mat slippery, couldn't stand up for very long and also kept sliding off of the eggs. She managed to pop 10 eggs and then it was Donnells turn. Donnell thinks he can do better since he has a bigger booty. I think he was liking the oil part a little too much, the judge had to tell him that's enough! Donnell busts through the eggs like nobodies business and wins the challenge.

So we say sayonara to Mary as she is carried out by the Japanese mafia. Majide! Double D

The Next Design Star-Family Affair

Final three, Trish, Matt and Jen. Last year this challenge was to design a room for a family in need, which I totally liked. You know giving back and all that junk. But this year, the contestants get to design a room for their families. I guess the judges thought designing for a family member would be challenging, well maybe for Matt. It seems his mother has her own ideas of what she wants and apparently is an avid crafter. Matt will be decorating his mother's basement and turn it into a craft/gameroom. Matt's main focus is to hide the kiln, I guess mother is a potter also. Trish's family lives in Detroit and she is decorating their living room. Her mother seems nice enough telling Trish whatever she designs, she'll love, while dad sits mutely. Jen is designing a living/dining room for her sister that lives in Iowa. Each one has a handyman to help them with the renovations. Trish's handyman is apparently new to his craft, when she ask him how long has he been doing this? duh six weeks. I thought for sure Trish would come back and the wood floor would be laid in a mismash design. Jen's design for her sister's house is to possibly refinish the wood floors, but decides that they are too messed up to do that and resorts to carpeting. Didn't her sister say they ripped up the carpet in the first place? I don't care if it's made with recycled stuff and is green for the environment and is so soft. I would want wood floors. I definitely thought the room had way too much carpeting. I did like her signature hand painted walls, which Vern said, be careful or you might become a one trick pony. Out of all three rooms, Matt was the most innovative, although Ms. Martha didn't understand why he chose 4 black leather club chairs for the seating area. I thought that was genius and looked great in that space. In the end, I knew for sure that Trish was going to be cancelled since she didn't bother to move the living room furniture in a different direction. She basically kept the same layout but just resurfaced the fireplace and added decorative pieces and got new living room furniture. Well I guess Dad got a new recliner out of it. Basically this episode lacked the drama, suspense, pizazz! Essentially, everyone lacks personalities. Heaven help them if they pick Matt, while a great designer, do we want to continue to look at that bald head and Trish's personality was mostly flatliner. Jen's the best candidate for this but is she really that talented? Well, we'll see what happens in finale, somebody, dazzle me!-Single D

The Next Food Network Star-Vegas Baby!

The group is still in Las Vegas for the second half of their challenge. This time it's a 30 second promo and they have Lisa strung up on cables at the wine tower where wine angels pluck bottles of wine for the diners, only in Vegas baby! Seems like Lisa can't fly and talk at the same time. Out of all the promo spots, this one should have been cake, but I guess it takes coordination to talk and be hoisted at the same time. Lisa could have been Tom Cruise's accomplice in Mission Impossible which was more like promo impossible. Not to mention that Lisa's coach was Guy Fiere. What better lay back personality can you get? He's just like one of the cast, which he was only a short two seasons ago and now he's a food network staple. Aaron has to walk through a casino and stop at a craps table then shoot the dice, much more harder to make it look natural but he manages to bring out that personality. Adam didn't fare too well as he did his shtick with two Vegas showgirls on stage. He looked like a clumsy Pee Wee Herman, with two left clodhoppers. Next they are told to bring their A game and cook up a monster buffet for their food challenge, so it's off to Whole Earth. While there, Lisa buys two packages of monk fish and accidentally drops one out of her cart as the camera pans to it on the floor. I just wanted to scream, Lisa your fish! Adam's buffet will be as he says a smoketacular and Aaron is making pasta 7000 different ways, ok maybe 5 different ways. Not only do they have to cook it all and thank goodness they had the help of the other cast offs, but they have to entertain and serve it up to Vegas personalities. Lisa and Kelsey start cooking when Lisa realizes that where's the second half of her monk fish? It's now fish rot on the floor of Whole Foods. Thank goodness she had her crown roast pork which looked impressive but unfortunately she managed to burn half of it. Hey haven't you heard of rotating the meat in the oven? I even know that! I would just like to see her cook something flawless for once, I know she can do it. Lisa makes her presentation by singing a song, which surprises everyone, since she does have a great voice. Who knew the lady chef could belt? The chain male cast of Spamalot were in love! Next it was Aaron's turn on the mic and all he managed to do was to embarrassed himself and the entire audience. He mumbled something in audible in the mic cue the crickets! His food was the plain step sister of the three buffets. They said make something over the top and all Aaron made was picnic food. Adam's smoketacular was the crowd favorite. What's not to like about BBQ? Smoked chicken wings and smoked pork chops, am I making you hungry? But does that show that he can really cook? I think this was the quandary when it came down to the judges. Who would they get rid of? Each one of them has major flaws, Lisa can't pull it all together to create a masterpiece, Aaron's food and persona don't quite hit the marks and Adam, Mr. Personality, but can he cook? I guess it remains to be seen next week as this week the judges throw out the rules and keep all three of them, where someone next week will be name the Next Food Network Star.-Single D

Project Runway Season 5-Grocery Shopping

While on my short hiatus, I did manage to watch Project Runway in my hotel room, gee is it that time already? Seems like each season comes so quickly. This season it's the usual suspects with quirky personalities. Here they meet up with Tim Gunn and Project Runway, season's one Miss Thing with more makeup than your Elizabeth Arden makeup artist. He makes his grand entrance by sashaying across a busy NY street, traffic stopping and not because of the red light! Tim announces that it's the grocery challenge, which our Miss Thing won, and the rest is history dahling! I'm like what, make fashion out of melons and pasta? Some of the designers did take it literally like Kroto buying kale and cherry tomatoes? Nothing like rotten vegetables on your dress, ok maybe a mid morning snack. Mostly everyone ran to the plastic tablecloth section and the housewares. Daniel used blue plastic cups for his dress which he melded into a bustiere cocktail dress. I wouldn't know whether to drink from it or wear it. Stella, dominatrix from Queens, immediately headed for the garbage bag section. Yep, she definitely is the garbage bag queen except when she opens the bags at the studio, they were the thin cheap type, she shoulda bought the Glad. Instead she got junk or in this case garbage. Then there is Suede, with his mohawk of royal blue states in his bio a good hoodie is a must and I agree. Suede designed a rather demure blue tablecloth dress something I would wear to work, except plastic might be too hot in Vegas in the summer. Terri took mop heads and braided a top out of it which seemed to work that is if you can resist the urge to stop, drop and roll. In the end, it was Jerry that was auf with his white on white trench coat which the judges said looked like some kind of serial killer out fit. Granted the yellow gloves were a bit much, but at least he sewed something, unlike dominatrix's draped garbage bag disaster. Wrong wrong wrong judges!! In this case it was garbage in and Jerry out, too bad we didn't get to see more of your talent! -Single D

This season we have a diverse group of designers half are hard edge, all are cut-throat and a few look like Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, personality wise anyway. This should be good. We have Stella who is down right scary and designs for rock stars or pimps, OK. Blayne has an obsession with tanning, can you say skin cancer waiting to happen?

Tim Gunn wakes the designers at 4am to go to Gristedes grocery store. Austin Scarlett from season one greets the designers. You think that was a name change? All that was missing was the hoop skirt and lacy umbrella. The designers have to design an outfit from what they can find in the grocery store for $75.00. Everyone pretty much avoids the produce section. Did they learn nothing from Scarlett, I mean Austin, who won that challenge with a corn husk dress? I was thinking Romaine lettuce bodice, with cardboard backing when it wilted, with maybe a Pepsi carton skirt.

Stella buys trash bags, which is right up her alley, and says her "fabric" is garbage. Need I say more? Almost everyone else bought table clothes for their material and are called out by Tim who says the judges will think they are slackers. That seemed to kick them into gear. Leann started covering her table cloth dress in candies and Stella started sewing her garbage bags. Blayne's model had more curves than he thought and had to hand sew his "girlicious" outfit.

After the runway show, Jerry got a bashing from the judges when they said his outfit was freaky and looked like a handy wipe gone wrong. Blayne's outfit looked like something out of a bad ScFi movie. I loved Kelly's vacuum cleaner bag dress from the start. I thought it was one of the most original creations. Daniel's plastic cup dress was also very cute. Kelly's vacuum cleaner bag dress is the winner with Jerry being Auf'ed. I guess the judges wanted to see if Stella could actually do something. Double D