So, I have some good news and some bad news. The good news is that this episode finally wasn’t full of filler. Some stuff actually hit the fan, which is what we’ve all been waiting for (yes, that was a Royal We right there). We don’t watch The Real Housewives of Orange County for the avant garde fashion choices, after all.
The bad news is that it was all of Lynn’s uncomfortable family issues that hit said fan, which made my skin crawl for approximately 45 minutes of the hour-long episode. I like this whole car-crash of a show a lot better when consenting adults are the only victims, and I also like it a lot better when it doesn’t subject me to a caterwauling drunk woman who is somehow still smiling because of how tight her stupid facelift is. That is a combination of annoying and creepy that I’d rather not have in my Thursday night.
As always, let’s talk about the housewives that weren’t directly involved in the meat of tonight’s show.
Vicki, obviously, was working during the majority of the episode so she wasn’t there during the final fireworks, but we did see a bit of her. First, she was on another of her dates with Don, who surprised her with a big ol’ ring and then wiped some bird poop of their server’s head. Don is easily the least terrible person on this entire show (he may be the least terrible person in the entirety of Bravo’s Housewives universe), and the fact that he seems to genuinely like Vicki makes me wonder if she’s not as bad in real life as she is on the show. I shudder to think what other reason he would have for staying with her.
Before she disappeared back to her office for the rest of the episode, she managed to redeem the botulism-and-orange-chemicals “party” that she had for her employees last week ever so slightly by bringing in a financial planner and providing lunch for her younger employees (and both of her kids). That’s actually a decently nice thing to do. I wish someone would teach me some of that stuff. More specifically, I wish someone would teach me how in the world I’m supposed to do my freelance taxes. If this were to be a Twitter trending topic, I would tag it #ThingsTheyShouldaTaughtMeInJournalismSchool. Just sayin’.
Ahem. Anyway.
Although Tamra was present at the night’s trainwreck, she mostly just sat there with a excrement-eating (I’m not allowed to cuss on here – hello, advertisers! – so just fill it in mentally) grin on her face the entire time, happy that she wasn’t involved in the fight. Previous to that, we saw her and Beta Douche Simon cleaning out their garage in anticipation of selling their house before the bank foreclosed on it. Tamra took the opportunity to tell us that things were fine, just FINE, between her and Simon, which is silly, considering that we’ve already read the ending to that book, so to speak.
Gretchen played an integral part in Lynn’s eventual meltdown, but she also rode around on her motorcycle for part of the episode and showed off some makeup that is apparently a part of her new line, Gretchen Christine Beauté. Yeah, with the pretentious ‘e’ and everything. If there’s one thing I really don’t need in my life, it’s eyeshadow endorsed by a housewife who always looks like she puts her makeup on with a trowel.
And then there was Alexis, who facilitated the whole meltdown by throwing a boozy party in the middle of the day, to which she invited several women that hate each other in various ways. She did it under the guise of peacemaking, which is adorable. Absolutely precious. No one ever resolves anything on Real Housewives – if they did, we wouldn’t have a show. Plus, they all know that they don’t get any camera time if they’re not beefing with someone, and these people need camera time like the rest of us need food, water and shelter.
Before we talk about what went on at the party, however, we have to talk about the spectacular parenting FAIL that Lynn had beforehand. She took her daughter to the mall to talk to her, because apparently no one in Orange County is able to communicate with anyone else if they’re not both engaged in an activity that involves boozing, tanning or shopping. They’re almost like the Jersey Shore kids, but not as ironically lovable. While in the car on the way there, her teenager told her that she was hung over, a fact which did not seem to trouble Lynn at all.
Once inside, Lynn tried to engage in a Serious Discussion at the mall, but Alexa was not interested in participating in said discussion. She chose to display her distaste in her mother’s timing by doing the most mature thing she could think of, which happened to be calling her mother a witch-with-a-b and throwing Lynn’s cuff down on the table.
Instead of doing what my mother (and presumably, most mothers everywhere) would have done and dragging her little ingrate of a daughter out of the mall by her hair, Lynn sat there with a creepy smile on her face (presumably because her facelift does not allow her to make other facial expressions) and tried to use her words to express to her daughter how sad she was to see that she was disrespecting her cuff. Alexa very plainly tried to tell her that if Lynn forced her to abide by her punishments, then she might act right every now and then, but the sentiment didn’t seem to penetrate Lynn’s leather-like face. She just cradled her poor cuff and mentally frowned. But not physically, because she can’t.
After seeing that interaction, I can no longer bring myself to fault Gretchen for anything she’s said or done toward Lynn and Alexa in the past few episodes. In fact, when they played back some of the clips, it was obvious that Gretchen made it very clear that she was just trying to give Alexa an outlet and make her feel heard, since most teenagers have a hard time talking to their parents. Doubly so for Alexa, since I’m not sure that Lynn has entirely mastered the English language.
Considering all of that, things were definitely not going well when it came time for Lynn to sit down with the other women (minus Vicki) for a drunken lunch at Alexis’s place. As soon as Gretchen asked how Alexa was doing, things careened out of control so quickly that I can’t even entirely remember how Lynn, who appeared to be both drunk and possibly on some pills (she accused Gretchen of slipping something in her drink on Watch What Happens Live, although she pretty much always seems high to me), went from making inappropriate jokes about Kegel exercises and her husband’s manbits to wailing about how hard it is to live in the OC, where sixteen-year-olds get BMWs.
Listen, Lynn. Orange County is not the only place on the face of the planet where parents try to live vicariously through their kids by buying them expensive cars – it happened where I grew up, and I’m fairly sure that it happens in the chichi suburbs of every major city in America. It’s also not any semblance of an excuse for not actually parenting them, or for giving up on them when they get into their teens.
Although she began her little scene by repeating how hard she tries to be a good mother, she eventually started talking about Orange County expectations, and that’s where she lost my support. It seemed entirely as though she was lamenting her own lot in the world – her crappy facelift, her fake tan, the hours she spends at the gym that aren’t making her any younger, the house that she’s about to get kicked out of on next week’s episode because she has no skills and never thought to save a dollar in her life. When she spends so much time thinking about all the things she has to do in order to keep up with her own ego, how can we possibly expect her to take the time to deal with anything else, much less something so exhausting as an unruly teenager that seems to desperately want someone to ground her? And then actually stick around to make sure she stays home? Clearly Lynn doesn’t have the time for that in the middle of busy aesthetics schedule.
It was pathetic and sad and thinking about it still makes my skin crawl. I can’t write funny little jokes about this stuff. This woman needs to get off my television, get out of her plastic surgeon’s office, and do something about her family. You know, besides just getting defensive when an adult that has made some mistakes in her life offers to help her stop her daughter from making the same ones. Anyone care to guess what attention-starved, attractive teenage girls with clueless, absentee parents do in their spare time? I shudder to think, but perhaps Lynn should ponder it for a while.
I don’t want to end my last post of the week on such a sour note, but there was absolutely nothing bright or cheery or not soul-crushingly awful about this episode of Real Housewives. So, instead, here’s a cute puppy video:
Original post by Amanda Mull
