We’ve moved on from wedding season to birthday season and after Sandoval’s Extra Extra themed soiree last week, we’re on to preparing an 80’s themed birthday for the guy who thinks themes are stupid. That scenario can only make sense if you live in Jax’s “it’s only cool if I do it” world.
So much of this show happens outside of SUR now that it feels like the scenes with Lisa seem inorganic. I don’t see her having much in common with Ariana outside of their love of horses, so in spite of the stable setting the scene, I don’t get the impression it would ever occur if cameras weren’t involved. I understand that with losing her mom she wasn’t in a good place, but I hope they find a remedy for the stilted nature of these cut-ins, because I genuinely enjoy seeing her.
The main message I gleaned from Lisa’s meet-up with Ariana was a discussion about James turning a corner and attending a meeting. She genuinely thinks the tide will change for James now and I hope she’s right. As we flash over to James and Raquel’s, it does appear that he’s committed and he’s saying and doing all of the right things. I sincerely wish him well in the endeavor.
Katie is going through with the girls’ wine night she proposed at Sandoval’s birthday. Every single girl from the show is invited except for Kristen. I’m of two minds about this. I can’t be fake. If I don’t like you, I’m not going to pretend like I do. That said though, I think it’s a really crappy thing to do to someone you were so close to. She could have easily made it a wine night for the new cast members as a “get to know you” or stuck with hanging with her regular group. I’m never a fan of excluding only one person.
During the day on Thursday, Sandoval, Schwartz, and Max all gather to hang out and funnel beers. California adulting is vastly different than the Ohio version. Sandoval decides that the perfect prank to pull on Jax would be to TP his house. Three months ago, this would have seemed funny albeit juvenile. Now as I was watching, I couldn’t help but wonder how many people were incensed or crying over each wasted quilted square. But I digress, Sandoval is actually able to convince Jax it wasn’t him by showing a pic of one of his trees festooned as well. I have to give him kudos for how much thought he put into his alibi.
In a random off-theme moment, Brett asks Scheana to come on his You Tube channel. Despite my love of Roget’s Thesaurus I have no words to describe the awkward, cringe-worthy, unsettling train wreck that this was. Brett is either taking the piss out of her, or he’s really that clueless. Calling her a middle-aged, divorcee’ who’s been around the block and is freezing her eggs is hardly putting Scheana’s best foot forward, especially after the pain-staking effort Scheana put into positioning herself in front of the camera to be seen at her best angle. (Yes, my typing tongue is firmly planted in my keyboard cheek.)
Wine night is upon us and as the ancients used to say “In Vino Veritas.” We get down to some truths. The first truth being that Lala feels totally scorched by Raquel’s walk-off and needs to reclaim her Alpha status. The second truth being that as much as she claims pit bull status, without Rand’s money and connections she’s a hostess from Utah and about as gangsta as my grandma self. Were it not for fear of revoking Rand’s PJ privileges, I guarantee you Stassi would have gone full blown Dracarys in the moment where Lala checked her.
Jax’s birthday party at Rocco’s is 80’s glory. Leave it to Scheana to show up in a Jazzercise leotard. Jax looks like a busted Sebastian Bach, but at least he seems to be enjoying himself for a change. His bromance with Rand is one of the more age appropriate things about him, and as a gift Rand has decided to prank Sandoval back for the Charmin Incident. He’s hired actors complete with fake cop cars to arrest Sandoval for vandalism.
It all goes down at the party after-party (how do they even have livers?) Things are just getting underway when the fauxfficers knock on the door. They ask Tom if he has anything on him and Tom randomly discloses that he’s wearing two belts. Add fashion crimes to the list and he’s handcuffed and convincingly escorted to the patrol vehicles. The actors even thought to throw in the head push to clear the door frame. The rest of the group is standing around aghast and confused about what’s going on. Rand didn’t draw it out nearly long enough for my taste, but he spills the beans and most of them are blown away by what a good prank it was.
The two hold outs are Katie and Ariana. Ariana I expected, because she can’t seem to look at anything through a humor-filled lens. I may be alone in this, but I’m beyond the age of caring whether people agree. When you dissect everything through a woke lens before you chuckle…nothing is funny. I need laughter in my life, sometimes even the irreverent kind. Katie’s reaction was the one that seemed disproportionate to me. I actually kind of got why Schwartz was so honked off at her. I don’t think, however, that husband’s should ever publicly berate and humiliate their wives though. That’s a marriage no-no in my book. But after being on the receiving end of her humiliating him for years, maybe he just hit his limit.
Next week we’ll be treated to the aftermath. I hope you’ll join me!
