This collection of entries is from February 05, 2003.
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Yech. Why am I still watching. I love the game, hate this implementation. Shame on you Stone Stanley Entertainment!
The first game is the traditional "Three Questions" game - except they're not in a quaint village somewhere in Europe, so they make do with paths through a Hawaiian jungle, with the person in hiding wearing a camouflage outfit to blend in with the vegetation. The only win $10,000 of $30,000 and there is a lock of animosity that we've always seen with this game. Odd. I think the players are starting to hate the whole experience and just want it to end. The second game is called "It Takes A Thief" and is a convoluted, Mole-ish scavenger hunt in a Hawaiian mansion (very nice place). The players wear jumpsuits, they have to have two people lay on a bed to activate a blacklight out in the darkness outside (a backyard? a front yard? can't tell where the hell they are) to read hints on items/articles in a fluorescent ink. The clues find things that have numbers that they have to key in as a digital combination to a safe that has to be opened with 30 minutes, which somehow they were able to accomplish - only to find another clue inside which has them diving into the outdoor swimming pool (another nice amenity at this house) to collect bags of money (one for each person). They get $75,000 but they needed some hints from Ahmad along the way that cost $1,000 each, so they only earn $72,000. The pot is now $233,000. The contestants take the final 20 Question quiz and the Runner Up, the Winner, and The Mole are revealed next week along with a reunion of the cast.
Oh joy.
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Now remember - I love the show's concept, I just hate the current implementation. I went and bought an authentic (complete with Certificate of Authenticity) Mole journal from ABC Auctions. It was just something I wanted because I still believe in the show and am a big fan of the first two seasons and I really would have liked to tryout for the next series (but I believe that was already cast). It's a cool journal, complete with embossed fingerprint on the cover.
There's so much out there on the web right now, so for you Reality TV fans out there, here's some comments, observations and a few links...
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OK. Celebrity Mole Hawaii. Just sucks. Nothing else to say about it - they've just killed what I think was a very clever Reality TV game. Sucks.
Joe Millionaire. Gee, where do I start... OK, we knew about Evan's Toll Evasion ticket and his past as an underwear model. Then we have finalist Sarah Kozer's odd little soft porn bondage films. We have supermarket tabloid The Globe saying finalist Zora Andrich actually married Evan at the French château. (There's also one totally unsubstantiated rumor that one of the girls on the show is pregnant from Evan.) Paul Hogan the butler is even in the frey, having been almost fired from an assignment just prior to the show (actually, he quit right before getting fired). Did you know that he's a member of the International Guild of Professional Butlers (and they have a webpage for him)?
The Bachelorette. Two days after the show was broadcast that had him being rejected by Trista Rehn, Greg Todtman was busted at New York's John F. Kennedy airport and charged with trying to smuggle drugs onto his American Airlines flight to Los Angeles. But we just know the winner is Charlie Maher.
The Bachelor. Remember Aaron Buerge and "winner" Helene Eksterowicz? They broke up. I mean, he blew off her January 17th birthday, what do you expect?
Amazing Race 4 appears to be in production - they were in Alappuzha, India, (somewhere around Kerala) where an article mentions 7 pairs of contestants (that will give you an idea on how far into the race they are) "participated in a traditional bull race, carrying bundles of coir on elephants, riding a cycle-rickshaw with chicken crates and a night on a rice boat." It also looks like there's a possibility of the show being pushed-off a bit as CBS has ordered more episodes of Star Search.
Do you remember Mike ''Boogie'' Malin from Big Brother 2? Do you remember his bar/lounge Belly? Don't you think that it's an odd coincidence that Gabriel Cade of Survivor Marquesas bartended there and Alex Bell of Survivor The Amazon was a doorman there? (nice little article on how Belly is a "Reality TV halfway house".)
How about a new ABC series based on a British Channel 4 show Wife Swap?
And not really part of the Reality TV genre per se, but guess what TV show was voted the favorite of HGTV's programming? Trading Spaces. That's not a good thing as Trading Spaces is not on HGTV - it's on TLC!
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I hate Wednesday mornings. It's Garbage Day in Hoffman Estates. Now, I really don't mind taking out the garbage. Not really. What I do mind is taking out the recycling bins. I don't mind doing the recycling during the week - it's no big deal, and actually much easier to do than what I had thought when we started this years ago. But dragging the bins out to the curb, especially the ones with the bundled newspapers is just a chore. The can & bottle & cardboard recycling? Not a problem. Newspapers? Problem. We get three newspapers a day during the week (Chicago Tribune, USA Today, and the Daily Herald) so we're piling up newsprint at a good rate. And it's just so damn heavy. *sigh*