There are just certain things one should never do:
1. Enter any supermarket or CVS the day after Halloween when all the candy is 50% off and the sugary portion of the brain gets stimulated simply by looking at all of the discounted Twix that line the shelves like a caramel-and-cookie-and-chocolate-coated dream.
2. Meet a blind date on a boat that takes you far out to sea when you’ve never been that good a screamer.
3. Try on a bikini in December unless you’re tan, drunk, or surrounded by blind people who have been drinking.
4. Go shopping for electronics on Black Friday without having first rubbed Vaseline across your entire body. The slippery nature of the stuff will help you to stop the person who is trying to club you over the head so she can snag that humongous TV from getting a good grip on your forearm.
5. Watch the reality show you’re tasked with recapping when you are in a very dark mood.
Yes, I’m coming off perhaps the bleakest week of my adult life, a week where I lost a lot. I had to say goodbye to one of my greatest loves and it’s left me feeling a bit disoriented, more than a little bit lonely, and like I’m trying to swallow a craving that tastes both salty and sweet but the lump in my throat keeps getting in the way of gulping anything down, even a memory. Over the last seven days or so, I’ve been faced with realizing definitively who is there for me in the murkiest of times and who is not. I have watched life turn into death. I have lost water weight from crying the kind of guttural sobs I didn’t think my body even knew how to generate anymore and I have lost any sort of patience for assholes who try to hurt those around them. And it is with that mindset taking hold of my thought process that I’m going to issue a warning: if you want to read a nonjudgmental recap where the writer pretends these Vanderpumpers are not society-tarnishing demons, you should wander away from this page immediately. Come back next week when I’m sweet again. Call it projected fury caused by wrenching grief, but I’m venturing close to the shadowy corners tonight – and I’m inviting you to come with me as long as you’re willing to take the journey without a flashlight.
This one’s meant to be dark.
Luckily for someone like me who feels the need to rage just a bit, this season has already included such minor depravities as an intervention spearheaded by a wife who prefers that her husband remain tipsy; Jax’s nose covered in bandages and his ear stuffed with something that appeared to be hardened mucus; and Kristen and James attending couple’s therapy in an effort to save a relationship that is basically a cautionary tale come to life where all the characters are played by monsters with really bad hair. In other words, the moon is already creepy and full and the stark trees look extra menacing in the undistilled darkness of Vanderland.
Tonight’s descent into absolute nothingness begins at SUR, a restaurant at this point I wouldn’t even enter on a dare. Scheana seems to be doing much better than she was the last time we saw her when she was handing a cup to her husband so he could pee into it for a random home drug test. She feels optimistic that she and Shay will be just fine and he’s even going to take off a few pounds in the process of getting healthy and, dammit, she is going to learn to cook because nothing cures an addiction to painkillers like a frittata! Lisa listens to her employee’s lunacy for a moment before turning her attention to what Jax might be stealing from the premises tonight. Is it a SUR candle? A case of wine? Someone else’s nose cartilage in case his runs out for good? While I am momentarily preoccupied by adding “kleptomaniac” to my expanding list of reasons of just why Jax Is The Worst Person Alive, Lisa stays focused and asks him about Brittany. She’s back in Kentucky where I hope she’s shopping for more appropriate interview attire. In the meantime, Jax tells Lisa that Scheana and Shay’s marriage won’t last and when Jax is calling out your relationship, you’re either completely f*cked or you will stay together forever.
In the back of the restaurant, James and Lala hang out and flirt and she tries to remind him that he dropped his drink the other night and the glass shattered everywhere and it was so adorable. James can’t remember that event because of those pesky blackouts he suffers from, but he does remember making out with the new SUR hostess who clearly needs to be reprogrammed into someone who looks at James and sees only the repulsive creature he is. For now though, Lala actually finds this prick appealing and she seems more than willing to throw down with Kristen, the chick who is James’ unofficial ex-girlfriend – and the kind of ex who will not go quietly. (Oh…why is Kristen’s ex-girlfriend status “unofficial”? Well, James hasn’t quite gotten around to telling her that he’s happily f*cking someone new.)
Lo and behold, who comes wandering in just then but Kristen? I know! It’s such a random occurrence and not at all something set up by producers! Kristen walks in and approaches Lala at the hostess stand to ask if she will please tell James that she is outside. All of this suspenseful drama might be so very exciting if I cared about any of these people in the least, but like I said, I’m in a dark place and watching them intentionally making their lives complicated and miserable is actually offending me. Still, if someone knocked Kristen’s head right off her body and we got to see it roll down the back alleyway of SUR in slow motion, I might cheer up a tad. James leaves his DJ post to go talk to his psychopathic ex. He immediately lights up a cigarette and in a furious swirl of exhaled smoke he says that he doesn’t trust her. Settle in, because the entire story here is so ridiculous that it almost defies comprehension.