Goat Guts, Anyone?

Last week on Mad Mad House, Kelly barked at a dog, bawled like a baby and brayed at the moon. She was evicted for egregious overacting and left in a self-righteous huff. “These people are freaks! All of them!” were some of her parting words. No word yet on whether the nuns are going to let her back into the convent.

Episode Three opens with the usual fast-forward tour over the burning cauldron, through the imposing front door and down the hall to where the big grandfather clock is always striking midnight. Also? The moon is still full. This place must exist in some weird time warp where it is always midnight at high moon.

The remaining houseguests are gathered in the living room dishing and dissing on Kelly.

Jamie: “Everyone is glad Kelly is gone, to be honest.”

Then conversation turns to the Elimination Deliberation process, and who’s “in” or “out” with the Alts.

“You’re gonna need to shed your inhibitions if you want to stay here,” Nichole says. Loana takes this very personally.

Brent tells the camera “Me and Loana are the black sheep in the house.” Then back to the house where Eric tells them “I don’t see either of you here in two weeks.”

Loana cries some more. The Five Alts trek in and join the discussion. Loana cries again. Ta’Shia tells them “You just gotta be open.” Loana cries.

Scene: Fiona’s bedroom, at night.
Loana? Still crying.
Fiona? “Loana’s ‘Crocodile Tears’ just mask intolerance.”
Me? Starting to get bored. “Come on, guys, do something outrageous! I’m soooo bored here!
Enter Art. “Good morning, everyone. Me and Don need three people to go to the grocery store and pick up some stuff. Who wants to come?”

Finally! A Road Trip! That should be fun, right? Who will go?

Road Trip!

Doh. Everyone wants to go! Mass excitement! It’s a chance to escape from the gloomy house! Woo-hoo! They draw straws to decide who goes. Brent, Loana & Eric are chosen. Could they have picked a more boring three? I mean—really! I start to lose some of my first excitement, but remain hopeful. Shopping with freaks is always fun.

(This is a total aside here, but I’m still bored. See, *I* went grocery shopping at Red Owl with a vampire once. She wasn’t as pretty as Don, but kinda scary looking. I think it was the spiders she had inked onto her partially shaved head. Major fun. Everyone stared and tut-tutted. I am so hopeful for this trip, even with the dull as death Brent & Loana tagging along. Uhhh… back to the show now.)

They pile into the big black SUV. Don makes them all buckle up, because “Even the undead wear seatbelts.” “Buckle up America,” Don tells the camera. This would make a nice Public Safety announcement from Detroit’s automakers. Buckle up, and you too can remain undead.

Art, wearing his usual skirt, has donned extra-large, double nipple rings and inserted a two inch black claw through his nose. He is bare-chested as always. Don is dressed for success, vampire style. Needless to say, people notice them.

Art goes all gregarious. “Hi!” “How ya doin’?” “Hey!” He attempts to engage the simple townsfolk. He offers advice on sodium consumption to a fellow shopper. The townsfolk stare & goggle.

Art checks his list. “Nail polish remover. Would that be under ‘Feminine Hygiene’?” He starts down the feminine hygiene aisle. I shudder and cross my legs. I wonder what the heck female Primitives do with their nail polish. <shudder>

Don corrects him and they head to cosmetics. Thank God vampires know their women! Or thank Beelzebub. Whatever.

Our happy group next crosses (you’ll pardon the expression), crosses paths with a nice older woman who decides to chat them up.

“I’m fascinated,” she reveals. “This is an Angel”( points to Don), “This is a Devil” (points to Art), and “You are an ordinary human being” (points to Eric). What are you doing here?” (I so wanted to see the look on Don’s face when the old lady identified him as an ‘angel’! Quelle tragic error!) (I am using parentheses too often here, aren’t I?) (Sorry.)

Art tries to charm her. “Why am I the devil?”

She approaches him and runs her hands over his naked chest. This is some ballsy old woman!!! “You have devil symbols all over you! Here. And here!” she says.

Art debates her. “You don’t know what is in my heart!”

Old woman: “Do you even have a heart?”

Art: “Of course!”

Eric: “He has one of the biggest hearts I’ve ever met.” Way to kiss up, Eric.

The old woman gets cold feet suddenly and pushes her cart off down the aisle. The Mad Mad House gang continue shopping. Don bites into a package of raw meat, grossing out a few people. Art continues to browse in feminine hygiene. Loana is completely invisible during this trip. Brent zooms up & down the aisles, pushing the cart and pretending he is not with the unGodly freaks. Eric is just having fun.

As they head for the checkout Don wonders “Do we have enough pasta?” I think WTF? Vampires eat pasta? Who knew?

Art buys bunches and bunches of roses. Loana asks if they are having a party. I figure the flower blossoms will be given to good witch Fiona for some Wiccan thing, while Art will keep the thorny stems for his private piercing pleasures.

Back at the Mad House, Nichole, Jamie and Fiona are posing in little bitty bikinis. The camera feasts on their near-naked bodies. Fiona is all turned on. “We are hot, hot chicks! We are powerful women!” She wants to do a Goddess ritual to honor the inner Goddesses in the Mad Mad House women.

“We can have a hot chick day,” she tells the three women (yeah—Bonnie is there too, just not in a bikini.) “For what it’s worth,” she continues “I’m going to invite Loana but I’m hoping she doesn’t want to come.” Fiona does not like Loana—that much is crystal clear.

The grocery shoppers return, and it’s time for lunch. Eric is invited to eat in ta’Shia’s room. For the Alts, invites and commands are the same thing so Eric troops up to ta’Shia’s lair. There is a dead chicken hanging from her light fixture. I am reminded that voodoo is a tough gig for chickens and goats.

Ta’Shia rolls some shells, reads the future and tells Eric he drinks too much. She tells him it is very important that he doesn’t drink and drive. WTH? Ta’Shia is angling for a PSA spot too? Anyway, Eric nods and later tells the camera that he will drink less ‘while in the house’. That Eric—always going for the extra points.

(Look! The SciFi network is airing a KimPossible commercial! I wave to Kim. She ignores me, as usual. But Kim is a Goddess so she can do whatever she wants with me.)

Back in the Mad Mad House Art and Loana are chatting. Fiona appears in the doorway to invite Loana to the Goddess Ritual. “You must be willing to consider yourself a Goddess, be treated like a Goddess and call yourself a Goddess. I anticipate it’s probably something you won’t want to do.” Whoa! Is that a grudging invitation or what?

Loana notices too. “That was a loaded question,” she tells Fiona. They snipe back and forth at each other. Fiona keeps saying you can come, but I don’t really want you. Loana keeps saying I’d come if you really wanted me. Finally, they agree that Loana will not come.

Fiona: “I’m glad you decided not to attend.”

Have I mentioned that Fiona is looking particularly witchy lately? Her lovely hair has turned all dry and snarly. Witchy, if you will. This woman needs some hair product! Or is her true nature finally revealing itself?

Art reasons with Loana. “The ritual is about empowerment, not religion.”

Loana decided to go and gives Art a big hug before she leaves. Yes, our repressed Christian girl gives her tattooed freak friend a full-bodied hug. He runs her back fondly. Maybe there is hope for this girl after all!

Fiona and the girls are all in the witch bedroom, plotting their ritual, when Loana appears in the doorway.

“I don’t want you with us,” Fiona tells her. “You’ll just cry and spoil the beautiful, sacred Goddess energy.” Or something like that.

Loana tells her “I am all about empowerment, and women’s power.” So they let her join after all. Fiona even comes up with a hug.

Oh, My Goddess!

The next time we see the women they are on their way to the Goddess Ritual. In keeping with the sacred nature of the occasion they are not wearing any underwear. Or clothes. Instead they are clad with various bits of sheer white cloth, tied here and there on their bodies.

They enter a Sacred Circle cast from all the flowers Art purchased in town. The first thing they do is anoint each other’s bodies with runny, white clay. Fiona instructs them to rub it on smoothly and gently.

Wow! Girl-on-girl action! This is even hotter than the three bimbos bathing in Survivor Amazon! ‘Cause, like, this is five women—with close up close-ups and everything. Mark Burnett, eat your heart out. (Okay, I’m sorry. I have to say this. If you have ever watched porn movies where the women rub—you know—onto their bodies at the climax of certain scenes… Well, this looks just like that. Sorry, but it does.)

Once they are all smeared with the clay, they hold hands while Fiona invokes the Goddess. “We sacred women, painted white, painted pure, painted perfect” etc. etc. Then they wash the clay from each other’s bodies, very gently scrubbing with flower petals. They towel each other off, but all that dripping water has soaked into their pure white clothes. The camera is so happy. This is even better than a wet t-shirt contest! Eventually, they get drunk, start kissing each other and kind of form a fur pile on some silken pillows. It is at this point that the men—who have been wondering what the heck those silly, empowered women are up to—stumble on the scene.

They gape. Noel looks like a cross between a goldfish and a piranha. Eric quickly crosses his hands in front of himself and laughs with delight. Tim looks curiously disgusted. Either he is majorly, seriously f*cked up by religion-based hang-ups or he is gay. I decide I don’t care which of those applies.

The girls rub and writhe in their circle until Fiona looks up & notices the guys. She addresses the watching men. “This is the realm of the Goddess. If you want to enter you have to be prepared to worship us, bring us wine and massage us. We have some oil here.”

The men are stunned, trying to understand exactly what they will be permitted. Noel paraphrases Fiona. “So, let me get this straight. In order to enter your circle we need to get drunk and give you massages.”

The drunken Goddesses all giggle a yes.

“Alright!” The guys rush off, pushing and shoving, to get more wine. Back in the house, they decide to strip off their clothes and wear just bathrobes when they return to the circle. These guys are so hoping for a Goddess orgy rite thingy. Please God Goddess—let there be an orgy!

The girls all cheer when they see that the men are wearing only bathrobes, and bringing fruit and wine.

Noel: “For those of you who are interested, I have a bowl of nuts and a banana—which I offer to you.” They all laugh. I decide I love Noel.

Let the Massage Fest begin! Noel feeds the women peeled grapes. Eric starts massaging Fiona’s feet, then her calves, then her knees, then her thighs, then her…

Noel: “I would have worshipped anything she asked me too.” I predict Fiona will choose Eric for her next room-mate.

Brent looks thoroughly uncomfortable and barely touches Loana’s shoulders in a grudging massage. Tim is off somewhere playing with Noel’s banana.

SciFi breaks for commercials. (Things have got too hot even for cable.)

Back from commercial, we see Tim and Avocado talking. And talking, talking talking talkingtalkingtalking. Tim does not know how to shut up. Avocado observes that “Tim is afraid of silence.”

Later that evening Tim makes surprise announcement to the group. “After tonight’s trial, I’m not going to speak for 24 hours. Everyone is so happy! Nichole tells the camera “Tim! Why not really test yourself and go for two weeks?” I agree. Tim has such a whiny, grating voice and all his opinions are stupid anyway. Not that I am judgmental or anything.

Trial Time

Oh crap. It’s another voodoo thing! Didn’t we just have one of those? I want a vampire ritual! Or a naturist ritual! I want to see Art hang Tim from the ceiling with a hook up his ass! I want an Alternative to these endless voodoo challenges! But ta’Shia just rolls along.

“Everybody gets one white sheet, and a red warrior’s scarf for their head,” she says.

Okay—cool. Maybe it’s a voodoo battle to the death! And the white sheet is a shroud for their victims! No such luck. The sheets are to wear.

The eight remaining winner-wannabees file onto the challenge field at—you guessed it—midnight. (It is always midnight here in Mad Mad Land.) They line up in front of 8 holes in the ground. Behind each hole is a mysterious pile of stuff, covered with another white sheet.

Ta’Shia has two gorgeous, hunky, bare-chested guys to ‘assist’ her in this ritual. ( I try to decide which of these two I would pick for my room-mate. Such a difficult choice. I decide to take both. Mmmmm—voodoo sandwich time. Oops! Did I say that out loud? Uhhh… Back to the episode.)

Ta’shia reminds everyone what is at stake. The winner of this Trial gets the usual 3 benefits:

1. Immunity
2. Can observe the Alts deliberate who to vote off.
3. In the case of a tie—they pick who goes.

“In voodoo tradition,” ta’Shia intones, “many ceremonies involve connecting with Earth energy. So, get into the hole in front of you.”

They climb into the holes. Then ta’shia tells them “My assistants will assist in this trial by filling the holes with disgusting crap associated with voodoo.” Okay. Not really. She said “My assistants will assist by filling the holes with sacred items associated with the voodoo tradition.” The assisting hunks whip off the white sheets from each mysterious pile.

“First, earth. For healing energy. The voodoun hunks dump a bag of dirt onto the head of each person. They wince. It’s funny. Okay—I am going to enjoy this voodoo ritual!

“Second, fruit, to be used for the God’s sacred ceremonies. The voodoun hunks dump a bucket or smashed and pulped fruit slime on top of the dirt on top of each person. <giggle>

Third—honey for the Goddess Ursula (?). The hunks dump a full bucket of honey onto the fruit pulp which is on the dirt which is on the head of each person. Eew! It’s thick, nasty stuff and flows over their eyes, noses and mouths!

Four. Feathers—to cleanse negative energy. The hunks empty a bag of feathers onto the honey on top of the fruit pulp on top of the dirt on the head of each person. It’s like being tarred and feathered, voodoo style.

Five. Next is fish and sea-weed, for Agway the goddess of fertility. Bonnie screams “It’s cold!” The Alts all giggle insanely. And the helpful hunks dump a bucket of slimy fish parts and seaweed onto the feathers on top of the honey on top of the fruit on top of the dirt that is on the head of each person. Eric: “The smell was awful! My strategy was simply not to vomit.”

Six. Animal organs! She doesn’t bother explaining why animal organs, or else I was too freaked out to hear, but anyway—the happy, helpful hunks dump a big bucket of raw, loopy intestines onto the fish parts on top of the feathers on top of the honey on top of the fruit pulp on top of the dirt that is on the head of each person. Evidently, the goat guts are cold too. Everybody screams. Even the other watching Alts. (I decide I will not invite the two hunks to be my room-mates. They may be too kinky even for me! And I say that out loud!)

Okay—that was fun. But how do we know who won?

Then ta’Shia gets really diabolical. “The only thing left to do now,” she announces, “is to find the five sacred items that are in each of your holes.” She holds up each sacred thing for her victims so they can see what they have to look for. They must find, in the slop below,
1. A black cloth voodoo doll, about 5 inches tall
2. A rattle
3. A talisman necklace (a small one—not one of the immunity necklaces)
4. A candle, about 6 inches tall, red.
5. A key. A skinny, regular little key.

“The first person to find all five items and place them onto my altar wins!”

Shivering from the cold, cold fish parts and goat guts, the plucky players pick themselves up out of the hole and start to dig through the nasty stuff looking for the sacred objects. It is kind of like bobbing for apples, only way more disgusting.

It turns out to be a race between Bonnie and Brent, although Eric makes a good showing too. Eventually, Brent finds all 5 objects first. But—shades of messed up contests in reality shows all over the world—he loses one of them back into the goop! It’s a chance for Bonnie, and she pulls through! Bonnie wins!

“I am a Goddess, dammit!” she yells as she dumps the crap sacred stuff onto ta’Shia’s altar. The Alts all laugh.

The dirty, filthy houseguests troop off to shower and get gamma globulin injections.

The Sound of Silence.

The next day everyone is shown clean, happy and having lunch at poolside. Not a fish part or feather to be seen. Oh no. It’s much worse than that.

Tim has taken a vow of silence. For him, this is a doorway to whole new level of annoyance. He now acts out every single thought that passes through his brain instead of just spitting it out vocally.

<Look at me!>
<Guess what I am saying!>
<hands on hips>
<puckered lips>
<waving fingers>
<Look at me!!!!!>
<stand up>
<sit down>
<jump up>
<hands on head>
<Look at me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!>

All the houseguests agree that a silent Tim is even more annoying than a babbling Tim, and much more difficult to ignore.

A Refined Dinner Conversation
Miss Manners would be so proud…

Eric decides it would be fun if they all dressed up and went on “dinner dates.” They draw cards to see who is partnered with whom, then march into the dining room arm-in-arm. These are the couples:
Eric & Bonnie
Loana & Noel
Brent & Jamie
Tim & Nichole.

The men hold the ladies chairs, dishes are passed politely. So formal, so elegant.

Avocado decides to play a little game. “If you had your choice of dates,” he asks, “who would you pick and what would you do on your date?”

Brent goes first. “I would pick Loana and we would go on a picnic.”

Eric: “Jamie and I would go listen to some jazz.”

Nichole: “Bonnie! We would go to a spa and be pampered all day long!”

Tim is still being silent, but stands up, bows, and kisses Nichole on the cheek to indicate his choice and, I guess, what he would like to do on his date.

Which leaves Noel to be the cheese, since he stands alone and unchosen. However—not to be left out of the whole date scene—Noel describes his dream date. Himself. (***Note from the Swami: I am not making this up. Noel said every single word below. Unprompted. By himself.)

“Since nobody picked me, I will take myself on a date.

I would take myself to a park, and walk hand-in-hand with myself.

I would take myself to a movie. Buy a couple of cokes… and let one just sit there.

Then, back to my place, with a roaring fire, where I would massage myself.

Eventually, I would end up crying and masturbating in my closet. And in the morning I would awake and leave a note for myself. “Thank you for the good times. I’ll call you.”

So. Funny. A perfect, deadpan delivery. The Alts and the houseguests are convulsed with laughter and give him a round of applause.

The Elimination Deliberation

After dinner, the Alts hook up with Immunity winner Bonnie and head off for the stupid elimination deliberations. This is what they said:

<brak> <brak> <brak>

They take turns nodding profoundly, like a bunch of Bobblehead dolls bought off eBay.

<brak> <brak> <brak>

I’m sorry. It is just so stilted and boring I can’t possibly make fun of report it. Once they are done <brak>ing, Bonnie is asked to leave the room. My theory is that it is at this point that the real discussion and decisions happen on who to vote off, and whether or not to force a tie.

Out in the courtyard, the moon is still full and the clock strikes midnight as the Elite Eight sacrifices file in to await their fate. The Alts march in and take their thrones. Art is in charge this time. He gives the same old/same old/ necklace speech, whoever gets the greatest number of stupid necklaces placed upon their necks is voted out and must leave immediately. It there is a tie, immunity winner Bonnie will decide who goes. Necklaces will be for sale on eBay soon. Along with Bobblehead Alts.

They vote.

--Art gives his necklace to Brent, with no words.
--Don: “Hello, Brent. Let this necklace placed upon you signify an embrace. No hard feelings” Same thing he always says. For those who don’t speak vampire, I will translate (sort of): the embrace of a vampire = death & damnation. Don is just making fun of the idiots one last time!
--ta’shia. “Eric, may this necklace serve as a wake-up call for your need to redefine yourself.” Ta’Shia is into tough love and prefers to evict people she really likes, like Hamin. It’s a voodoo thing, I guess.
--Fiona. “Brent. What goes on in here is not just a game. It’s life.”
--Avocado “Brent. <brak> <brak> <brak>” (Sorry. It was long & not worth repeating.)

Bonnie cries and gives her buddy Brent a genuine hug. Loana gives him a hug too, and tries to cry. Damn! Where are those crocodile tears when you need them? She grimaces, she screws up her face and finally manages to squeeze out a tear or two.

Next Week on Mad Mad House

The houseguests are locked into steel cages.
Eric is caged and gagged.

Announcer: The House is Divided.
Tim and Eric are shown arguing.

Announcer: And the Alts fight back.
Fiona: “We have to wound them.

Announcer: Worlds Collide on Mad Mad House.

Also? PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) picket the Mad Mad House to protest the gratuitous use of goat guts, and ta’Shia is burned in effigy. Which somehow gives her more power.

Okay. I made up the PETA stuff.

Dook Sux