TAR, Season 9, Episode 1

Looks promising, with the glaring exception that producers elected not to include myself and Will in the cast (from here on out we will be known as Team Trailer Trash* [3T for short]). I’m going to attempt to do my own version of a recap of the show each week. Don’t plan on me recapping the episode event by event, like TWOP does. But rather, I’ll just comment on how, if 3T was on the show, which choices we would have made on the detours/roadblocks, and commentary on my love/hate for any or all teams (and Phil) on the show.

If Team Trailer Trash were on the show
Yay, DENVER and what’s more RED ROCKS!!! Wooooo! Needless to say, 3T would have rocked this initial part of the show, as I’m very familiar with the area and the airport. We would have avoided at all costs taking the Continental flight, because I hate Continental.

Brazil! Now, if 3T would have made the show, we would have invested in some Spanish lessons. So, please play along and pretend that we speak Spanish, which should help a tiny bit, even though Brazil’s language is Portuguese. (In hindsight, 4 yrs of latin in high school wasn’t the most practical idea. But my main reasons for taking it were a)it looked good on transcripts b)the teacher was cool and the class was a cakewalk b/c of her and c)the retreat every spring to Estes Park where I would ditch most of the scheduled activities and go hiking with hot mountain boys from other schools. Now though, latin doesn’t do me a whole hell of a lot of good.)

Roadblock: re-build a motorcycle or ride a helicopter to some building (or as I call it – “chopper or chopper?” Will didn’t think this was all that clever….). Now, at this point in the show, we pause it, and discuss the merits of each task and figure out which one we would chose. Now, being that we are both engineers and Will is somewhat of an engine repair enthusiast, we decided to choose the motorcycle option. However, after seeing how cool the helicopter ride was, I know I would regret that decision…. But I would hope that we’d perform better than the other teams in rebuilding the motorcycle.

General commentary on each team
Lake & Michelle – well, lets just say that this is one dental practitioner I would never visit. Could you imagine, sitting in the chair as Michelle works on you, and Lake yelling all the time? And you just having to sit there with your mouth open, feeling very uncomfortable?

Dani & Danielle – really don’t have much of an opinion on these 2. They lost major points with their matching pink outfits, although they seemed to accept the fact that getting dirty was a component of the motorcycle detour. They did win points by thinking the Frat Boys were tools, though, so there is hope for them.

BY & Tyler – first thing out of Will’s mouth (Cartman Voice) “Goddamn Hippies” (from the South Park “Die Hippy, Die” episode [we have this permanently saved on our TiVo, its that funny]). Apart from the hippyness, they did make me laugh a few times and generally have their game on.

Ray & Yolanda – no real opinion here about these two. I suspect they will be headed for dating-disaster by the end of the show though, as they are the typecast “long distance dating” couple. I was impressed by the restraint Ray showed for not beating the hell out of the guys commenting on Yolanda’s mechanical prowess.

John & Scott – the typecast gay guys, although supposedly they are “life long friends” friends, rather than a couple. Sadly, they didn’t have the chops to stick around. I did find them mildly amusing and I would have rather preferred the Houston Frosties to be Philiminated instead.

Dave & Lori – ok, say it with me now! Neeerrrrddds! Until reading their bio on CBS, I loved them. Perhaps I should have ignored the bio just now. Musician and Pizza Hut asst mgr? Oh good lord. But I guess there aren’t too many opportunities for high falutin’ jobs in Manhattan….Kansas. Anyways, last night, they were my top team in terms of like-ability. Just love that nerd love.

Eric & Jeremy – annnnd here are the “pretty boys” typecast team. But really, they’re not all that pretty. Or really all that fun to listen to. And they have nipple rings. Enough said.

Fran & Barry – ok, on the show last night, they were listed as being from Littleton, CO (woo! Go Littleton!), but the CBS bio says they’re from Silverthorne…… Hmmm. Anyways, based on the Littleton connection, I loved them right away (and no, I did not know them). But then the roadblock on the bridge lost major points….. Please perform better so I can like you again. K?

Lisa & Joni – wow, reality tv producers sure know how to pick winners from Houston, don’t they? Ok, so Joyce and Uchenna were great. But lets see…. The girls from the Bachelor, Brandy (with her red weave fro’), that Cat woman chickie, and Cassandra from America’s Next Top Model were all equally horrible. And this made me think, if 3T did make it on the show, I guess we’d be “from Houston” which I am just not prepared to actually have “Erin” and “from Houston” in the same sentence. So, based on this alone, I suppose its good 3T was not selected for the cast. Anyways, Lisa and Joni…. Yeah, don’t like them. One bit. The yelling, the spazzing, the Jesus prayers, the makeup. All horrible. Wish they’d been Philimated instead of John & Scott.

Team MoJo – ok, they’re growing on me. I for one like the t-shirts. I thought they were cute. Mo did lose points by crying in the lobby of DIA over not catching the first flight, though. But overall, they’re not too annoying so far.

Wanda & Desiree – at first, I found them annoying. But they really played well, mainly due to Wanda’s knowledge of Portuguese. To date, I feel pretty neutral about them.

“Baby” count. Will and I refer to TAR as the “baby, how bout we watch that ‘baby show’ baby?” Because it seems that there is no other term of endearment allowed on the show. And sure enough, as they left the parking lot of Red Rocks, I heard my first “baby”. Although, later on, I did hear a “sweetie”, and it was nice to hear something else for a change. Will claims if 3T was on, he’d be dropping the nicknames of “muffin” or “pumpkin” on me. And I told him that if he were to do that, I would basically ignore him the entire team and hit on some of the hottie single guys in the race instead.

Overally, TAR 9 shows significant improvement over the suckfest that was the family edition. I look forward to seeing how this season progresses.

*Long story from college. Will's nickname was "Third Wheel (Will) Trailer", given to him by his advisor - how nice of him! He soon became known as "trailer", which then went screaming downhill into "Trailer Trash".