Previously on Andy Rooney Is So Five Minutes Ago: Kail and Mike were on the block, courtesy of the Eponymous D.I.C.K., and Nick and Daniele were making out under the covers, or at least talking about making out under the covers, which is just as good as actually doing it, if you are a censor. Everybody seemed to be after Mike for being a threat, which was a big surprise to those of us who saw him as pretty much a block of cheese, but America sent Subservient Eric to try to get Kail out of the house. He did his best, but there was nothing doing, and Mike went home 7-2. In being totally ineffectual at getting his way, Eric thus represented some of us very well. Dick tried to figure out who cast the votes against "him" (meaning against his wishes, for Kail to go), and he quite wrongly accused Jen. Then Dustin became the new HoH, and we all got another shot at living vicariously through Eric, which I bet you never thought you"d be doing after you saw that he resembled everyone"s little brother, ever, even after said little brothers are in their thirties.
That eye in the credits should be getting residuals.
We blue-and-white back to the vote that ousted Mike The Threatening Nonentity, and then Kail tells us that "prayer does work." It"s good that she found the right moment for spiritual enlightenment. In particular, she seems to think specifically that Dick was pounded by God, since he (Dick, not God) originally wanted Jen or Kail to be out. (God: "Seriously, even if I had nothing else to do and were spending My day sorting My CD collection, I certainly would not care about this, as even I have My limits.") Zach tells the camera that he was the other vote against Kail, which everyone seems to know, and Dick tells us that he"s just as happy having part of Kail"s alliance out as having Kail out.
As everyone hugs, Dick throws some particularly ugly shit at Kail, telling her how she shouldn"t think her reprieve means she has friends. Now, I don"t like Kail, but that kind of weird cruelty always strikes me as vaguely sociopathic, because people who need to say "you have no friends" to other people are not typically the ones having the biggest birthday parties themselves, if you know what I mean. Dick then attacks Jen for a while about how he"s so smart that he knows she voted against Kail. On the one hand, it"s unsettling because he"s being such a bastard, but on the other hand, it"s as satisfying as it always is when an idiot parades around lecturing us about how smart he is. (As long as he"s not part of the executive branch, because then, we"re back to "unsettling.") Elsewhere, everyone else is curious about the missing vote, too (they know about Zach from Nick, so it"s Eric they don"t know about). The more Nick questions who the other person is, the more Amber starts to think that the second vote was Nick himself. Before long, Amber is totally convinced it was Nick, and they"re all whispering to Eric about the big mystery and not realizing that he"s the one they"re looking for. "If it wasn"t Jen, it was Nick," Dustin declares. Jameka tells Daniele, when Daniele doubts that it was Nick, that her heart is telling her that it was, and that Daniele just can"t see it because she has this "relationship" with Nick. Of course, Daniele protests, because she just thinks it is so upsetting when people think she"s close to Nick, when all she does is talk under the covers about how much she wants to kiss him.
Dick continues to berate Jen about how he just knows she was the other vote against Kail -- which, of course, she was not. He"s proud of himself anyway, and he tells Amber and Daniele that he now knows that Nick "leaked" to Jen that Kail was not going. Why he cares about that, I am not sure.
We blue-and-white to Dustin"s HoH win, and he shows his celebratory side as he tells us it"s "flippin" fantastic." Amber bawls in the DR, OF COURSE, about how happy she was when Dustin won. She clarifies they were "happy tears," which you could tell if you knew about her fifty-six distinct ways of crying and what each of them means (I hear it took her friends years to know the difference between "happy tears" and "I just stubbed my toe" tears), and then she tells us how she and Dustin are the "strongest alliance in the house." For his part, Dustin tells us that Jen, Kail, Zach, and Nick are his targets. So it"s basically Kail and her alliance, plus Jen, just because. Kail DRs that she knows Dustin might still not be happy with her, but Jen says she doesn"t think Dustin will put her up, especially after she got rid of Joe The Gonorrhea Accuser for him and everything. Dustin and Amber celebrate some more, and they both agree that at home, "Joe is dying." Ha! I bet that"s true. I predict Joe"s TV already has holes in it from him throwing shoes. Dustin takes them all to his HoH room, which is still a prison cell, which I still don"t get. ("Your prize is...confinement!") Everyone looks at Dustin"s pictures of his "fam-fam," which...ew. My fam-fam would barf-barf if I ever referred to them that way. Kail says that his mom and dad apparently don"t worry about "his choices in life." And by "his choices in life," she means...well, you know. Boys. She can tell this about Dustin"s parents in the pictures, because they"re standing right next to him without wearing hazmat gear or anything. Props to them for being so loving! Although Kail seems to be expressing mostly shock, like, "They don"t even seem to be hiring deprogrammers, so...I guess people love their in all different ways."
Dustin cries and reads his letters from home. Apparently, Dustin"s brother is glad that this show is here to show off Dustin"s awesomeness. And then Dustin bawls and bawls -- like, a lot -- about how he misses his brother. It starts out touching, and then it gets really embarrassing. This show would be a lot better with 80 percent less Very Moved Crying and 80 percent more Infuriated And Vengeful Crying.
Dick gives a big lecture about how people with dogs shouldn"t call their dogs "baby," which he is doing as a roundabout way of explaining how his life is naturally richer and more meaningful than yours because he has kids and you don"t -- a phenomenon with which all people without children are familiar. He looks to Amber for support, like, "You"re a mom; you feel me, right?" But Amber protests, saying she loves both her dog and her daughter, and in fact, she says that she considers them both to be her kids. I admit, Dick was being a dick here, but Amber"s explanation of equating her child and her dog sounds a bit weird to me. "I love my dog just as much as I love my daughter" is...I mean, you can"t really quantify, you know? Loving a pet is loving a pet and loving a child is loving a child, but I will freely admit that if you told me you would not know what to do if the building were burning and you could save only the child or the dog, I would wonder about you. I don"t think this is what Amber is saying at all -- I think she resents being used as part of Dick"s lecture, and I think she"s just one of those people who loves her pet and really resents the "it"s just a dog" attitude that Dick is espousing. Dick tries to make it into whom you would die for, but Amber counters that by saying that she would die for her dog in addition to her daughter. I think he backed her into a pretty idiotic position there, because I don"t think she started out to make it like this, like she would die for her dog. I mean, maybe she would, and I"m not saying that would be wrong, but I think he just bullied her to a point where she didn"t feel like she could give an inch. Dick seems to think this is all going to make him look cool, but it"s actually making him look like an obnoxious bully, especially when he basically tells her that if she doesn"t like it, the answer is to bully him back. But Amber claims she"s "over it." (Clearly.) Dustin tries to tell Amber that Dick is just pushing her buttons, and she says "it"s because he tries," which is...exactly Dustin"s point.
After commercials, we come back to a very brief segment on what Dick calls "the Dick At Night Show," wherein Dick apparently walks around playing pranks on people after everyone is in bed. In fact, in the morning, Daniele sprays herself with the faucet because he"s rigged it, and she doesn"t think it"s all that hilarious. No, really. That"s the entire segment. I don"t know either.
We then watch as Zach talks about going to a comic book convention where there were naked girls covered with eggs, and...I think I might have been hit with a tranquilizer dart and hallucinated this part. I seem to experience Zach offering this big explanation of watching guys beat women with flaming whips, and...the point of this, it turns out, is that nobody likes Zach. Which is dumb, but better than if there were going to be a story point based on the actual content of the story he was telling, which seemed impossible. Dustin compares Zach to Eeyore in a pretty funny moment, sound-effects-wise. Dustin does tell us that getting away from Zach is fairly difficult. We watch, for instance, as he gradually drives everyone out of the teacup except Daniele, who comes right out and tells him she doesn"t want him to visit her after the show. She tells us that she"d rather eat slop for a month than talk to him for an hour. So, wait. She likes Zach, or she doesn"t like Zach?
Later, Dick DRs that the entire week has been very hard for him, and we blue-and-white to him fighting with Daniele and her crying and him being obnoxious and throwing things. Good times. He tells us that he went to talk to her and try to "take the high road," but it turns out that Daniele wasn"t particularly impressed, since he never listens to her anyway. When he tells her he wants her to be as nice to him as she is to the other people in the house, she bursts into tears and explains that they"re all nicer to her than he is, and she wants to leave. Dick"s brilliant response is to try to one-up his own crying child by insisting that he"s cried more than she has since they"ve been in the house. Way to go, "Dad." He claims that he doesn"t want to lose touch with her again, but he can"t explain it in any other way than how it affects him -- it"s so hard for him, she has no idea, et cetera. She tells him that he"s said horrible things to her, but he counters that she"s been mean, too, which is how you know that he"s in no position to be her dad, because that"s not how dads act. He doesn"t have any generosity toward her, you know? I"m not saying parents shouldn"t expect respect from their kids, but he doesn"t seem to have any ability to just put aside his own interests and really try to make her feel better. She tells him that he"s less like her dad and more like "a mean friend," which on the one hand is hilariously dumb-sounding, but on the other hand, I think I know what she means, and it"s very sad. She"s talking about how he"s like that "friend" who you feel stuck with even though they shit-talk you all the time and you don"t know why you stay around. Dick apologizes, kind of, but it"s all about insisting that he"s a good person, and you can just tell that he"s in this discussion to hear her forgive him, and ultimately to get something for himself, and not to make her feel better, which is sad. This is why he actually is a bad dad, at least right now, and which is not to excuse Daniele"s behavior at all. But all Dick"s tearful swearing that he loves her and would never abandon her just doesn"t make up for the fact that he doesn"t really care how all of this is making her feel. He cares how it"s making him feel, which means that in a sense, he actually loves her less than I love my dog, because I always at least have some concern for how he feels.
When we come back, it"s time for the most surprising story of the week: Eric and Jessica. No, really. Hey, Eric! We did not tell you to do that! But they practice a little dancing and flipping in which he spins her around, and they both admit that they feel close to each other, and I still cannot believe that"s her real voice. And...scene!
Dustin, dressed in a silly royal outfit, rounds everyone up for the food competition called the "Humpty Scramble." Oh, yes. They all pair up -- Daniele and Nick, Eric and Zach, Dick and Kail, Jessica and Jameka, and Amber and Jen. The food competition turns out to require each pair to dig out a bunch of jigsaw puzzle pieces and assemble them into a big Humpty Dumpty. First team to put together their egg is guaranteed no slop. At first, Dick and Kail are rolling, then Jessica and Jameka are coming on, as are Daniele and Nick. The big winners in the end are Jessica and Jameka indeed, so they are guaranteed real food for the week. Jameka says she was just proud of them for winning. Dustin announces that they have to put five people on slop for the rest of the week. This is an ugly task. Dick is the only one who hasn"t been on slop, so he"s first. Their second choice is Zach, though they fake out Eric first. Jessica admits that this was just because Jameka doesn"t like Zach, heh. Next up is Kail, whom...again, they don"t like. Then Nick, because Jessica says he"s a threat in competitions. And finally, they choose Jen, who tells us she"s happy to be on slop, and this will keep her from eating too much. I have to say, she"s weirdly growing on me.
After the commercials, it"s time for Dick and Jen to sit around and not like each other. He taunts her about whether she"s had a boob job, and she handles him like a champ, totally unfazed and bored with his antics. He"s really not getting to her, which I personally love. It"s fairly obvious that he"s not used to dealing with people who are smarter than he is, which doesn"t speak very well to the company he keeps.
Kail tries to get Dustin to put up Dick and Zach with an eye at having Dick booted, but Dustin tells her that "the house" is hot to have the Kail/Zach/Nick alliance knocked down again. Kail takes a risk and volunteers to go up as the famous "pawn" of legend if Dustin can guarantee she won"t go home. Dustin tells us that what with her being "weak, feeble, desperate, and annoying," it"s not like he was shocked to be approached by her. There"s not a lot of content in that speech, but the ability to come up with "weak, feeble, desperate, and annoying" in an instant does earn him some respect from me. "Feeble" is a good word. Especially in this context.
Jen is next to visit Dustin, and he asks her opinion of Kail. She tells him that it wasn"t her who voted to evict Kail, but Dustin isn"t sure he believes her. Jen throws out Daniele and Dick as threats, but Dustin asks her about Zach. She says that Zach would go home if it were him and anybody else. It"s hard to read this discussion, because I"m not sure what they actually think of each other, except that I have to think she"s right that she has to have at least a tiny amount of a point with him for getting rid of Joe.
And now, your player and mine...Eric! He opens his instructions, which tell him to get Jen nominated. Eric thinks that"s a great idea, and he"s "more than pleased" to have her as a target. Yeah, you did a great job last time, loser. Dustin talks to everyone, suggesting Zach and Kail as one option. Another would be Jen and Kail. Jameka favors Zach/Kail, while Dick wants Nick/Kail. Eric says that while Jen isn"t going home this week, they should put her up for being the other vote against Kail. Heh. Dustin tells us that he needs to get Kail or Jen, and then Nick or Zach, out of the house.
The new America"s Player thing asks us whether Eric should try to introduce as a catch phrase, "Sweet Chicken!", "Booyakah!", or "I"d Do That For A Dollar." Okay, this just got awesome. Dance, puppets, dance! At the beginning, I thought that the charm of this was supposed to be that we would control the game, but that"s clearly not what it is. The charm is making somebody do things that the other houseguests react to as if they"re genuine, which makes the other houseguests look stupid. And I am always, always in favor of that.
When we"re back from the final commercials, Dustin is contemplating his nominations, while others are contemplating their chances of going up. Jen doesn"t think she"ll go up. Zach doesn"t think he will, either. Kail is afraid that she will, but she hopes that she"s only a pawn. Dustin ponders the keys and the box and the box and the keys and I hate this part and I am so happy we only weecap this show now. Nick thinks he"s safe, and his stupid porn "stache is comfortable along with him.
At the nomination ceremony, Dusting brings out the box. He says that he based everything on "competitiveness and strategy." I don"t even know what that means. Amber is the first to get her key. Then Jessica, Dick, Jameka, Nick, Zach, Daniele, and Eric. So that means Jen and Kail are up. He tells Jen she"s a strong competitor, and he tells Kail that her behavior has been "questionable," whatever that means. Kail says she"s feeling "really worried," even though she offered to go up. She"s just going to trust Dustin, which is too bad, since he says that he really wants to send Kail home and believes that will happen. Jen says she"s hurt to be put up, which is interesting and appears to be an actual reaction.
Next time: Can Eric make the house start saying "Sweet Chicken"? (If it"s not "Sweet Chicken," I will be so mad.) Will someone win/use the veto? I don"t think we know. We will have to see. All of us together, we will see.