Monday evening marked the end of my ill-fated journey into Real Housewives of New Jersey recapping — an effort destined to leave my life in ruins, as what was once a promising career and home life was left shredded and demolished by a months-long fugue in which I could talk, think, dream and breathe about nothing but PROSTITUTIONWHORE! and her famewhoretastic companions. And while (apparently) going back in time so that I can undo this damage is not an option… I am (apparently) still able to reflect back on the months that were, contemplate what I – and, by extension, all of us – have learned, and try to figure out how we can apply this knowledge to ensure that I never commit to recapping this freaking show again we all live together in the love and light.
1. What Is A PuffyChucky?
(sigh)
Okay. I’m realizing that I just spent several months of my life writing about a woman… and for virtually all of it, I referred to her by the name she gave to her… uh… womanly… uh… region… area… place… as she described it during the late stages of preparing-to-deliver-another-baby-to-festoon-with-giant-bows-and-leopard-skin-clothing. Somewhere in a small liberal arts college in New England, an entire English department weeps at the four years they wasted on me.
Btw: PuffyChucky? Hereby officially confirmed as the Season 2 MVP.
MVP! MVP! MVP! MVP!
2. It’s Entirely Possible That Someone Named PROSTITUTIONWHORE! Is Not, In Fact, The Worst Person In The World.
This was the real revelation of Season 2, because while Season 1 had primed us to expect nothing but drama and evil and insanity from our favorite PROSTITUTIONWHORE!… this past year made it clear that as despicable as she can be, she’s not even the worst person on the show (never mind the world at large). Not one but two (2) different woman (::pours one out for the PROSTITUTIONWHORE’s grammatical skillz::) rose to the challenge and established themselves firmly as legitimately terrible people capable of making Danielle Staub look good by comparison: Cryptkeeper Kim G and – the dark horse and winner of this season’s RHONJ Bitch of the Year Award – Horrible Nightmare Daughter Ashley!
Please join me in congratulating Ashley for coming out of nowhere to claim this esteemed title, as she arose from the wings (she was more of an annoyance in Season 1 than anything else) to spend most of Season 2 embroiled in a violent (the smoking weave!) catfight with PW and – by extension – with her mother and family, who she embarrassed thoroughly by virtue of her astonishing immaturity, selfishness, stupidity and rank spoiled nature. Speaking as a parent (and for the record): if either of my two girls grows up to be like HND Ashley? Please crack me in the head with a clawhammer — both because I will deserve it and because getting cracked in the head with a clawhammer is clearly preferable to dealing with the reality of life with somebody like Ashley.
3. That Being Said… PROSTITUTIONWHORE! Still Kind Of Sucks
It’s funny, but after a full season of being exposed to the incredible awfulness of Kim G and HND Ashley – plus two loooooooooooooong reunion episodes in which consisted of little but attacks (some borderline physical) on PW – she became almost (kinda sorta almost) a little bit sympathetic. And then, during the second reunion episode, someone commented and reminded me of the beginning of Season 2, when Sharon Osbourne was having some kind of get-together at her house and PW basically went insane with jealousy at not being invited, loading her kids into her white Range Rover and driving in circles around the Osbourne compound while PW’s (impossibly bright and capable) daughters basically talked her off the ledge of what could have quite possibly have evolved into some kind of twisted OJ scenario. At which point, I went: oh, right. She IS a total nut job (my guess: borderline personality disorder) fully capable of doing something as downright awful as, say, showing up at a benefit for a kid with cancer and causing an unforgivably massive scene in which she (and her dread crew) (sorry: different dread crew) dropped boatloads of f-bombs and threats of throwdown/beatdowns, thereby almost wrecking the whole thing.
4. Reality TV Casting Decisions Are Kind of Confusing
Having said all that, there’s no doubt that PROSTITUTIONWHORE! is the little engine that could and can and did run the most compelling plotlines of RHONJ Season 2… which makes Bravo’s decision to can her (STILL NOT EXPLAINED!) that much more baffling. Why Bravo? Why? Why must you take our PROSTITUTIONWHORE away? There’s a story there somewhere, and I – for one – am dying to hear the inside scoop.
5. There Are Some Things You Just Can’t Un-See
Five words: Kim G on the pole.
Not shown: Kim G on the pole. Because
then you’d have to claw your eyes out.
6. Ex-Cons May Experience Some Difficulty Re-Integrating Into Mainstream Society
Granted, it may be a bit easier in New Jersey than in some other parts of the country (::cue Sopranos flashbacks::), but watching the struggles of erstwhile PROSTITUTIONWHORE! pal Richie Shankbora trying to find his place out in the world – without, y’know, breaking parole by wigging out and assaulting someone – taught us all a valuable lesson in… something. I don’t know. But I am curious: I have a pretty thorough understanding of the parole system based on the fact that I’ve watched a lot of Law & Order, and they always talk about how one of the tenets of parole is that you – as a parolee – are not allowed to hang out with other criminal types. Given which: why wasn’t it a problem for Richie Shankbora to spend so much time with ex-con Beverly Merrill Danielle Staub? Isn’t that some kind of a violation?
7. Traveling With Friends Isn’t Always A Good Idea
Witness: the long and horrifying “Hey! Let’s pretend this isn’t Bravo’s idea and go take an impromptu vacation to Italy with our families!” trip to the old country by Mom, Sharon Osbourne, and the PuffyChucky squad. It’s entirely apparent that these three families are very close as a (dys)function of day-to-day life in north Jersey, but take them – and (some of) their children, plus multiple sets of elderly grandparents – and transport them en masse through several airports, across the canals of Venice, onto a huge luxury liner (where our prayers that the entire PuffyChucky family – kids and all – will be eaten by the giant killer sea worms from Deep Rising will go sadly unanswered) and then into buses and across the greater-Naples-metro-area and into the ancient, hillside streets and homes of their forefathers… and you see not only multiple examples of why Americans have such a terrible reputation overseas, but a case study in how minor character flaws and annoying traits can become “Things That Make Me Want To Kill You” over the course of many lengthy, up-close-and-personal days together. (All fingers here are pointing directly at PuffyChucky, Kong and their hideous cadre of demonic offspring, btw. YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE.)
8. Your Friends Might Believe You, But The Authorities Will Probably Have Another Opinion
Ah, Kong. You gigantic, DUI-convicted, bankruptcy-declaring homunculus. How long until you end up in the pokey? And will Richie Shankbora’s little friends be waiting for you there? This is one of the big things I’m dying to see resolved in Season 3 (wait… did I just say that?), because claims along the lines of “We live in a $10M mansion with marble-and-onyx floors despite the fact we make only $69k/year” and “I was totally sober when I flipped the truck six times, but then I had a couple of quick shots of whiskey at my friend’s house to calm my nerves, and that’s the only reason the cops thought I was drinking” are somewhat less than ducks-ass watertight. On the plus side: conjugal visits!
9. If A Captain Zentastic Falls In The Forest, Does Anybody Hear It?
When you start out the season as one of the titular (heh) real housewives, you probably don’t expect that you’ll end up a somewhat forgotten minor character along the lines of Sharon Osbourne’s dull (for TV) offspring and the other/”I own a shop full of upscale whore couture” Kim… but that’s exactly what happened to Dina – aka Captain Zentastic, aka the woman who lives surrounded by hairless cats (shudder) – this season. And while her quasi-spiritual/new-agey crap lived on in PROSTITUTIONWHORE’s ongoing meetings with her energist (I’m not sure if that’s spelled correctly, but I’m pretty damned sure it doesn’t matter) and chants of “Amazing things… amazing things… amazing things happen…” ultimately it became surprisingly easy to forget that as the season began, Kim G was not the (de facto) fifth housewife. Ah, well. As Shakespeare once said: Famewhore Reality TV is a fickle mistress.
10. Shank vs. Shiv
Shank is the verb; shiv is the noun. Example: Paulie sharpened a toothbrush into a shiv, and then he shanked that fuckin’ snitch Johnny Two-Times in the yard.
I think we all learned a little something here, really.
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