Guess what they call me here?

Wow. Last night's show had so much amazingness, I don't know where to start.... This will be a long one. Grab a coffee.

I guess you have to start with Debbie giving up on Coach. She finally had enough of his... well... everything, and she decided it was time to jump ship. Now most of us who actually watch the show know that giving up on your day-1 alliance at this late stage in the game is a BAD idea. Not Debbie. Well, that's not entirely true. I think she knew it was a bad idea, but she knew she'd backed the wrong horse. The lightbulb went off & she realized that JT & Stephen are the ones to be allied with, not Coach. (Say it with me... Duh!) Begging the question... why isn't anyone even considering voting off JT or Stephen? More on that later...

So now to the fun parts. The Survivor Auction. Here I need to digress for a moment. When did Survivor get so cushy? I mean, I realize they live outside and there are bugs and roaring animals and rain and not much to eat. BUT... almost every reward comes with food and the auction is all french fries and deliciousness. (Except for Stephen's chicken hearts... which probably weren't that bad.) Remember when a staple of the show was the eating contest where they had to eat all the crazy zebra intestines (or the like) before the other guy? Now that was fun! That was surviving. Now it's like, oh we get sandwiches. Oh, we get fries... Yawn...

Anyways, the other part of Survivor we love (well, I love it) is the visit from home. Everyone at the auction gave Taj their money so that she could "buy" a video from her loved ones. Apparently Taj left a little baby at home and is having a harder time than the rest... Nice, right? Turns out Taj's husband is back at camp! She loses it. Then Jeff says if she's willing to go to Exile (with her hubby), everyone can have a visit back at camp. Nice, right? So, there were some lovely moments b/tw Taj & her husband, Erinn & her dad, Stephen & his brother, Debbie & her husband... And that brings me to the other 2. First, JT. His visit is from his younger sister.... who didn't seem quite right. Maybe it was just the crazy alligator teeth that threw me off, but ummm... whaaaaa? And she's just as unintelligible as JT, which was cute. (Cue banjos)

Then... there was Coach. He gets a visit from some dude, who you assume is probably his brother, right? Maybe a best friend? Nope. Coach's visitor is...

HIS ASSISTANT COACH!!!!!

First let's discuss that it's a bit sad that Coach doesn't have any family or close friends who either can or want to visit him. Let's assume he has no family and that Asst. Coach dude IS his best buddy. So... if it were you, wouldn't you say, "Yay, I'm so excited that my best friend could come to Brazil..."? Right? Nope. Not if you're Coach. He says, "I am SO excited. Of all the people in the world, I get to see my ASSISTANT COACH!" Then.... they do stretches together & dude cracks Coach's back. (Which, btw, Coach reassures us is NOT sexual in any way. Uh, thanks.) Oh, and the other great part was where he excitedly tells Asst. Coach, "Guess what they call me here? DRAGONSLAYER!!!"

He just keeps on giving.

The immunity challenge was an obstacle course, where you assume (I do) that JT will win. Thing is, at the end of the course, you have to memorize a series of math symbols, then go back and put them in the right order onto your board. So most people run out/over/under/across and get the first few symbols, then have to go back to get the rest. Stephen gets out there (barely... has balance issues) but memorizes the entire sequence by assigning them numbers and then remembering the numbers (e.g., plus is a one, divide is a two, etc.) So he wins! Brilliant! Was also nice to see how genuinely happy he was to win something.

So we know Stephen, JT and Taj are safe. There's a cool moment before Tribal Council where Stpehen & JT are talking about how crazy it is that no one wants to vote for them, even though everyone is pretty sure they are in control of the game. Coach wants to vote for Taj, citing the immunity idol (and he's probably right) but everyone is annoyed with the Dragonslayer and it looks like he may go home. But then Debbie pushes it. She works it harder than Victoria Beckham on a red carpet....She goes to Stephen & JT and tells them that she wants to be in the final 3 with them and is happy with third. WHAT? Why are you on this show, lady? She told them if she won immunity she'd give it to them. WHAT? Honestly, why bother playing at all? I know she's scrambling at this point, and trying to offer them something better than Taj, but thing is... what Taj offers is loyalty. Debbie dumps her day-1 alliance on day 32 or whatever, and shows that she's willing to do anything to win, right? So then why say third is ok? Ugh.

At Tribal Council, it's a Coach Roast. The jury comes in all wearing feather earrings and carrying their jackets over their shoulders a la dragonslayer. Snort. In the end, Debbie votes for Coach, Coach votes for Taj, and everyone else votes for Debbie.

Do you love how Coach still thinks he's in control of the game, even though he hasn't been in on the decisions lately at all? And - the vote for Debbie was brilliant - Coach won't question the others as soon as they tell him that Debbie had turned against him. He'll crush on JT even harder.

Next week, Coach is heard to say, "Hit me with your best shot, Pat Benatar!"

Sigh... it's pure gold.