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Another week of Survivor, and another entry from me. I'll link to - and read - Nick's commentary later. No dreams about it last night, nobody cleaning the steps in a jungle, and no large black men. In fact, having just said that, Survivor is an entirely white game now: Daniel is gone, Religious Bitch is gone. Of course, there were only those two to start, but still… Let's review what happened this week.

The show started with Alex nearly losing an eye. As he's chopping wood, he puts one hand on each side of a log and pushes down to try to break it… with the machete in one of his hands. The log breaks, one hand goes down quickly and the other - the one with the machete in it - remains up. His body goes down of course as well, the machete recoils upwards, and bammo! Slice just above the eye. Says Matthew, "I am surprised that an injury like this hasn't happened earlier. No one here is really that experienced working with a machete." I guess nobody there is really experienced with common sense either.

After nearly becoming the 11-eyed tribe, the men fetch their tree mail - the youngest members of the tribe were sent off to meet up. Dave and Jenna each paddled out to meet Jeff, who told them that they were the youngest because tradition affords opportunity to the young. Whether or not Dave "seized" his "opportunities" with Jenna will perhaps forever remain a mystery.

Dave and Jenna talked. I was reminded of the old joke about the fastest ways to spread news. Telephone, television, tell a woman. Jenna absolutely spilled her guts. "Heidi is this, Jeanne is next to go, blah blah blah." Dave wisely noted that he was gathering a good amount of intel, noting that "You have to think to yourself, do you really want to be revealing this much about your tribe?", and when his turn to share came, he said "Butch is 57, and from Somewhere, USA" and so on. In other words - at least as far as we know from what was shown - Dave far outsmarted Jenna in gathering information about the other tribe.

What's most interesting to me as this series gets older is this: you never see people on Survivor talking about previous Survivors. Deena said "you don't want to be the leader, cuz they get voted out" once, referring to previous Survivors, but that's been about it. Here's the key tie-in: in every previous Survivor, when two members of the tribe have met up, something big has happened. Did Jenna and Dave watch a single season of this show? How could they not treat what they were doing as something that was likely to be huge?

After a good night's sleep and another breakfast, Jeff dropped the bomb: the two younger members were going to pick new tribes, alternating man, woman, man choices so that each tribe would have three members of each sex. LAME! I did not want this to happen. The dynamics of an all-male tribe and an all-woman tribe were interesting. To chuck that - the whole billing of the show, in fact - to the piranhas has spoiled this season a bit for me. Oh well. Let's see how it plays out.

Dave and Jenna pick new members - Dave choosing the older guys and Heidi, Christy, and Jeanne (NOCAST Bitch, Deaf Bitch, and Provider Bitch), Heidi quite obviously taking the rest. 🙂 Dave and Jenna return to their tribes to deliver the news, and it is at this moment that we see Dave absolutely fucking up. He learned a lot about all the women from Jenna's babbling, yet he starts his speech by saying "We had to pick new tribes, and I picked Butch and Roger." He didn't say that they were forced to alternate choices between the genders - he should have. Men are egotistical and "I didn't pick you" is a slap in the face. As Rob said, "Dave said, 'let me tell you guys that I stayed completely true to us and took advantage of Jenna. Oh, by the way, Rob, Alex and Matthew, you are going to Jenna's camp to live with them.'"

However, it's what Dave doesn't do next that's most incredibly appalling: Dave does not share his knowledge with his fellow tribemembers. He does not put forth the idea of remaining united as men, and looking at this cross-tribe pollination as a method of more quickly disposing of women through infiltration. Nooooooooooooooooo, sir! Dave is a rocket scientist? I think after this show his employer is going to have second doubts. Perhaps he's a model rocket scientist, but that longer title wouldn't fit on his application.

The women - it didn't surprise me that they didn't attempt to formulate a plan for their infiltration. They seemed a bit more divided than the men, and Jenna was losing her fellow cute girl Heidi (who ain't cute, and is actually quite scary looking). Awwwwwww, too bad.

At any rate, the two tribes flip flop a little and I'm surprised not to hear an "oh my God, look at your shelter!" type of comment from the women going to Tambaqui or an "oh my God, look at your shelter!" type of comment from the men going to Jaburu. Christy immediately reveals that she is deaf - if the men were smart they'd use this against her. They can string her along, using her vote, playing into Deaf Bitch's "give me sympathy" need, and then strategize behind her back. She is deaf, after all, and this is a game for a million dollars.

As for the women's reception to the invading guys, says Deena "It's amazing what a little bit of testosterone can do for somebody. Boys come into the camp and Shawna is one hundred-eighty degrees better." Funny how that works. The three middle-aged men (Rob, Alex, and Matthew) are now in a camp with Jenna and Heidi, the two hottest gals (though we're on a relative scale here, of course). Frizzy Bitch is excited and renewed. Lame, Shawna. Lame.

The challenge was easily the most uninteresting event of the evening. Jaburu took an early lead and then held on at the end. Dave - Model Rocket Scientist Boy - seemingly has no idea how to steer a boat, weakly paddling sideways in an attempt to steer. Uh, Dave… you're the recipient of this week's clue bat beating (or so I thought).

The tribes return to camp and the men of Tambaqui decide to vote off Jeanne. The women keep Dave around for reasons I forget, and draw straws to vote either Roger or Butch off. Butch loses, and we're set for the first tie we've seen on Survivor in quite some time. But… before Tribal Council, Dave successfully bends Heidi to his will, swinging her vote to their side.

Heidi, you're this week's winner of the Clue Bat Beating™! You even said it yourself, "so if we lose two more then I'm next." Stop and think girl. Rather, let me do it for you now: if you vote with the women, there's a 50/50 chance you'll be in the top three of your tribe (with Jeanne and Christy) and at worst, your number four. If you vote with the guys, you're at the top of a group of three… but it's the bottom three, and you're guaranteed to be number four. The smart play is to stick with the women and then get rid of the guys. At the merge, you'd simply hope that Jenna and Shawna had played the same cards, and the few remaining guys could be disposed of your "we can walk around topless" routine.

Incidentally, I saw no topless babes, meaning all that crap before was just a bunch of hooey. Go figure.

At Tribal Council, people lie through their teeth but try to look good. Christy says the word "disability" again - how many times is she going to blatantly remind the tribemembers that they have a leg up on her? When asked whether Heidi was voting for old alliances or strength, she answers "Uhhh, well, yah." For that, you deserve another Clue Bat Beating™.

One more thing: the last vote cast for Jeanne was spelled "Gene" - clearly a guy's way to spell that name. Dave, Daria, Gabe, and I wondered who'd done that. Guess who? It was NOCAST Bitch! For misspelling your tribe member's name so horribly, Heidi, three times is a charm: BAM BAM BAM goes the Clue Bat on your ugly little head.

Next week on Survivor…

Shocked by Jeanne's departure, Christy seeks answers from the tribe as to why they spared her.

Sadly, Christy, that's absolutely the wrong way to play that game, because "why did you keep me?" might result in the guys saying "hmmm, y'know, we don't know… you're next!"

Alex and Shawna's budding relationship grows to new levels, but Matthew's interest in her develops as well, as he makes a play for Shawna's affection.

Survivor is not a dating show! These men are fucking pathetic. So is Shawna. There's a game going on around them, and are these little "feelings" getting involved emotionally is not the way to play. Brian last year showed that, and every other winner has as well. Even the curly haired guy from a few years ago, the nice Jewish soccer player. Uhhh, Evan? No, that's Joe Millionaire. Uhhhh, whatever. Ethan, that's it.

Dave's strategy takes a tailspin when he learns Butch & Roger have their own ideas about who should stay and who should go.

Not surprising. Model Rocket Scientist Boy hasn't exactly been playing the game. He even made a comment last week like "here I am hanging out with some guys, but I just remembered there's a game being played!" Uhh, yeah.

One Survivor's performance at a Reward Challenge has an enormous impact on a tribemate, who calls it the "defining moment" of their life.

Yeah, whatever. Guess we'll just have to wait and see.

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