Matt nominated Rachel and Brendon this week, and Ragan busts out a "Hallelujah" in the Diary Room over the news. Brendon DRs that it was a stupid move (by which he means one he doesn't agree with), and Matt is going to need to look out for whichever one of them stays. I'm sure Matt is terrified. And Rachel is tearfully wondering how she became the bad guy with all the men in the house. And whose fault is it that all those women got picked off, Rachel? After the nominations, Brendon tries to cheer Rachel up in the bedroom, but nothing's going to improve their mood like going out to the kitchen and acting pissy to everyone. Kathy is sitting with Hayden, Matt and Ragan, which sends Rachel into an angry salad-chopping frenzy. Britney offers to talk her down, still playing the fake ally, while the rest of the house assures each other that the one who stays won't be much of a threat week.
Brendon and Rachel feel bad for themselves in a bedroom, and Brendon offers to win the Power of Veto and use it on her. There's a clip in the DR of Rachel whining in the DR, and Brendon promises to protect her, because that's what knights do. I'm going to go throw up now.
There's a mini-bowling alley in the backyard, presumably to let them practice for the PoV competition. The houseguests take turns doing some practice bowling. Except for Rachel, who stomps off to cry when Ragan offers her a turn. Brendon tries to go buck her up, but she's so entrenched in victim mode that she tells both him and the DR that she can't "give any more." Brendon threatens to pick her up and drag her out there, but ultimately she goes out and starts killing it with the practice bowls. The two of them are still out there practicing until after 4:00 AM, when everybody else has gone to bed. It's very Rocky. I just hope the PoV competition is at seven the morning and they're too exhausted to play.
Matt calls the houseguests together to pick the players, and Brendon talks big about handing over the medal right now. The four automatic veto players stand at the front of the room: Head of House Matt, nominees Brendon and Rachel, and Ragan, who won the Veto Ticket last week. Matt draws Kathy's name, Rachel draws Britney, and Brendon draws Houseguest's choice. Which, since the only people left sitting are members of the Brigade, isn't much of a choice at all. He picks Enzo for sucking at competitions.
The front doorbell rings, and in walk Jeff and Jordan from Big Brother 11 and The Amazing Race 16, dressed in matching hot pink bowling shirts. Are they stalking me or something? Enzo DRs that Jeff would be a member of the Brigade, complete with the nickname "Pretty Boy." Jeff and Jordan do a joint DR in which they report that they're still a couple. I was worried. They'll be hosting the PoV competition. It's called "Lover's Lane," and the bowling alley has been augmented with a theme that looks like Valentine's Day threw up. Jeff and Jordan talk about how this is the first time they ever hosted a PoV. "Probably because no one liked us in the house," Jordan says. Still with the razor-sharp analytical mind, that one. They explain the rules: each player knocks down as many pins as they can in 45 seconds, then picks another person to challenge. Whichever of the two knocks down the least pins is eliminated in that round, and then on to the round.
Rachel DRs that this is "the obstacle of a lifetime," with five other people trying to knock her and Brendon out. The obstacle of a lifetime? I wonder what cancer survivor Kathy would have to say about that. Rachel goes first, and knocks down what looks like a decent six pins. Rachel picks perennial deadweight Kathy, who quickly downs two pins and then chokes, but pulls it out at the end by getting five more pins. Rachel DRs about how Kathy's talk of playing with integrity and morals is bullshit, I guess because she beat her at something. How immoral of Kathy not to throw a competition.
Brendon goes , feeling the pressure. He sucks wind, and throws his last ball so wildly that he nearly beans Jeff and Jordan. "He has the worst sportsmanship that I have ever seen in my entire life," Britney DRs, "and I played fifth-grade basketball," Brendon's final score: three, which will end up being the worst in the entire game. "I feel like a monkey could probably knock over four pins," Rachel DRs. Should have had a showmance with a monkey, then. Brendon challenges Britney, who handily beats him with five pins, putting Brendon on the loser bench with Rachel. Rachel tries to keep him calm and quietly whispers at him to "be classy." It's not clear what Rachel's version of that would be.
Enzo's up, and Matt DRs that, at this point, their objective has been achieved, and they're all just playing for fun. Britney cleans up with nine. "Bye-bye, Meow-Meow," Ragan DRs, and then blames his own score of seven on being "blinded by the hotness of Jeff and Jordan." Matt gets nine, so Ragan's out, leaving Kathy, Britney, and Matt. Britney knocks out Kathy 8-7, leaving it to Matt and Britney. And she wins her third PoV with ten pins, and boasts half-heartedly about it to the DR. Jeff plugs his Around the World for Free show, which he'll be returning to and to which I am not providing a link, and Jordan DRs with him about how she already told Jeff what kind of ring she likes when he gets back. So now that Rachel and Brendon's showmance is doomed, what's left for Rachel to do but get into it with Kathy? Wait, what?
After the ads, Rachel wastes little time pulling Kathy aside and lighting into her. Kathy takes it for about ten seconds before getting up and leaving the room, calmly refusing to listen. But Rachel follows her into the kitchen, where almost everyone else is, so she can embarrass herself more comprehensively. Watching from the HoH room with Ragan, Britney gets up to listen in from the doorway. Rachel insists that Kathy apologize, but Kathy refuses: "I beat you! End of story!" Brendon tells Rachel to let it go because it's not worth it (which may be code for "you're making an even bigger dick of yourself than usual"), and as Kathy leaves, Rachel bitches at her about her "morals and integrity."
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"She is disgusting," Britney reports to Ragan, full of righteous indignation. Downstairs, Hayden sticks an oar in, and when Rachel takes another crack at Kathy, the latter retreats to the HoH room, where Ragan reminds her of Rachel's obnoxious behavior at her last HoH win. The editors also remind us, in case we forgot. Britney rejoins them with a snack and threatens to smack Kathy in the face if she apologizes to Rachel. "She is goin' home. Bye-bye," Kathy pronounces. I'm sure their only regret now is that Britney can't veto Brendon and have Matt nominate Rachel twice.
Ragan gets called into the DR and reads a few a saboteur suggestions off a laptop. One is to hide Rachel's hair extensions, but he refuses to touch them. And nobody would notice a change in smell if he hid stinky cheese under Brendon and Rachel's bed anyway. But turning Brendon and Rachel against each other? "That sounds playful. I'll go for it!"
Saboteur message. Everyone gathers in the living room to hear the disguised figure tell Rachel that Brendon has been throwing competitions in order to screw her over. "God, you jerk," Rachel laughs at Brendon, not buying it for a half-second. But after she leaves the room, Britney suggests that the saboteur is trying to get Brendon sent home, which makes Matt -- and everyone else -- think Rachel is the saboteur. Ragan's just glad that nobody suspects him, and now everybody is just more determined to boot Rachel.
That night, Rachel asks for a talk with Britney, who isn't sugar-coating anything. She says she has no plans to use the Veto. Rachel tries to bribe her with the $5,000 she won at last week's PoV, but Britney correctly says that would be bad PR for her on every imaginable level. Rachel suggests Kathy as a replacement nominee, but Britney says there's no way to save both of them, no matter what she does: "It wouldn't matter if they brought back Annie and she went up." Okay, she could sugar-coat it a little.
Rachel reports this back to Brendon, who promises Rachel that he's going to try to keep her there, but she insists she doesn't want to stay without him. "You don't have to be my knight all the time," she says, and he insists that he does, and he's going to tell her how it's going to be. Some more stuff happens, but I'm throwing up during most of it.
There's no charade of deliberation before Britney calls the PoV meeting, but Brendon DRs that he's going to do something drastic. Britney offers to let Brendon go first to plead his case, but he insists on Rachel going first, "as a gentleman." Britney chuckles awkwardly and plays along. Rachel appeals to what she thinks is Britney's friendship, and offers her the five thousand dollars to her if she uses it on either one of them. Britney gives the floor to Brendon, who stands up and calls Britney a "spoiled brat" and "selfish." He calls her out for talking with him and Rachel last week about putting up Matt and Ragan, and tells her that he assumes she'll do what's best for her. But he says that if she uses the Veto, use it on him. He sits down, and Britney just laughs. Rachel sits there in open-mouthed amazement at Brendon's display. Britney throws some choice words back at him and announces that she will not use the Veto.
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Britney DRs about how Brendon is a "classless, disgusting, vile person. If Brendon thinks he can get away with bullying me and spreading lies about me, he's got another think coming." So she has clearly not seen through his little ruse. In fact, she pointedly hugged Rachel after the meeting. Kathy DRs that she couldn't be happier that either one of them is going. Brendon DRs that he pissed Britney off and made himself a target, so he's thinking his plan worked; and Rachel weepily DRs about how special she feels, to the point where she already wants to avenge Brendon and "take out every single person in this house." Good luck with that.
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M. Giant is a Minneapolis-based writer with a wife, a son, and a number of cats that seems to have settled at around two. Learn waaaay too much about him at Velcrometer, follow him on Twitter, or just e-mail him at m.giant[at]gmail.com.
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