A struggling single mom has moved in door to the Playgirl Ranch, and her âcuteâ son Bo struggles to make her sudden appearance in Timmyâs life less contrived by âendearingâ himself to our favorite surly drunk.
Pam throws Buddy out of the house, which upsets Lyla so much that she drives to Austin and finds out that Jason is getting all Mountain Dew Xtreme on her with the tattoos and such. If she hadnât stopped watching Lost last season, sheâd just be happy that it wasnât tattoo-artist Bai Ling âdefiningâ (i.e., giving syphilis to) him. But as it stands, Lylaâs pretty upset and feels like sheâs losing Jason.
Buddy getting thrown out of the house also upsets the Taylors, in whose house he invites himself to stay. Not like the successful businessman has the dough for a hotel or anything. So heâs there, making Tami cook pork chops and grossing Julie out so much that she sneaks off to a party at Tyraâs house whereâ¦
Tyraâs mom is so out of it over Buddy dumping her that she slices her own butt off with the glass-topped coffee table. For real! Julie freaks out and calls her mom to come to the hospital to be an adult for them. But Tyra is mad at Tami because Julie told her that her mom said thereâd be no more TYra COllette in her life, but then Tami helps her clean up the house after the Butt Slice-a-Thon and they make up, and the awesomeness of those two ladies sharing the screen nearly makes the television implode.
And to all of us who thought that Waverly had spent her time away from Dillon having a sin baby, we were wrong. She was spending her time being CRAZY. Yeah, sheâs so crazy she goes and harshes on my namesake and then quotes the totally wrong Robert Hayden poem. Any poetry nut (see what I did there?) worth her salt knows that when it comes to Hayden itâs all âThose Winter Sundaysâ all the time.
Football game, Panthers are ahead by five with seconds to go. Panther defense is on the field, leaving Matt, Smash, Tim, and -- well, come to think of it, those are the only players we know of -- leaving Matt, Smash, and Tim to gnash their teeth in worry from the sidelines. If the defense holds, the Panthers head to the state semifinals. Snap, slow motion, running, slow motion, a Hail Mary pass, a bobble, a dive, aaaand it's incomplete and we can move on to the hair and the sex and the drinking and the fun!
Maybe not so much with the fun quite yet. Pam Garrity is screaming at Buddy, throwing glass at him and telling him that he's ruined their family. A bit of a delayed reaction this Friday night since Tyra's mom outed their affair at church last Sunday, but...I guess Pam does seem a bit slow, all told. The Garrity kids -- Lyla and the unnamed little boy and girl -- crouch on the stairs listening to their parents fight. When Pam really starts throwing things at Buddy, Lyla whisks the kids into a bedroom and tells them that everything is okay, that sometimes adults fight like that. She cringes at the sound of their furious voices while her little siblings cry. She puts a video on the television to drown out their voices, but doesn't succeed in drowning out Pam's demand that Buddy "GET OUT!"
In Austin, Herc rolls out of his room while saying, "Roll out!" If Herc doesn't watch out, Jason will soon begin thinking that redundant narration of one's actions is another side effect of paralysis akin to excessive "wooo!"ing. Jason remembers that he's forgotten his wallet in his room and wheels back in to get it. Herc tells him to leave it, that "if you can't count on a functioning spinal column the one thing you can count on is a drink on the how-wse." Herc's really twanging it up in this scene. Jason's cell rings and he sees that it's Lyla. Herc groans and mutters that she's got a radar for when Jason is about to have a good time. I guess it's been pretty quiet in her control room lately, then, because Jason has been pretty much a wet blanket for a while now. Jason answers the phone and we cut to Lyla in her room, crying, but overhearing all the "wooo!"ing! happening behind Jason. She remarks that it sounds like he's having a good time, and he demurs. He asks if she's okay and she sobs "yeah" and so he's like, okay, then! Call ya later! They hang up and Lyla sits in her room crying.
Uninspiring credits. Now here's some fun! The Playgirl Ranch is throwing a theme party. The theme is: Drunk Idiots. Groups of mucklemouthed teens stand around listening to very bad music, throwing back shots out of Solo cups, and "wooo!"ing in a variety of general directions until Billy gives them one particularly lame direction in which to woo: "Goin' to State! Goin' to State! Goin' to State!" That's the best chant he can come up with? Unidentified Mucklemouth comes up to Tim to tell him some lady is at the door and "she looks pissed."
High-heeled boots sneak into Smash's bedroom in the blue midnight light. Waverly climbs into the bed on top of him and starts smacking away. Thanks, lip mike! Smash whispers that she can't be in there, that his mom'll catch them for sure. Waverly says she knows, and that's why they need to go somewhere else. Where? How about "a nice, romantic, moonlight swim." Mischievous blues music starts up and Smash whispers, "Waverly Grady...what's gotten into you?" I'm going to guess that, this time, it's not enough meds pedaled up from Nuevo Laredo.
Cut to the Waverlash getting naked and slipping into a pool, accompanied by down-homey "oowwwww" yowls on the soundtrack. They make out and Smash says that he's never seen her like this before, "but I could get used to it."
Lyla lies in bed trying to call Jason. His voicemail picks up, and she furrows a bit. She throws the covers back and goes to her closet, gets a duffel bag out, and starts packing.
Drive-by camera, morning in Dillon. Julie wanders out of her room in her robe and pushes the bathroom door in. Whoa, now! Behind that door is Buddy Garrity, shirtless and wrapped in a towel, his face covered in white foam. It remains inconclusive as to whether Cisco Adler is in there with him, but the shirtlessness, towel, and white foam point to "yes." Julie shrieks and runs away and we cut to her in her parent's bedroom insisting that "n-n-no, no, no, no, no," Buddy Garrity is NOT living in their house. Eric is in bed, his hair very bleary-eyed, while Tami brushes her teeth. They all talk over one another in a family way, Tami telling Julie that nobody's happy with the arrangement, Julie shrieking like a howler monkey, Eric telling everyone to take it down a notch until he finally gets out of bed; he gives the women some horizontal jazz hands and tells them they're all being "veerrry dramatic, veerrry dramatic." So. Cute.
Tim is under his truck when a "cute" and "endearing" moppet gets on the ground and asks, "What are you doing, Tim Riggins?" Tim answers with a throaty hangover that he's fixin' his truck. Moppet introduces himself as "Bo Miller, your new door neighbor." Sam, Cousin Oliver, Chrissy, Andy, and now "Bo." Quite the illustrious lineage you've got there, moppet. The kid goes on and on and on in this nails-on-a-cuteboard kind of voice, and you'll have to forgive me if I recap his scenes in a blackout. Tim asks him if he can shut up, and there's another reason (right after "hubba hubba") I love me some Timmy. Bo responds, "I don't know, can I?" Tim gets serious and tells him that he has to shut up, "because I'm incredibly hungover right now." Bo wonders what "hungover" means but Tim snaps, "Go home."
Austin. Quad rugby camp. Lots of wheeling around to guitar rock. Jason seems pretty good, but what do I know. The drills are very choreographed and fast and so come off less Xtreme and more West Side Story dance-fighting. I am always up for some choreographed dance-fighting. Cut to Jason and Herc wheeling out of practice. They're both humming some sort of song -- "Do, do-do-do-do-do" -- and trying to push one another's sport wheelchair off track. I don't know. It must be man love. Jason notices Lyla standing a little ways off and tells Herc that he'll catch up with him. Herc groans, "Oh, well if it isn't Little Miss Buzzkill." Jason tells him to shut up while suppressing a smile at Herc's antics and then wheels over to Lyla.
He says "Hi!" Lyla is like, I just drove two hundred miles and all I get is "Hi"? Jason backtracks ineffectually, "I'm just shocked to see you" -- Lyla looks down -- "Surprised?" -- Lyla's lip quivers -- "Happy! Happy's a better word" -- Lyla furrows. Dude, get a clue. He asks her what's wrong and she warbles, "I think my parents are splitting up." Jason goes slackjawed and wonders whether now might be a good time to discuss Sanskrit and the Art of Extreme Wheelchair Culture.
Excuse me, I'm blacking out again. Bo is on the screen telling Tim that he's going to play football for the Panthers one day. He playacts a snap, doing his own sports announcing, and not only does he have a lobotomizing voice, but he's one of those little-man children. I know this kid doesn't have control over the contrast between his stumpy little body and older-seeming comportment, but he's just giving me a real violation-of-nature kind of revulsion (tm Webster) and I'm just starting to get pretty confused here, having any kind of non-positive reaction to what is going on on my screen during this hour of television.
Deep breath.
Okay. Tim takes the football from BoManChild and tells him he'll teach him how to spiral. He instructs him how to place his fingers on the laces -- pointing out that Bo will have a hard time with his little hands -- and then tells him how to turn to "put what little weight you have behind the ball." Bo watches all this intently, nodding his head and jerking around spazzily. Tim throws the ball, Bo catches it and does this horrible Gremlin voice, something about "Candy, candy!" before throwing it back to Tim. God, I'm going to need some "Candy, candy" if I have to watch too many more scenes with this kid. The kind of candy they've got down there in Nuevo Laredo.
Jason and Lyla are talking things over in his room. Lyla has not opted for the four-inch espadrilles of distress, going with a more common choice of jeans and a ratty hooded sweatshirt to express her depression. He thinks her mom will just get over it. Lyla doesn't know, and says she doesn't know that she should. Jason repeats a piece of advice he got regarding his own experience with being cuckolded: "There's no weakness in forgiveness." Lyla smiles at Jason and says that he seems really happy. She climbs on the bed with him as he says that he's happy to be playing a sport again. He says he hasn't been this happy since the accident. Lyla furrows, and Jason says that that came out wrong. He assures her that she makes him extremely happy, and reaches out to caress her cheek. She notices something on his wrist, grabs his arm, and pushes his sleeve up.
Shocking Sanskrit Revelation! (Why the promos didn't promise to reveal the Sanskrit Secret we've all been wondering about, I'll never know.) Lyla gets pretty shrill as she tries to rub it off with her hand: "Is this real?!" Jason sheepishly explains that it was an impulse buy. Lyla exclaims that he's now permanently messed up. Jason reminds her that he was pretty permanently messed up before and sort of chuckles, telling her it isn't a big deal. She looks at him intently and says, "It kind of is." Uh, except it isn't. She asks what it says, and he explains the whole patchouli mess to her. She seems pretty satisfied with the explanation that it says "peace" in Sanskrit, but then remarks that "It's just not you." Jason counters with A Major Theme: "Well, it is now."
Eric comes home and we follow him down the hallway toward the kitchen/living room. Tami snarkily calls out, "Helllooo! I'm in here makin' pork chops!" Buddy is on the couch, he gets up to greet Coach and says he hopes Coach doesn't mind that he got the game tapes out to review. Tami looks at her husband like she's been wrestling a bear all day. Eric tells Buddy he'll be with him soon and then asks Tami if they can talk for a second. The woman is whisking something off-camera with some seriously emotive culinary force. She mutters, "Mmm hmmm," and we cut outside where the Taylors are forced to have their colloquy.
Tami blows her top about Buddy going and buying a bunch of groceries and making her make pork chops until Eric tells her to hold up a second. Apparently, Neil Kenney, the athletic director of TMU (new fictional university interested in Coach), wants to have dinner that night to "talk about the future." Tami asks, "The future? Our future?" and then hugs her husband and tells him how proud she is of him.
Truly the lady has removed her glasses and is now H.E.T.F. That's my new acronym because I don't like M.I.L.F., especially since a number of my hot female friends are now mothers themselves. My new acronym, instead of emphasizing the motherhood of the woman in question, focuses on what really matters, the "huh, she is actually pretty hot" surprised reaction of a young man or woman to the existence of a particular person's suitability for bedroom activities. Thus H.E.T.F., or "Hot Enough To Fuck." So, she runs over to the Playgirl Ranch to collect her Lobotomizing Man Child. (Somehow, writing the , I feel that a time warp has occurred and I'm recapping Supernatural again.) She struggles with her son at the doorway of the Playgirl Ranch. He insists that he's hanging out with Tim Riggins, learning about football, and has "doubled my skill level in just one afternoon." Tim appears at the doorway with a beer and a soda in his hand. He hands BoManChild the soda. Bo's mom remarks that she heard Tim and Bo were hanging out a lot that day; Bo continues driving the screwdriver between my eyes by squeaking that "the only rule is that I had to keep my voice down to a level three because Tim Riggins had some sort of massive hangover thing." His mom chuckles disapprovingly and then reaches for her son, whom she obviously cannot control. Aw, needy single moms. Aren't they endearingly frazzled? Bo launches a campaign to have Tim come over for dinner. His mom ineffectually says no, Tim ineffectually says no, so it's settled: Tim is coming over for dinner. She finally drags her kid away, and calls behind her, "I'll make it short."
Not making it short is Julie, who continues waging the awesome Snot Rebellion of 2007. She cannot believe they are making her stay in the house alone with Buddy Garrity that night. Tami, meanwhile, is busy -- I know, I know, it seems impossible -- making herself HOTTER for dinner. This involves a snakeskin wrap dress, a little Diane Von Furstenberg knockoff that I hope to Jesus she got at Marshall's and is ROCKING THE SHIT OUT OF -- take that Fashion Week. Julie decides to go below the belt and points out that she isn't allowed to hang out with Tyra anymore, but it's fine if she's in the house "alone with a known adulterer." It seems Julie has reached the age of perpetual italics. Tami refuses to let Julie get a rise out of her, and just says she's sorry that's they way Julie sees things and calm calm calm -- RAP RAP RAP "HUNNY!" she knocks on the bathroom door to rouse her husband. Who responds by flushing, coming out of the bathroom in a jacket with undone tie and very Date Night hair, and without missing a beat saying, "I heard everything your mother said and she's right." Once again, these three just pulled off another fantastic scene all while jammed into a space not much bigger than a postage stamp. Brian Cox would not fare well on this show, I don't think; not enough room in these Texas single stories for grand gestures.
Waverly's father opens the door to greet Smash. He steps outside of the house for a moment and remarks that Smash and Waverly are spending a lot of time together. Smash starts stuttering about his good intentions for Waverly until her father stops him and says he's not looking for that kind of talk today. Smash grins in relief. Preacher Man gets serious and asks Smash if he's noticed anything different about Waverly. Smash says no, and then her father, very seriously, asks Smash to let him know if he notices anything different about her.
Austin. Xtreme Wheelchair party. Corey's rocking out quadruple-amputee-style. Jason is pointing out all the cosmopolitan wheelchair athletes to Lyla when Susie comes up and brightly asks him how his wound is. She bends down to check it out and then extends a friendly greeting to Lyla, saying that she did the tattoo. Lyla gives her a bitchy smile and introduces herself: "I'm Lyla, his fiancée." Awkward.
Buddy eats dinner at the table. Julie wanders into the kitchen, and Buddy tries to make small talk. He asks if she wants to join him for dinner and she snarks, "Uh, I don't eat dead pig." Buddy tells her she doesn't know what she's missing. Right. Only a wonderful, magical animal. She starts back toward her room when Buddy asks where her parents are. She stutters and tries to cover up their meeting, saying they went to a "new, little Italian place. You know, it's good for the marriage," and then noticing that she's put her foot in her mouth. She scurries back to her room, saying she'll be in there doing homework "with the doors locked."
Tim eats dinner with Bo and his mom, Bo nattering on and on in the service of exposition. Some things we learn: they are eating taco casserole, and Mom had a bad old boyfriend named Hank who ran her out of Knoxville in search of a new start. Bo burps, and mother and son laugh together. Aw, sweet. ... Great, now I have to kill myself. All it takes to turn me is a good burp or fart joke. Talk about an easy woman.
Austin. The Xtreme Wheelchair crowd is driving Lyla to drink. Join the club, woman. She sucks down whatever is in her Solo cup and leans against the wall. It is unclear whether she needs the support because of the alcohol or because of the UTTER BOREDOM she must feel at all this Quad Rugby talk. Jason is asking a group -- including Herc and Susie -- whether he has a chance of starting. They all laugh, and Herc tells Jason to slow down. He continues saying that if Jason makes the team, he'll probably ride the bench for a while. Lyla decides to weigh in: "Oh, he'll make the team." Everyone turns to look at her. "He's an ex-quarterback?" Cringe. Herc makes a joke about not realizing that Jason wasn't some turnip that fell off a tricycle, and everyone laughs. He continues by getting very patronizing and saying, "Football is not quad rugby." Lyla is pissed now, and she sees him his patronizing and raises him a reminder: "You're right. It isn't." Herc gets pissed himself and demands to know what she's insinuating. Jason tells Herc to ease up. Lyla is just sort of bobbing and weaving. Susie jumps in and tries to play nice. All that Sanskrit must've gone to her brain. All I want to do is see Herc and Lyla get in a ring. Susie translates Lyla's comment like all Lyla was saying is that Jason just really wants to start. Lyla gestures toward her drunkenly and says, "Thanks, sweetie," and then sort of staggers around behind Jason and tells Susie to go tattoo somebody else's fiancé. The crowd "ooooo's."
Smash and his friends are all at the burger joint. Smash is, obviously, talking about literature. WTF? He's brought up "the lit test" coming up for which they have to read, as one of the women reminds him, "Robert Frost." These must be Waverly's friends. Heh. Waverly jumps in and remarks about all the people they've been studying that year. Robert Frost. "Boring white guy." Cheers to that. They've also got Emily Dickinson, who Waverly calls "Psycho chick!" Whoa, now step off ED, bitch. She continues, wondering why they don't study any poets of color. Her friend assents, as do I. What kind of high school doesn't at least throw in a good bit of Langston Hughes or Rita Dove? But Smash wonders, "Like who?" like Waverly just suggested they read more poems by polar bears. Waverly lists them off: Gwendolyn Brooks, Sterling Brown, Amiri Baraka, and then Robert Hayden. Which sends her into a dramatic recitation of "Full Moon," which now that I think of it, probably would be a high-school girl's favorite poem of his because it's so overwrought and fantastical and guttural. She throws herself into the recitation, and nicely enough, she misses a few lines and words here and there. She gets all closed-eyes and beret-ish and the whole thing is rather uncomfortable to watch. Although they'd probably enjoy this sort of thing down in Austin if she ever wants to take her show on the road.
So, she ends up bouncing in sexed-up excitement as she finishes the poem. Smash has been looking on in concern and starts muttering that she should stop, but she finishes, now standing, and grabs Smash and makes out with him accompanied by scandalized shouts and wide eyes of diner onlookers. As she releases Smash, she yells out, "That's how Robert Hayden makes me feel. Robert Hayden can write!" Yes, yes, it makes perfect sense that she is going out with this jock. Everyone at their booth just thinks she's acting kind of wild for the moment, but Smash is obviously concerned. So are Explosions in the Sky's crescendoing guitars.
Over at the House of Plaid (have I mentioned how much I love the wallpaper in the Collette household?), a full-on stripper party is in effect. Obviously, Julie is there. Tyra tells her sister -- who's working on a fifth of Jack Daniels all by her stripper lonesome -- to slow down on the drinking, and then turns to Julie who looks down in the mouth. Julie says she doesn't defy her parents well and Tyra remarks that she isn't doing anything particularly bad. Before she realizes what she's saying, Julie responds, "Uh, yeah, except they've totally forbidden me from even hanging out with you." Tyra immediately looks hurt but brushes it off. Matt and Landry come in and Tyra waves to them. Matt goes to Julie, who smiles sweetly at him and they banter pre-sexily with one another. Tyra shoves a drink at Landry -- "Here" -- which he takes as an invitation to actually try to talk to her. Tyra raises her Solo cup and addresses Julie -- "To your loving mother!" -- and they all questioningly raise their cups with her in a toast until Landry tries out a toast of his own. Clears his throat. "To Tyra. I'm in your house right now. With you. And strippers. Just God bless everyone who enters here." Everyone toasts.
Close-up on Matt and Julie. Matt asks Julie if her mom knows she's there and Julie tells Matt to not even ask. Matt says that he just doesn't want her to get grounded again. "Again"? Didn't she just get grounded last week? Then he leans in -- and I'm sure I'm somehow in violation of a number of state laws in how I'm looking at this look on his face -- and tells her, "Cuz I kinda like seeing you." Good God, little boy is hottt. Meanwhile, in the background, we've been instructed to notice Angela reeling around in a demented Nuevo-Laredo-and-blue-bathrobe waltz. She's muttering about looking for her cigarettes. Matt notices her and asks Julie if that's Tyra's mom. Julie, naive little girl wishing she had such a down-and-dirty life, remarks that it is, "but she's cool." Angela finds her cigarettes on the glass coffee table and turns around to sit down on the couch, except for she really just sits down on the glass coffee table which shatters underneath her. The music stops and the strippers laugh, because they only have two settings: purr and giggle. But Tyra rushes to her mom and finds that the back of her robe is all bloody. Lady just sliced her butt off! For reals! Tyra shouts, "Somebody call 911!" but somehow neglects to go for comedy by adding, "We've got a butt emergency!"
The Taylors are at dinner with the TMU guy and his wife. Some blabbing about how good Coach Taylor is until Tami's cell rings and she gets up to take it. It's Julie, who tells her mom first that she isn't hurt, and then explaining that Tyra's mom had an accident and they need an adult at the hospital with them. Tami asks what Julie's doing there and she tells her mom that she was at a party. Tami starts to scold, but Julie asks that she yell at her later and get down there first. Tami tells her she'll be there.
Tim gets walked to the door by the H.E.T.F. lady. If they'd give her a name, I'd be able to stop using terrible acronyms to refer to her. They wait at the door and she calls to Bo to hurry up. He calls out that he'll be right there. Tim looks out the door and remarks first that he is Canadian, and then that her rain gutter is cockeyed: "Yeh know, eh, yer rain gutter's fallin' off." She says she's got a long list of things to do. With work, Bo, and homework, she's got her hands full. Bo runs up and hands Tim an 8x10 picture of himself. He says, "I thought you might want to have this," and Tim responds, very cutely, "Well, you thought right." The fact that this kid is handing out his 8x10 kills me. Like, don't you get only one of those in the package? "Sorry Grandma, I gave the big picture to my -door neighbor who I hope to bring together with my mom in a sordid and slightly inappropriate affair. Here's a 5x7 instead." Also, the photo itself is kind of priceless, with Bo wearing a sweater vest and Richie Rich slicked-back hair.
Smash drives Waverly home and asks her if she's feeling okay. If by "okay" you mean "in the midst of a manic phase," then I'd say all signs point to yes! Waverly tells him that she's "alive" and "feelin' the world." Smash doesn't buy it, so she finally 'fesses up that she had been taking medicine for a mood disorder but she stopped taking them. She says she's better, she's got it under control, and she doesn't need drugs to keep her straight. Which makes me wonder whether she ever knew about Smash and the steroids, and also whether that storyline is over? I don't particularly care -- as long as this show keeps me flush with Matt and Julie and various butt-slicing melodramas, they can flush continuity straight down the drain -- I just want to know if I can check that subplot off the list or what. Like I thought for a while that Voodoo would come back, just because I loved that one fight he and Smash had over who was playing better hip-hop music when in reality they were both playing equally good hip-hop music and if they had just stopped fighting over it then maybe they could have co-existed, except they kept fighting and now look, are there any decent rappers coming out of New York OR L.A. these days? No. It's all coming out of Richmond or Virginia Beach. Which is weird, right? And now Voodoo is gone and we'll never know. If I had been instructed more clearly HOW and WHEN to check him off my list, I wouldn't be going on trying to make demented comparisons between a fight two characters once had and the East Coast/West Coast conflict of the early '90s. Or maybe I would. We do not know.
Smash asks Waverly if her dad knows she stopped taking her medicine. She laughs and reminds Smash that he's seen him "in the pulpit, sweatin', worryin'." Smash chuckles, "He do be sweatin'. He do be sweatin'." She says that it's her body and she can do what she wants with it. She asks Smash how he feels on the field, and he answers that he feels alive. She responds, "ALIVE! That's exactly it." She says she feels better than she's ever felt before and Smash looks like he believes her.
In the hospital, Julie, Matt, and Landry sit around waiting. Landry is sad because he felt like he was really having a breakthrough with Tyra tonight. Matt responds as usual to Landry: "You're retarded." Tami rushes in and cuts Julie's apology off. She instructs Matt to take Julie home and just generally takes charge.
Coach comes home looking for Julie, who isn't there yet. Buddy is reading a magazine in front of the television and doesn't respond when Eric asks him about Julie. He pauses and then asks out of the side of his mouth, "So how's Neal Kenney doing?" Coach asks how he knows he went out with him. Buddy says "Notepad. Little something I learned on Magnum P.I." He rubbed the notepad with pencil to lift off the impression. Heh. Buddy wants to know if Coach is going to take the job, but Coach stonewalls him, just repeating that there is no job offer yet.
In Austin, Jason and Lyla get back to his room. Lyla wanders around the world and asks, "Do you love her? You love her, don't you? Do you love her?" Jason doesn't know what she's talking about and she says "the cute tattoo girl." Lyla is a bit slurry as she says, "No, it's okay, its okay, you love her!" Jason says he's never seen her this wasted. Girl needs to get out more if this is as wasted as she's ever been in eighteen years. Jason tells her she's funny when she's drunk and she slumps onto the bed and says, "It's not funny, Jason, when you drive all the way from Dillon and you find your boyfriend hanging out with people who scare you and getting tattoos from sexy girls. It's not funny! It's not funny, Jason." She starts breaking down and crying and says that he's changing and she's not changing with him and they're never going to last because she's not changing with him. Aw. It is hard to be in love in high school. ["Every time Lyla gets on one of these tears, I start out all 'bitch, YOU CHEATED ON HIM so SHUT UP' but by the end of the scene, she's got me sympathizing with her. EVERY time. Amazing." -- Sars] Jason reaches out to her and apologizes that he wasn't taking her seriously. She says that "it's okay because it's bigger than us," I guess trying to reassure herself that they didn't do anything wrong to make their love fail, but that sets Jason off onto one of his romantic tirades and he says forcefully that nothing is bigger than the love he has in his heart for her. Lather, rinse, repeat. These kids need something new to do.
Tyra's mom, sadly, has had to have had a butt-ectomy. The rest of the season will document her valiant struggle to adjust to life without a butt while Tyra works tirelessly to find a butt donor for her suffering mother. I'm sorry, but is anyone else's immaturity bone just completely tickled by Angela's injury? No? Well how about the reference I just made to your "immaturity bone" being tickled?
So Angela is at home in her bed. Tami brings her some water, for which the worn-out old lady has to thank her effusively. Tami walks out into the living room and looks around at the filth and drunken debris. She takes her coat off and starts to pick up shards of glass. Meanwhile, Ole Sis is passed out jowls-down on the couch. Tyra comes out, thanks Tami, and tells her she's got it from here. Tami says that Tyra needs someone to help her clean up and Tyra snaps, "Well, it's not gonna be you." But she doesn't realize who she is dealing with, and Tami snaps back bigger and better, "Well, yeah, actually I think right now it is gonna be me."
Tyra stands up and tells Tami to stop pretending she cares about the Collettes. Tami protests, but Tyra goes on, telling Tami that she found out that Tami won't let Julie hang out with her any more. Tami's face registers real regret that Tyra knows this. Tyra continues, telling Tami to stop acting superior in her house, that she isn't a friend of the family. Tyra, in tears, shouts at Tami, "Go home!" Tami is quiet for a second and then, questioningly, "Tyra?" as she steps over some debris, following the girl into the kitchen. God, Connie Britton is a careful actress. She levels with the kid: "It's just that...Julie's my girl." She explains that she might be blaming Tyra for how Julie's been acting even when it might just be that Julie's growing up. She gives Tyra a glimpse into the heart of a functional mother, saying that she thought she'd be able to handle all this and know what to do, but she doesn't, and she feels like a big freight train is coming in her direction and she's just trying to stop it. Tami apologizes to Tyra, who just says that she'll get the broom. Connie Britton goes off to a corner to contemplate the step in her program of awesome world domination.
Buddy is walking to his car with his things. Coach follows him out and Buddy whines that he's going to go hide out in a hotel and hope nobody sees him. If you want to go unnoticed, first you'll have to take off that huge striped sweatsuit, fella. Coach doesn't dignify this whining with a response. Buddy continues, telling Eric that "it's just not very cool for you to be havin' meeting with me livin' under your roof." Wah wah waaaaah. They have a fairly useless fight about what Buddy is doing worrying about the Panthers when his family is in shambles. It ends on a slightly threatening note with Buddy telling Eric just how much he cares about the Panthers, which...? Didn't we already know this?
Tami and Tyra have finished cleaning -- Tami having done so in her heels the entire time, it appears. As any World Dominating Mastermind would. As Tami leaves, she suggests brightly that Tyra come by her office on Monday to talk about her academic future. Tyra smiles and asks if she's Tami's new project and Tami responds, "Absolutely!" As she leaves, Tyra calls out, "Mrs. T? Thank you."
Indie Rock Choice of the Episode begins. It's David Usher, who only matters a smidgen to me due to his -- according to allmusic.com -- collaboration on a song with Tegan from Tegan and Sara. I liked it better when we were playing "Where's Austin?" This seems more like a game of "Canada? Why Canada?" (Joe R. is going to kill me for saying that about his beloved Canadian indie bands.) Smash is asleep when his cell phone rings. He picks it up and it's Waverly. She says that her dad is at church all day and Smash says to give him two minutes to get over there. We can see that Waverly is not doing so good over at her house, but Smash is not yet aware that he'll be dealing with a crash when he gets there.
In Austin, Jason and Lyla wake up. Jason raises his fist in the air and says, "Victory!" These two would be the types to only be able to get it on after melodramatic confessions of their love. Lyla laughs, and Jason raises himself on his arms above her. He tells her that it'll all work out, that he'll make the team, and they'll go on vacation to Beijing. He tells her to trust him.
Tami comes home and finds Julie sitting in her bed looking sad. She just looks at her daughter and hugs her.
Tim, wearing a backwards baseball cap, walks out to his truck and notices the jenky gutter door. He fixes it.
Smash knocks on Waverly's door. She doesn't answer, so he walks in, playfully calling out to his girl until he comes upon her in the kitchen, sitting on the floor in the corner between the stove and dishwasher, white t-shirt pulled over her knees that are pulled up to her chest. Her head is in her hands and she's shaking and crying. Smash sits to her, asks her what's wrong, and when she doesn't respond, he looks around him like someone will appear who's able to give him an answer.
Tami comes out, dressed cozily in sweatpants and t-shirt after her long night, and sits down to her husband with coffee. Eric tells her that he got the call. "TMU made the offer." Tami nods, and they look off in different directions around their house and exhale, "Wow." Looks like we're on our way back to a few more Coach-centric episodes. And we all know who is psyched about that prospect. That's right. The Hair.