So the show starts off with Big in a hotel room with Dom Perignon and strawberries. Carrie knocks on door and says all sexily, "Room service." Big is all, "We've got to stop meeting like this." And then they start going at it. The shot fades to Big in a cheap hotel room, and Carrie knocks and comes in complaining about changing scheduled times to fuck. Carrie tells us, "Our affair, like our hotels, had gone from elegant with crystal to seedy with plastic cups." So it went from Big's level to Carrie's level? The two of them are lying in bed, Carrie smoking and Big eating cheese crackers. Carrie complains about the room being too hot, and Big reminds her that she is the one who chose it. She says she chose it because it is in a location where no one they know will see them. Big doesn't care who sees them, and Carrie doesn't want anyone to get hurt. They start to kiss but Carrie pulls away because it is too hot in the room. Big wonders if she is saving it for her boyfriend, and she gets all pissed. Big apologizes, and Carrie asks how they got to where they are now. Um, I believe it started with Big pushing himself onto you in that elevator and then it moved onto making fuck appointments. At what point did you become confused, Carrie?
Carrie and Miranda sitting are together at a bar, and Miranda looks totally gorgeous and Carrie looks like a female Bruce Springsteen the way she has her t-shirt sleeves rolled up. Carrie tells her that she is having an affair with Big and has started smoking again. Miranda asks for a cigarette, so Carrie gives her one and tells her, "Don't inhale. Do you hate me? Say you don't hate me." Miranda tells her she doesn't hate her and then asks how long she has been with Big. Carrie tells her it has been three weeks and she is in the middle of it and can't see, so she wants Miranda to yank her out of it. Miranda tells her to think about CIM, and Carrie tells her she is afraid Big is getting jealous of CIM and is going to call him or tell Natasha, and she doesn't want to hurt CIM. She wonders if Big only wants her now because he can't have her, and Miranda tells her straight out, "Yes." Carrie is afraid she has messed everything up and it will never be the way it used to be. Gee, what makes you think that, Carrie? The fact that you have been fucking a man who threw you over for a younger woman, while you have a man who loves you waiting at home for you? Carrie wonders if she can be like the people in movies who have affairs and then realize what they have at home is the best thing, so they go back to their old relationships and no one gets hurt. Miranda tells her, "I don't watch Lifetime Television for Women," and to just stop. I'm loving how Miranda is telling Carrie everything she doesn't want to hear and is trying to smack some sense into her. Carrie tells her she is going to stop. Just like she stopped smoking? I don't think the "Big Patch" is available yet. Miranda asks if Charlotte knows and Carrie tells her if she told "The world according to Bride," Charlotte would kill her. Miranda is all, "At least you wouldn't have to be a bridesmaid then." Ha!
Samantha walks into a new bar on the West Side, and Carrie tells us, "It was the typical male mix: ten percent Wall Street, ten percent real estate, ten percent she'd already slept with." Samantha sees a man from across the room and Carrie tells us, "His name was Tom Reymi. A Manhattan legend...the male Samantha." Oh good god. He walks over to Samantha, and they already know who the other is. It's good to know that they each know they are the male and female Mattress-Backs of Manhattan. That way, they can compare notes on each other with their friends. They decide to skip the small talk and pleasantries and go home to fuck. Back at his apartment, the two of them are macking and he asks if she swings, and shows her his sex swing. She gets all hot and bothered and tells him she always wanted to join the circus. He asks her when was the last time she had an AIDS test, and tells her he was tested three weeks ago. Carrie tells us, "The only sex test she had ever taken was the Cosmo quiz." He asks if she has been tested, and she looks all sheepish and tells him she knows she is healthy. He tells her he can't have sex with her the way he wants unless he knows she is safe, and that she should really get a test because he is a very good fuck and she won't regret it. Samantha looks all confused. I can't believe that Reymi wasn't all disgusted that a tramp like Samantha never bothered to test herself. If I was with someone who I knew got around as much as they did and I found out he had never had a test, I would be running out of their apartment yelling, "Cooties! Cooties!"
Charlotte plops down a mountain of bridal magazines at the restaurant table the girls are sitting at and tells them about all the color-coded Post-It notes on the pages of the magazines that signify whether she thinks she likes the gown, thinks she really likes the gown, or doesn't know if she likes the gown. Miranda asks them to kill her, and Charlotte passes out magazines to the girls. Miranda gets Modern Bride, Samantha gets New York Bride, and Carrie asks if she gets "Annoying Bride." Miranda sees a cute pocketbook in her magazine, and Charlotte tells her she can only look at gowns. Miranda is all, "What's your theme again, 'A Nazi Wedding'?" From out of nowhere, Samantha asks if they've all had an AIDS test. Carrie is all, "Good morning. Where did that come from?" and Samantha tells them she met a hot guy, but he won't have sex with her until she has a test. Charlotte is being all-about-me-bride and whines, "Samantha, we're looking at wedding gowns, could you not talk about AIDS right now?" Carrie tells Samantha she has had two tests, and Miranda tells her she had three tests. They look at Charlotte, and she doesn't even pay attention to what they are talking about and asks, "How do we feel about opera-length gloves?" They can't believe Samantha had never had a test. She tells them she is terrified of maybe having AIDS. Oh, okay. So if you never get tested, it means you don't have it. That's smart. Oh, wait, it isn't. It's totally ignorant. Carrie and Miranda tell her the test is nothing, but the worst is waiting for the results and hoping they don't get taken to the little room that the people who test positive get taken to. Charlotte yells out, "There are 1400 gowns in this magazine, and I've only seen 600 of them. I need help!" Samantha tells her to "chill the fuck out" and hire a stylist who will help her find a dress, and offers to fax her over some names. Charlotte is finally happy. Samantha wishes she could get someone to take the AIDS test for her. I wish the writers of this show could make these characters responsible for their own actions.
Carrie is home at her laptop, wondering about safe sex and how people take precautions physically but not emotionally. She wonders why there isn't a pamphlet out that warns you about high-risk emotional behavior -- I believe the title of the pamphlet would be called Common Sense in Relationships. She asks her computer, "When you crawl in bed with someone, is sex ever safe?"
Miranda walks by a Blimpie with someone dressed as a sandwich passing out flyers. The sandwich tells her to "eat me," and she gets all upset that she is getting sexually harassed by a sandwich.
Charlotte is in a Vera Wang gown boutique with a stylist named Anthony Marantino. Anthony is a cross between Isaac Mizrahi and Jm J. Bullock. He gets all upset that no one is waiting on them and starts shouting for people to bring them dresses. Charlotte looks at Anthony with love in her eyes, and Carrie tells us Charlotte realized that Anthony is the Italian mother she never had. Because all Charlotte ever wanted was an Italian mother. Uh, not. A saleswoman and Anthony wheel in a rack of gowns, and Charlotte's eyes grow as wide as saucers and she swoons over all of them. The woman takes one dress off the rack to show Charlotte, and Charlotte thinks that the white gown is too white, and the woman starts to tell her that the color is fine when Anthony blurts out, "HATES IT! Move on!" It sort of reminds me of the Wayans brothers doing "Men on Film" on In Living Color. He asks the woman to show them another gown style, and Charlotte looks at it and kind of shakes her head. Anthony is all, "HATES IT! Good beadwork though." Anthony tells Charlotte that she will know the perfect dress when she sees it, and as the woman brings in a third gown, both their eyes glitter and they hold hands, and they just know that that dress is the perfect one. I don't know…it looked a little too poofy for Charlotte. And seriously, I thought I found the perfect dress when I saw it on the hanger, but as soon as I put it on I knew it wasn't. The third dress I tried on I didn't particularly like at first, but I wanted to try on a princess cut dress and I saw that one, but after I put it on it just looked perfect on me and I ended up getting the dress I didn't think much of on the hanger, and now I don't even remember what I thought was the perfect dress.
Samantha is at the clinic, and the doctor is asking her some preliminary questions, like if she has taken an HIV test before and why she is taking the test now. The doctor asks Samantha, "Do you have sex? Oral sex: give, receive? Anal sex? Do you use condoms?" Samantha answers yes to all the questions, and then the doctor asks the loaded questions, "How many sexual partners have you had?" Samantha looks like she is thinking hard because she is counting, and asks, "This year?" Oh, the hilarity! Actually, that is pretty sad, and it looks like the doctor is unamused too.
Carrie tells us, "While Samantha tried to remember her sexual past, I came face to face with my sexual present." Carrie and CIM making out, CIM making some noise that Carrie is annoyed with. Carrie looks very uncomfortable with CIM and tells him she can't breathe and pushes him off of her. He gets up and puts on his jeans, and she apologizes and asks him not to leave. CIM goes to take a leak, and Carrie watches him and tells him she is in a weird place right now and will be out of it soon. CIM asks him if he can do anything and tells her he will give her room to figure out her problems. When she is walking around her bedroom, you can see that Carrie is wearing men's tighty whiteys…why? I hope to god this doesn't become another horrible fashion trend like those big-ass flowers seem to have become. CIM goes home, and let's hope we never see him again.
Miranda goes past Blimpie again, and the sandwich tells her to eat him again. She goes into the Blimpie and tells the manager that the sandwich is telling women sexually explicit things. The manager doesn't seem to care that a sandwich is telling people to eat him. She goes back outside and the sandwich tells her to eat him again. She starts yelling at him, when she sees him smile from behind the mesh face mask part of the costume. She smiles slyly and walks off. What the?
Miranda is on the phone with Carrie, telling her that she has started fantasizing about the man inside the sandwich. How disgusting is it that for days Miranda wants to punch this guy's lights out, but the minute she sees shiny white teeth, she starts thinking his harassment is erotic? She is the kind of women sexual harassers think all women are, like behind all their protests they really like men saying those kinds of things to them. Thanks for setting back proper behavior between the sexes about fifteen years, Miranda.
Samantha is in the waiting room of the clinic waiting for her test results. The doctor comes over to her and tells her that her results are back. Samantha realizes that the doctor is leading her into the "little room," and she faints. Carrie tells us that her test came out negative, and that the doctor just wanted to take her to a quiet place to lecture her on safe sex practices. I doubt she'll listen, though.
Carrie is back at the seedy hotel waiting in the lobby for Big. A man comes up to her and propositions her. She finds Big checking in and tells him that she was propositioned, and that she can't do this anymore. She runs out of the hotel and lights a cigarette, and Charlotte bumps into her. Big runs out of the hotel, and Charlotte looks stunned. Big tells her that he had business in the area and bumped into Carrie. Charlotte tells them that she was checking on her wedding gown at the tailor, and then she tells them she has to leave and she runs off. D'oh -- busted!
Carrie is at Charlotte's apartment while Charlotte is wrapping up her stuff in bubble wrap and packing. Carrie is trying to explain how she couldn't help herself by going back with Big. Charlotte tells her Big is married, so now Carrie is the other woman. Carrie tells her she feels bad about it, and Charlotte tells her she should feel bad, and that all she really thinks about is how it will affect her if Natasha found out, not how Natasha feels. Charlotte reminds Carrie that she is getting married in three weeks, and then asks Carrie how she would feel if someone had an affair with Kyle. Carrie tells her she would kill them. Charlotte doesn't know how Carrie could do it, and Carrie tells her she is going to get out of it. Okay, wait a minute. Charlotte is getting married in only three weeks? It would take months just to get that wedding gown of her dreams, much less get a church and a place for a reception in New York City that would be available on the same date. For the high falutin' wedding Charlotte wants, it would take over a year to arrange what she wants. Talk about suspension of disbelief!
Carrie tells us that "a week of fantasizing hot sex with the unknown man inside the sandwich had gotten to Miranda. She needed to at least see who it was she was dealing with." Miranda walks up to the sandwich and asks to see his face, so he takes off the face mask. He looks like a college-aged guy -- kind of stoned with long hair in his face. Miranda smiles and walks away, and Carrie tells us, "After all, what did they really have in common? She was a lawyer and he was a sandwich." He is a sexual harasser, and she gets off on it. Harassing sandwiches and you, perfect together!
There is yodeling music in the background, and Samantha and Reymi are in the sex swing moaning and groaning as Carrie tells us that after a week of anxiety, Samantha enjoyed the benefits of safe sex. The swing breaks and they fall to the floor. I guess it wasn't so safe, huh? Yuk yuk yuk!
Carrie is in Big's bed; they got it on during his lunch hour while Natasha was at the Hamptons. Yeah, it really looks like Carrie is stopping this affair. Except for the part about her still having sex with Big. As he is getting dressed, Big tells her to take a shower and have something to eat if she wants. Carrie tells him she feels like a hooker, and since he is married they need to end the affair. Big offers to call Natasha to tell her that he wants a divorce, and Carrie tells him not to. Big thinks she doesn't want him to tell Natasha because she is love with CIM and isn't willing to give him up. Carrie hands him the phone, and he tells her he will tell Natasha only if she is going to be there for him. She tells him she isn't ready for that, so he leaves and tells her to let herself out. Big is such an asshole in this scene that he is even turning me off, and I love the little slimeball.
As Carrie is walking around half naked in Big's kitchen eating out of a Chinese food container, she looks at pictures of Natasha and things that she has decorated the house with, like tea roses and antique sugar bowls. Natasha comes home early and catches Carrie in the kitchen trying to get out through the back door. She follows Carrie down the back stairs and yells out that she knew she was having an affair with her husband, but not in her own home. Natasha then falls down some stairs and falls flat on her face. Carrie runs back up to see how she is, and a ribbon of blood pours out of Natasha's mouth. Ouch! Over Natasha's protests, Carrie gets a taxi for them and they go to the hospital.
Carrie is sitting in the waiting room of the emergency room when Big arrives. He asks how Natasha is and Carrie tells him she lost a tooth and needed some stitches in her lip. Her parents are on their way, so Carrie is leaving. Big thanks her for being there, and tells her he will call her. Carrie looks all disgusted and says, "For what? We are so over, we need a new word for over," and she looks at him real hard walks away. Yeah, right. I'll bet anyone a dollar she ends up with him again week. When Carrie gets home, CIM is waiting for her. Damn! I was hoping he got tired of Carrie's shit and never came back. Carrie tells us, "Somehow I had found a way to let myself out of the mess, and I made it home." Honey, life is not like a Lifetime movie. Just you wait for your ass to get burned!