Previously on Miss Alli Takes The Week Off And Attends Her Reunion, Which Reminds Her That High School Was Kind Of Like Survivor , Only With Fewer Rats And More Cheerleading: Rory was peevish over the women's admission that he was targeted for definite banishment, and he laid on a guilt trip as thick as the dearly departed Bubba's head. Julie and Twila forged an unlikely, Butt-and-Jeff friendship over their endangered chick status at Lopevi, while Rory continued to make clear that he was no one's working stiff. Lopevi used its animal-wrangling skills to land a steak-and-eggs meal after it turned out that Eliza is only a pig magnet when she hangs around in bars. Julie tried to ingratiate herself into Lopevi using her naked ass, while Twila did the same using her fully clothed air of simple, salt-of-the-earth, highway-working, good old American gullibility. The immunity challenge -- apparently modeled after some sort of underwater version of Mousetrap -- demonstrated that new blood is needed in the Department of Challenge Planning, and also that Leann is one of the only people you will ever see who could drown in a demitasse cup. Lopevi delivered another sound thrashing to the Girls-N-Rory squad. Back at camp, an offhand comment from Lisa that made the mistake of recognizing that no one's continuing presence can be guaranteed was construed by the preening Ami as a sign of obvious disloyalty, and all of a sudden, the women turned on one of their own. Adios, Lisa. This season would not have been the same without your charms. And when I say "charms," I mean...well, you know what I mean. We all know what I mean.
Credits. That one shot looks eerily like power lines. Maybe it secretly is, and electromagnetic fields make you stupid. Imagine if we discovered that the idiocy of Survivor contestants had an organic cause. You could remove the source, and after 39 days of unoccupied time, they would invent a car that ran on Saltines or something. Nothing would amuse me more than being able to cite the efficiency of my car in "miles per cracker." Which I would pronounce "pa-cracka."
Uh-oh, roiling clouds! That can only mean another day of manufactured drama. As awkward conversations throughout history have shown, there's nothing that says "human interest" like talking about the weather. We return to Lopevi on Day 16, where apparently, the entire sequence has been put together to encourage the development of a new breed of dirty euphemisms. For instance, Chris is hacking the bamboo. See? You could totally use that. That would liven up your party. Or, you know, confession. In other news, Sarge is carrying wood in his sack. There's another one! KA-POW! They're everywhere, people. I'm not so crazy about what "Twila and Julie are hauling a log" would be taken to mean, but they are, as is Chad.
Speaking of Chad, he gives us the update on the always-fascinating matter of division of labor, which is the freshest topic for a Survivor interview since You Never Really Know Who You Can Trust. Chad, perched in a tree with the WonderFoot 3000 pointing directly at the camera so that you can admire how shiny it is, interviews that camp is now running like a well-oiled and yet still somehow creaky machine, and everyone has certain jobs to do. Some get water, some do dishes...and then there's John, whose job it is to occupy space so that the camp doesn't fold in on itself, turn into a black hole, suck in the entire CBS lineup, and lead to the advent of a twenty-four-hour boogie-boarding channel. We watch the pretty boy lie asleep by the fire as Sarge casts a disapproving eye from under his Tilley hat. For those of you with degrees in ancient (and I do mean ancient) history, I do believe that is, if not the actual Hater, a very close relative of the Hater. There's an absolutely awesome shot of Julie and Twila sitting there like, "Hum dee dum," and then John sort of sits up into the frame, totally oblivious to all the people who were just sitting there staring at his motionless self.
John tells us in an interview that he's "tired and bored," and adds that because there's not much to do, folks on this team just kind of "kick back." Of course, this is a reasonable impression for him to hold, since he apparently is unconscious during the parts of the day with working in them, and he only rouses himself for the back-kicking. Every day as he wakes up at noon, he undoubtedly says to himself, "The pot-cleaning fairies came again! That is amazing! And the birds who bring us water have once again blessed us by carrying buckets in their beaks! Thank God, or the need to provide a subsistence lifestyle for myself would cut into my kicking-back time." Trying to make the point, Chad walks up and drops a bunch of wood right behind John's head, but John just turns around, looks, and doesn't react. Sarge sets his lips in a pout, stares at John, and gives a tiny nod that either means, "Yeah, sucker, you're going home," or "Chad, you distract him, and I'll stab him with the immunity stick, because who doesn't love irony?" Chad now interviews that "John is an enigma," but he doesn't seem to mean "an enigma" so much as "a useless tool," because he goes on to say that the big enigmatic mystery of which he speaks is how John can sit around on his ass while everyone else is working. Which isn't really mysterious, as much as it's just irritating. It occurs to me that we'd all be better off if fewer people confused the problem of pedestrian uselessness with the higher purpose of being lost in thought, so...don't encourage the world's inert philosophers, Chad. Pretty soon, we'll all be tying their shoes for them because they're going, "Get me, I'm a conundrum. No time for laces!" Anyway, Chad says that, up until now, there hasn't been that much talk about John's situation, but people are starting to notice and make remarks.
To wit, Chad and Chris now trash-talk John, marveling to each other that what John lacks in willingness to do work, he makes up for in voracious eating. Chris adds that John is "the kind of person that coasts through the game," and then vows that John won't coast on their watch. "No way," Chad agrees. I'm not sure Chris can really back that up, is the thing. Chris is the guy in every monster movie who's like, "Ain't no way some giant flyin' worm is gonna scare me offa my own property," and then he goes outside, and the thing you see is the monster POV shot of him spending his last moments of life screaming like a girl. But for now, back at camp, being schemed against without his knowledge makes John so tired and woozy that he needs to lie down. Fortunately, he spends most of his time about 86% horizontal, so from there, it's really just a matter of dropping his head.
Over at Yasur, Rory prays. As he explains in an interview, he always prays first thing in the morning, but today, he's praying especially thankfully, because he "cracked these ladies" and survived tribal council the night. I'm not sure he really cracked them so much as he benefited from Lisa's flapping yap and Ami's need to throw the weight of her chest around, but there's no need to begrudge him his moment. Rory explains that his new plan is to try to start something with Leann and Ami, with whom we see him taking a walk in the jungle, because he's thinking that even though they got rid of Lisa, four is still a bigger number than one, so he might not quite be safe yet. As Ami sucks thoughtfully on sugar cane (auditioning for her centerfold layout, no doubt), Rory asks her what the situation is as far as their alliance, because he really doesn't want to go before Eliza. Ami returns to Our Alliances, Ourselves mode as she explains that the women have been inspired by the fact that "no woman's alliance has stayed together through this game, ever." Ugh. Nothing makes me hate the sisterhood like reality television. I mean, men's alliances haven't stayed together, either, because it's really not a group activity. If anything, I would be more depressed if women players failed to protect and advance themselves out of some imagined obligation to be "nice" or "loyal" in a game that requires the opposite, you know? But at any rate, it seems like Ami sees this as a situation where the women have something to prove. About the unifying power of eggs or whatever.
Rory continues to argue that Eliza has nothing to offer the team and he does, but Leann just tells him that the women's alliance is what it is, and that it's too damn bad for him, basically. Ami brings up the issue of what would happen when the merge (which she calls the "merger," which sounds just as stupid as it always does) comes, and she snottily asks about "the guys back home." Rory says, "What do you fucking mean?", which causes Ami to coolly lecture him, "Don't cuss at me." Ami apparently is not aware that that isn't really cussing at you; "Fuck off" is cussing at you. He's just cussing in a conversation with you. Not that I don't appreciate the lessons in etiquette from the precious little pro-hair-braiding side of things. Girls are so delicate, you know. Rory tells Ami that he's sick of her expecting him to do all the work around camp in anticipation of being thrown out anyway, and Ami tells him that, in that case, he shouldn't do any work -- he should feel free to sit around on his ass and await his booting. Rory tries to tell her she's being ridiculous, because he doesn't give a rip about Sarge and Chad and those guys. And if Ami were as smart as she thinks she is, she'd probably have checked this out when Rory and Bubba first got to the team, rather than assuming that the most reliable alliance would be one based on boys versus girls. But that wouldn't have gotten her any I Am Woman, Hear Me Snore points with whatever group of weird, incense-burning goofballs she probably hangs around with back home. Rory tries to remind Ami that he's been working the whole time for the tribe, unlike Eliza, but she can't hear him over the din of her self-congratulatory smirk, which is so obnoxious that it gives off a deafening, though subliminal, cry of "nanny nanny boo boo."
Heading back to camp, Rory voices over that being told he's getting the boot has "done a job on [his] head," and that he's decided to enter "self-destruct mode." Apparently, he has a Sandra-like plan to screw the team or sabotage the camp or something. Which is, as it was when Sandra did it, so very mature. Because honestly, how dare they vote him off when that's only the purpose of the entire game? So Rory explains that he's going to "salt the earth." Presumably...I don't know, stomp the sugar cane or something. I don't think they even have salt, so maybe he's going to pee on stuff. "Soak the earth with urine" just doesn't have that Biblical ring, though. "If I get voted off this island, the Yasur tribe will burn," he says. So maybe he's got incendiary devices on timers. Maybe Jerry Bruckheimer has taken this show over, too.
We move to a challenge beach, where the tribes approach each other. Lopevi is interested -- and Chad looks amused -- to see that Yasur has ditched Lisa instead of Rory. Jeff notes the surprised faces on Lopevi, and Twila -- who is developing into the person who always answers Probst's rhetorical questions with total sincerity and makes explicit what he was, for once, trying to leave for the rest of us to fill in -- agrees that she was sure the women would stay together and boot Rory. Jeff explains that today's challenge is for reward. In this challenge, you start by cracking a coconut on a rock and filling another coconut shell with the juice. You then make your way through an obstacle course that includes a couple of seesaws and a cage and stuff. See, the trick is to do all this without spilling, get it? Then, you pour the juice into a jar at the other end and return. The jar has a black line, and the first tribe to fill the jar to the line and bring the full jar back to the starting line will win. The reward this week is what Jeff calls a "Home Café," which makes no sense to me when he first says it. A what? It's not at their camp, so why isn't it just a café? Anyway, he says that there will be a coffee maker, "lots of Folgers coffee," croissants, juice, and a little something from home for each person. (I always hope one of the letters from home will say something like, "I am thinking of you, and realizing I don't miss you that much." Because you know that's happened at least once.) In addition to enjoying the sensual pleasures of the "Home Café" during the reward itself, the winning team will get to take a coffee maker, mugs, and some coffee (Folgers!) back to camp.
And, you know, not to get nitpicky (heh), but Jeff tells them that the coffees include "every flavor you can think of." My sources at Folgers.com suggest that "every flavor you can think of" includes, in this case, French Vanilla and Hazelnut Cream. And then a lot of things that taste like...you know, coffee. I think that if I really put on my thinking cap, I could probably come up with a few flavors besides hazelnut and vanilla. Jeff hasn't spent nearly enough time in the Pacific Northwest.
Lopevi has to sit somebody out, and it will be Sarge, who does appear perhaps to be not so light on his feet and probably a good candidate for sitting in this situation. The first two people up are John and Eliza. I really do hate recapping challenges. It's all walking and sneaking and trying not to spill anything. Eliza empties her coconut and returns to the beginning. Leann goes , starting out significantly ahead of Chad. You'd think that this would be one of the few challenges where Chad might have slightly more trouble maneuvering, but you would be wrong. (Or I would be.) For a guy who hasn't had that foot all that long, he certainly uses it like he's had it all his life. Ultimately, Chad passes Leann and finishes ahead of her. He pours and returns, then Leann does. Chris and Ami go . Rory and Twila go . When Scout's turn comes, she just dumps hers out, letting somebody else go . Apparently, she's thinking this course is too hard for her, or for her artificial knee. Which...I don't want to say Chad's showing her up, but she's got to be sitting there like, "Oh, sure, I and my replaced knee would get on the same season as Ass-Kicking Bionic Foot Guy." Eliza and Julie, Ami and Rory, Chad, Leann, Eliza, blah dee blah.
Both teams get close, and it's ultimately Leann and Julie in the last leg. Leann gets a little ahead, and then a little more ahead. She fills up the jar past the line, but starts back without the jar, which has to be full when she gets back to the start. She actually trips and falls on the way back to the starting line, but she manages to get back up without spilling, and she makes it back to the start and wins the challenge for her tribe. "Yasur wins Home Café reward!" Jeff yells, because he gets a hundred dollars every time he says "Home Café." Ch-ching! Lopevi, on the other hand, is getting nothing. NOTHING! Go home, losers! Yeah. Have we mentioned Yasur is going to the Home Café? I say "Home," you say "Café"! "Home!" "Café!" "Home!" "Café!" Yaaaaaaaay, Folgers! And in the ensuing celebration, you'll notice that none of the women has any armpit hair. Can I ask just how pampered the castaways are these days? They don't even seem hungry anymore. Maybe it's an insurance issue, but it's gotten pretty obvious this season that life at camp is not exactly a matter of you versus the possibility of dying of exposure. I'm not saying I want to see people suffer, but...well, maybe I do, a little bit.
And during the commercial, you figure out why Jeff had been using that stupid terminology -- "Home Café" is the name of the Folgers single-serving coffee maker they're promoting. Wow. You know, it's not that there hasn't always been product placement, but really, it has gotten unbelievably crass and tortured this season. Although I will say you haven't lived until you've seen the demo at the Folgers site where they show you how to make a cup of coffee. Put in water! Put in coffee packet! Press button! Sometimes, you have to know when not to use video enhancements, because if I were the plaintiff's lawyer representing someone who managed to burn himself with that machine, I would use that video as evidence that they intentionally marketed it to people who were too brain-dead not to scald themselves. (Also during that commercial break? The Amazing Race returns November 16. Considering how my other shows are going this fall, all I can say is...I can't wait to see you, Phil.)
Yasur makes its way to the Home Café™, where there is a big bulletin board with family pictures and baby pictures of everyone. Rory points to one and says, "This is me," which I think is awesome, because these women are dumb enough that I can totally imagine them standing around going, "Ohhhh, which one of us is this, in the picture of the little African-American boy?" Awesome. Eliza gushes in an interview that it was wonderful to see everyone's pictures, blah blah blah. Different people point out different pictures of themselves, and we learn that Leann, like most girls of the late '80s, was a victim of traumatic hair feathering. Scout calls herself "a little ragamuffin." Eliza tells us that seeing all of these family pictures of everyone "touched [her] heart." I like the picture of Ami where she looks like the lost Go-Go. And...is that Leann in a cowboy hat made of plastic cheese? Please tell me it is.
And then, it is time for many admiring shots of the Home Café™ machine itself. It's by Folgers. It's so easy to use! It brews such delicious-looking coffee! They eat croissants, and then Eliza stumbles across a stack of envelopes, one for each person. They each have, it turns out, some letters from folks back home, so this will be the part where there's lots of crying. Even though they've been away from home for, like, two and a half weeks. I mean...okay, miss your family. But seriously, no one's gotten taller since you left. You'd still recognize everyone. I go for months without seeing Sister S, and that doesn't mean I weep whenever she sends me an email. For some reason, Rory gives Ami a big kiss on the cheek, which is more than she deserves. They all toast each other with juice and coffee, and Ami product-places the French vanilla. "Who wants coffee ?" she asks, which would tend to remind the audience of the main problem with the Home Café™ in this setting, which is that there are five people and it makes one...cup...at...a time. It would be fine if you live alone and drink only one cup of coffee, but if you're like me, and you drink half-caff so that you can fill your mug all morning long, the Home Café™ is not for you. But don't think about that. Just look at the shiny machine. Works great for large crowds who want to drink coffee in sequence rather than in unison!
And in this commercial break, you learn that if you don't vote for Bush, the United States of America will be eaten by wolves. And you thought there was no subtlety left in politics.
At Lopevi on Day 18, it's time to read treemail. Today's treemail came with a slingshot with which they have to practice, because they'll all need to shoot at the challenge later. Unsurprisingly, Sarge gives a little lecture to everyone about how to hold the slingshot. Shut up, Sarge. He then tells us that there simply isn't any question that Lopevi will win this challenge, what with its being a boys' game and everything. But honestly, how many guys who are in their twenties and thirties played with...slingshots? I mean...I just don't think that's been common in my lifetime. Maybe the guys would have an obvious advantage if it were Nintendo. Or emotional obfuscation. Sarge says that Yasur "is like a high-school team against an SEC team." I guess that would make it doubly humiliating if the SEC team lost, right? Yeah. "They're going to give us a run for our money, but they won't win," Sarge declares. Laboring under the curse of the whammy Sarge is endeavoring to place upon them, the members of Lopevi practice slingshotting. John tries a shot, and says that he's been a target and a "threat" all along, so he figures that, at this point, they need to win the immunity challenge, or he's toast. He doesn't seem to be aware that he might have been able to stop this from happening if he hadn't become a complete slacker after the team mixup, but there you go. I mean, the Sarge group needs to do something before the merge, and they might have been willing to make John part of it if they didn't kind of hate him. But, whatever. He fires the slingshot. Dramatic!
Over at Yasur, Rory is "amusing" the team with a pro-wrestling-style bit of patter before they practice with the slingshot. He tells us he feels great, and is at "high rev." Partly because of all the caffeine. By Folgers! From the Home Café™! Because when it comes to your corporate sponsors, the best part of sucking up is Folgers in your cup. Rory shows the women how to use the slingshot, and explains in an interview that he knows he's going if they don't win, so the challenge is critical for him.
The teams head to the challenge beach. Jeff takes back the big pointy immunity stick and declares that immunity is available once again. He also tells them that he sure hopes they practiced with the slingshot, because it's time to show their stuff. He explains that each tribe member will shoot at a vertical grid of tiles that are suspended with wires within a wooden frame. The frame corresponds to...man, this is hard to explain. The point is that you take shots at tiles, and depending on which ones you shoot, you gradually not only get closer to being finished, but you knock out members of your own tribe from shooting. Just trust me. So ideally, you would concentrate not only on getting tiles, but on not knocking out the people on your team who are good shooters, although it looks like that would probably require more precision than any of these people is likely to have.
Sitting out for Lopevi will be Chris. The first shooters are Rory and Chad. They both hit. Oh, and hello, Chad's arm. I am always happy to see you. Then Ami misses and Julie misses. Scout and Sarge both hit. Twila misses, Leann hits. Eliza misses, John hits. Ami hits, Julie misses. Some time elapses, the clouds roll by, and Yasur is up 7-5. Scout hits, and Leann is eliminated. Rory hits. John hits. Eliza misses. Twila misses. Rory hits. Chad hits. Julie misses. Rory hits, and Ami is gone. 17-15 Yasur. Chad's arm hits. Scout hits. Sarge hits, and Julie's gone. We have reached the point where Yasur has two tiles left to hit, and Lopevi has three. Rory hits, bumping off Scout, and leaving Rory as the only Yasurrian. John misses. Rory misses. Chad's arm misses. And Rory, coming up big, hits, finishing the challenge and giving Yasur the win. So the girls can all still pretend to like him, because they don't have to bump him off. Jeff tells everyone that tonight will be the end for one of Lopevi's members. They head back to camp to prepare for tribal council later. Have I ever mentioned that I hate recapping challenges?
Yasur returns to camp, where a bat is still hanging upside-down. That bat is the most bored bat of all time. They're all happy about the win -- particularly Rory, who knows he saved himself from being totally hosed. And you'll never guess what they all think would make a great way to celebrate. Coffee -- by Folgers! One cup at a time! Home Café™! Rory interviews that he "rocked the hell outta [Ami's] world today." Which...wait, is that dirty? He claims that this is because she could have chosen either to be in an alliance with him or to get him out, and she did neither. I don't know if this is so much rocking her world, but...whatever. I think I'm glad it didn't turn out to be dirty. Rory says that Ami, thanks to having blown him off and then seen him save himself, is now "#1 on [his] hit list." The women all congratulate Rory on what a great job he did, while Ami coolly interviews that Rory is "cocky," but that she will graciously allow him his happiness since he did just single-handedly keep himself from being eliminated. She says that while she's happy for the victory, she's sad that either Julie or Twila will be eliminated , not that she wasn't originally in an alliance that was planning to boot Julie anyway. Ah, well. Consistency is the hobgoblin of people who care about consistency.
Volcano! At Lopevi, Sarge says that they lost, and that they will go to tribal council. Thanks for the update, man. Where would I be without you? He explains to the math-impaired that this left "us" equal to "them," which I guess means, for the moment, that "we" are Lopevi and "they" are Yasur, not that anyone seems entirely convinced that that's the long-term alignment to watch. Elsewhere, Chad has a chat with Chris in which he says that he doesn't trust Julie, and continues to believe that, as of the merge, Julie will flee directly for her women friends. Chris puts in that Julie wants to boot John, and Chad's like, "Well, right." Because she would. I mean, you at least have to suspect that she would suggest someone other than herself, no? Chad interviews that trust is a big issue in the game, and that he doesn't trust John, and isn't sure of Julie either. He tells Chris that although he doesn't want to keep John, they at least have "the guys." See, I think they need to abandon this idea, because even if they boot Julie, there will only be a tie, and that's assuming that Rory comes back and votes with the guys, which I see no reason to believe he would, necessarily. At any rate, Chris confirms that Chad doesn't trust Julie. Chad adds that if he were convinced of Julie's loyalty, he'd boot John, but he isn't. Chris brings up the reasonable point that if the women's alliance were as ironclad as Chad is characterizing it, then presumably, they wouldn't have booted Lisa. So there's obviously some opportunity to crack that alliance. And when Julie wasn't in with Scout and friends at the beginning and has been separated from them for this long? Hell. Most of her original girlfriends are gone, and I see no reason to assume she wouldn't stay with an alliance of guys if she thought it benefited her.
There is a whole little segment of moth-spiderweb imagery here that is a little heavy-handed, but still pretty funny. Because...yeah, webs are sticky. Don't get eaten. This message brought to you by Folgers coffee. No, not really. John sits around at camp, and Chris tells him that he's not sure where Chad is going at tribal council. John tells us that he has to trust one person, and that he has chosen Chris. That would be the same Chris who was recently shit-talking how much John eats. Hee hee. There's a strong ally for you. John thinks that he and Chris "could really do some damage." Mostly Chris. And mostly to John's ability to stay in the game. Interestingly, Chris asks John whom he would vote to get rid of, and John puts up Chad. Probably a mistake, as it washes away any idea in Chris's mind that John is down with the boys and would make a good member of a male alliance. John argues that Chad will get "the sympathy vote" with the foot, and he repeats it in an interview. And you know...it's true. It's gross, but it's true. If I were John, I'd be thinking the same thing. I don't know if I'd say it or try to act on it, but you bet I'd be sitting there thinking, "Let's see, preening pretty boy versus really nice guy with one foot. Mm-hmm, that'll be a close vote." Although it's not just the sympathy factor -- it's also because John sucks and Chad is cool and likable, which John probably knows.
John then has a chat with Twila and Julie, in which he tells them of his plan to get rid of Chad. (My favorite part is where Julie is so laden down with wood that she can barely walk, and Twila's like, "Yeah, go on, I'll fill you in later." At which point Julie totters off, about to fall down dead, and the shot actually looks like it might be from a Christopher Guest film or an episode of Arrested Development.) The dumb thing about this discussion is that John is offering them Chad instead of one of them, but he hasn't offered them a reason for Chad instead of him. I mean, if John really believes it's him going, then Twila and Julie probably know that or will know that, so they won't need to vote against Chad to protect themselves, and John doesn't seem to be making much of a case as to why it would be in their interests to go with him instead of Sarge and Company. Twila and Julie talk like they might be willing to go along with the Chad boot, which John says would be accomplished through an alliance of the two women with him and Chris. John interviews that he takes Twila at her word, owing to the fact that she's "a rough redneck," and "all rough rednecks that [he has] met are pretty loyal." And also, they wear trucker hats, chew straw, and loooove a tractor pull. Shut up, John.
Later, Lopevi lines up to make its way to tribal council. John says that everyone could be lying to him, but that he's either out or he's not out, so there's not much point in his worrying over it. "Tonight is the night for me to figure out where I stand in this game," he says. And I can't argue with that. Knowing that, I wonder if he wishes he had brought water more and slept in less.
The sky turns an unnatural blue color, and the team heads for tribal council. Once there, they take their seats and face Jeff. He asks Chris about the fact that Lopevi, which had been on such a nice roll, suddenly suffered back-to-back losses. Chris says that it did seem like they were dominating, but then...gee, what happened? He's not sure. He does argue that the losses were both close, and he thinks they smoked Yasur in the ones they won, so there's that, at least.
Jeff asks Chad what it was like having to think about voting somebody off. Chad says that whenever people are going off and doing various things, everyone is very aware of who's with whom, and who's alone, and whether it's good to be alone or not. He says that "there's a lot of posturing going on." Chris is then asked whether everyone on the tribe has a role, and he very, very carefully says that everyone has something that they do. Sure, in John's case, it's sleeping, but we don't need to say that out loud. Sarge is asked what Twila does well, and he calls her "the wanderer for exotic foods," which makes her beam and laugh in a way that's very endearing. He says she makes meals, she gets firewood..."She does everything." Jeff asks John what Twila could do better, and John says that she's such a "workhorse" that he kind of wishes she would take more naps. HA! That was funny. Pathetic, but funny. Kind of fate-sealing, too. But still funny, because naps are good. I endorse naps. Jeff asks John whether seeing Twila skipping naps ever makes him think...you know, that he should maybe take fewer naps himself. John gives the fundamentally wrong answer that he does things whenever he's asked to. And as we've discussed before, the first lesson of camp work is that you really can't wait around to be asked. That's a demonstrably bad answer. John babbles a bunch more about naps, which...yeah, you can only say "nap" so many times before it starts to sink in that you know the word a bit too well.
Jeff asks Chad to talk about life at camp with people he's living with and competing against. Chad says something kind of convoluted about how first impressions are really trustworthy if you have good instincts...or something...and how if you can get to someone's "core level," then you can trust them...I don't know. I'm kind of staring at his eyes, which I like. Chad says that he thinks he can pick up on who the manipulating liars are, and I believe that might very well be true. Jeff asks Julie whether the tribe trusts her. She says that the tribe has jelled well, so she thinks that while there has been and will still be uneasiness about her loyalties, she just hopes they'll take the proof of where she stands from her votes -- including the one she's about to make. Chris is asked what his vote is about, and he mentions "trust." He says that sometimes, it seems like trust is there, and sometimes, it's not. He also says he's basing his vote on who will benefit him in the future of the game.
But now, it's voting time. Sarge votes. Twila votes. John votes for Chad. "I'm afraid you might sneak by some more, and I need you to go," he says. Julie votes. Chad votes. Chris votes.
Jeff returns with the Urn-O-Names. The first vote goes to John. Then Chad. Then John. Then John. Then John. So in spite of the efforts to create suspense, that is indeed it for the pretty boy. Snuff! And then John turns around, and while he doesn't actually give the finger when he says, "Take it easy," I think the finger is implied. (Officially, it's a hang-ten sign with the index and pinkies, but it sure looks like a flip-off to me.) Jeff reminds them all that you never know whom you can trust, and he sends them all back to camp.
In John's exit interview, we learn that he played and he lost. He hopes Chris wins, he hopes Sarge comes in second, and everybody else can bite it. Ah, well. Not everyone is a poet.
week: Sarge's naked ass. No, seriously. And Rory figures out that his tribe is worthless, which means he was a little slow to catch that snap. "Everything is turned on its head," whatever that means. Something about merging? Who knows. I'm anxious for the merge, myself, because this has been the most smoothly-executed pre-merge sequence of all time, and it's actually very boring.