Scottsdale: Windrose Drive

MPDP appears in jeans and a brown suede shirt. She's in some kind of OK Corral-type set. (Is it a set? A real town? What do I care? I'm calling it Goofball Gulch.) Frank (in cowboy hat and fringed vest) and Doug (denim shirt and leather chaps) pace off, turn, and aim pieces of wood carved into vaguely gun-like shapes at each other. Professor Frink: "It'd be great if those were real guns." Me: "Maybe, if they were loaded." Frink: "Yeah." Me: "Yeah, but who do you hope is the faster shot?" He has to think about that. Doug notices Ty standing on top of a building and aims his "gun" at him. Ty goes all sheriff on Doug's ass. It's pretty unconvincing. But wait! If you're not impressed with Ty's acting skills, maybe you'll like him as a stunt man. Or a guitarist. Or whatever else he gets up to as he attention-whores his way through yet another episode.

Back to MPDP, who's in front of a sign that I believe reads "Sherif." Frink: "Doesn't 'sheriff" have two 'F's?" Me: "Usually, but they've only got $1000. Gotta cut corners somewhere." Homeowners Stacey and Chris, and Jody and Michelle, want their bedrooms redone. Jody and Michelle want their "stadium-sized" bedroom redone because it's the room they haven't done yet. It's a fairly large room, though I don't think it's the largest bedroom yet. White walls, beige carpet. There are two large arched window covered with white custom-made shutters. They've got a lodgepole entertainment unit, but they're over the Southwest thing. They want to update the room now. The king-sized bed has no frame and neutral linens; there's a blanket box in orangey-toned wood at the end of the bed. Over in the opposite corner of the room, there's a small desk and a quilt stand. There's a wide chest of drawers in a medium orangey-toned stain with a large matching mirror above it along the wall opposite the entertainment unit. There are children's drawings and a large framed wedding photo on the wall here, a pennant and a wreath there. Very little of the furniture in this room goes together. Michelle says it gets very hot there in the summer, and adds that the room is so large that their boys will play football in there. There's a shot of a large triptych, each panel of which features a single tulip (reddish pink blossom on yellow background; yellow blossom on eggplant background; white blossom on red background). They love these paintings; they got them in San Francisco. They're by artist Warren Knapp, whose slogan, "Big Art for Big Walls," makes me think that he's definitely found his niche market. He appears to be targeting those people who've bought monster homes and McMansions and don't have a clue how to decorate their twenty-foot high foyer or their 520-square foot living room with the sixteen-foot cathedral ceiling. More power to him. He could also go with "Mass-Produced Art for Mass-Produced Homes." The style is sort of greeting-card illustration if you ask me. I'd buy a card that looked like this, but I wouldn't spend a pile of money to get a big mass-produced version of it for my walls. Anyway, those are "their colours": purple, muted red, and gold. Michelle says that Doug does a lot of things that push the limits, but she's never seen a room of his she hasn't liked. I have to assume she hasn't seen the Brazil room. She thinks the best thing they could see when they open their eyes are some colours that work with the rest of the house and a sitting area, because they both love to read and lounge and listen to music. They want it to be their getaway place.

Chris (a principal) and Stacey (a school librarian) don't know what to do with their master bedroom. It's also a pretty large room, but for some reason it doesn't get called "stadium-sized," even though with windows identical to their neighbours', I presume their houses are pretty similar. The walls are a warm yellow; the carpet's greige. The bed has a black metal headboard and is placed between two windows with dark blue drapes. The bed linens are some kind of Holly Hobbie floral/quilty deal in white and light blue. There are white night tables on each side of the bed and an orangey-toned wooden chest at the end. Along one side of the room is a red wing chair with a lamp and a tall, teensy white table beside it. to that is an old-fashioned vanity table and trifold mirror in a warm orangey stain. In the corner to that, the TV is on a low wooden table. Stacey and Chris say they're excited about having Frank work on their room because he's not afraid of colour and they love colour. Shot of a painting in many shades of pinkish red with lots of strong blue, framed in gold. Stacey mentions that she likes fall colours, and can imagine some purples being used. Chris says the worst thing he can imagine would be country -- which surprises me, since the room is kind of country-ish, though not the nasty clichd stuff they go on to describe: borders and dried flowers and pastels. They say they're trying to get away from that sort of thing. They claim they're not going to be too uptight and are into the adventure of it all.

Key swap. Boring. I note that a wide, short v-neck is incredibly flattering on MPDP. If she needs an evening gown, she should look for one with a neckline like that and get a beautiful-but-not-too-flashy necklace.

Chris and Stacey find Doug and Ty laying boards out on the floor. When Chris and Stacey arrive, Doug and Ty start tossing a football back and forth. Ty eventually takes the ball from Doug and hurls himself onto the bed, face down, and howls. Doug's wearing a black short-sleeved t-shirt and jeans, looking his usual telegenic self. Stacey says they want to make the room romantic and give it back to the parents. As Ty hauls in wood, Doug announces that they're going to call the room "Barrier." He plans to build a big wall -- six and half feet tall -- to divide the room into sleeping and sitting areas. He says they're going to paint the walls "butternut," and then I guess the divider wall is going to be "rust." Stacey loves that. They unload the room.

Frank is lying on the bed and pointing at items to keep or lose. When his team arrives, Michelle says they need to liven up the colours and "get rid of some of the nineteenth-century-ness of it." She wants to make it more modern, intimate, and exotic. Frank holds up an ornately decorated incense package and says it's the inspiration for the room. He's planning "really rich, warm, understated colour for the wall." He says they're going with the existing burgundy and blue colours, but they're going to embellish them. They're going to do artwork, bedding, and a canopy. They're going to make a TV stand out of a white chest of drawers. He says that when they shut the door to the bedroom, they'll be in India during the colonial period. This, I've gotta see. Frink and I exchange the usual skeptical glances we share anytime non-Indians purport to do something Indian. Jody and Michelle are on board. Frank does a little happy dance. The room is unloaded.

Ty is busily building the wall -- inside the room, mind you, so we won't have any of these "oh my gosh, the piece doesn't fit" non-dramas. Doug gets Ty to explain to his team that they're not using sheetrock because it's time-consuming.

Frank shows his team a potted dark purple petunia. I know they look like used Kleenexes half the time, but I've got a soft spot for petunias because they're cheap, they're colourful, and they bloom all damn summer if you deadhead them regularly. Frank says he's not going for that exact colour, but that he wants that "velvety opulence, that rich Indian look." Now I'm interested. He reveals his paint; it's a beautiful medium blue-toned purple in the can. Of course I love it. I'm scared, though; there are a bunch more quart cans of paint. Frank shows a dark blue paint which he says is for the window wells.

Ty blathers on about MDF and glue and dust. Doug says he had to skimp on other stuff to put money into the wall.

Frank reveals a "bluish violet" for the furniture. Not loving that with the other colours, especially the main purple. Michelle says they'll love it. Jody pronounces it "very sexy." The other two cans are a bone white, for furniture. Furniture painted white? It's not striking me as terribly Indian, or British Colonial. Frank says, "I want it to be rich and dark and sexy and smoky and kind of Calcutta-like." MPDP fans herself. ["Well, sure. What's sexier than starvation? Only bubonic plague." -- Wing Chun]

The bumper back into the show is Ty writhing around on some hay, pretending to be shot. Doug explains the furniture layout to Stacey.

As Frank and his team begin painting, Jody says he feels like they should have some Indian music playing to inspire them. Of course, I think that they probably can't have music playing when the cameras are on, because it would just make things too difficult for the sound people. Nonetheless, MPDP says they could do that. They proceed to make feeble little sounds that I guess represent their perception of some Indian music. MPDP balances on one leg in her imitation of some kind of Indian dance. I glance at my husband. Frink: "I don't even know what to say." Note to Banyan/TLC: Maybe it'd be a good idea not to feature the parts where people are being somewhat ignorant.

Ty blathers incomprehensibly on, reassuring Stacey and Chris that this freestanding wall is going to be secure.

MPDP helps Frank's team paint. She wants to know if they're painting the ceiling. Well, I hope so. Apparently, there's some water damage somewhere (it's not shown) that affects the decision. Frank describes three options: leave it the way it is; paint the ceiling purple, too, or (sigh) paint a wavy "Indian-ish" line around the top of the wall or the edge of the ceiling or something. Please, not the wavy line. Though Jody and MPDP are interested in that. I'm surprised he has so much paint that painting the ceiling doesn't seem to present any additional expense. But why would Frank buy enough paint to cover the ceiling, too, if he wasn't sure what he'd do with it?

Ty gets Chris to fire some nails into the wall.

Frank asks the walls what they want, since he says he's not getting any answers from his team. The walls shrug indifferently. MPDP says that Jody and Michelle want the wavy line, but Frank said it was too gimmicky. They agree to paint the ceiling. Whew.

Doug and Stacey darken the stain on the chest of drawers. Doug says it has that "we just bought this piece" look. I know what he means, but I think a lot of people consider that highly desirable. Stacey says that Michelle and Jody did just buy it and didn't want it painted, but didn't say anything about staining. Doug pretends to give her a hard time about not saying anything about the piece until after they sanded it and prepared it for staining.

Frank's team agrees to paint the ceiling a solid purple.

Doug does the "are you worried about your room?" segment with Stacey as they work on the staining. She says she's a little nervous, because she doesn't want it to be too crafty or country. Doug: "Ooooh...well, you did have Frank. He's gonna paint a chicken. He's gonna do it. He's gonna go ballistic and paint chickens. Haven't you seen the chicken...he paints chickens in every room." Heh. Maybe he'll paint chickens wearing little saris and bindis. Oh, don't give me that look. He so would, if he thought of it.

MPDP says she'll go get some more painting tools. Frank says they have to take the blades off the ceiling fan and cover the mechanism with a garbage bag. Yawn.

Doug says they might do two coats of stain; he'd like the furniture to be very dark. They can recoat in eight hours, which is why he wanted to get on this first thing.

The ceiling in Frank's room is painted. Whatever.

Doug reveals his paint: bright yellow. This, I guess, is the "butternut" colour. Stacey "ooh"s and Doug asks her if she likes it. She hesitates but tries to sound enthusiastic: "Yeah!"

Frank discusses his plans with Ty (who's wearing his beaver T-shirt again). He says he needs a box to put on the dresser to contain the TV. Ty asks if they can call it something besides a box. You see, he really has problems with boxes these days. Ty's career ennui is starting to wear on my nerves. Frank's willing to call it a container. Anything to move the process along, I'm sure. There's a lot of pointless blather about having doors that open.

Doug reveals his other colour, for the partition wall: it's bright red. So the colour scheme is...McDonald's! Apparently, the homeowners have posted that the colours are really more like rust and gold, but I'm telling you, on TV, on this screen, it's pretty much McDonald's packaging all the way. MPDP wanders in, and Doug tells her not to give him any grief. Crouching beside him and slinging her arm around him, she wonders why he would think that, and whether he has a "guilty [sic] complex" or something. He just knows it. MPDP: "Why?" Doug: "Because there's no paint on the walls!" Everybody laughs.

Frank tells Ty he's making nightstands out of trash cans stacked end to end. He needs Ty to make wooden tops into which he can set tiles. Ty pretends to understand.

MPDP wants to know what Doug's team has been doing. They explain that they've been working on the wall and furniture. MPDP squawks at Doug: "Okay, so you're not in trouble. What's your problem?"

Frank is outside with Michelle. He tells her to assemble a cabinet with shutter doors, and says he'll send Jody out to help her while he works on some art projects.

MPDP tries to paint around one large piece of the new wall that's leaning up against the existing wall. Doug asks, "Yeah, can you girls get that out of here? Thanks." MPDP and Stacey struggle but manage to move it out of the way. Doug: "Lift with your knees! Lift with your knees! There you go. You don't want to hurt your backs."

Jody and Michelle wrestle with the "assembly required" furniture.

Doug laments the texture on the walls, because it means he can't do decorative finishes on them: "Everyone out there, don't put this texture on your walls." MPDP asks what is up with the texture on walls. I'll bet they see a lot of that, given how many newer houses they redecorate. Doug explains that it's "cheap and quick," and that it makes things difficult, because it's hard to put tape on the walls and so on. MPDP sings my song: "Things just aren't made like they used to be." Doug: "No, they aren't. And I'm really gonna rebel." You go, Doug! I don't know what your plan for rebellion is, but count me in. I got your back. Anything to stem the tide of these cheap excuses for finishes.