The Amazing Race 8 Insider, Episode 10: Bill Gates, If You’re Reading This...

This is going to be the fastest article I’ve ever written because I’m like SO late on this. I got caught up in buying a few paychecks’ worth of Christmas gifts over the weekend and totally forgot about this until late Sunday evening, and then life conspired against me and I wound up not being able to do it even then. Dedicated recapper that I am, I got up at 5 a.m., skipped my workout and went straight to the showers at the Y, then came to work where I have proceeded to hurriedly watch the clips before anyone else gets in. Now, I’ve got ten minutes until my shift officially starts. Let’s see if I can find my recap zen and get it done!

I Scream, You Scream: We all scream for ice scream, especially if we’re the Bransen girls. Not usually screamers (well at least not on the show, and I really don’t want to know any more detail than that, if you catch my drift), this clip starts with the girls shrieking and running past a long line of cars. They’re all stopped at the road construction and the Linzes are down the line from them. One mentions something about ice cream, the girls shriek, run down there, retrieve ice cream from some smiling Linz brothers and run gabbling back to their vehicle. Once inside, they explain to us that the night before, they had parked their vehicle and hence couldn’t leave, so they coerced the Linzes into buying them ice cream when they went into town for dinner. Once the Linzes returned, however, the girls were asleep. Being the gentlemen that they are, they saved it.

We cut to the brothers who explain the same thing.

What a Bummer: The Linz team is in the car post-golf task and the brothers say it’s a bummer they had such a good lead going in and are now second. They say they screwed up, went around the course twice, and hadn’t looked in the holes. One mentions that this always happen—they get on task, get wound up, and then mess up in the excitement. Megan’s like “no big deal” in a totally supportive way. This is a classy team. They’re competitors, but they don’t beat themselves or others up over screw ups. They just tighten their resolve and move on. The boys wish they had picked silver because they saw it easily. They ask what color the Bransens were and are shocked it was purple. It sounds like they are shocked because they did not see purple easily, so it is amazing the Bransens finished that quickly. They joke that maybe the Bransens will take a wrong turn and that they don’t need to win again.

Small Talk: This is a very painful clip wherein the Weavers, dressed in Old West-Ho (and not pulling it off in a cute, funky way like Megan Linz did) attempt to converse with Buffalo Bill in an odd mixture of present-day and attempts at roleplaying in the past. Rebecca leans on the old man, probably making his day in THAT outfit, and asks how he’s doing. Linda painfully attempts to claim she’s a Florida pioneer settling with all the Spanish during Bill’s time. He misses her point (and I’ll give him this, so did I at first. It was hard to tell what she was getting at) and responds that he has a sister in Florida, obviously talking about himself and not his alter-ego, the long-dead Buffalo Bill. Someone says something about enjoying Buffalo Bill, and he pops back in character and spouts of the dates he lived or somesuch, and I kid you not, but they all seem amazingly impressed that he knew this. Then again, knowledge eludes these folk, so any little tidbit must seem amazing.

So, I was amused that the little hot-panting wearing chicas picked the total slutty outfits (and looked slutty in an Old West trailer trash sort of way, whereas Megan Linz looked hot and not at all whoreish). Apparently this mode of dress is okay, but the Godlewskis are the fake boobed, fake haired devils of the Amazing Race. Ah hypocrisy, how I love thee.

Harder Than It Looks: The Godlewskis are driving and discussing the teepee task. It was complicated, they say, almost too complicated. Chris explains some details on it. She proudly proclaims they did it, they got it up. Couple that with the title of this clip, and my mind hit the gutter. That’s hard to do at Zero-Dark-Thirty. I’m so not a morning person, and my sense of humor has to take awhile to catch up to me. Anyway, this is a nice clip because it shows the sisters all getting a long. Something I’d almost forgotten they could do.

Good News: This is the Bransens, post-leg. They are excited to be in the Final Three. One daughter tells us they came in first and best of all, Phil told them they were in the Final Three. They have been waiting for this for awhile (so have we!!) since they had a non-elimination leg (boo) and a double-leg (yay). She is happy they made it to this point. It’s for real now. They are all excited. Even Wally looks excited, in his own Wally way.

In A Different Light: The Bransen girls, still post-leg. They see Wally as a different person now, not just their dad. He’s still an authority figure, but they are also on even ground to an extent. They are able to see him as Wally, as Walter, and not just Dad, able to see him how other people might. Others give them compliments about him on the race and it opens their eyes. Wally has been social which shocks them. He’s social with people he knows, but keeps to himself around strangers, so to see him come out of his shell here shocks them. Last night, for example, he came out and talked to the Linzes with them, whereas usually he would have stayed in the camper. From day one they were like “oh my gosh, Wally is social!” That’s the fun thing about being a parent, shocking the kiddies. Wally looked as amused as I felt.

Shaking Things Up: Post-race, the Linz boys chat about their disruption of the poor town of Cody. People were looking at them, one says, especially these two “big-ass trailers” neck and neck. Heh. Heh. He said “ass.” Take your shirt off and do that please? Call it my early Christmas present, since I doubt Santa Bill is going to turn up on my doorstep! The brother laughs about how they ran through a restaurant that was doing business, and they’re just glad they didn’t knock over a waitress or anything. They find Buffalo Bill and according to the boys, he looked half-tanked. What else is there to do while you’re waiting for bizarre-o tourist types running a race? I’d drink too. That reminds me, I need to buy more booze for the finale. If the Weavers win, I will need alcohol in copious amounts.

Anyway, the Linzes show again their love of not just the competition but the actual race. They mention how fun it is. This family has really grown on me. Go Linzes!!