If You Think She Might Be Your Wife, Have Her Milk a Goat

When I was 7, my family stayed at the old Sheraton hotel, next to the plot of land that would eventually become the Galleria Mall. I was left alone with my brother Donny in the hotel pool. Donny decided it would be fun to continually throw me into the deep end and not allow me to escape. If I swam to the side of the pool to rest, he’d rush over and toss me back into the middle. I remember trying to breathe with water in my nose and throat. I eventually became too tired to tread water and sank to the bottom. Donny pulled me out, told me not to tell Mom and Dad, and punched me.

I would gladly go back and re-live that night rather than endure the torture ABC has beset it’s faithful; back-to-back nights of two-hour Bachelor episodes. Even Donny eventually pulled me out of the pool.

I don’t understand the logic behind two episodes in one week. Maybe  ABC knows that years of recapping this crap has pushed me to the edge of insanity and they’re going in for the kill shot. Maybe they’re just worried about Sean finding love. Either way, you’re getting two recaps this week. I can’t promise they won’t suck. I am, after all, recapping crap. I’m reCRAPing! Get it? Jerks.

Sean Lowe only has 11 girlfriends left. All of his girlfriends hate one of his girlfriends. The one they hate is named Tierra. She’s tierrable.

Chris Harrison walks in and says, “Ladies, there are 11 of you, congratulations.” He seriously says that. Harrison announces that the whole show is moving to Montana. The girls gasp and cheer like they’ve been told they’re getting free diamonds in Las Vegas, not traveling to a boring, beautiful place without electricity. (Editor’s note: Greg knows nothing about Montana .)

Sean takes the same plane that Arnold Schwarzenegger used in ‘Commando’ to fly to Montana. He says, “Montana is definitely going to test some of the women.” It’s true. The girls are tested. Tierra has to swat away a bug. I almost fainted.

This show is super fun but it’s also totally serious. There will be a 1-on-1 date, a group date, and a dreaded 2-on-1 date where one of the girls gets dumped after dinner. I would like to take a moment to point out that the purpose of this show supposedly is for a man to find his wife.

Lindsay gets the first 1-on-1 date. They go outside of the log cabin and jump inside of what Sean calls “the most bad-ass helicopter ever.” Sean has obviously never seen ‘Airwolf.’

Lindsay has known Sean a long time. They met a couple of weeks ago and have spent not one single moment together away from a camera crew. She says “It feels so comfortable and real. I feel like I’ve known this guy forever.” That statement is unrealistic, at best.

They have a picnic basket and blanket set out for them by producers on top of a mountain in Glacier National Park. They’re there for 4 seconds before they retreat to a lodge to drink and make out in front of a fire while talking in soft ‘growly’ voices. Sean talks about the great day they had that lasted 4 seconds. They get to know each other. Lindsay talks about the Army, or something.

They’ve had such a good and pointless time together that Sean gives Lindsay a rose and tells her how she’ll be a great wife. There’s some slurpy makin’ out. It sounds like when you have food caught in the drain of your kitchen sink and the water has trouble escaping.

When making out is over, they run outside. Sarah Darling holds a private concert for the small Montana town they’ve been making out in…. wait…. I can’t end that sentence with a preposition… for the town in which they’ve been out making? Whatever. No one reads down this far. Sean and Lindsay make out on a little carpet in front of 300 or so Montanans. They’re raised above the group like Pharmacists. Sarah Darling doesn’t seem to mind. Sarah Darling is attractive. She looks like a Bachelor contestant. Sarah Darling may as well be a Bachelor contestant because she’s only spent 11 fewer minutes with Sean than Lindsay.

Next comes the group date. Sean takes his group of girlfriends with an odd number of arms to a farm.  Selma is wearing something on her head.

Daniella says, “We see canoes and goats and hay. What is going on?” Chris Harrison tells them what is going on. Harrison calls it the ‘Bachelor Montana Wilderness Relay Race.’ I’m guessing it’ll only be a matter of time until this race becomes an Olympic event. The girls are broken down in teams. They ride canoes, saw wood and then milk goats. One of the girls has to drink the goat milk because everything on this show makes a ton of sense. The Bachelor is now ‘Survivor’ and ‘Fear Factor.’

“I will down goat’s milk to get more time with Sean.”- one of Sean’s girlfriends.

While Chris Harrison is explaining the rules of the game, the girls have looks on their faces like they’re being told they must choose which finger gets cut off.

The canoe race is first. ABC does not make Sarah with one arm canoe. The canoe race is slow and clumsy, but everyone is clearly getting to know the man they’re trying to marry.

When both teams dock their canoes, they move on to carry hay bales. Sean learns all of their food allergies and favorite books. Next up is a pair of giant saws. They saw wood. Early in our courtship, my wife and I had a big breakthrough when she was sawing wood while I stood and watched from 30-feet away.

Milking goats comes next. My sports quota is filled. There are a ton of ‘nipple’ jokes because we’re all four years old.  Please don’t let my Dad ever find this recap. Models milk goats. I hate this show. The red team milks its goat quicker and hands off the goat milk to a girl who drinks it. It spills all over her face. I’m pretty sure it’s a metaphor for something.

“The goat’s milk was warm and it came out my nose.”- That same girl that said the other goat’s milk thing.

The losing team is unhappy because they have to go back to the log cabin to sit on the couch and complain. One of the losers says it best, “Knowing that I missed out on a deeper conversation with him, it sucks!”

The winning team cheers because they get more time with Sean. “I can’t even believe this is happening… this is like… beyond all of us. This can’t be happening,” says a girl who was just told she’d get 2 more hours to share her boyfriend with a bunch of other girls. “I’m so happy to be here with red team,” says Sean, professing his happiness.

The winners hang out with Sean at a bar with couches for a couple of minutes until all hell breaks loose. Chris Harrison heads back to the log cabin to bring the losing team back to the party. There are no rules on this show. I should have believed Chris Harrison in the beginning of the season when he told us that there were no rules. This show is rule-less. I guess that there is one rule. The one rule is that you can always expect there to be no rules. If the Bachelor was a restaurant and the waitress handed you a menu, you would look the menu over and be like, “Where are the rules?” and she’d say, “There are no rules. I’m sorry.” And you’d order something else.

The winning team complains about the losing team joining their party. “I just downed goat’s milk. I’m so livid this is happening.”- That goat’s milk girl again.

The atmosphere changes from fun cocktail party to crazy hate-fest. The girls sit on couches and complain.

Goat Milk drinking girl pulls Sean aside to brag about her ability to chug goat milk. She and Sean snuggle for 5 seconds. AshLEE comes in and snuggles. Sean and AshLEE make out. The rest of the girls complain about their snuggling. “They’re, like, sitting on each other’s laps,” Daniella says, after seeing her boyfriend sitting on one of his other girlfriend’s lap. Daniella has a weird mouth. She talks like she’s trying to keep food from falling out of her mouth. Daniella is all upset and cries. Sean makes her feel better and then he makes out with her despite the load of boogers spread across her face from her crying spat. Luckily, Bachelor producers have installed microphones on their molars so we hear each of their taste buds rubbing up against each other.

Daniella gets a rose and the rest of the girls throw beer and popcorn onto the ice. They’re outraged over a girl from the losing team getting a rose that was rightfully theirs through a series of canoeing and goat milking. “Not everything is roses in my world because, let me tell you, when Selma gets angry, Selma gets angry,” says Selma, I think.

Even more ‘drama’ gas gets thrown on the ‘drama’ fire. Tierrable sneaks out of her log cabin to steal time with Sean. She crashes the party to cuddle with Sean on a bench. She complains about her 2-on-1 date. Sean says “uh” and “yeah.” It’s dramatic. Then, they make out.

Sean’s other girlfriends never find out about the treachery, so the world does not blow up.

Before the 2-on-1 date, Sean sits on a hill to think by himself. Horses are nearby. Jackie and Tierrable arrive in an SUV with blurred out license plates… because someone out there would look up those plate numbers and do what? Can you even do something with a person’s license plate? Was it a personal license plate that had a dirty word on it? Did you guys know that no one ever answers the many questions I pose in my recaps?

The 2-on-1 date is more important than a couple of wars. One of these girls will get a rose. The other gets dumped.

They ride horses together and it’s awkward. Tierrable says awful things about Jackie to the camera. Tierra is acting extra terrible today. It’s like ABC handed her $20,000 and said “Hey, get America to hate you more”.

Jackie gets a moment alone with Sean and uses it to tell him that Tierra is a bad person. She tells Sean that Tierra flirted with a guy at an airport. Please read that last sentence back to make sure I got it right. Also, if any of you readers out there ever become contestants on the Bachelor, please don’t tell the Bachelor anything about other contestants. It never works. Sean doesn’t dump Jackie immediately, but I feel like it is coming. “I know you’re real. I know you’re genuine,” says Sean to one of his 11 girlfriends who signed up to date a total stranger, also dating dozens of other women on television.

When they’re done riding horses, they sit down to eat dinner and get dumped. Sean announces that he isn’t sure who he’s dumping. He pulls Tierra aside for a talk. She makes up a story about an old boyfriend who died to make Sean feel sorry for her. It works. Sean dumps Jackie. See! Don’t snitch! Plus, Tierra is getting paid by ABC to be on the show, so Sean couldn’t dump her.

Sean puts Jackie in a limo. She cries. She has gladiator shields for earrings. Jackie was nice. I hope she gets a shampoo commercial.

Meanwhile, Tierra and Sean get a fireworks display. The girls in the log cabin can see the fireworks and they go nuts because fireworks are awesome if you’re 5 or in the 1700’s. Tierra acts awful to the camera about getting a rose. I’m beginning to think that she is not here for the right reasons.

Next is the cocktail party. Sean’s girlfriends get all dolled up despite the fact that they’re in Montana.

Desiree pulls Sean aside to show him how much of her boobs she can place outside of her dress. It’s impressive. Must be the altitude. Desiree is a gorgeous girl who needs constant reassurance that she’s not about to be dumped. They’re all stupid for going on the Bachelor, but I don’t doubt that it would be hard to do what these girls do on this show.

Tierra acts nasty so, the other girls sit on their couches and ignore her. Tierra gets mad and leaves the room to act crazy. It’s a pathetic display of pointlessness. A couple of the girls chase after her to argue. Everyone talks at once. They all hold their wine glasses up when they argue. “If I want to go get engaged, I can easily go get engaged,” says Tierra during the argument that I did not quite understand.

While Tierra is screaming, Sean catches her being awful. He pulls her aside to talk and there’s talking. Sean’s radar is up so he asks LesLEE what she thinks of Tierra. The entire country stands up and prays that LezLEE tells Sean everything. She does not. She tells Sean that Tierra is cold. No one wants to jump on the Bachelor grenade.

They come back from commercial with a shot of a stuffed bear. Chris Harrison sits down with Sean to recap everything we’ve just seen. This show is 2 hours long and there is another one tomorrow. Sean complains that the girls aren’t up front about Tierra and her true intentions. Chris Harrison, although he knows every detail about every girl on the show, says nothing to help his friend Sean. Chris Harrison also wants Sean to find his wife, by the way.

The rose ceremony is next. Sean has to dump a girl. He looks at pictures of them while soft, dramatic music plays. Sean goes in the other room and dumps Robyn. Robyn holds the distinction of going further in this game show than any black woman in Bachelor history.

Robyn does not cry in the limo, at first. Bachelor producers manage to squeeze some tears out with their biting ‘You just got dumped. Don’t you feel like crying?’ questions.

Tomorrow, Tierra drowns … because ABC knows that you can’t fall in love with someone unless they’re put in a situation where it becomes possible they could drown.

Greg Bauch is the author of ‘Frank Dates’ which costs less than 3 apples.