Another new Housewife, another crumbling marriage. Of course, we knew the picture-perfect (and utterly boring) image Shannon tried to drill into us in last week's season premiere was total crap, and this week we discovered she's a looney hypocrite in a crumbling marriage. Aw, shucks! She's gonna fit right in!
Yes, Shannon won't let her kids have cell phones and wants to live an eco-friendly, super-healthy life, but she drives an Escalade SUV and doesn't exercise. She's a conundrum! Even she doesn't understand herself! Kudos to her for confessing her hypocrisy, though I'm thinking her openness to New Age whackadoodles is going to bite her in the ass and potentially drain her kids' college fund. When a guy wants to put $20,000 worth of jewels in (yes, in) your teeth, then gives them to you for free when you balk at the price, I bet he's sticking table salt in there and figuring out he'll scam you on another day. But let's hope Shannon gets a hefty divorce settlement so she can keep the crazy train rolling.
Of course, I'm getting ahead of myself. Shannon thinks she and David have a fabulous relationship when they're alone together. The problem is they're never alone together, and the two of them bicker so pointedly during a dinner party both Tamra and Vicki have flashbacks to their bad marriages. When he's with Shannon David always looks like he's trying to picture his happy place, which may very well be in another woman's lap, and I don't get the impression he has quite the optimistic view of this marriage that his wife does. When she announces she's sending her daughter Sophie to cotillion classes, I sense he's right on the verge of saying “great, another useless female with no job skills” but doesn't.
The other relationships on the show aren't all ponies and roses, of course. Vicki announces to Tamra and Heather that yes, she loves Brooks and she's keeping him. Wow, she kept that secret, didn't she? Tamra and Heather both nod and smile, then gossip once Vicki leaves the table. Tamra doesn't trust Brooks and suspects this is yet another carwreck-in-waiting, but she's sick of arguing about it and figures she can just shake out the broken bits and paste them back together when Vicki comes crying home.
Everything between Tamra and Eddie is fabulous except they're both working too much and Tamra wants to give Eddie a baby. Why? Because, even though he says he doesn't care, she thinks he will someday and she never gets to see her kids and she's getting old and he'll resent her if they don't make a baby and why did she marry a younger, hot guy because he's going to leave her and panic, panic, panic!
Heather, who is entirely too reasonable (and literate) for this show has many suggestions and peppers Tamra with them while they're out with Shannon. It's almost cute that Heather wants to help and thinks anyone else is really listening to her.
She tries to explain to Tamra that having a kid — not an easy task, as Tamra's had her tubes tied and that probably means adoption or surrogacy — is not the best way for her to heal her sadness about only having partial custody of her kids. Tamra's eyes water, possibly because Heather used too many big words to get this point across, and Shannon thinks Heather is waving a big red flag. She's bossy, that Heather! Now, if Heather would only whip out some tarot cards, Shannon would pay attention.
Tamra has a Halloween party which looks like a lot of fun, especially the buckets of skulls, that artfully carved brain-watermelon, and the hired spooks. You know you've arrived when you can hire people to wear masks and pop out at your guests, possibly making them wet their pants. Oh, and Shannon finds that tarot card reader, though we don't get too much information about what the future holds for our Housewives. What we do learn is that Vicki (gasp!) adores Shannon. Yes, Vicki, the Housewife who hates pretty much anyone who isn't bringing her a stiff drink, has fallen in like with her fellow Aries. And really, what could be spookier than that?
Do you think Shannon's marriage is in trouble? Do you think Tamra should have another baby? Would you have jewels put in your teeth?