The Real Housewives of New Jersey Season Two Reunion – Part 1

WARNING: It is highly recommended that you refrain from ingesting liquid beverages while reading this blog.

We start off with a scary moon and some scary music. Very dramatic.

Andy Cohen really tires to drag out his introductions and build anticipation as he tells the ladies how nice they look and compliments them on random things that no one cares about and makes statements about the obvious; “Teresa, you have a cookbook. Danielle, you have a song.”  and basically just wastes time.

I think the women always try extra hard to look good for the reunions, but for some reason they always end up looking extra bad. The heavy makeup and bright lights don’t do them any favors. And they all look extremely uncomfortable in those short tight dresses that are clearly the wrong size. Jacqueline looks like she borrowed that dress from her daughter, Teresa thought it would be a good idea to have two big red flowers over her boobs, Caroline is just a tranny mess from head to toe, and Danielle looks like she’s ready to go stand on a street corner and make some extra cash after the show ends. 

Andy comments on Caroline’s weight loss. Her hair is improved, but other than that I think she looks older and less healthy than she did last season.

Teresa is like a pitbull in it’s cage right before a dog fight. She’s shaking and frothing at the mouth and waiting for any opportunity to unleash her anger on Danielle. She eventually finds a way to turn a question about Jersey Shore into a story about how Danielle is a disgusting pig. Andy agrees, and let’s it slide.

Andy tried to give Danielle a vocabulary lesson, but she was still unable to prononce the word “women”. Even as she attempts to mimic Andy and repeats the word after him, it still comes out as “woman.” Andy decides that she’s a lost cause and gives up.
Teresa think’s it ok to make up your own words. Snoop Dogg does it, so why can’t she?

Teresa says she will never change for anyone, and Caroline looks disappointed.

Then the conversation turns to Dina. The women are still insisting that Danielle tried to have Lexi taken away from Dina. I never have and never will believe this story. Judges do not go around taking (teenage) children away from their mothers based on rumors and lies. If Dina has nothing to hide, then nothing Danielle could have ever said or done could have gotten her daughter taken away from her, so what the hell are they all so upset about?
Them claiming that Danielle tried to have Lexi taken away from Dina makes as much sense as saying I tried to have Teresa’s kids taken away because I implied in a previous blog that the outfits she makes them wear are child abuse. Nothing about this story – or their reactions to it – makes any sense.

Jacqueline says that Danielle put a silencer on Dina.
Caroline says that because of Dina’s “silencer” they aren’t allowed to talk about whatever the thing is that happened between them. Maybe if Albie weren’t a total failure and would have stayed in law school he could have explained to his mother that a gag order on Dina prevents  Dina from discussing the subject, not the rest of them. We’ve all been wondering about this Dina/Danielle story since the last reunion and we want answers, but Andy doesn’t care. Instead he wants to get back to talking about footage of babies. He almost got to it too, but good ol Teresa found a way to turn a conversation about baby footage into an argument about which one of them is a worse human being.

Teresa calls Danielle disgusting for never acknowledging Jacqueline’s baby.

Did you acknowledge your nephew?

Pause

Did you?

Of course I did.

Jac: “yes, yes.”

Pause

That’s funny because they….
And then the moment we’ve all been waiting for: Teresa totally loses it.

I clearly hear Teresa say ‘Do not BREAK up my family!” There is a lot of speculation going on all over the internet about what exactly Teresa said here. “Break” is winning in the polls, but “bring” is not far behind. I’ve listened over and over again but I just cannot hear “bring” no matter how hard I try. But I don’t even know why we are discussing this. What do any of us really expect from the woman who says “sangwhich”, cleavlage”, and “ohh-ba-dey”.

Look at that look. She’s plotting her revenge as she slowly walks away.

Teresa throws pillows

She throws Andy

Then she completely loses what little ability she has to communicate with language and begins howling and grunting. Caroline put the dog training skills she learned last season to the test.

Even after Teresa hurled him into his chair, and screamed at him, and bossed him around, Andy speaks kindly to her. He sorta gently scolds her and tells her nicely that from now on she can’t get off the couch, he says that he’s really not kidding, that she really has to stay on the couch. “Is that a deal?” he asks. Two minutes later he changes his mind and decides that it’s ok if she gets off the couch, just as long as she doesn’t cross him. Either Andy really likes Teresa, or he is utterly terrified of her.

Caroline says that if Teresa were this person that was just behaving like, she wouldn’t be friends with her. What? Does she think an alien invaded Teresa’s body? That was Teresa behaving that way. They claim that they never see Teresa act like that. Well of course they don’t, they constantly tell her how cute and funny she is no matter how horribly she behaves. You think you’re so tough Caroline? Try telling Teresa the truth about something, then we’ll see how tough you really are.

Danielle sits back stage and receives positive energy from her hair stylist.

And after all that, Andy still wants to go back to the clips and talk about the babies! Just bring out a ring, slap some glove on them, and give the viewers what they want already!

Of course Andy doesn’t bother to make anyone clarify what the whole “nephew” thing is about. A lot of people are assuming that it must be something pretty bad for Teresa to get so upset. But I think it’s possible that it might be nothing at all considering that we saw her flip a table last year because she was told to “pay attention”.

Andy tries to force us to sit through scenes of the ham game and Albie’s learning disability. Luckily I’m watching online so I fast forward through all that crap.

Caroline finally reveals what Albie’s mysterious “learning disability” is. He doesn’t have dyslexia, but he has “reading comprehension” and ADD. So now I have to wonder why the hell didn’t they just say that from the get go? What was all the secrecy about? Why am I even writing about this? Who cares? Let’s move on.

Caroline is asked a question about her marriage and she says all marriages have rocky times and anyone who says differently is a liar. The camera focuses on Teresa while Caroline is saying this.

Then Caroline is asked a question about shaving her face. She is still sticking to her “exfoliating” story and says “I’m not a monkey. I don’t have facial hair.” Again, the camera pans to the other couch. Jacqueline is laughing but Teresa has a straight face and a blank stare.
I wonder if she was trying to stop herself from getting in Caroline’s face and screaming “DO NOT BRING UP MY FAMILY!”

Caroline is well aware that everyone on the internet calls Teresa a monkey. I am choosing to believe that she made that comment on purpose as revenge for the Italy trip.

Andy reads my new favorite RH quote: “My kids wore lace and crinoline at those ages, my dogs wear leopard.” Teresa wants to know what that means. Does it mean Danielle’s children were better dressed than her’s? Teresa doesn’t freak out or run across the room. She’s pretty calm actually. So I guess it’s ok for Danielle to talk shit about her kids, just as long as she doesn’t bring up her nephew.

Danielle lost the “tough guy” attitude she had in her interview when she was alone with her armed bodyguards. She now insists that she was simply making a comment about fabric, and was in no way shape or form comparing Teresa’s children to animals.
That was the best line of the whole season and now Danielle is back tracking.  So disappointing!

Her dogs aren’t the only ones who wear leopard.

Jacqueline says that Danielle’s kids cry in the nurses office at school everyday because they get teased so badly. I totally believe that.

Andy says he didn’t know Teresa spoke Italian. I think everyone who watched the Italy trip still doesn’t know if Teresa speaks Italian.

Andy asks Teresa about her cookbook. Everyone is smirking while she tries to remember the name of the dish that is supposed to be her favorite and repeats the lines her PR people taught her. Teresa did not write that cookbook and everyone in that room knows it.

Andy didn’t question Teresa about the fact that she has a recipe in her book for homemade pizza dough, yet on the show Joe said that he never saw her make a pizza in his life,  and she admitted to using store bought pizza dough. I like Andy, but I don’t think he should be the one handling the reunions. He lets them get away with too much.

Teresa says (with the help of Caroline) that the yellow diamond ring she got for her anniversary was actually a yellow sapphire cocktail ring and not a diamond. I’m so glad she cleared that up! So it wasn’t a half a million dollar ring, only a few thousand. Ok, then I guess that totally excuses buying jewelry while filing for bankruptcy. See, Teresa isn’t as bad as we all thought.

Teresa’s house isn’t in foreclosure. Bla bla bla we already knew this. To tell you the truth, I’m a little bored. This reunion was way less eventful than I had imagined. I want to talk about the nephew again!

Teresa said she never saw the auction website. I don’t believe that for a second. I personally tweeted the link to her, as I’m sure many other people did. She said that she doesn’t like to read negative things in the press. There is that word again; Negative. All the housewives seem to have this problem where they confuse the word “negative” with the word “true”.

Andy asks Teresa if she is worried about losing her house. She says no, because even if they lose everything her and Joe will just start over again with the scheming and the filing false insurance claims and the mortgage fraud. Plus they bought life insurance from Vickie for their parents so they are gonna be millionaires soon enough. No worries.

Andy brings up Joes’ drunk driving accident. Danielle said that it really doesn’t make sense to flip your car and then go get wasted. Teresa makes her best “what are you talking about” face:
Caroline and Jacqueline rush to Teresa’s defense. Caroline says that Joe probably fell asleep behind the wheel, Teresa realizes that this is a way better lie than the “yawned and hit the gas” story and decides to go with that one instead. “Yeah, that’s what I think too. He fell asleep.” They all insist that it’s normal to do shots after hitting 4 trees and flipping your car. Everybody does it in Jersey.

There were some questions about whether or not Danielle had an affair with Danny. Jacqueline says that Danielle broke up Danny’s marriage. Danielle says she doesn’t even hang out with Danny, she only used him as a prop because she needed to be able to speak in her scenes taped with him.

Andy asks Danielle how she afforded her daughters sweet 16 party, and she says: Pay attention, I paid for two things; bussing people in, and security.
It just didn’t have the same effect that it did last year.

Danielle says that she sorta, kinda, maybe might possibly be involved in a somewhat possibly unconfirmed female relationship…. or maybe she said that her and Lori were just really close friends. I’m not sure.

Jacqueline says she only saw a preview of Danielle’s sex tape because “someone sent it to her”. But then she goes on to describe the tape in detail, even discussing camera angles. Her and Teresa are giggling. They totally saw the tape. They watched it on the big screen with Dina and Caroline and a bowl of pop corn.

Teresa swears that she never talks about Danielle. Only in every scene of the show and in interviews and magazines and her blog. But other than that – never.

I know everyone thinks Teresa looks like a monkey, but I’ve been noticing a resemblance to another member of the animal kingdom lately.

The ladies argue some more and the reunion ends. I have to say I’m a little disappointed by the easy questions. Andy Cohen sucks as a host. Can we get Dana White instead?