Episode 30.10

I still find it hard to determine who this season has the best chance of winning. So much of the cast is just blah. The men on the blue collar tribe have all been portrayed as arrogant at one point. Some have had better edits than others. Sierra has almost nothing in her edit and that’s never a good sign. Carolyn’s edit is all over the place. Shirin seems to be making a quick turnaround, but that doesn’t seem to be good at the end. Will is probably out as a contender after the last episode. Tyler could have a chance, but I don’t think that it’s enough of a chance. But enough of my ramblings.

In the first segment of the show, Dan thinks that Mike doesn’t have a chance at the game since Mike blew up at everyone. Since when did Dan know much about the game? Shirin is still upset at Will. She opens up to Dan about it and they talk a lot about it. Of course, he doesn’t actually think highly of her in the end.

In the second segment of the show, we get to the reward challenge. They are put into two teams of four. Another schoolyard pick that is not shown decides the teams. Mike, Shirin, Sierra, and Rodney are one team making Carolyn, Will, Dan, and Tyler the other team. Also, a commercial says that the Survivor seasons Redemption Island and South Pacific are now on DVD. I wonder if they’ll ever catch up to the current season. Anyways, the red team of Carolyn, Will, Dan, and Tyler win the challenge due to their straightforward strategy. The other team just seemed to fumble their way through the challenge.

In the third segment of the show, the people at camp talk about the challenge that was lost and how to get rid of Mike. People at the reward talked about that as well. But it’s hard to really tell what’s going to happen with Mike. Will his time in the game be cut short? What about his hidden immunity idol? Is Tyler in control of the game? It’s hard to tell much of anything regarding that.

In the fourth segment of the show, we get to the immunity challenge. A surprise second necklace is given to a woman while the first will be for a man. I wonder why they didn’t do at that at the first immunity challenge. That seems strange to me and I don’t think that I’m okay with that. Carolyn wins the woman’s immunity necklace. This leads to a showdown between Mike and Rodney which Mike wins. Shirin feels that she’s at the bottom now, which she is.

In the fifth segment of the show, Shirin does whatever she can to get people to vote against Tyler. I do have to wonder if Mike could give her the immunity idol. Tyler wonders what Dan’s advantage is. This leads to the now famous stolen bag scene. It’s hard to sum up what is going to happen and Mike does consider giving his idol to Shirin. Will he? I hope so because that would make things interesting. Shirin is still upset over the domestic violence. I don’t think that would be something anyone could easily get over. I’m glad that I don’t have to put up with it. So much of tribal council is focused on making the right decision that it obviously has to be theme of this season, but a fellow blogger pointed that out already. He noticed that from the very first episode. This makes me wonder what the final vote will be like. Mike does a brilliant idol play. If he was portrayed badly before, then he seems to be a much better player now. No idol was played in the end and Shirin was voted out. But drama was definitely caused. Tyler and Dan got votes in the game. I’m not sure if Tyler is still considered a threat or not.

On the next Survivor, the alliance of six starts crumbling. Rodney also falls apart in some way. It’s very hard to tell where this season is going. Shirin is glad that Mike didn’t play his idol on her, even though this gets herself voted out. Meanwhile, I’m getting very annoyed at what my computer considers a sentence fragment.

Total confessional count: Carolyn- 19, Will- 13, Sierra- 14, Dan- 21, Tyler- 16, Mike- 36, Rodney- 28, Shirin- 22. New confessionals this episode: Shirin- 1, Carolyn- 3, Will- 0, Sierra- 2, Dan- 4, Tyler- 2, Mike- 3, Rodney- 4.

Will is at the bottom of the confessional count. I don’t think that he has much story left. Mike is the highest with Rodney second highest and Dan third highest. Meanwhile, I have to get caught up on the great blog that I mentioned earlier. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode 30.9

From this point onward, you will get no more updates about what movies I may or may not be watching throughout the week. I don’t know why I told you about all of them in the first place. I guess I just wanted you to know when I’d be starting my rewatch of the first season. Hopefully I can do that on Sundays from this point forward. I’m not sure if it can be every Sunday, but you’ll get at least two posts when Survivor is on hiatus about the first season. And that’s in addition to any random thing that I already plan to post. Any movie watching updates of mine will hopefully never reappear in this blog, although it might, depending on what happens in the future.

There’s a lot of guesses as to where this season might go. A lot can still happen that will affect the show in the end. It’s hard to tell who has the best chances based on their edits. I might end up doing lists in the future where I do a paragraph of the contestants in order of where I think they will go out. Simply, the most likely to be voted out in my mind would be mentioned first and the most likely to win in my mind would be mentioned last. I know that other Survivor bloggers have done that so I might try that strategy as well. Speaking of future seasons, I might as well tell you about the future of Survivor in the next paragraph. I don’t know if an official renewal has happened yet, but seasons 31 and 32 seem guaranteed to happen.

SPOILER. They are filming the 31^st season right now with a set of all new players. They are filming it in Cambodia. There’s an interesting thing to note regarding that location. The French version of Survivor was filming a season there, but a contestant in it died and they had to cancel that planned season. It seems like a strange place for the American season to go since it has that notable event against it. But maybe this will help trump the bad publicity that place had. I keep hoping for a “normal” season (one with all new players, only two tribes not divided in any unusual way, and no major twists throughout the season; the most recent normal season in my mind was Samoa) to happen again. Meanwhile, I’ll just settle for an all new cast that knows how the game works since we’ve had far too many a clueless player in all new seasons recently. You’d think that there’d be a ton of great players that would want to play the game, but actually getting them on the show is a problem in its own right. END SPOILER.

It is hard to tell where this season is going. All I know is that I could tell that Joe didn’t have much to him in the edit so it was clear that he was going to get voted out at some point. I didn’t expect it to go the way it went, but I could tell that it happened. You know, Jenn from this season is the first contestant since Shawna from Amazon to ask to be voted out and not have their wish granted. That makes only two contestants to have that record. It’s weird how every man that we know of who asked to be voted out got their wish granted (including those who didn’t actually want voted out), but the women that we know of didn’t have their wishes granted. Of course, there are a different people who might have asked to be voted out, but their requests weren’t actually seen in the final edit. I could mention them if I wanted to. But enough of my ramblings.

In the first segment of the show, Rodney thinks that now is the time to get rid of Mike and Tyler agrees with that. Somehow, the Survivor auction begins immediately after that scene and before the opening credits. Will buys himself out of the auction. Why would they do that? Is it just me or have the auctions become opportunities to screw with the players? Stupid producers! They go quickly through the auction. It’s hard to tell what to make of this. Everyone but Will (who is no longer in the auction) gets letters from the loved ones. This could be the thing that gets him upset at everyone. Mike fakes out at the letters and this could lead to interesting backlash.

In the second segment of the show, Mike decides not to fake out after Carolyn possibly could have given hers back. Dan, Caroyln, and Mike are the people who use their money to buy for the advantage and Dan is the one who winds up with the advantage. Will seems to get a consolation for being bought out of the auction. Did they rehide Jenn’s idol? It turns out that he gets rations and he decides to give them to the rest of the tribe. Now it doesn’t seem that cruel, but maybe it is. Mike calls out everyone about the supposed alliance that Shirin might have made up. Did she? I can’t remember. But I do know that Carolyn’s idol seems irrelevant to this season as a whole. Does that mean that she makes the end and doesn’t need her idol that whole time? I’m waiting for them to mention her idol on previously on Survivor, although it could pop up again in this episode.

In the third segment of the show, Sierra thinks that Mike was making a bad choice by bringing up where he stood in the game. She is right. One should never say where one is in the game. Mike also has regrets about bringing up the alliance in the game which Rodney reveals is a real alliance. Dan gets an extra vote at tribal council. That’s a new twist in quite possibly any Survivor version. I’ve never heard of that used internationally. Does he have to vote for the same person each time? I like bringing up Survivor trivia when it is relevant: Dan will be the first player since those on the tribe of outcasts in Pearl Islands to cast more than one vote at a single tribal council. That excludes any double elimination tribal councils.

In the fourth segment of the show, people think that Will hid food from them and only gave them the bad stuff from it. This leads to his blowout. Shirin has a bad past which makes the blowout worse for her. She then vents her frustration to her alliance. We then get to the immunity challenge. Will doesn’t want to play the challenge so that he can get his letter from his loved one. Shirin objects to this happening. So he doesn’t get his letters. This is one of the many ball challenges in Survivor. Do you have the balls to do this challenge? Do you have the precision to handle these balls with care? Mike has an extra ball. Can he win the challenge? He does. Drama is promised at tribal council.

In the fifth segment of the show, Mike is doing the happy dance. The pretribal drama is unfolding as usual, although I can’t tell who would vote for who. I wonder if Dan can use his additional vote if he winds up on the jury. Probably not, but we’ll see. We finally get mention of Carolyn’s idol for the first time since quite possibly the first episode. Dan doesn’t know which side to join since he is suddenly a swing vote in the game. Who is the target? I think that, as usual, the person who gets voted out will be a surprise to us in the audience. Shirin and Will have a continuance of their fight. Who is in what alliance is brought up at the tribal council. Will Dan use his extra vote at this tribal council or a different one? I think that he should wait to use it, but I don’t know what he will do. He does not use his extra vote. Nobody plays an idol. That seems wise at the moment since those with idols don’t seem to be in danger at the moment. Jenn gets voted out of the game.

On the next Survivor, Mike runs out of allies and Tyler does his own game. It may seem that looking through another person’s bag is against the rules (and maybe it should be), but it actually isn’t against the rules. You just have to leave any items you find in the bag or you are breaking the rules.

Total confessional count: Dan- 17, Tyler- 14, Mike- 33, Rodney- 24, Shirin- 21, Carolyn- 16, Will- 13, Sierra- 12, Jenn- 22. New confessionals this episode: Jenn- 2, Dan- 4, Tyler- 1, Mike- 8, Rodney- 3, Shirin- 1, Carolyn- 1, Will- 3, Sierra- 1.

Mike’s influx of confessionals puts him at the highest among the players in the game. Rodney is second and Shirin is third now that Jenn is out of the game. Everyone else has lower than 20 confessionals. Sierra has the lowest and could be the one who gets eliminated when the game shifts against her alliance. It is hard to tell what all will happen, but I am enjoying the ride. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode 30.8

You know, when people I know read this blog of mine, they may talk to me about it. So I have to be careful with what I say, not that I would normally say anything bad in the first place. When we think about the game right now, there are three people that are clearly at the bottom: Jenn, Shirin, and Joe. It seems unlikely based on the edit that Joe will last a long time. The moment he loses immunity, he’s out of the game. I don’t think that they can turn it around the way other underdogs have. But once they are gone, the game would then get very interesting as we watch the people left turn on each other. Of course, that’s just how it COULD go. We don’t know for certain that’s how it WILL go.

Movie update: On Saturday, I watched one of the dancing videos. There are still more of them for me to watch, so it remains on the list. On Sunday, I rolled Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian. Now this leads to something interesting. With it wedged between an m choice and a p choice, I would have only two letters to choose from since I can’t move the last choice from the dissolved Monday list. It turns out that I don’t have either an n choice or an o choice to replace it so I will now have to get rid of the Sunday list. This means that starting next week, I will start my Survivor: Borneo watching, starting with the greatest and most outrageous moments special and going all the way through the entire first season again. I will only watch one episode a week since I don’t like to watch a lot of a show all at once. Plus I have other things to do. I guess that I’m done with the movie watching updates for the moment. While I know that I won’t be able to watch Survivor every Sunday, you’ll be able to tell when I did it by my TV blog getting updated. This should also create two random blog posts during the off season when Survivor isn’t on the air.

I’m not sure what else there is for me to say before I get to the actual point of this blog. I’m not sure when I’ll be back on twitter again. It’s possible that I may never get on twitter again. I hope that I can in good time. If this blog suffers, then you’ll know that I’m on twitter. But enough of my ramblings.

In the first segment of the show, Dan continues to be an arrogant ass. The decision of whether or not flippers win the game could be foreshadowing that a flipper wins this season. Shirin doesn’t want Jenn to leave the game. I’m not sure why she is thinking that. If Jenn leaves, Shirin stays in the game. But Shirin is doing what she can to control the game and has a strange way of saying it. “I’m in the driver’s seat backseat driving the driving.” Say what?

In the second segment of the show, we get to the reward challenge in the game. The reward is chocolate, which explains the Twix commercial. He does the give everyone a small amount thing that happens sometimes. An unseen schoolyard pick leads Rodney, Joe, Jenn, Caryoln, and Will on one team fighting against Mike, Shirin, Tyler, Dan, and Sierra on the other team. The second team I mentioned is the one that won the challenge.

In the third segment of the show, we get to the chocolate reward. Shirin may be more of a focus in recent episodes possibly because she’s doing something important. But, is she still a dumb player in the edit. Jenn feels that she owns the chickens. I’m not sure how she got to that conclusion. Rodney makes fun of Mike, much to the enjoyment of everyone (including me). Also, since when did McDonalds reinstate their happy meal toy commercials? It’s been gone a very long time and now we are supposed to accept that they are back. Are they staying back? Weren’t the two Sonic guys gone for a while? Why were they gone?

In the fourth segment of the show, we get a preparation for the immunity challenge. Jenn has a strange way of planning the leave the game, similar to something that Brandon Hantz might have done, intentionally or not. Also, Joe’s perfect winning streak isn’t intact after the reward challenge so that could be a huge problem for him. This does make me wonder something: if someone asks to be voted out in the jury phrase of the game, should they not be allowed on the jury? If real quitters can’t be on the jury and people who ask to be voted out are considered quitters, then it would be hard to classify that. Also, keep an eye out for flies at the challenge. I think that I saw one on Joe. I have the feeling that Jenn will win the challenge and do what she said she would. Well, I was wrong. Tyler won the immunity challenge. Can Jenn still convince the other people to vote her out? I honestly don’t know. I can’t see why people like her at the moment. Hopefully, someone can kindly explain that to me.

In the fifth segment of the show, splitting the vote comes up. While it is actually a good strategy sometimes, cases like this prove that it isn’t always the case. Joe is planning on making a fake idol. I hope that I’m not the only one who likes fake idols because I sure do miss them. He tries to play it off to Mike as real which is bad since Mike has the real idol. Jenn’s strange game play is brought up at the tribal council. Mike reveals his idol to everyone, but Jeff wisely can’t confirm if it is since he hasn’t played it yet. At least two people admit to something along the lines of not being sure what is going on at tonight’s tribal council. Mike decides to play the fake idol (the one he revealed) that Joe gave him on Will. This could be the first time that a fake idol play doesn’t result in the holder of it getting eliminated. I do wonder how the play of that on Will could affect the game. Joe is the person that gets voted out. At least this episode was pretty interesting even if the alliance on the bottom didn’t flip the game. It would have been Survivor history to have an alliance vote their own person out and still be in control of the game. And no, Ozzy getting voted out the first time in South Pacific doesn’t count for that in my mind. Also, shouldn’t the fake idol have been thrown into the fire? The fake idols of China, Micronesia, and Gabon were all thrown into the fire. I guess it wasn’t a real burn this time.

On the next Survivor, Will hates Shirin while Mike and Rodney continue their feud. I don’t know what all will happen on the next Survivor because of vague promos as usual. I still think that Mike wins the Mike versus Rodney feud. But we’ll see if that happens or not.

Total confessional count: Mike- 25, Rodney- 21, Shirin- 20, Carolyn- 15, Will- 10, Sierra- 11, Joe- 14, Jenn- 20, Dan- 13, Tyler- 13. New confessionals this episode: Rodney- 2, Shirin- 5, Carolyn- 0, Will- 0, Sierra- 1, Joe- 3, Jenn- 4, Dan- 0, Tyler- 0, Mike- 4.

This is another episode where nearly half of the players in the game don’t get a confessional. Does that mean that none of them will win? Possibly, but we’ll see about that.  Jenn, Mike, Rodney, and Shirin all have twenty or more confessionals with Mike having the highest number. Will has the lowest number of confessionals now, but that could change with the next episode. Is this still Mike’s game or will something happen to change that? We’ll see. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode 30.7

Lent is over, as of the posting of this blog post, which means that I can finally watch CinemaSins again and return to both Wikia and Wikipedia. How soon I’ll do all of that could be a bit of a mystery to me. There are a lot of mysteries in my life. I have a lot of shows that I watch. If there are three good things on at once, I record one on my laptop, record one on VHS, and watch the other one. This has lead to a backlog of things on VHS that I have to get caught up on. I’m ignoring any TV show at the moment that I have on DVD to watch, which is a shame. There’s a lot I want to see. Meanwhile, there’s a lot to be added to the list in terms of TV shows on DVD to watch. At least I’ll have the upcoming summer break to look forward to.

Movie update: This being Easter weekend, I knew that I probably wouldn’t get much watched. I ended up seeing Rat Race, the number 5 choice on the Sunday list (a list that can be watched from on Mondays now as well). I couldn’t put the oldest choice from Monday’s old list on the Sunday list, so I moved the Survivor Borneo special to number 5 and put Titanic from the old Monday list as number 6. The other movie that I watched this week was a nature documentary. That being part of a series, I couldn’t move the last Monday choice to a new list yet.

Since it looks like hidden immunity idols will be important as we go into this episode, there is a reminder I want to tell you about. If somebody finds the idol, you should pay attention to the music in the background when they find it. Is it triumphant? Does it seem like good music is in the background when they found it? Or does the music not have much good connotation to it? The music can be an indicator as to if the idol will be put to good use or not. The better the music, the more likely it is to successfully save someone. No twitter for me tonight. But enough of my ramblings.

In the first segment of the show, we get to Merica coming back from tribal council. Storms are in my area which makes me glad that I have two different affiliates that have Survivor. But the storms being in both viewing areas are a bad sign. I am getting more and more convinced that Jenn is a terrible person who will either make a terrible winner or a bitter jury member. Why so mean, Jenn? Considering how Jenn Lyon also played the game, she seems to be a disgrace to people with that name.

In the second segment of the show, we get to food arguments, it seems. You do have to wonder if the reason that Survivor isn’t as good anymore is because it has been on too long. Food arguments are a sign that nothing more interesting is happening. We then get to a reward challenge. No teams in this challenge, which is cool. I like real individual challenges postmerge. Long story short: Joe wins the reward challenge. He picks Tyler, Will, Carolyn, and Shirin to go on the reward with him. Why did he pick them? I don’t really know.

In the third segment of the show, we get to the reward in question. While Jenn wins the award for meanest contestant this season, Shirin probably wins most annoying. That’s saying something since Dan is also a contestant this season. Joe finds a clue to the hidden immunity idol and Tyler notices this. Mike notices them when they come back and sneaks after them. I think that I want Mike to win at the moment. I know that no Mike has ever won Survivor, but that could change in the future. I admit that his decision to get everyone to chase after Joe isn’t that good a one. I question everyone’s game play this season. Who’s playing the best game? Is anyone playing a good game? Would anyone notice that Carolyn isn’t looking for an idol? Dan is very bad at the game. Very bad. What good is telling someone that they are going home going to do? You can’t call yourself a fan of this show and be doing crap like that. You’re so freaking dumb sometimes. I haven’t even starting doing different nominees for the awards I will give at the end of the season yet, but Dan should probably get one for being dumb. I’ll figure all that out by the end of the season at least. Also, is anyone annoyed that Kelly isn’t on the jury? Why not put her there?

In the fourth segment of the show, Mike still can’t find an idol. Will they get to his rivalry with Rodney at all? But he does find a hidden immunity idol and the music and hashtag seem to be a good sign for his future. We then get to the immunity challenge. It’s basically a sliding puzzle which sounds like a good idea for a challenge. I would like it just because I know how to solve it. I can’t promise that I would be able to solve it first to win the challenge, but I’d probably be better than some other people would be. Joe wins immunity again after Dan incorrectly thinks that he won twice. Jeff feels the need to point out that Joe’s a treat in the game. I think that everyone knows that and why Jeff has to tell everyone that seems strange to me.

In the fifth segment of the show, Shirin feels that she is safe even though she lost the challenge. Cocky much? Also, what is an idiot savant? Don’t those words contradict each other? People don’t know who has an idol or who to vote for. Meanwhile, if Joe is a major contender in the game, why is his confessional count so low? Does that mean that he’ll get voted out the first time he loses a challenge? We get to the tribal council with me having no clue as to what might happen. Hali has a strange and unusual history lesson about the country of America. Maybe she has a point, but it doesn’t sound like she knows what she’s talking about. No idols are played. In the end, the person voted out was Hali. She is the first person to join the jury.

On the next Survivor, the challenge that happens seems to be very weird in some way. Also, Jenn might actually be quitting the game. Really? I hoped that we were done with quitters for a while. They say that bad things come in threes and since the last three seasons each had a quitter, than that means that this should be the first one since Caramoan to not have an (official) one. It could be that Jenn is getting a NaOnka edit, which would make sense.

Total confessional count: Joe- 11, Jenn- 16, Dan- 13, Hali- 15, Tyler- 13, Mike- 21, Rodney- 19, Shirin- 15, Carolyn- 15, Will- 10, Sierra- 10. New confessionals this episode: Jenn- 1, Dan- 2, Hali- 1, Tyler- 3, Mike- 4, Rodney- 3, Shirin- 3, Carolyn- 1, Will- 0, Sierra- 1, Joe- 2.

Will and Sierra are largely irrelevant to the season if you are going on their low confessional count alone. They both share the lowest with only 10 confessionals each. Mike has the highest with 21 confessionals. Rodney is the next highest with 19. I wonder how quickly people will get above 20 confessionals. Mike started the thread this season. Can others get that high as well? We’ll see what happens and whether or not Mike is going to win this season. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode 30.6

You should be seeing this post on a Wednesday. Hopefully, I’ll be able to post normally for the rest of the season. I might even go back to live tweeting. I don’t think that I’ve been on twitter this whole year and its really driving me crazy. If the quality of this blog suffers, then I must have been live tweeting. I wouldn’t do it if it weren’t so fun. I really like twitter. You can learn a lot about current event/pop culture that you otherwise wouldn’t know. I just don’t know why I haven’t had the time to get on that website lately. That’s so terrible. If this blog suffers, then you’ll know that I must have been live tweeting. Here’s hoping!

Movie update: Once again, I was unable to watch a movie on Saturday. This time, it was because I went to church on Saturday instead of Sunday to avoid the crowd that comes with confirmation that happens at my church on Palm Sunday. I predict that the coming weeks will be hard with me possibly not watching movies as often as I like and my TV schedule will be complicated to keep up with as well. The AD miniseries (just a quick sidebar, if you don’t know why a miniseries always lasts a short time to never reappear again, you need to learn more about how television works. I understand if you are confused, though, with limited run series, event series, and miniseries being different things that are used interchangeably) will complicate my Sunday TV show watching. As usual, new episodes of shows will appear on Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday. If they ever wonder why the ratings for shows that air new episodes on those days are low, then they probably underestimate the Christian influence in the world. I’m always busier than I would like to be and was only able to watch one of my Sunday movies. I watched The Emperor’s New Groove, which was the number 2 choice. That moves Mr. and Mrs. Smith to number 2, the Night at the Museum sequel to number 3, and Paulie, from the Monday list, to number 4. Due to repeat letters, the number that I rolled on Tuesday was not able to be replaced by a choice on the Monday list. The choice that I watched was a play recording of The Sound of Music. I am replacing them with movie length Nature Documentaries. It being plural means that it is part of a series

POSSIBLE SPOILER. Okay, nobody has made an official renewal just yet, but it is believed that there will be two more seasons of Survivor. Rumor has it that an all new cast (well, some sort of cast, at least) is in Cambodia filming what will become Survivor 31. There’s more rumors as to what Survivor 32 might be. It looks like it could be very interesting. Why? Apparently, it will be an all-stars season that we the fans get to pick. America’s choice is currently the name of it, although I don’t know if that’s what it will end up being called in the end. I’ll let you know when an official renewal happens. It’s possible that the reunion show of this season will be the break between filming seasons 31 and 32, much like how seasons 25 and 26 were filmed with the 24 reunion show in the break between them. Or, at least I think that’s what happened. I’d have to look up the filming dates to know for sure what happens. But keep an eye out for voting for a cast for an upcoming Survivor season. END SPOILER.

There’s no twitter for me today. I ran out of time to get on. Also, be sure to check out the Survivor Oz website to see what their April fool’s Day prank is this year. Hopefully I can get back on twitter in the near future. But enough of my ramblings.

In the first segment of the show, Escamaca got back from tribal council and talk about the blindside that happened. Rodney was blacked out on the Addicted to Survivor facebook group so he probably won’t have many chances in the Survivor game. They could be wrong about him. Will they be? Some contestants went to what they thought was a reward challenge. Most people knew that it would be a merge, which it was. This was evident to those who didn’t already know when Jeff Probst wasn’t there. The color of the merged tribe is black as usual for seasons starting with more than two tribes.

In the second segment of the show, the shelter was removed when the tribes were merging. Why would production do that? This wasn’t like in Fiji where they had to get rid of the luxurious beach. The blue collars want to stick together which could lead to a white collar/no collar alliance, as revealed in the promos for this episode. The tribe name was Merica. I like it, but I don’t think that other people like it as much as they could. All the usual postmerge drama is coming into play, which I like. Also, Dan got stung by what was probably a jellyfish.

In the next segment of the show, we get to the immunity challenge which is a Survivor stable in the game. Get a grip is the name of the challenge. Dan struggles early into the challenge and falls out first. Will falls out pretty soon after. Tyler randomly drops out. Why? I don’t know for sure. It is hard to tell who has the best advantage. Jenn gets stung by an insect at this challenge. Rain comes down pretty hard at the challenge. Joe and Carolyn are the last two people left at the challenge. Based on what I can tell, Mike wants Carolyn to win the challenge, I think. In the end, Joe wins the challenge.

In the next segment of the show, the people consider voting out either Jenn or Hali. Will is told to vote for Hali, although the vote is probably for Jenn. Will the queen b be knocked off her throne? She could be. The white collars appear to be the swing vote in the game. Tyler is glad that he is not on the chopping block. I have no idea what will happen. It seems to be between either Jenn or Kelly. I really hope that it is not Kelly because that means Jenn will get to stay in the game. On the other hand, the game might be too obvious for the future if Jenn gets voted out. She also has a hidden immunity idol and the music that played when she found it makes it seem that she will use it well. The plan might hinge on Will and that’s a bad place for plans to hinge on. It looks at least like the game is picking up now at the point, which is a good sign for the future of this season. If the white collars go with either group, they would still be in a minority if they are the only ones left in the game. But, they could stick check things up. I fellow blogger that I know thinks that making the right decision is the theme of this season and he’s probably right about that. It’s a shame that I always get behind on reading his blog posts. Jenn decides to play her idol at tribal council. She probably saved herself. Did you know that nobody who has successfully played an idol on themselves has ever won the game? In the end, Kelly gets voted out of the game.

On the next Survivor, the Rodney/Mike rivalry gets to a head and there’s another mad search for hidden immunity idols, probably like how it unfolded in Cagayan. Does Kelly’s elimination spell doom for the blue collars? Who will I have to root for to win the game now? I might have to root for Mike, but he could only do that by winning his rivalry with Rodney. Can he do that?

Total confessional count: Mike- 17, Rodney- 16, Shirin- 12, Kelly- 10, Carolyn- 14, Will- 10, Sierra- 9, Joe- 9, Jenn- 15, Dan- 11, Hali- 14, Tyler- 10. New confessionals this episode: Rodney- 4, Shirin- 2, Kelly- 3, Carolyn- 3, Will- 1, Sierra- 0, Joe- 1, Jenn- 3, Dan- 3, Hali- 2, Tyler- 3, Mike- 4.

Despite being important to this episode, Joe is tied with Sierra with the lowest confessional count and they are both the only two in the game with less than ten confessionals. I forget if Kelly is on the jury or not. I hope that she is because I like her. Mike has the highest total confessionals right now. I know that my numbers might be off because they are normally lower than what other people have. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.