Broderick

Sharon stole the show. "When Jesus is my portion, a constant friend is He. His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches over me."

FOUR love scenes today -- gotta be a new record. (1) Ted & Shanice (2) Beautiful Nicole & that God-awful Chemistry-free Carlton Creature (3) Dani & Big Bill (4) Jacob & Smitty 🤣

If I remember right, the first time we saw that "coffee spot" was around Halloween. At the time, I thought it was part of the hospital cafeteria. That ain't the case, based on those little signs. I really can't figure out what it's supposed to be.

It's a new year, and I genuinely planned to give that thirsty horndawg Nurse Ashley a chance to entertain me as she desperately throws her Basic Wares at yet a 3rd victim in a brief 10-month period --- but it's just plumb excruciating, y'all. I keep expecting Timothee Chalamet to appear as an X-ray technician or Rami Malek to show up as a nurse's aid, in a last-ditch effort to make her drab ass interesting. That "ice cream comparison" was agonizing, but at least it led to a cute scene between Shanice and Ted.

I was taking the opening scene very seriously, until Hayley pulled out that big envelope that said TEST RESULTS!!!!, and then I busted out laughing, realizing it was Dani's ghoulish nightmare. I thought it was effective. I love Beautiful Nicole, but Lord have mercy -- Carlton is plumb dreadful. I believe he's enrolled in an acting class taught by Tomas & Derek.

Besides being WAY TOO THIRSTY for his "best friend" Ted's ex-wife, Carlton just can't keep up with Beautiful Nicole in the acting department. He's dull as hell to me. Sometimes I wonder if Greg Vaughan's unavailability to tape some scenes led to this sudden resurgence of Nicole's friendship with Carlton. At one point, she acted like she was DONE with him. Then after Winterfest, he popped up again, to my disappointment.

And I could be dead wrong. But there's been a TON of literary symbolism going on the past few episodes that points to Naomi being pregnant. It's the type of thing writers & readers jump onto. Anita yelled at Tracy the other day and broke a teacup. As she flung the cup, Senator Dupree walked in just as Anita yelled, "I want more grandchildren!" Then, at the Mardi Gras celebration following Epiphany, Naomi (of all people) "got the baby". And Naomi didn't say it once, but yelled it twice, to drive the point home, that SHE was the one who "got the baby". Anita then brought Naomi a crown, which seemed to symbolize Anita "passing something" to Naomi (the triple negative cancer gene). At the end of the episode, Naomi presented Anita with a gift, by placing the crown on Anita's head for the photograph, indicating that Naomi would be "gifting" something to Anita later (the grandbaby that Anita told Tracy she wanted).

Or the opposite. Naomi might change her tune entirely & decide not to postpone having a baby, after all. Based on the (excellent) Mardi Gras scenes, there appeared to be some foreshadowing Naomi will wind up pregnant. As she chatted with Andre & ate her king cake, she suddenly squealed, "I got the baby! I got the baby!!" The writers could've theoretically given the baby to any king cake-eater in the room, but they specifically chose Naomi for the honor. I don't think it was a throwaway. I think they were previewing a 2026 story for us.

Just finished Wednesday's show, where Beautiful Nicole dropped by with the mini-quiches and big plans for Samantha's cotillion debut. I loved Tyrell's tirade about cotillion culture being a way to further separate the "haves" from the "have-nots", juxtaposed with Nicole's explanation of how the debutante society (as well as fraternities and sororities) raise money to help the very "have-nots" that Tyrell feels are being discriminated against by cotillions, fraternities, & sororities. That conversation was NOT typical soap opera fare, and it was certainly something to think about.

Finally got to view Episode #200 tonight. WOW!! What great work from everyone involved. I know it's a gloomy issue, as each of us likely knows someone who's suffered (or who is currently suffering) with breast cancer, but those Duprees knocked it out of the park. Every single one of them. I'm handing them an armful of DuPraise of my own tonight. (And I just knew Anita & Vernon's little Sweet Baby would be the first one beating a path to their door. He didn't let me down.)

Episode #198 & #199 are now on Pluto, for those (like me) who were galivanting around last week & missed them. Episode #200 should pop-up on Pluto tomorrow.

Yeah, I think we're STUCK with Ashley for a while, as she's been more integrated into the canvas than Derek ever was. Hopefully, we'll see better writing for her, and hopefully she'll take an acting class or two.

I think there's 3 areas where things desperately needed improvement. (1) The "triangle" with Derek, Ashley, and Andre just never worked at all --- very little chemistry among them, and the writing for that story was disjointed and lackluster at best. I'm sorry someone lost a steady job, but that entire debacle needed to be dropped from the canvas. (2) The actor playing Tomas is horrible (and has been horrible since Day One). (3) There was entirely too much "DuPraise" in the dialogue (people endlessly praising the Duprees). I've noticed that's finally lessened-up over the past couple of months.

My biggest takeaway from 2025 on BTG is how well Karla Mosley & Daphnee Duplai have grown into leading ladies.

Probably what Ted should have said is, "Nicole, ole weird-ass Leslie is running around saying Vernon is having an affair with Sharon. Now, I believe she's wrong. But on the off-chance she's right, I wanted to let you know about it so you wouldn't think I'm keeping secrets from you. She's most likely wrong, though." How hard would that have been?

I really enjoyed the Christmas episode with Vernon singing "Joy to the World" and "Never Can Say Goodbye". (Hard to believe Dani & Beautiful even considered ruining Anita's Xmas with that silly third-hand account of Vernon's "affair" with Sharon. It's painful enough that LESLIE believed it, and even dumber that TED would believe Leslie's story, and downright RIDICULOUS that Nicole would believe Ted's testimony about it.) The payoff of Clifton Davis singing was probably worth the silliness of the circumstances though, I guess.

Ours always went up late, too -- because one of the kids (me 😆) insisted on keeping it up till January 6th for the wise men's arrival. Mama was afraid it would burn the house down if they decorated it in early December and left it up till Epiphany. Now that I'm an adult with my own place, we just wait and decorate it on Christmas Eve.

Meet your first! We brought our inside Sunday and plan to decorate it Wednesday afternoon. That'll give us our twelve days (plus one extra), which seems like more than enough to me. I'd be tired of it if it sat there from Thanksgiving till Epiphany.

They messed that up. Mrs. Bell isn't related to Irna. Bell often told the story about his introduction to Irna. He was working for a Chicago ad agency. He heard Irna might be looking for an assistant writer, as one of her writers was leaving. He called Irna's secretary and was advised to submit a sample script. He did. But the writer who was thinking of leaving decided to stay. Several months later (or years later), he crossed paths with a lady who said she was Irna Phillips's niece. He said, "I sent your aunt a script one time, but nothing came of it." The niece said, "I believe she's looking for someone right now." The niece mentioned her conversation with William Bell to Irna, and Irna said, "If you see him again, tell him I need an assistant. I believe he's the boy who's married to the talk show hostess, and he sent me a script once." That time they connected, and she hired him.

No pushback from me. When there are TOO many female writers, the Lifetime movie effect generally begins creeping in. Needs more male input. A balance is always good.

Miss Nicole is perfect ... You nailed it; she's distant and kinda cold, but she's so pretty and so engaging that you can't help being drawn in.

If I were getting something delivered from Dooky Chase, I'd get the pompano or the veal panne -- not that damn ole gumbo. Winterfest hit all the right marks for me -- it's like those countless parties we ALL attend in early December -- overhyped during the planning, and then it's just a basic party where somebody gets drunk off their ass [in this case, Vanessa]. From a dramatic standpoint, I thought it served its purpose -- it highlighted Kat's isolation from her childhood & from the people she's loved all her life; it gave Leslie another chance to torment Laura & Mona; it showcased Bill's nostalgia for Dani Dupree & her family; it struck a note of jealousy in Theodore when he saw Beautiful enter the club with her new beau; and it started Beautiful's "healing process" from all the hurt she's felt since learning of Ted's betrayal. And best of all, it caused Drab Ashley to leave in an even more MOROSE mood than usual. My only complaint is that the writers seem to think we're as DUMB as Leslie about Vernon's meetings with Sharon. I thought it was clever to create a situation where Leslie gets the wrong idea and can potentially make a fool of herself, but the writers seem to think we're all as stupid as Leslie about a series of voice lessons. Hopefully, we ain't. One thing the writers have done well is consistently show us the kind of person Senator Dupree is. No sense in trying to trick US into thinking he's suddenly changed.

Having adult kids is the most interesting thing I see about him. Maybe Kat can trade-in that dud she's stuck with for one of Dr. Rollins's kids, lol.

I imagine the writers considered dramatizing the scene involving Madison, Chelsea, and Willow but decided it could easily backfire from a medical perspective. Either Willow would've had to go WAY over the top with her observations, or else her commentary would've come across to many viewers as completely reasonable, especially with Chelsea sitting there smiling & encouraging her, while Madison frowned in frustration. The end result, unless Willow was presented as TOTALLY bizarre, would've appeared that Michele Val Jean supported the position that a "smile and a crystal" are more effective than an antibiotic in clearing up an infection, and I don't believe that's the impression BTG hoped to give. In this case, it was probably better for everyone to discuss it afterwards to highlight that Willow is down in an internet rabbit hole, and Chelsea was encouraging it. As Anita said today, "I thought Aunt Melba was completely normal and fine in the brief amount of time I spent with her, but I realized Vernon and his mother had FAR more experience with her than I did."

I had nothing against Maurice Johnson, but I'm crazy about Keith D. Robinson. I believe he came along at a difficult time -- "after the damage to Ted had already been done", so to speak --- but I can't imagine anyone else in the role now.