It’s Day 5 of the feeds (Day 8 for the HGs) and the morning starts off as any other day we’ve seen: HGs getting up, deciding better and heading back to bed and Jack using the washroom without regard to his hands, where they might have been and what might be on them afterwards. By quarter to ten, Robert and Jack are outside cleaning the pool and not talking about much else (it appears to be some sort of a rule that the pool must be cleaned by a certain time every morning?). Over the next hour, through various wake-up calls by BB, the HGs tumble out of bed and greet the day in the shagalicious house. BB gets an early start to the day and calls one HG after the other into the DR. Chitchat ensues and we learn that golden boy Nathan has had his tongue pierced, that Jun quit smoking just when she entered the BB Hamster House, and that Robert professes he would have foregone his BB experience had he known about the X-factor in advance. To further our viewing delight, Jun decides to wear a scandalously high and loose cropped top under which we can see her breasts hanging out (check out the caps; it’s fairly shocking). Apparently Dana finds it shocking, as well, as she comments on it to other HGs several times—though her choice of word is “boobies.”

Scott begins the day by letting us and the HGs all in on a little secret: his plan is to annoy everyone to get to the end. After all, who would you rather be up against: “sweet Alison or a total prick?” Careful, Scott, you’re close to being redundant there. He also tells Amanda that he wants to get back together with her, but that he won’t pressure her or bug her outside of the house. If she wants to see him, she can call him.

Meanwhile, inside the HOH room, we have a little Powwow going on: Nathan is asking Alison, Erika and Jack if it is okay for Dana to use the veto tomorrow in order to put Scott up (he makes a specific point of letting Erika and Jack know that he wouldn’t go behind their backs without checking in with them first). While Erika and Jack seem willing enough, Alison expresses some worry that if they don’t go after the exes, they will come after them. She advises grinning and bearing his presence for a couple more weeks at least in order to keep the “elite 8” intact, and then letting one of the exes nominate Scott. As a group, they agree that Dana is playing with her emotions and not her head; Jack suggests that it is a NY ego-driven issue that is at play between her and Scott, while Nathan simply thinks that Scott is chemically imbalanced and were they out of the house, they would have had a fight by now. There is also talk about Dana’s aggressiveness and how this is an issue of discontent in the house, as well (especially for Alison as she seems jealous of Dana and Justin’s relationship in the house).

Dana then comes in on the meeting and basically says that she won’t use the veto unless someone asks her to; she wants to honor the original alliance, and yet she also has a hard time being around someone who is so “vile.” Some HGs are concerned about getting rid of Scott, too, since he would be helpful in ousting Justin whom they all fear as being sure to win physical challenges in the future (there is obviously a lot of contradictory thought occurring here as it has also been suggested that Justin would be the easiest ex to throw a HOH challenge to specifically in order to get Scott nominated). Throughout all of this, it is apparent that Dana is very nervous about the situation; from her bug-eyed face and frantic maneuverings, she seems to understand that she is skating on thin ice.

In the kitchen, we are treated to a lovely moment between Alie and David. While he is standing in the kitchen eating potato chips, she comes up and embraces him from behind and asks if she can touch his abs. His response? “I’ll trade them for your tits.” Lovely.

Later in the day, around two in the afternoon, the lolling HGs begin an interesting conversation about their most embarrassing moments. From David, we hear a story about how he was “with a chick and couldn’t get it up.” He was tired and on medication, he explains. Jee asks what David was on so he can remember never to take it and everyone laughs. Next, we get to hear Robert’s most embarrassing story and, if true, it’s a doozy. One night, while “hammered,” he hooked up with an older lady, went home with her and had a good time. Everything went fine, and though in the morning he may have called her the wrong name, he figured it was no big deal—that is until he started to take a closer look at her. It seems the she wasn’t really a she at all, or at least didn’t use to be. It’s not surprising that the HGs howl in laughter at this story. Amanda recalls an incident of incontinence in grade school; David remembers dropping an Egg McMuffin, slipping on it and falling on his ass; and Alison admits to being so scared while parasailing once that she peed all over her best friend. Nathan opts out of the fun and heads to the HOH room to read the Bible (as one poster puts it, “Yes, he’s reading his trusty Bible and probably thinking about all the lies he told in the last hour”). When Alie comes in, they lounge all over each other as he reads, and he finds specific quotes to recite out loud: “…two will become of one flesh…” They chat about parts of the Bible he has read twice, other parts he doesn’t know well, whether or not Alison has been baptized (she has) and if Nathan has been confirmed (he has). What is most obvious in the whole interchange is that Alison desperately wants attention from him.

When Alison remarks that the HOH bed is the most comfortable in the house and asks Nathan if he wants her to go, he replies, “I’m so ready to get out of the HOH room. It’s too stressful, and I don’t want to be the middle of everything.” She asks him what he would do with the money were he to win, and he replies that he is neither a giver not a taker; he would retire with the money, buy his parents cars and maybe go into real estate with his father. Jun and Michelle come in and he now takes the opportunity to read a passage from the Bible about “money (being) the root of all evil” (Nathan is less than subtle; he also is either trying very hard to confuse his Harem, which is not so difficult to do, or he is truly a man of ambivalent feeling right now).

The afternoon trudges onward as the HGs go about wiggling their fingers together (“ex-cell-ent”) and twirling their moustaches. As Dana and Jun whisper in the bathroom (more inconsequential plotting), we notice that they hold their microphones close to their mouths. The speculation is that they have been warned by BB about microphone etiquette (go BB!). Later, Alison, Dana and Michelle discuss next week’s noms and decide that it should be Erika and Scott. There seems to be a foregone conclusion present in their collective mindset that Justin ~will~ obtain the HOH and that he ~will~ nominate as they wish. Given Justin’s misguided loyalty to Alison so far, they could be right.

As evening rolls around, there is a little blip in the general flatline of existence that is Nathan’s Harem: Dana notices that Nathan took her towel from under her folded clothes without asking. She bites out that he doesn’t know “who he’s ***** with.” When he comes around, she asks him about it and he simply states that he thought they were “sharing.” Well, Jun might not mind that *****, Dana says, but she sure does. Later, there is more Harem-discord as Alison and Dana complain about Nathan, then Dana and Jun complain about Nathan, and, well, it looks like the golden boy is starting to grow a little tarnished. Dana wants to use the veto, but doesn’t want to end up looking like the “bad guy;” she blames Nathan for this. In her anger, she even threatens to go to Erika and Jack and “expose” Nathan to them. Phrases such as, “I don’t care how freakin’ hot he is” and “he’s too cocky” spill from her lips. And now the inevitable happens: because Alie is worried about it turning out to be the “boys against the girls,” Dana suggests that perhaps they should consider voting to evict Jee. Folks, it was only a matter of time. A lot can happen in just a few days in the Hamster House.

Outside, David and Robert engage in a gag-inducing, male-chauvinistic, chest-thumping conversation about the women. When Robert asks David if he would date any of the women outside of the house, David answers no and then qualifies it by saying, “But maybe only for booty calls.” They then go on to rate the women by different categories: best lay, best looking, etc. Though there are various conflicting reports on who they would choose and the wording that is chosen, we hear phrases like “who you’d just like to pound” and “who you’d just like to bend over and *****.” (I’m really going to refrain from calling these ***** assholes the ***** piece of ***** assholes they are. Um, oops.) David chooses Michelle “simply because of the build-up,” while Robert’s tastes run to the likes of man trolls (okay, okay, I didn’t really say that; I was channeling Scott for a second). Erika, too, rates high on their lists, though Jun might have a hard time believing that someone so geriatric could be attractive.

Time for…no, no, today’s Turtle Bitch installment is nothing more than a piddly, little commercial: Erika takes them out for a walk by the pool.

Onto the evening chatter: When Alison asks about the feed-freaks and wonders, “What, are they just watching us do this,” Justin nods and adds, “And doing other things like watching the girls and jerking off.” Alison is not very appreciative for the newfound visualization she now has. Jack tells the others that his oldest son is 37 (read that folks, 37—older than the next HG by four years) and is a surfer who travels all over the world to surf. Jack also mentions that he once worked as a traveling chef. Justin explains to four of the girls that he puts his socks on first out of the shower, because he fears that by putting his shorts on first with bare feet, he will be spreading bacteria to his privates and risk getting jock-itch. Amanda says that the last thing she wants to do is get back together with Scott, but that she doesn’t want to appear to be a bitch on camera by being mean to him (no, Amanda honey, that would just entail being ~sane~), while Scott mourns having thrown his feelings for Amanda out for all to see. Jee, Justin and Robert all want Scott gone; they hope Dana uses the veto. They think that Nathan has too many alliances and it will come back to bite him on the ass in the future. They are sad for Amanda who is on the block because they view her as both nice and diplomatic, as well as “hot!” Michelle comments that “heat is exfoliating from (her) body,” and Jun seems to have a hard time holding back from having fun with that one (c’mon Jun! Give it to us; we can take it).

And now for a little spice of the evening: Amanda, given the generous and kind soul she is (and I am convinced—attention, sarcasm alert!!—that this has nothing to do with being nominated and Dana having the veto), decides to tell Dana that Scott has been calling her “man troll” behind her back. Dana, however, believes that this is just an act of desperation on Amanda’s part and vows to just let it slip off her back. Will this be the end of that? Hmm…when Dana tries to talk of it a bit later and Jun and Michelle look on with utter disinterest, Dana retracts into feigned nonchalance and mumbles, “I’m over it. It was so five minutes ago.” Yes, it in fact was, Dana.

Dinner tonight is tomato soup (made from tomato paste) and baked potatoes with cheese sauce prepared by none other than Chef Jun. Again, compliments run around the table and someone remarks that her future husband will be a lucky guy. Scott heads off to the DR and dinner remains altogether an unremarkable fare. There is some frequent moaning about the foods they miss, however, which is growing to be tiring in the extreme. Jee dreams about meat; Dana wants her snacks (oatmeal cookies to make ice cream sandwiches). Again, I point out the fact that this group has still not seen a single day of PB&J.

After dinner, Amanda and Jee head outside to smoke (hey! I just realized the two nominees are the only smokers in the house) and Jee opens up to Amanda about his past. Having come to America on a “boat” and not being able to speak English, he was teased a lot in school and his childhood was very rough as a result. Once he went to college, however, and his English improved immeasurably, he became much less violent, though he and Jun still fought verbally a lot, calling each other names and using excessive profanity with each other.

Meanwhile, two of the feed cams are showing Scott who is curled up in bed sleeping. A poster points out that he has been sleeping on and off all day and skipped dinner—it may be time to call a shrink or up his meds. He’s not too tired, however, to refrain from flicking the whirring camera a couple of birds as it zooms in on him. When he finally comes out from the bedroom and tells the others how bored he is, there is a general sense of sincere concern with the HGs. Scott, however, resumes his usual crass behavior almost immediately. When David mentions how sexually frustrated he is becoming, Scott tells him to “go rub one out.” Then he suggests playing spin the bottle with everyone; when they balk, he growls, “Aw, c’mon, doesn’t anyone have any balls?”

What happens next is a little hazy. Scott approaches Amanda and tells her that he “heard stories” about her after they broke up, but when she asks him to elucidate, he walks away. The next thing we know, Scott is throwing those garish yellow chairs around the kitchen and the first real drama we’ve seen on BB begins its journey (on the actual feeds, we see Dana hear some ruckus and go investigate; the camera is in time to see Scott throw the last chair). Then, when called to the DR, Scott responds, “No, I don’t wanna go to the DR! I don’t feel like going to the DR. Come and get me! You can’t ***** handle me…”

FOTH. When we come back, Scott is outside calmly talking to Amanda and explaining that because he realizes that he cannot have back with her what he once had, he blew up. Dana, however, is in the kitchen telling the others that it was like WW III in there, that Scott is crazy and both he and Amanda have to go. She says that she fears for her personal safety with him in the house. When Scott heads to the bathroom, the HGs head outside to talk to Amanda about what happened. Amanda tells them that Scott feels he was “***** over” by BB with the X-factor (I guess Scott figured he could win the game but didn’t anticipate having to deal with Amanda there—and given his strong, very strange feelings for her added with his mental imbalances, we’re getting drama and then some). When Scott returns from the bathroom, things go on relatively calmly with general chat and support (Erika gives him a hug) and discussion about what they’re going to do for the rest of the evening (truth or dare? Scott says, “What do you want me to do? Throw some furniture?”).

You’d think that the climax of the evening had already occurred, no? You’d be wrong. See, Scott takes the opportunity after throwing the chairs to discuss with Amanda how he hasn’t dated anyone since her because of his “HPV.” HPV are genital warts. Okay, a moment to pause and think “ew,” but nothing to really freak out about.

But the night is steadily building… Jun remarks, half-jokingly, that she doesn’t want Scott to hear all the things she has said about her and track her down outside of the house. Michelle is concerned that Scott blew up after only seven days in the house. When Scott apologizes to a group of them, no one says anything in return (“Didn’t anybody hear me?”). Talk immediately ensues about the veto and using it to get rid of Scott.

Around 10:00pm a meeting congregates in the LR. Scott wants to explain to everyone why what happened happened. And what does he explain? That he has the Human Papilloma Virus and because he has had to deal with it, he has isolated himself from the world. Since he broke up with Amanda, he has not had sex with anyone because of the HPV, even though it is not contagious if you do not currently have the genital warts (which he has not had in over a year). The first to speak up is Nathan who tells Scott that he should not be dealing with this in the house, that this is not the appropriate place for him at this point in time if his behavior is going to affect the other HGs' personal safety. Scott is upset at this as he adamantly insists that he would never physically hurt someone in the house. The meeting dissolves into bickering and the general consensus is that Scott’s apology is hard to accept because it is the third or fourth one. Without any resolution at all, the meeting ends and people disperse into the house.

Where does Alison head? Straight into the bathroom where she starts balling like a baby (I am sorry, but it is true), clearly not only overreacting to the situation but being willfully ignorant as well. It seems Alison is scared that now ~everyone~ in the house is going to get the HPV from the WC, and her concern is not mild—she literally begins sobbing uncontrollably and only interrupts her grief to puke into the toilet. Michelle joins in and the two are seen (not joking, I saw it with my own eyes) supporting each other with their arms as they cry and walk out of the bathroom. The girls, once calm enough to act in a reasonable manner (huge, huge, HUGE sarcasm, folks), gather forces and head to the bathroom to clean the toilet to within an inch of its porcelain life.

For a long time afterward, the cameras are zoomed in on unpopulated rooms and we are left to wonder what is happening. Then there is a FOTH, and when back, things seem to have returned to normal. Scott, however, is missing. Is he gone? Has BB taken him out of the house?

Apparently so. We overhear Jack remarking that Arnold and Allison (producers of BB) are “quality people” and took the right action, both for them and for Scott. And that’s that. We don’t know if he has been removed temporarily for counseling or if he is gone for good. It appears at this point to be the latter.

After such a night, you’d think the house would be in turmoil, but surprisingly everyone is mellow and the night proceeds similar to the ones previous. We giggle when we overhear Jack make a joke about the turtle pushing the rook on the chessboard and Michelle returns, “No, it was the castle!” The women discuss choreographing a dance for themselves on the morrow. Alison and Nathan return to what they do best, scheming in the HOH room. Now that Scott is taken care of, their target for next week is David. They talk about how they cannot trust Dana because she is so paranoid and is so close to Justin. Alison, predictably so, regurgitates everything Dana said about Nathan to her master. Honestly, their plotting is getting so convoluted and contrary that it is becoming entirely too tiresome to bother recording it here. Essentially their concern is mostly with David, Erika and Jack, though the combination of Justin (the brain…what??), Robert (the smooth-talker), and Jee (the decoy) is worrying, too. Meanwhile, David, Erika and Jack are scheming on their own. More of the same, but opposite. The wildcard at this point seems to be Dana, whom both sides think they can either take or get rid of. Outside, Jun tells Dana what Nathan said about her (it’s a backstabbing kind of night—must be the full moon) and Dana gets upset. Once they are all grouped into the House of Harems (er, sorry, Head of House room), they all play nice and attack the only one of their own missing from the bedroom: Michelle. Nathan, when told he has her wrapped around his little finger, says it is “all a joke” (meaning his relationship with her).

And it goes on, folks, until four in the morning as usual. What began as an ordinary day climaxed into an unusual day but ended just as normal as they come. And so the waves of the great sea that is BB roll.

To bed, to bed, perchance to dream of anything ~but~ BB