Survivor Philippines (yes, there will be spoilers) (Page 7)

I think Penner didn't want to go out like James with an idol or two in his pocket.  He might have just got a "spidy sense" vibe at tribal or noticed people scrambling before leaving for tribal and he wasn't in on a lot of the discussion.  He's a smart guy and hope he stays around and he doesn't seem to play dirty.

One of the tenets of Survivor is ALWAYS do what it takes to stick around for another tribal council.  The game really can change day to day and sometimes all you need to do is survive tribal to tribal.  One of the worst mistakes people make is sticking with a failing plan.  If the plan isn't working, change the plan!

Someone is still on the bottom and Penner needs to find out who it is.  Which three voted for Pete?  RC, Penner, and ??? Who was the third?  That's a start.  I'd like to see him latch onto the Malcolm alliance.  He also should start working the "we need to get the immunity threats out now" approach...that's the only way he'll probably get Malcolm and Pete out.

So many options.  These first few eliminations after the merge area really a turning point in the game...or can be.  If they don't turn the game here then it does become the big alliance picking off the folks not in the alliance.

Ya... so nothing terribly wrong with the weak tribe voting RC... other than I hate the strong alliance and anything that works in their favor... Abi, Pete, Artis. RC worked in their favor.

All is not lost. Penner no longer has an idol. they can bring him back into the fold and work on one of the others. There are still plenty of numbers to work on the terrible three.

It never is about who to take out, it is about who you can beat in a final 3 and we have seen plenty of people there that do not belong. So who know... is Abi so abrasive people will be willing to bring her along?

I really think Lisa, Denise, and Malcolm make a very strong 3. Lisa was by mistake, but it can work. I bet she stays loyal, and so far, those two do not know who Lisa is.

Kent is playing a good game, but he is sort of playing too man people. It just might bite him. He has jumped around a bit so far. Not a loose cannon, but he has jumped around a bit and said some thing to a lot of people. Other than that, he is playing pretty well and trying to make some decisions for him.

Where'd you find them?  I could only find Part 1.

NM.  Finally found them under "new" instead of under Ponderosa...where I assumed they would be....

She really didn't play as well as I thought she would.... I can't really say what I expected of her, but I just thought she might play better. She wasn't "horrible". She seemed a bit of a diva, and didn't want to cause waves. I don't know, I thought her resume would have played out better.

Abi just lives moment to moment on her emotions and that is the easiest kind of person to play. RC is gone because Pete not because of Abi. Abi is just a stupid pawn that Pete can play her anger to get the result that he wants. I hope when she watches the shows she realizes how much of a B she is but I doubt she will.

Good point about Penner approaching those on the outs.  Or if Jeff Kent decides he needs him in his alliance again he can say he was just trying to flush the idol so he wouldn't use it on him.  I don't know if Penner will buy it but he doesn't have much of a position at this point to do anything about it.  I guess we'll find out Wednesday. 

So many "business" types think they will do well and manipulate but they are usually the worst.  Don't get me wrong, most of it is the luck of the draw with your tribe and RC got crazy Abi and Artis.  Seems like Artis is always ready to go off on someone out there.  Maybe it's just being out of your element and he wears it all over his face that he is upset at the situation.. I don't know.  He has a major gripe about Skupin for some reason.  I still can't figure that one out.  It seems in this game the younger girls only play is to latch on to a bad guy type like Russell Hantz and ride until the end and not ruffle any feathers and hope for an "anti" vote.  Not being sexist at all but it seems like not many women have won the slot by playing the game, except for Kim last season . There was Jenna as well on Amazon.  I think that was about it that were women that played their way in to the finals and didn't just ride coat tails like the one that beat Coach a few seasons ago.  Is it just a society perception thing? 

Ya, I agree. Usually it is the strong tribe taking out the weak... but the strong tribe isn't really strong, it was two groups.. Abi, Pete, Artis... and Skupin, Lisa, and RC... Malcolm was swing. And the weak tribe was already trying to eat their own, but we only saw that because they went to tribal.

So you still have Pete, Abi, and Artis. They will stick together. As it is now, there is Malcolm and Denise with Lisa playing tag along. But we really don't know if they will join in with others. Jeff has no other choice right now but Carter... he has made promises to Penner and Skupin, and probably thinks he is good with Denise.

It isn't a tight 5-6 right now that is just willing to get rid of the rest and sort it out after that. Still plenty of game play with this group. Not really the same as past games.

I'm actually liking this season now compared to previous seasons where it's a strong 5-6 man alliance and they just pick off the other side in a predictable way.  This can change quick and that is old school survivor.  I still don't like the 3 tribe set up they started with, it was just to boring.  I think it might come down to Malcom and Jeff Kent as far as game play at the end and if that happens who do you give it to.  Both have played a good game to this point. 

Right...

I am SO excited to see at the reunion what she says when she learns all her resentment to RC was unfounded and Pete planted the evidence.

But her personallity?  She won't care and shrug it off.  Even though she falsely accused and kept going on and on about it - she looks like a fool, but she will just brush it off.  She just doesn't care that she slanders someone and will probably LAUGH that Pete did that and think it's funny.

And chances are, just my luck, they won't barely even mention it in the reunion.  I wish I got to ask the questions, because I think I have much better ones than the passive ones Jeff asks most of the time.

People like Abi make me sick. 

Now that my rant is over...

I would be SCREWED at that challange.  25% of your weight?  That one was actaully slanted to the smaller players because if you were twice as heavy, I doubt you have twice the hand strength.  So little strong girls/guys like Dennise and the track coach rock it.

I knew the baseball player would do well, they have strong hands/wrists.

Crazy, everyone just loves Dennis.  She's going to be there till the end unless the evil empire of Abi and Pete find her a threat.

Lisa was nice, but I think that's a BIT rude to dump everyone's bad and start hanging them out.  I would at least ask the group if that's what they want. 

I know this is mean, but something about the track coach - hard to look at.  Not an actractive guy, IMO.  Butterface for a dude.

RC fell in the hard luck catagory like someon mentioned.  Good/strong player, but wrong place/wrong time.  There is a lot of luck in this game along with the outplay,outlast stuff.  Getting from one vote to the next always gives you a chance.

I could see Abi blowing up at someone and suddenly getting voted off.

Someone mentioned Alan Alda, and now that's all I can think about with Penner.  Thanks for that!

I forgot what the trailer was for next week.  Anything look exciting?

RC said in her post race interview that the biggest misconception she had coming in was that people would make the SMART choice (aka business type decisions) and in reality they are making the safe choices.  So, that may explain why some business types don't do well.  They probably have a hard time wrapping that fact around their noggins.

Not many women have won by playing the game...that is true.  Even Jenna and Kim won a TON of immunities in addition to their gameplay and that really helps.

I am not sure what disturbs people about riding coattails.  That's a valid strategy IMHO.  Choosing which person to align with is a VITAL element of this game.  In order to ride coattails you have to choose the correct person...someone who you know will get to the end but you know everyone will hate them so you'll get all the votes.

I think an interesting twist to the game would be if there was a formula to calculate the winner instead of just votes.  For example, you get a certain number of points for votes plus a certain number of points for every challenge you win, etc. etc.  That kind of system might make it less viable that a pure coattail rider could win...because let's say the votes are fairly even...4-3 or something in favor of a coattail rider...the coattail rider probably didn't win challenges and could end up losing.

I guess in a way it would make the challenges a HUGE influence...even bigger than they already are.  That would be a downside.  But, it would be a surprising twist and they are always looking for those.

I never really liked any of the "percent of your weight" challenges.

Denise is having a pretty good run...considering how many tribals she's had to go to!  She's a therapist...she relates to people for a living...she's really good at it apparently.  That's why everyone loves her.  Plus she seems to be an asset at camp and such.

I wondered if that was one of Lisa's jobs at the Tandang camp...maybe she didn't think to ask because her tribe was so used to her doing that?

Trailer for next week was Penner scrambling and declaring "me against the rest of you".

I wonder if they will re-hide the idol?  Doubtful...they couldn't hide it in plain site again because everyone knows what it looks like now!

^^^^ ETA:  haha, not above, you slipped that in.  The one above that.

In response to this.  I think a lot of the times it's just don't stand out.  Don't be a leader or hyper aggressive.  Don't be bottom of the barrel or disliked.  Just blend in and latch on to the right group.

I think if you are quiet and liked and very "average" you fly under the radar for a LONG time.  Shoot, Dennise was an obvious target right after the merge, but came accross and nice and not threatning and they unloaded one of their own tribe.

Just my thought if I were to play.  But it's not my personallity, so it could be hard.

Oh yeah...  I remember now, and was thinking it was a bit of a crybaby move.  Sort of like "waaa waaa waaa, you tried to vote me out so screw you all".  I think I would try to work hard to be liked and get INTO a group.  Not alienate everyone.

OK, pshycological question...  Needed it's own post.

Do you recall how upset Penner got because he had ONE vote from the previous vote?  It obviously came from the girl that got voted out (former miss whatever).  What else is she going to do?  She wasn't obviously in on the plan to vote HER out.  So she had to cast it from someone.

I guess part of me would say whatever, she voted for me.  If there were MORE than one vote, I would worry.  Or did he take it personally that even the girl that was getting booted even cast him a vote even though he voted for her?

OR, would you/he be concerned that the group probably led her to believe they were voting for Penner, so she voted that way and he was stress that of all people why pick him to be the false target?

I bet that game just plays with your mind and paranoia.  Especially when you see groups all huddled to gether all the time.  Stressfull I bet.  I have access to a guy that played before, I should look him up and ask.

I also plan to grill the chipendale guys that are on Amazing Race to get the back story on that show.  They are friends of the ours.

It's definitely a game you need to have good control over your emotions to play.  He definitely would be better off just using this new knowledge to come up with a better plan of attack.

But...sometimes your emotions take over...that's kind of the whole point of having them on a deserted island short of food and water...take away food and water and comforts and people's real personalities can't help but come out and controlling emotions comes more difficult.

Either way...next week should be interesting!  Penner is really going to try to shake things up!

That is one of the reasons they have a psychologist around the contestants after they are voted off.  It really messes with your head because it's SO outside of reality.  You can't trust what anyone says.  You can't confide in anyone without worrying whether they will use that knowledge against you.  The longer you are out there the worse it gets because the OUTSIDE of reality becomes reality.  Remember how upset Kat was when she got voted off?  She didn't realize it was a game...she still thought it was real life so she felt actually betrayed.  Whereas the majority of players really do understand it's a game and don't take it personally when they get voted off...

That was me... you're welcome.

but even his mannerisims are like Alan Alday. The way he gestures and everything. I'm not saying it is on purpose...all I'm saying is he could make a killing in a Vegas inpersonation show.

Ya... that is the stress we don't see from the couch. Hunger, sanitation, poor conditions, cold/hot, boredom, lack of sleep, lack of comfort, paranoia, people truly out to get rid of you. It seems easy from my couch...it's for a million bucks, how hard could that be?

But I would come unglued after about 3 days of less than 8 hours of uninterupted sleep. And no coffee!!!! That would approach homicidal.

I can roll with punches pretty well when my head is straight and I can concentrate on the big picture. But I am a rotating shift worker. I work days/nights weekday/weekends. I actually love night shift because I am a night person... but every 5 week rotation, I have to work a 3 and 4 night strech, and then swap back to days to be with the rest of the world. It used to be a lot easier, but the older I get the harder it is. For the first two days it is profound. Up/down, real irritable, real emotional. I make very poor decisions. Family knows to leave me alone. Like really bad PMS I guess.

But that is the point of Survivor, to put people under stress and see what happens. We don't get to feel that stress on our couch, but it can effect people in dramatic ways.

Yes, this is definitely a show you should "prepare" for (if you have enough warning and I don't know how much warning they get).

In no particular order you should:

1. Ween off coffee.
2. First gain an extra 10 pounds then
3. Restrict your food for a week immediately prior to leaving so that the "hunger" the first few days isn't as bad.
4. HYDRATE really well.
5. Practice sleeping on the floor (I think sleeping in weird places is an acquired skill)
6. Oh, and learn how to make a freaking fire. :D