The Other C Word
The beauty of this episode recap is it writes itself. The best part is just taking the quotes right from the horses’ mouths. After all, being fluent in Jersey-speak is an art unto itself.
We pick up after the fight between Jacqueline and Robyn the night before. The push is on for Robyn to leave. Robyn spares Melissa from telling her to get packin’ by volunteering to leave of her own accord. Teresa is ticked off because she feels Jacqueline escalated the fight by sitting on Robyn’s lap after Robyn threatened to rage on Jacq’s a__. Tre directs her annoyance to Jacq with, “Why don’t you rage on your own ass?” What does that even mean? It sounds like a comeback from a fifth grader whose classmate just smashed the cupcakes his mother packed in his lunch.
The remaining group goes to dinner where another fight erupts. No sooner do they sit down than Jacqueline, feeling that Tre is turning against her, says, “You’re a table flipping b-tch.” Well, it would’ve been nice to say Grace first. Jacq brings up the whole issue of Teresa’s soldiers again. That leads to a whole rehashing of “stripper-gate,” where someone was supposedly trying to set Melissa up by saying she was a former stripper. Jacq asks Melissa if she remembers that she actually warned her that this guy was out to get her. Melissa acts like she can’t recall Jacqueline looking out for her. This aggravates Jacqueline who thinks Melissa has been acting weird with her. “You’re full of f***ing s***,” Jacqueline blurts out to Melissa.
As Shakespeare said, “Hell hath no fury ….” Jacq is now on a roll. She follows up with these little gems to Melissa: “You’re a fake, phony b*tch. Everything Teresa said about you might have been true.” Pointing to Melissa’s face, she adds, “You’ve had four nose jobs!” Wow, way to cross the line of no return, Jacqueline. That faux pas should have been as plain as the nose on…well, Melissa’s face.
Siggy tries to jump in to mediate. But, Dolores knows this crowd only too well. She cautions, “You’re in the part of the zoo – do not feed them.” Then, going against her own advice, she orders Buffalo wings. Teresa comes to the defense of her sister-in-law, whose fake nose is now out of joint. Tre accuses Jacqueline of feeding some guy the story about Melissa being a stripper. This infuriates Jacq who yells, “You’re a twisted b*tch.” To which Tre responds, “I learned from the best,” as she points to Jacqueline. Not to be outdone, Jacq counters, “You’re a f***ing criminal!” Oh, no she didn’t.
To the camera, Jacq calls Teresa “that little psychopath, narcissistic sociopath.” Well, looks like someone’s either been delving into books about mental disorders or watching reruns of Law & Order: SVU.
Melissa tells her sister-in-law that Jacqueline is upset that she and Tre are getting along now. “I feel like a dumb-a**,” Teresa tells us. Was she talking about letting Jacqueline back into her life or was that it a self-assessment that could be applied across the board? She adds that Jacqueline has been doing a lot of work to her face, so maybe some of that injected Botox got into her brain. Well, then, at least Jacqueline has an excuse for her behavior. What about the you?
Meanwhile Siggy is growing increasingly upset. She becomes a bit melodramatic as platters of sushi are brought to the table. “They keep bringing out this food and I’m gonna vomit.” It’s probably not from the fighting though; more likely it’s because raw fish and Buffalo wings don’t exactly mix. Undaunted, Teresa is determined to prove her sensitive side. “I’m fragile,” she says trying to garner some sympathy. “No, you’re not,” Dolores contradicts. “Anyone want chicken wings?” Tre follows. Now, if making sure everyone has enough poultry in their bellies doesn’t demonstrate sensitivity, I don’t know what does.
Back home, Joe Giudice is bonding with his daughters over Chinese take-out. Trying to see the bright side of going to jail, he tells them, “I’m gonna get nice and skinny.” Milania ponders, “It’s surprising – you don’t eat junk food and you’re still big. Bigger than pregnant people.” Out of the mouths of babes…
Jacqueline winds up going home early from Vermont. She decries that Teresa is a toxic person, and that Tre and Melissa don’t deserve her in their lives. Siggy also decides to go home early the next day. “I feel like someone stuck me in a f***ing sewer.” Over-react much, Siggy? The next morning, Siggy awakens to find Dolores gazing out the window. “I’m looking out to see which window I’m gonna drop out of,” Dolores tells her. Did all these women go to the William Shatner School of Overacting?
Teresa wakes up with a call from her chubby hubby, who is programmed into her phone as “Honey.” She spills the story of the major confrontation with Jacqueline the night before, especially the part about Jacq calling her a criminal. “I just had a big hard-on before you started talking about this,” Joe replies. Prison wardens take note: No need to put saltpeter in the prisoners’ food – just play episodes of The Real Housewives of New Jersey on a loop.
Siggy, who is exhausted from the tension, doesn’t want to be with anyone except Dolores at this point. As she faces the camera, she brings out a fan, because reliving the drama is causing her to have a hot flash. Dolores has also had enough and wants to be alone too. But, lo and behold, Melissa and Teresa show up all decked out and ready to have fun. Teresa is sporting a flapper-type fur headband with a feathery medallion that could possibly be the product of a mating between a pheasant and a beaver from the grounds of Downton Abbey. Dolores, who feels like she’s been through a war, gets a load of the two visitors and quips, “Melissa looks like she’s going to Studio 54 with a full face of makeup and Teresa looks like Melania.” I assume she meant Trump, not Tre’s daughter.
When Siggy and Dolores decide to beg off going out, Melissa and Tre head out by themselves to spend the day together. They look a bit shell-shocked when they realize they now have no one else to talk to but each other. They board an aerial tram and Melissa is soon probing her sister-in-law about her feelings now that Joe is only two weeks away from going off to jail. Of course, Tre starts to cry and Melissa kinda fake-cries, which is obvious because she pulls out a tissue yet doesn’t seem to produce any real tears to wipe away. Teresa, seeing compassion flow from her formerly distant sister-in-law, caves in to the gratuitous display. “I feel the love,” she states in her new Namaste way. Melissa asserts, “We’re not gonna let people get between us.” Aww, while we’re waiting for Taylor Swift and Kanye West to kiss and make up, at least we now have Terlissa…or is it Meleasa?
Next episode: Kim D hints that while Teresa was away at camp, Joe Giudice may have been up to some other activities besides PTA bake sales.
Eileen Budd is a comedienne and writer who is currently working on an anthology of true stories of mid-life daters. If you have a dating story that happened to you (funny, inspiring, or downright weird), please send it to: datingover40tales@gmail.com.