The Real L Word’s Saj Golde Launches Black LGBT Magazine

Brittani’s Team Pick:

Shows end, time goes on, and people keep living their lives. While some members of The Real L Word go on to be professionally gay and others continue their jobs (whatever those were), others are still finding their way and figuring out how they want to use the small followings they’ve garnered from being on television. I’m sure the first person you worry about is Sajdah “Saj” Golde. While it’s unknown whether she has continued dry humping people in laundromats (no judgment here, I love laundromats), she has definitely started a magazine called BlackOUT which is a collection of short stories about lesbians’ war against nite lites.

Just kidding, it’s a magazine geared towards black LGBT folks! When Elixher asked Saj why she created the magazine, she said,

“After being a part of The Real L Word, I learned of many other young LGBTQ people of color who were also in need of LGBTQ role models, a role I certainly couldn’t take on alone. So I wanted to create BlackOUT as a space were LGBTQ individuals can see themselves, people like them, experiences like theirs.”

If you’re not one of those people that refuse to buy magazine based solely on the little paper cut factory subscription cards that fly out of them every two seconds, then you’ll be pleased to know that the magazine is currently available in the Amazon Store. It’ll be available in the Apple App Store soon enough. Subscriptions are going for $20 a year which seems like a good deal to me, although I don’t usually have twenty dollars to my name so I have no real concept of money.

Real L Worlds Collide For Vote For Equality Charity Basketball Game

The women of The Real L Word are coming together this Saturday, September 24th at All’s FAIR in L’s & Basketball, a charity basketball game for Vote for Equality‘s efforts to defend The FAIR Education Act, which will now require the inclusion of gay and lesbian as well as disabled leaders that have made contributions to our society in History class.  It’s the first law of its kind in the country and is currently facing repeal. The goal of the event is to involve all sectors of the LGBTQ community, as well as straight allies, in a positive environment for not only an exciting game but an opportunity to actively support the cause. Vote for Equality has been working since 2008 to combat anti-LGBT prejudice and to defeat our oppositions messaging to ultimately win ballot measures.

So, just who is involved in this good game of lezzie b-ball? Well, Sajdah (along with partner Tawana Briggs and Chanel Brown) has wrangled together cast members from Seasons 1 and 2, including Whitney, Rose, Jill, Kelsey, Francine, and Kacy (with Nikki and Cori cheering from the stands, like the good ‘pumps’ they are).

It will almost certainly go down something like this:

[yframe url=’https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1dr5maYtdc’]

Saj promises surprise halftime performances, special memorabilia for guests, and fun prizes.

All’s FAIR in L’s & Basketball
Saturday, September 24 @ 4:30 PM
Cal State LA (5151 State University Drive, Los Angeles)
$8 advance / $10 door

The Real L Word Episode 209 Recap: The Pieces Fall Into Place On Top of Each Other

Hello Nation. It’s time for another episode of The Real L Word, a show about a group of teenage detectives who go around solving neighborhood crimes and mysteries with the help of a very secretive friend: Ghostwriter!

L to R: Lesbian playing Whitney, Lesbian wearing a vest, Lesbian with a flat-top, lesbian in mom jeans/belt/tucked in&billowed out shirt, lesbian in overalls, lesbian in flannel

Hello lesbians, lesbian allies, and people who have strong feelings about lesbian erasure and welcome to the very last recap of the worst show in the whole wide world besides I Want a Famous Face, The Real L Word. As I’ve mentioned in the past, it’s a show which follows young sapphics as they have sex, talk about sex, talk about Whitney, and wrestle in various liquid food items.

Number one feeling about this episode?

[Sidenote: Because I’m supposed to be in a car right now on the way to San Diego to talk about something important, I feel insecure about the quality of this recap which I wish I had four more hours to obsess over than I do.]

ARE YOU READY !?!

+

We open with The Real L Word getting all Suddenly Sundance with about 45 seconds of avant garde to the skippy sounds of a song my intern tells me is called “New Little Girl” by Kimberly Nichole, a singer apparently as famous as the cast of this show. Guess Tempted was too expensive.

Romi’s very year-of-her-birth today with a 1981-inspired morning routine which includes ancient arts like shaving one’s legs in the bath-tub, listening to records on a record player, and wearing tri-pink-colored bras from The Limited Too.

the wife of bath

Romi’s all like, bla bla sober sober getting my life together, no more Kelsey, bla blah, whitneysex was fun but won’t let the Mixterator get in the way of her career goals with Love and Pride Jewelry etc etc blah blah.

Speaking of the Jewels, Romi’s prepared like a Boy Scout for this Day Out. Lest a hapless midwestern lesbian attempt to wear a necklace as a feather earring, Romi and Vanessa are putting together a “look book” because in order for them to succeed, they need an visual explanation of “who the girl is and how you wear the jewelry.”

Top Model Challenge: The One With the Mohawk and the Tunic

You know how America’s Next Top Model gets more & more irrelevant every season as they dangle anorexic 24-year-olds from helicopters and dunk them in dry ice and paint their faces into other people’s faces and then stick jungle leaves in their tits and tell them to model through a flesh-eating bacteria epidemic? I wish this part was an episode of ANTM where Romi had to do a shoot on a rooftop in this Futuristic Dominatrix Monk tunic thing and she was afraid of heights. You know?

romi's evil twin

Romi: “There’s more love, there’s more passion, and there’s gonna be more heartache that comes to it too if things don’t work out.”

one thing's for sure: my hair is bangin'!

The camera loves her. It’s never really loved someone like this before.

Over to Whitney, who’s driving my dream car through my television nightmare, declaring her hookup with Romi “a mistake” ’cause of Kelsey & Romi’s recent split, which is so very whatever.  “Romi and I will always be friends.” Yawn yawn black swan.

she's my favorite mistake

Whitney’s jitney’s heading to LAX to snatch the exotic brunette Whitney ordered on ErosGuide this morning, Jaq.

when a lady has 56 identical lovers, you run out of lower-third options

Jaq is Whitney’s San Francisco Treat, second only to Rice-a-Roni.

Maybe I’m just unable to wrangle through Jaq’s battalion of accessories and multifaceted jingly pirate apparel to hear her words or thoughts, but I’m 85% sure she’s spoken maybe five words this season. She’s a body, Whitney will fuck it, next!

Jaq appropriated three different cultures just to make that one earring

“Jaq’s coming to town to help with the pants vs pumps event,” says Whitney, which makes as much sense as anything ever has in Whitney World. Palm trees!

Francine’s mother, adorned in a silk leopard-print blousey thing and the largest most amazing sunglasses in the Sunshine State, has arrived.

no mom wait 'til we get to the cabaret show to start dancing with me, this isn't grey gardens

Francine’s dying on the inside with her big gay secret, but Momma jumps right on in to the boyfriend-pushing and cassette-mongering. By the way: love her. Wish this show was Date my Mom instead of whatever it is, I Want a Famous Face or something.

dream lover come rescue my daughter

Fun fact: Francine’s Mom was apparently a “famous actress and singer” in Japan in the 60’s, which I’d like to see an entire documentary about but instead I’m watching this show. Continuing with the vintage audio device theme Romi established with her record player (she was listening to Frampton Comes Alive! if you must know), Mom’s brought Francine “cassette tapes of me singing” which is so so very Little Edie (sans craziness/raccoons).

put that shit in the tapedeck francine

Yoko’s talking about boys as Francine makes a face for every stage of  necrotizing fasciitis.

Mrs. Francine: “Yeah, if you’re going to choose a guy, he has to be nice.”
Francine: “Yeah.”
Mrs. Francine: “Of course they need to have money, too, not just a pretty face. You’ll get bored of the face in one year.”

Francine, who’s been bored of the face since grade school, manages, “It’s important to be with a — good person.”

god this lady has no fucking idea how fucking gay i am

Francine: “It always makes me a little on edge when she comes into town but this time I’m even more on edge because I want to come out to her.”

where can i get rid of this church's chicken before it stinks up the hotel room

Look at Yoko and Baby Francine:

when i knew

I used to think Francine’s look was Fancy Hobo but now I realize it’s 100% Olsen Twins:

who wore it better

At the hotel, Francine retires to poolside where she vacillates between Foxtrot Posture and Pain Faces while staring at her phone and freaking out. Francine rings room service for two girly gaywads with a slice of lime and a cherry in hopes the grenadine or vodka will inspire her to reveal her gayself to Yoko, who I already have this like very deep tender love for that I can’t explain.

i feel like there's flesh-eating bacteria in my solar plexus

#headdesk

or maybe email? what about email? an e-card?

Over at Rachel’s Rock Bottom, our hapless heroine’s submitting herself to therapy, ’cause the best way to really expose yourself emotionally is to do it on Showtime in front of the 400 people who still watch this show.

rachel, you are getting very sleepy. very sleepy.

The Therapist, in all her therapeutic splendor, says things and then Rachel says this thing:

Rachel: “I’ve always had problems talking about my emotions and whatnot. I lost my father like ten years ago very suddenly and then I had to move in with my grandparents who just lost their son — their only son — you know at that time my Mom and me were not like, okay… I also hate crying so I don’t do it, especially around my family, I never cry. I don’t want them to think that I’m sad.”

i guess they're gonna know now that i'm sad though

Rachel was close to her father. He went to PFLAG and was supportive, a regular Novotny (sorry I can’t stop bringing her up, the woman just needs to be seen). He even let Rachel’s kicked-out-of-her-own-home girlfriend shack up with them. Meanwhile according to Rachel, Mom is always “walking by” and telling her she’s going to hell.

hi rachel, you're going to hell and i made peach cobbler

I love how I repeatedly have nothing in common with anyone on this show besides death. And I guess life.  Not even taxes, ’cause I haven’t paid my taxes in two years ’cause I don’t know how.

have you been seeing spencer, emily and hanna?

Upon leaving therapy, Rachel says she feels way better, like “a lot of pressure is out of [her] body.” In a way it is —  when something terrible happens and you become the De Facto Capable Adult in your broken family you sort of store all that excruciating pain and sorrow in a drawer in the back reaches of your brain. And when people ask how you’re doing about that death thing, you say “I just block it out,” and they then they tell you it’ll catch up to you one day, all that repressed sadness. One day everything beyond the blocks will hurtle forwards and eat you alive when you least expect it. So you do other things, like drink and do drugs and work all the time so everyone else’s needs take up all the room in your brain, leaving very little space for your own feelings, which is just how you want it. But you fear the pit everybody’s warned you about, you’re still afraid that it’s lurking and could unexpectedly explode. Will it kill you? Sometimes you feel like it could kill you.

And then somebody makes you go, pays for you to go, calls so you can go, does everything short of sitting there and explaining your life story to the therapist so you can go. Then it feels passive enough to not set off the alarm system you installed on every emotional wall. Then you sit down and you say all the things and you cry and then there it is. That thing you’ve been afraid of — taking out your sad little heart out of your anxious chest and holding it up to the light — has started. And you’re still alive. More alive, even.

So anyhow, that’s what I think she meant by “I feel like a lot of pressure is out of my body.”

Cori & Kacy are sitting on the couch with chocolate milk and a dildo, talking about sperm.

i can't open my mouth any wider i swear

Kacy and Cori make penis jokes and slap each other with the prosthetic, which I hope they stick in the dishwasher afterwards. Also, they say weird things like this:

Kacy: “Lesbians have this tendency to befriend guys with huge penises because they never have to ride that donkey.”

Her lips, G-d’s ears.

bitch i will pimp slap you with two cheeseburgers and a dildo

Cori: “That guy has the biggest dick ever!”
Kacy: “It’s super ridiculous.”

which is why we're going to sinclair sexsmith's how to use a strap on workshop at good vibrations in san francisco next week

Long story way too long — Cori’s strappin’ up for the Great Gyno in the Sky again rather than using The Tugaboat Penis Machine, like a proper First Worldian Lesbian. More importantly, Kacy’s hair in this scene is six degrees of sexy like Kevin Bacon:

Over at Whitney’s Whimsical Workshop, Whit-Brit’s putting her hammer-swinging skills to good use, spray-painting and building shit with Jaq, who is suspiciously also operating various power tools.

it was the night before christmas, and all through the house...

The Pumps/Pants set pieces, inspired by Putt-Putt and high school productions of Guys & Dolls, are huge and ridiculous and unnecessary and also cute/oh.

butthead, she said "suck" heh heh heh heh

Hold your seasonably-inappropriate hats tight on your heads, ladies, ’cause Whitney’s about to blow your mind by doing something totally unique and important.

you remind me of a baby koala that i once knew

And the Whitney tape goes round and round and the painted ponies go up and down, we’re captured on a carousel of screentime. We can’t look back, we can only look, behind from where she came, and go round and round and round in the circle game.

Whitney: “If we work this well together making props, could we work this well together in a relationship? It’s possible.”

Just to recap, Episode 201:

Whitney: “I mean, we’ve given it a shot before so I don’t know if it’s meant to be for the future. Casual hookup [with Rachel]? It’s a possibility.”

Also earlier this season:

Whitney: “Is [Sara] someone I could see myself lasting with? I don’t know what the exact answer is.”

Just leavin’ all the doors open. Flapping in the breeze.

Cut to the shower, where Whitney and Jaq disrobe and make out in the red-light district of the Harem Bathroom. The lighting/music makes it seem like they’re slathering each other in cooking oil in a post-apocalypse sauna/bomb shelter.

I’d like to quote the song playing during this scene:

Ahhhh

Ohhhhhhh

Yeahhhhhh

Turn the lights out

Baby

Did you like that

I know you did.

Top that, EZ Girl.

hot cross buns

VIDEO: Real L Word’s Lesbians Share Coming Out Stories and Common Misconceptions

Yesterday Showtime released a video of The Real L Word girls’ coming out stories. This is possibly the entire cast at their most loveable / relatable / “real.”

[yframe url=’https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4trNK-Q1ZQ’]

This video came out last week, and it’s about “misconceptions” people have about lesbians. Scarlett and Vivianne are both in it, so it seems really fancy:

[yframe url=’https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UB_xsc7qt2g’]

Real L Word Episode 208 Recap: The Hardest Time to Write This Rhyme

Hello! Welcome to the recap for the 208th Episode of The Real L Word, a 30-minute situation comedy set in Miami Beach, Florida, where four previously married women live together as best friends, enjoying themselves despite hard times and sharing their various experiences. Topics include dildos, scissoring, and Metamucil.

This week on The Real L Word, everyone cried, including me. For once they weren’t the tears of embarrassment-by-proxy I cry when perfectly lovely respectable human lesbians masturbate on camera or run drunkenly into traffic or try to hump their girlfriend at the laundromat. Furthermore, my tears were not vampire tears:

My tears were tears of disappointment in myself for nearly shedding genuine tears at several emotional moments throughout this program, which is either a testament to the emotional prowess of sour diesel or to my devolving brain state.

Regardless I’ll be crying tears of joy next week when this shitshow finally grinds to a halt. Thank you Lord Jesus Chaiken, Amen.

this is what google image search turned up for “tears of joy”

Per ushe I would like to thank my lovely Intern Grace, who makes images for me even when they involve photoshopping Justin Bieber into a doorway or positioning a couple breaking up in outer space. Everything I ask Grace to do, she does. Just as an Intern should.

We open on the lean mean highways of Los Angeles, where our young homo Sajdah is zooming to the airport to retrieve her mother, who’s come all the way to Los Angeles for Parent’s Day at Gay LA Summer Camp. Upon arrival:

the girls at work told me lesbians love whiskey

LOVE HER!

god i love puppies

So, Sarita and Sajdah are besties ’cause she was 16 when Sajdah got born. Sajdah, still mourning losing Chanel to her own emotional baggage, is pleased as punch to see her Mom with her  literal baggage, etc.

Sajdah: “If I’m at my weakest point there’s nobody who can pick me up like my mother.”

This’ll be the first time Sarita will see Sajdah in full gay regalia: gay haircut, gay job, gay pants, gay interests and a super-gay tendency to ask girls she just met to pick out a condo with her.

i also suspect these camerapeople following me everywhere are also gay, though i’m not sure

Sarita got a sneak-peak of the main lez-show on her airplane flight over, from which the following hilarious conversation ensues:

Sarita: [pointing at a lebsian couple, pictured below] “Look those are the girls that I met on the plane. That is crazy.”
Sajdah: “You met lesbians on the plane?”

observe deplaning lesbians mating in the wild

Sarita: “Uh-huh. I said, ‘What’s your name?’ and she said ‘Ace’ and I said your mother didn’t name you that! She said–”
Sajdah: “Ashley.”
Sarita: “Ashley! How do you know?”
Sajdah: “Ace, Ashley. If it’s Ace it’s cause she had a girl name and she didn’t want it.”

Luckily Sajdah‘s got a name nobody can spell right, let alone assign a gender to.

just the two of us, we can make it if we try, just the two of us

Sajdah interviews that Sarita’s Mom was murdered a year after Sajdah‘s birth, which is horrifying and tragic and all the terrible words from the sad parts of Les Miserables, Flowers for Algernon and Beaches. Look at these cuties, modeling through it:

smize

Over blessed lunch at the local cafe, Sajdah and Mom discuss the fallout with Chanel until Sajdah is overwhelmed by memories of Little Big Horn and cannot continue the conversation or finish her coleslaw.

being gay is depressing

Sarita “It was just too much too fast. I mean, not trying to sound cold but that’s just a part of life, that’s just the way it goes.”

In other words:

mhm

Sajdah explains:

because she was really hot. like really, really hot.

Mom seems, thus far, not especially uncomfortable about Sajdah‘s California-induced transformation, although she’s got some questions about what Sajdah‘s got in them jeans.

Mom: “What happened to your pants?”
Sajdah: “What?”
Sarita: “Them holes?”
Sajdah: “They’re made like this.”
Sarita: “You bought them in the store like that?”
Sajdah: “They’re hot.”

what, i saw whitney wearing them on the show, so

Kacy’s out to dinner/wine/brunch with her friend Drea, talking about sperm. Drea, dressed for a cool spring afternoon at St.Mary’s School For Wayward Girls, is a lez-baby expert ’cause she’s got twins.

but does your vagina ever go back to how it was

Kacy, having seen many documentaries on the topic (almost definitely The Business of Being Born) but especially this one…

pilot

… has certain ideas about the insemination process.

Kacy: “Did you guys have sex before the insemination?”
Drea: “No! This isn’t TV, we aren’t in the room like as we inseminate like fucking, eating her out. Sorry that didn’t happen. It was more like — this is so weird, don’t move, don’t move.”

i beg to differ

Kacy, who still wants everything to be perfect and nice and respectful of everybody’s uteruses and gender identities and pronouns and life cycles, isn’t into what Drea‘s dishing out. Like, for example, Drea says the process of getting knocked up took about a year and seven inseminations.

the many faces of lesbian pregnancy

Kacy: “Seven fucking times? Seven of those car rides? I mean, fuck man, that really put it into perspective.”

like “seven brides for seven brothers” but without brothers and only sperm

Kacy’s still digesting this info when Drea reminds her that first comes love, then comes marriage, then comes the baby in the baby carriage and then comes lawyers, nannies, adoption papers, school, the baker and the candlestick maker. It takes a village.

and don’t even get me started on the “spit up”

Francine’s in her kitchen preparing for her Tiki Torch Garden Party with her girlfriend, inconveniently named Khristianne [confession: I can’t spell], who’s putting way too much butter in the shrimp, putting Francine at risk for morbid obesity.

oh my god i can’t believe it is butter

The guests revel in the glory of the professionally landscaped backyard, which was more likely prepared by fairies and wood nymphs than it was by Romi, Kelsey, Rachel and Whitney. Who wants backyard advice from the people responsible for this:

flashback, warm nights almost left behind

Khristianne tells the group Francine’s Mom is coming to visit with the relish of an ambiguously-gendered girlfriend half-concerned about Francine’s torrential downpour of emotional havoc and half-excited by the upcoming boxing match better known as “coming out.”

This inspires Rachel to share a little story of her own and really the only part of that story you need to know is this part:

Rachel: “You know what Mom, you might do hair to be like me, but you don’t eat pussy to be like your big sister.”

this isn’t full house

Stone-Cold Kelsey is a rock/island throughout, Romi cheerfully suggests Francine do a ComingOut Power Point presentation (this probably would involve a lot of pictures of Claire) and Whitney does this observer thing she does when she shows up in somebody else’s storyline. It makes her seem like a replicant, apparently necessitating another Lower Third:

whitney fucking mixter needs a lower-third but robin roemer doesn’t?

Francine is watching the World Cup in her head:

ooooo ahhhhhh huhhhhh

After dinner Romi confesses to Whitney that Kelsey expressed dismay over the possibility of Romi spending dinner laughing with Whitney — hahaha remember that night with the creamed corn and the dildo and the cameras and the whole world flipped out lol hahhaaha — while meanwhile Kelsey would be forced to simmer with unmet desire for a Tequila Sunrise or flaming banana.

When you start joking with your ex-whatever (“ex-girlfriend” – lower third) about your current girlfriend’s jealousy of your relationship with your ex-whatever™ then you know it is O-V-E-R.

We return to Whitney’s Acropolis of Apple-Bottom Jeans where Whitney, impressed by her own popularity, has decided to use her Clam-Powers for Good rather than Evil. She wants to host a “Lesbian Field Day” to support “Charity” (Charity: it’s everyone’s favorite charity!) and she’ll be calling this calamity “The Pumps vs. Pants Showdown.”

and then afterwards, the more butch girls pin the more femme girls to the wall

Huh. I wonder who’s gonna win!?! Lest you forget the Whitney Mixter Definition of Pants from last season, she reminds us: “I’m pants because I know how to swing a hammer.”

maybe if i sit here long enough rachel will just mosey on up between my legs

“Femmes take a little more time to do their eye makeup,” Whitney explains. That’s why Romi is the femmiest fem in all the femland. She could wear pants WITH pumps and nobody would dare second-guess her. Romi could swing a hammer while fucking a girl wearing a double-headed dildo and yelling “Call me Daddy!” and still — still even then, in that outlandish and pornographic and slightly unpleasant situation — her eyes would still give her away.

pump the jam

Speaking of eyes, Alyssa’s opening Whitney’s to the idea that Rachel’s a fucking mess and could use a motherfucking hand from her friend/ex-girlfriend/bathroom-cunnilingus partner, Whitney “The Hammer” Mixter.

sooo… basically “yes”

Alyssa: “I think she still wants to feel like somebody that you care about in real life.”
Whitney: “I do care about her.”

Although Whitney seems to be the last to recognize the destruction she’s fostered around her, she’s always open to being called out, especially by Alyssa or, at this point in her life, by thousands of angry internet lesbians. Whitney trusts everyone else is keeping better tabs on her behavior than she is, because they are.

Now we’re at an abandoned warehouse that looks like communist Romania from the outside and Kelsey & Romi’s Chamber of Secrets from the inside.

note the CBS (which owns Showtime) situation in the back

Romi‘s got this potholder wrapped around her head and has torn up Stephanie Tanner’s mini-dress, re-fastened it with twine and dropped it over her hot-pink-braed body and she’s screaming at Kelsey in her outside voice. Kelsey looks like a bored hipster shoe salesman. It’s quite a scene.

how many fingers am i holding up. how many. i bet you don’t know YOU DRUNK LIZZZZARD

Apparently Kelsey imbibed a goblet of the evil vino while out with her Mom, against Romi‘s Rules of Sobriety, so of course all fresh hell breaks lose.

Romi: “You don’t see anything wrong in this. You don’t think you did anything wrong. Nothing.”
Kelsey: [silence]
Romi: “We made a promise to each other that we were not gonna drink and that you were gonna support me in my sobriety. Your first night away from me, you went and drank and then right before dinner which I fucking made dinner reservations had a whole night planned for us, you wanna casually throw out to me ‘Oh I had a glass of wine.”
Kelsey: [silence]
Romi: “Maybe you don’t realize how much it meant to me. Maybe you don’t realize what I’m going through with this and that you promised me that you would do it with me and that you would stop drinking because you thought you had a problem. You’re a liar.”
Kelsey: “I had one glass of wine.”
Romi: “What if I said I had one glass of wine?”
Kelsey: “It was the situation. I didn’t just go to a random bar, I was hanging out with my sister–”
Romi: “I don’t care if you’re with your fucking Grandma!”
Kelsey: [leaves, probably wishing she’d had two glasses of wine]

Romi interviews that Kelsey essentially reaches for the sippy cup of Tanqueray whenever Romi looks the other way.

and merlot! you had fucking Merlot of all things!

Ultimately, Romi‘s in Saturn Return which’s the part of life where you try to get your shit together before you turn 30 (or recently thereafter). Romi‘s looking to escape the reckless abandon of Sapphic Youth, but Kelsey’s the team mascot.

Sometimes age is just a number, but 23 and 29 isn’t always fine and often leads to a glass of wine.

and also wash that bowl you had oatmeal in earlier, you know how i feel about that

Real L Word’s Sajdah Golde Gets Real: The Autostraddle Interview

Saj Golde’s storyline has baffled even the most casual viewer of The Real L Word this season. Did she really move to Los Angeles because she liked Season One? Is her relationship with Chanel for real? Does she need to review the “Is It Sex” flowchart? I met up with Saj last week in Los Angeles to learn a bit more about civil rights activist and future lawyer to potentially sue your ass.

How has the experience of watching yourself on The Real L Word been so far?

For me, it’s been positive. I think reality TV is almost like a memoir: they capture real life and then present it a way that folks are actually going to be interested in watching. So I think it’s fairly accurate, as accurate as it can be for 10 episodes, for the amount of time that was filmed. If someone sees you just for a few months of your life, they’re only going to get so much of you. I think it’s pretty accurate. For me, I’ve enjoyed watching it. For example, I can turn into the Incredible Hulk. I’m cool, but if I get upset, I’m the Hulk in a split second. I’ve been growing spiritually and working on not being so angry at the world, but being able to watch who I am when I’m angry has certainly been able to help. It’s definitely brought me down an insane amount.

You’re referring to the birthday party?

Absolutely.

What really happened? Because it was very clear that you were dialing it down because there were cameras there. It was pretty clear that had there not been cameras there, you probably would have slugged that woman.

Actually, I want to be an attorney. I’ve never put my hands on anyone, so I still wouldn’t have hit her. I think I was very much myself in that situation. My goal was to get out of there before it even got to that point.

What really happened that night? It was totally confusing.

The night was confusing for folks that were there. There was a complete misunderstanding between Natasha and I. I guess she was under the impression that I’m hosting a party, cameras are going to be there, it was a free-for-all, whereas for me, this was a private party for my girlfriend. I knew Natasha, so I didn’t mind her coming with some other friends. It wasn’t that big a deal. But for them to come in and build their own party? I mean, Chanel’s parents were there!

So she was just acting out to get on camera?

Absolutely!

Before we get more into the details of the show, I want to learn more about you. Who were your role models growing up – gay or straight?

The first one that comes to mind right now is Will Smith. Will Smith says things like, “Oh, I gave up on reality a long time ago.” It’s this idea of walking through life knowing that you could accomplish anything. You set a goal, and if you work hard, you’ll get to it. And this idea of letting go of what the world says is possible, you know, reality. I think there’s an interview with him, and he’s like, “The difference between you and me is if we both get on a treadmill right now to race, I would die on the treadmill. Before you beat me, I will die. I will run until I’m dead.” And I just think that’s absolutely amazing that someone is willing to put his all into anything, and that’s why he can have a movie as the only character in the entire movie, and it can be a blockbuster because he works just that hard.

As far as an  LGBT role model, you have Bayard Rustin. He worked side by side with MLK as part of the civil rights movement but was a gay man. He was out to some, but for other people in the civil rights movement, they were like, “We don’t want to bring a lot of attention to the fact that you’re gay.” Like, push that under the rug. And it’s funny because I love MLK, but he had a way with women, like, it’s not out yet. We’ll see soon when the FBI reports it out. But Bayard was such a part of that movement, and he was also struggling with being a gay man, and I know for me, it’s a whole other issue being gay in the black community. Black parents look at their children, and they’re like, “Why would you even want to be discriminated against again? Why sign up to be a minority in another category?” And I think that’s the biggest problem: that they think we “sign up” for it, that it’s a choice. It’s unfortunate because, you know, we want people to see that being gay is just like being black: I can’t help it. So those are my primary role models.

In your circle of friends who happen to be both gay and black, do you talk about celebrities like Queen Latifah and the fact that she is photographed everywhere with her girlfriend yet still denies being gay and often makes homophobic statements to the press?

That’s challenging. Like I said before, being black and being gay is like a double whammy because historically, blacks are rather religious, so it’s not a very accepting community. You have the hip-hop community that’s learning to be accepting, but they’re far away from where they should be. It’s just harder. For black people or for any person, I get why people would want to be in the closet. I wouldn’t tell someone else to come out, but I certainly know the benefits of coming out. There’s a ton of people that already love Queen Latifah. If she comes out, there’s an opportunity for her to let people know, “You already love me. There’s nothing about me that’s different other than the fact of who I share my life with, and I’ve been sharing my life with her, so there’s really no difference there.” And I honestly feel like it’s our duty as LGBT folks or as allies to come out so that other folks can better understand, because that’s where the major problem is: People just don’t get it.

Hypothetically, if she did come out, would you be ecstatic?

I mean, Wanda Sykes came out, and I wasn’t like, “Yay!” you know? So no, I wouldn’t. Coming out is important, but I feel like it’s a responsibility, so you don’t get any extra point for doing what you’re supposed to do. It’s like going to school. I graduate college, my folks aren’t like, “Yay, you graduated.” No, that’s what you’re supposed to do. So hell no, she doesn’t get any kudos.

That’s like that Chris Rock joke. “I take care of my kids! …You’re supposed to!”

[Laughing] Right! You want points for that? No You don’t get points for that. That’s what you’re supposed to do. There’s not going to be anything new where I’m like, “Yay, you’re the bomb.” No, that’s what you should’ve done. My thing is, how do you deny yourself you for somebody else? That was the main reason I can out, because I’m not going to be uncomfortable so that someone else can be comfortable. It doesn’t even make sense.

How has the reception been toward you within the black community? When people see you out, how do they react to you?

When people see me out on the street, it’s all love. I get a lot of love. But there’s a balance, of course, which I appreciate because life needs balance. So, there’s another population that for all the reasons [others] love me, they hate me. There are folks that are like, “Saj is a baby dyke. She doesn’t know what she’s doing. They need a real stud on the show. They need me on the show!” I had a back-and-forth with one girl who expected me to represent all things black and LGBT, and that’s such a ridiculous assumption for you to even expect me to. So does that mean Barack Obama represents all black men aged over 45? Not at all. He learned how to be black in college, actually, because he grew up in Middle America with white grandparents. He didn’t know anything about being black other than his skin tone. But is he supposed to represent all black men over 45? So it’s absolutely ridiculous. A lot of folks expect me to be more than what I am, and my thing is, how about I just be the first. So when we’re doing a photo shoot, and the lighting guy has to change the light bulb twelve times because he doesn’t know how to make the light bounce off me in a way that’s going to look well with all these other pale skin tones…

How did that make you feel, at the photo shoot?

It comes with the territory. I’m a pioneer in a lot of senses, so it’s not the first time I’m the first at doing something.

What else have you been the first at?

Even in my family, I’m the first to leave for college, graduate from college. I was the first to move away from home. I moved to D.C., then I moved out here. I was the first to buy a house.

How old are you?

I’m 24. I purchased my house at 20.

How could you afford a house at 20?

Good credit. [Laughs] I’d been working at Home Depot since I was 18, went through a first time home-buyers program, set up a condo in Maryland. But yeah, I was first in a lot of things. I was an AP/IB programs in school, so I remember being in my AP physics class and there’s 40 students. It’s a two-period class, so it’s almost three hours, and I was the only one. So that’s always been the case. It’s not that big of a deal for me.

I remember several months prior to the premiere, you tweeted about regretting the show. What was going on?

Doing a project like that, you open up your life. I had a full-time job, so we’d have call-times that went till late at night, where we’re on camera, we’re filming or whatever else because we’re all at a party or something of that sort, and I still had to go to work in the morning. And also because I had to work, all my interviews were late at night. That could be tough, and in moments like those, it makes you feel like, “Why did I sign up for this?” Even with this interview, it’s my story, but I’m not the one printing it. It’s almost like playing telephone, in fact, and I’m at the beginning of the line, and it has to go through all these different channels before its presented. Just like in telephone, when you first whisper in someone’s ear, you’re hopeful as hell, as it goes around, that when it finally comes out that it’s the same. So the moment like that, it’s like, “Shit. Why would I even enter a game of telephone for something so precious as my coming out story or my love story or my interactions with my family? Why enter that into a game of telephone?”

So why did you enter it?
.
Why I entered it and why I’m still grateful that I entered it is because there’s a lot of other folks who not only wouldn’t enter it into the game, they wouldn’t even think it out loud. The fact that I did, even if it comes out slightly different than it went in, those folks are getting something out of it, and they’re gonna appreciate it, and it’s going to help them be themselves. My life is good. When I came out to my folks, I was like 22 years old. I’m 22 years old, I’ve graduated college, I’m a homeowner, I have a career – I was teaching in D.C. – I have a car. I’m good. I have a life insurance policy. I have nothing to lose. I call my mother. I tell her I’m interested in a girl, and she’s like, “I’m cutting you off. I’m done.” I’m like, “ok.” You know what I mean? Now of course, she didn’t mean it. She called right back, but I didn’t have anything to lose in that situation, so I didn’t mind coming out. It was a matter of me just being my ultimate, 100% self and being comfortable in my own skin when there’s a lot of other people who don’t have those same freedoms. I work with students every day who have to hide their sexuality because they need their parents to eat. So for me, I’ll share as much as I’m allowed to share or as much as folks are able to receive for the sake of someone else. It’s all good.But something specific must have triggered that tweet…

I mean, it’s just tough. You guys meet my mother. You guys hear my mother and how she feels about it. I mean, I’m into this girl. Imagine if you’re just meeting someone, and you look like you’re in the middle of a Verizon commercial because you got a whole fucking network behind you. That’s scary! And I’m awkward as hell because I’m just meeting this girl, and I’m trying to be cool, so I’m like, overly cool, so that she can’t tell I’m awkward and nervous, and then there’s like a million people behind me. That’s tough. I almost, just like, “Damn, why didn’t I meet her a month ago? Why didn’t God send her to me before so that we could have a normal fucking relationship?” So there was a lot of things going on. That tweet could’ve come from anywhere. Because I’m a Twitter-whore, so that could’ve come from anywhere. There were a lot of things going on.

Is there anything you regret doing on camera?

I’m not really the type to regret. Rather than regret, I re-calculate. I’m a strong believer that everything happens for a reason, so things happen, some things hit well, some things hit not-so-well. But if something happens – and nothing has, nothing where I’m like, “Oh shit, I hate that that happened, or I hate how that was presented, or I hate this person.” I’m completely comfortable with it. I’m ok with it. But even if something were to come, because it’s not done, no, I wouldn’t regret it. I’d just re-calculate. Maybe it’ll impact a law school interview in the future, and I have to be prepared to explain. But that’s it. I don’t beat myself up. I love myself.

Let’s talk about Chanel for a little bit. Let’s start with: “We’ve been dating three weeks. I’m ready for her to move in.” That’s the funniest thing I’ve ever heard. Did they prompt you to say that?

She lived an hour away. She had a roommate and everything an hour away. I don’t do roommates. Plus, I got a full-time job, I’m working on the show. I wanted her close. Here’s the thing: I’m the type of person who, like I said, I re-calculate. So, if I meet you right now, things are cool, we kick it, and if they’re better than cool… All right, I don’t know about you, but when I was younger, we wrote a list of what we wanted in a partner. So it’s like writing that list that you fold up and you put in your Bible and you pray to God for, whatever. My list came true, and it didn’t take forever for me to catch on and be like, “Damn, that’s it, too. Whoa, damn, that’s like in my, whoa, OK, don’t move. Just in case you really are it, just stay right here. I need you right here.” She was just an hour away. That was the biggest deal. She never moved in. She was a fucking hour away. She was there all the time, so it’s like, instead of me having to take you back home, just stay here.

Were you playing up some of your naïveté for the cameras? Because it seems like some of your naivety towards sex in general was put on. Obviously you’d been with guys before…

When Chanel’s like, “We’re not having sex” — that was a complete misunderstanding. I misunderstood what she was saying, and that’s why I was like, “Wait, what? What do you mean we’re not having sex? We just fucked a minute ago.” My mother told me not to have sex on TV, so we weren’t having sex. And Chanel knew that. So Chanel had to remind me that we were not having sex, and I’m like, “What?” When the producers are there all the time, you forget that they’re there.

So basically, you were having sex off camera?

I’m not having sex on camera, period. I don’t have sex on camera. There’s so much more to my story than what happens in my bedroom. I’m not a porn star. I’m not getting porn-star money. [Laughs]

In the show it just seemed like you figured out what was sex was yesterday. Were you playing that up for the cameras?

Absolutely not. I will tell you this: They don’t pay me to be an actress. The amount of money that a reality show person makes compared to an actress is a dramatic difference. I know that. I’m going to be an entertainment lawyer. You will not get me to act and pay me like a reality star. So they literally followed my life and only got what they saw. I’m not doing anything in between for you because you’re not paying me to do so. So no, it was a misunderstanding, though. That’s why it seemed like much more. Because I’m stunned like, “What the fuck do you mean, because I know we’re fucking. Like, what are you talking about?”

So you guys were speaking in code on camera?

We were just talking about how we weren’t having sex. And it had me a little stunned. I mean, honestly, in that conversation, I thought there was more to come. I thought there was more to it, like, “Oh shit, word? There’s more to it? All right! That’s what’s up.” Because I’m still new. I remember my different stages of intimacy. In the beginning, it was just oral. I’ll do her, she’ll do me, whatever. I remember the first time I was in the scissor, and I was like, “Oh shit, word?” You know, like, wow! And it blew my mind that a woman got me off that way. I’d been dating guys, big guys, and then this gets me off? So, there are different levels. I even watched Romi and Kelsey do it, and I was like, “Wow, I haven’t done it that way yet.” So there are still different levels of intimacy. I mean, you watch a porno, and they’re doing shit you’ve never done, so you’re like, “Wow, that could be included in sex?”

A lot of the fans say things like, “There’s no way that Chanel is gay. She’s gotta be a straight woman.”

Unfortunately, there’s a stereotype of what gay looks like, and there’s internal homophobia that even homosexuals embody. So people make assumptions: She appears this way, she looks that way, she acts this way, she must be a straight. In fact, I remember when I first came out, describing to my friends exactly what type of woman I wanted to meet, and they’re like, “Man, she sounds straight,” and I was worried. But then you look at –what’s Ellen’s wife’s name? – Portia. If you didn’t know she was Ellen’s wife, no one would believe that she was into women. So it’s possible. People are going to think what they want, but I think it’s only their own internal homophobia. These people obviously don’t know Chanel. They’ve never met her. And for one, ain’t nobody just signing up to eat pussy just ‘cause. [Laughing] You know? Who does that?

I don’t agree with them, but a lot of people feel like, “Oh, she’s just looking for TV attention…”

Dude, if you would have sex to hook up with a Z-list celebrity, on a reality show… It’s such a niche community. Chanel is much smarter, has much larger dreams and aspirations, than to want to hook up with a reality show star to get somewhere. That’s almost an insult to both her and me. Seriously, this is such a small project in my life. This is nothing. For what my life will bring me, this is nothing. And if I ever knew someone that felt like this was it, we really don’t have too much more to talk about. There’s so much more to life than 10 episodes of a reality television show. I don’t even own a TV. Literally.

You said on camera that you moved to Los Angeles because you watched The Real L Word. Explain…

One of my friends got into FIDM (Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising), and she didn’t want to come here by herself. Like I said, I was teaching middle school English. I had a home. All I had to do was rent my place.  So I was like, “Shit, I can get a teaching job here.” I found out LAUSD was fucked up. So I’m college educated, saved up money, rented my condo, moved here to be with my friend. I also want to be an entertainment lawyer, so I came here applying for law school. It was a perk that the show about lesbians— I’m just coming out, so everything I’m learning about being gay, is coming from this show. So my first trip here, as soon as I got here, I went to The Abbey because that’s where they were last season. Did I move across the country to be a part of a reality television show? Hell no. Hell no. Hell no! That’s the most laughable thing. People come up with the craziest ideas! I’m a fucking field organizer with one of the most credible LGBT agencies. We only have six staff members. So to make it amongst that six, you have to be of some intellectual capacity, and you think I would move— hell no. [laughing]

Because you said on camera…

You guys are still reading between the lines. I moved to L.A. because I watched The Real L Word. I never said I moved to L.A. to be on The Real L Word. I want to be an attorney! It’s the precise use of language. People are going to assume— that’s insane! It’s like this: If I’m deciding on where to move, and this city is promising all these beautiful women and this great lesbian lifestyle, then that’s enough to have me move. I get tweets all day from people saying, “I’m moving to L.A.” Why? Because they think this is a utopia of women. They think that every woman walking down the street looks is a lesbian who looks like a model. So they’re all coming. So they’re all coming here. So, I did the show but I still have a real job.

Why didn’t you go to law school?

To win marriage. If I went to law school right now, there’s three years of law school, there’s another two to three years before I’m even credible in my firm, so that’s five to six years before I would be able to do anything meaningful in LGBT politics. Whereas right now on the ground, my job is meaningful every day. I’m making a difference every day, and this is a moment. It’s the urgency now.

Is marriage equality the thing that you are most passionate about as far as your activism?

Marriage equality is number one, only because I know that LGBT freedoms are going to come on the tail end of marriage equality in the same way that freedoms for black Americans came on the tail end of integrating schools, like Brown v. Board of Education. After such a huge case – and that went back to courts twice and then took forever for them to figure out how to integrate schools. But once black students were in schools with white students, folks started to loosen up. And I feel like once marriage equality is established, folks are going to start loosening up. There was a guy in New York last week who, there were two gay guys on the bus holding hands, and he told them to get off the bus, called the police, and the cops are like, “Are you fucking kidding me? I can’t make them get off the bus ‘cause they’re holding hands! You need to keep driving.” And him having to deal with that, part of the reason why that cop defended those two guys like they did, is because just weeks ago New York declared same sex marriage. So that’s why I’m behind it whole-heartedly. I studied the civil rights movement. I studied the feminist movement. And I know how it’s these big things that end up trickling down and loosening up the rest. So yeah, I wouldn’t not go law school to be on reality TV.

When do you plan on going to law school?

In the fall.

And you want to study entertainment law?

It’s between entertainment and civil rights law. I’m 100% into civil rights law, but I’m also into very nice things, and civil rights law doesn’t pay for very nice things. The hope would be to do entertainment law to pay the bills but continue to work in civil rights as a passing project, like pro bono.

What did you like so much about Season One of The Real L Word?

Whitney. I mean, I’m just coming out. I’m awkward as hell. I don’t know what I’m doing. If a girl kissed me, I’m losing it. So I’m still learning my footing, and there are very few, like, you don’t see same sex couples all the time that you can kind of attach yourself to and model yourself after. So I’m feeling crazy-awkward, and then I see Whitney in the airport scene. She drops one off, circles around, picks up another, and I’m like, “Damn, that’s fly.” Just watching her gave me the confidence that like, “You can do this. You’re cool. Chicks’ll dig you.”

Did you not watch The L Word?

Not at first. I watched it last year. I watched the whole thing at once. I didn’t watch television, so after I came out, I had friends who were like, “You should see this.”

Did you like The L Word? Who did you connect with on that show?

It’s crazy because I watched it all at one time. I love Bette Porter. She’s the boss. I could be Bette and Tina. I need me a Tina, and I’ll be Bette. Just kidding. But you know, she’s like, strong but she’s still a family woman. I’m looking for a partner. There are elements of Tina’s character that I greatly appreciated, but there are parts of it that I wouldn’t be completely comfortable with, and I think that the parts that I was most uncomfortable with were parts that Bette kind of encouraged. Like Tina didn’t really come into herself until after leaving Bette. I want a partner who’s able to be all that she wants to be. I want it to be like Russell and Kimora, Jay-Z and Beyonce.

It’s interesting that you mentioned Bette Porter, and then from The Real L Word you connected with Whitney. I would think you would connect with Nikki and Jill because they’re a more stable partnership.

It wasn’t the same. It’s a matter of different stages in life. The stage I was in in life, I connected with Whitney because I didn’t know how to interact with women and she made it look so easy, which gave me the confidence to be like, “It’s not as hard as you think it is. Believe in yourself.” And it’s not like I was having a problem meeting girls. They were coming to me. I was fresh meat, so they were coming. I just didn’t know what to do with them once they came.

How was your transition from dating men and being up for prom queen to coming out and changing your physical appearance?

I was a little tomboy as a kid. I grew up in North Carolina, so I do remember there was a gay couple in my neighborhood, but I didn’t know the word “gay.” I just knew my friend had two moms and it wasn’t that big a deal. So I was a little tomboy growing up. As I grew up, I kind of cut those things away because I kind of felt like it was childish and I needed to be a young lady and be a woman. So I went through the whole makeup and hair and all that shit. And I dated guys like middle school up until almost recently.

I actually cut my hair as a straight. It was just cut all the way off. It was D.C. It was humid. I was graduating college. I was all stressed out and was like, “What do I do next with life?” I’m applying to law school, so I’m having one of those crazy, I’d like to call it a mid-life crisis, but I was only 22. I shaved my hair off April 1, 2009. I remember I came to school, and folks were like, “woah,” and they thought is was an April Fool’s joke because it was April 1st. So I cut my hair as a straight. Actually, one of my guy friends cut it off. I think he knew then, too, like, “Aww shit, here it comes. This is what’s next.” After I cut my hair, women started hitting on me, and I liked it.

When did you stop dating guys?

About two years ago, and in fact, with the first girl, there was still a guy, and I was kind of like, I don’t know. I was in therapy.

So when you were a little kid, you never had crushes on women or even female celebrities?

Not at all. I think for me, the only thing I can think back on about my childhood that could possibly be an idea that I was homosexual was the fact that when I met every one of my friends that I have now the first start was “Ooo, you’re pretty. Be my friend.” And I was never the pretty girl, but all my friends are the pretty girls. I’m talking makeup. My friends, their hair smells one way, their neck smells another way. One color nail polish, different color toe polish. Louis Vuitton, like, 100% feminine women. And then there would be me with sneakers on. But we were just friends, and I loved them and they loved me. Their parents would tease, like one of my friends had a dad who would like, “You’re all over her call-log. You need a boyfriend. Stop calling her.” And I never realized. Even now with relationships, I have that same friendship but more. So now I get it. That’s why you were like, “Ooo, you’re pretty. Be my friend.” So that’s probably the only thing. Other folks thought I was gay. The first girl came onto me when I was 14. I was like, “Ew, I’m not gay.”

People thought you were gay?

Everyone thought I was gay. Everyone but my mother. After I came out, my mom’s friends were like, “You didn’t know?” And she’s like “no,” and they’re like, “Look at this picture.” And there’s pictures of me in dresses, but I look like a boy in a dress. In college, of course, like high school, college, I knew how to carry myself. I sat like a lady. I did the whole nine yards. I dated guys, thought I was gonna marry a guy.  I was preparing to be a wife. I could cook anything. The whole nine yards. But then, I meet this girl, and it felt— I was never uncomfortable with men. I’m great with them. I still talk to them, every guy I’ve ever dated. Actually, my first ever boyfriend when I was like, 7 was tweeting me last night. I think they all knew, too, but they were all great.

Real L Word Episode 207 Recap: Play With Fire and Microwave Your Desire

You guys, True Blood is SOOOO good this season! Twist after turn after twist after turn! See, I watch True Blood at 9:00 PM on Sunday nights and I’m always super pumped to follow up my True Blood viewing session with a brand-new ripe episode of The Real L Word at 10pm because, as I think we can all agree here, The Real L Word is basically the Mona Lisa of reality television and this Sunday night was no exception.

It’s like Monsterpiece Theater.

Someone call Charles Darwin ’cause there’s some serious evolution going on this season. And that evolution is happening on top of Romi’s head.

Romi Klinger: helping babygays everywhere by demonstrating a new alternative lifestyle haircut every week.

So we open with a warning from some benevolent higher power that this show is for mature audiences, which is debatable.

You know what this show needs? Men!

lesbians love men

I’m especially digging the opening theme song this week. It’s like how I feel about this show, “It was just another night, I don’t wanna think about it.” It’s perfect!

We open with Venice Beach stock footage and unfamiliar hip-hop music which means this scene will either be about the black girl or the girl-sporting-the-hairstyle-traditionally-associated-with-black-people.

It turns out to be the former — Sajdah and Chanel are at the laundromat, washing cum towels, that blue shirt Sajdah wears in every interview and probably about ten Hanes white v-neck t-shirts. Saj loves the V.

for the 100th time i'm not washing the shirt i was wearing when we first kissed i don't care how bad it smells

Sajdah: “Things are going well for Chanel and I. We’ve been together for over a month now, and we’ve progressed a lot, I mean, we’re intimate, I don’t know I think it’s time to take the next step.”

i think your watch is broken

Sajdah’s basically attempting to corner Chanel into a Promise Keepers situation and Chanel isn’t having it.

Sajdah: “You moving in, you’re my wife, we should practice.”
Chanel: “Practice what?”
Sajdah: “Being married.”
Chanel: “You just wanna have sex.”
Sajdah: “Not just for sex, I want you around all the time.”

Specifically around Sajdah’s waist:

do the humpty hump

Sajdah: “I hump her in public, she gets really upset about it. I mean shit, that’s the perk of being in a relationship.”

It’s true that if you’re in a relationship you’re less likely to get a shot of pepper spray in your eyeballs when you violate a woman’s pre-established physical boundaries, but that still don’t make it polite, RamboLesbo.

Chanel: “Stop grabbing my butt in public.”
Sajdah: “I wanna fuck you.”

Sajdah’s basically one unwanted humping away from being a part of somebody’s yelp review on how this laundromat is filled with crazy people.

Marissa?

Cut to church, where KayKay’s humbling herself before G-d, praying about sperm.

just please god get this staple out of my brain

“I couldn’t imagine not having kids,” says Kacy. Me neither, ’cause it’s all they ever talk about. I feel like without a baby they’d dissolve into thin air.

Kacy: “There’s something about getting on your knees, and really focusing in on what you want.”

Again this week Laneia decided to watch the show with her girlfriend and provide me with periodic updates re: their feelings:

Oh good, Vivian’s coming to LA. Cocomo Claire needs a buddy with arms and legs and a really gigantic heart right about now.

"francine francine francine francine"

Vivian hops into Clairealicious’s Lovemobile where a rose awaits her in the passenger seat ’cause Claire’s such a gentle tiger and Vivian is really just obnoxiously hot and has a Julia Stiles voice.

Oh and also:

Claire: “It’s good to see a face that doesn’t wanna rip my head off every second of every day.”

anyone want to baby koala

Vivian, who seems at once totally over it and totally into it, chats with Claire about the possibility of running into Francine during this trip, maybe at a Pan-Asian restaurant or something.

shit it's been so long i forgot to cut my nails

More fun topics await:

Claire: “You know I like it when we’re joined at the hip but I feel like sometimes we start bickering when we’re joined at the hip.”
Vivian: “I like how you’re already thinking about us not getting along which actually doesn’t usually happen. You’re confusing me with your other Asian.”

who? mulan?

Cut to an unnamed restaurant, probably The Olive Garden, where Khristianne and Francine are having dinner with Kelsey and Romi to talk shit about Claire.

So, Francine digs in, you know me and Claire aren’t speaking anymore, right? which serves to intro a Shittalking Shitstorm which is, ultimately, glorious. Claire’s growing on me as like the most entertaining aspect of this show ’cause she’s so fucking unpredictably bratzy.

L to R: x, x, Claire, Romi, Francine

Francine ignites the storm with an email from Claire which Francine remembers going like this:

“Everyone’s such a loser on the show. No one even has a real job. Everyone works in retail or in makeup that’s not a real job.”

Not Kelsey! Kelsey doesn’t have any job at all, she’s just keeping it real and babysitting the fairies who live in Romi’s hairdo, buying the alcohol, writing poetry and making dinner from Rachel Ray’s 20-Minute Dinners for Unhappy Couples. 

But AHEM Romi’s going through a Productive Life Transformation and Accomplishing Big Things and don’t you dare, CLAIRE, insult Romi at this juncture.

Francine: “Then she’s like, Whitney all she does is party for a living.”
Romi: “Bitch you moved here with no job, go back. Who does she think she is? What does she think I’m doing?”

If you thought this scene was about Claire or Francine or Khristianne you’re wrong, it’s about Romi!

Nobody who isn't serious about what they do would wear this on their head, mmk?

Francine: “You know what she said about Sara? That she has a dog face.”

Meaningful, coming from someone who occasionally verges on Golden Retrievery hair.

Kelsey: “Oh hell no.”
Romi [interview]: “I was like alright, she’s a deb, she’s done.”

next!

Romi does what every sensible lesbian does when they receive second-hand gossip about someone talking shit about their friends to a different friend: she immediately texts everyone she knows. That’s my girl.

Cue Lesbian Text-Message Tree!

Cut to Whitney’s Pussy Palace, where she’s getting Romi’s text in real time and who’s there to process the shit-talking with her? None other than Razor-Tongued Rose Garcia, who you all remember from Season One. It’s almost like Whitney phoned-a-friend and picked the Shit-Talking Expert to come in for a consult.

all up in our stars and shit

Whitney, reading Romi’s text:

“I was about to help her with her with the shoot but I guess I can tell her I’m too busy playing with lipstick. Who does this bitch think she is?”

Malibu Barbie, I think.

Whitney: “Here’s the thing: you can’t hold your own in any city. You’re whack. You have no personality and no fucking soul, so good luck in any city.”
Rose: “Nobody likes this girl, dude.”

Claire’s gonna have to move to the country, maybe Nebraska or something.

does this look like a hotel room to anyone else

Whitney says Claire could’ve had a “friend circle” (like the classic Minnie Driver vehicle Circle of Friends) but instead she’s just got a giant bucket o’enemies (like the classic 156-piece chicken meal from Kentucky Fried Chicken).

Real L Word Episode 206 Recap: Baby Batter Up Up and Away

“It hasn’t even started yet and I already hate it.”
-my notes

I’m not gonna lie, I woke up this morning with that unidentified pre-consciousness sick feeling in my stomach — you know the one. What is this mysterious pit? Did I have a bad dream? Did something terrible happen yesterday?  (The ideal answer is that something terrible happened in a bad dream.)

After a quick scan of “the top of my head” I identified that knotted pit in my gut as, in fact, the knowledge that in order to write this recap, I’d have to re-watch what was honestly one of the most ridiculous hours of television I’ve witnessed in my entire life. And I’ve seen every episode of The Real L Word Season One. Twice.

This week The Real L Word was like a lunch-time bachelorette party at The Olive Garden with penis-shaped drink stirrers and lots of virgin strawberry daiquiris during which all the lesbians at the table are whacked over the head with a dead fish or a signed copy of Tucker Max’s bestselling tome “I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell” and then thrown into a cold lake of Alginate.

Here’s the Cliff’s Notes version:

We open at Kacy & Cori’s sweet hammock of motherly love x2, where the girls are waking up and, of course, talking about sperm.

hey guys? when you have the baby, you'll still love me right? like just as much?

See, the sperm’s here — all hail the mighty sperm — and after setting it on their mantle surrounded by Votive Candles, Cori’s gotta go pee on a stick to evaluate her ovulation levels a.k.a. Pregnancy Readiness.

isn't the female reproductive system fascinating? the kids at home will love this!

Alas Cori’s not ovulating and therefore won’t be getting the hot beef/sperm injection today. Kacy’s cranking up the adorable by bending over and talking to Cori’s barren stomach which probably would prefer a Pop Tart to a baby at this point.

i am the eggman

OH DEAR LORD HAVE MERCY. Smack dab in the middle of the Penis Party Episode, we’ve got a father deathaniversary which, to me (because, as I’ve likely mentioned before, I too have an annual father deathaniversary, which I’m mentioning again because it takes up the screen-space where I could write about the actual scene therefore giving the illusion of a full recap without me having to attack my feeble emotional resources) is about 75% as much fun as a bikini wax (seriously I really can’t talk about this scene or transcribe any dialogue).

Romi and her mom look at a photo album of photos of Romi's father

So! Romi’s gotta spend this depressing holiday on camera, wiping her tears away.  We learn that Romi got married a few years ago to guy from her church who she implies was also gay. They married right before her father got sick so at least he got to walk her down the aisle while she was still legally permitted to do so.

romi at her wedding, dancing with her father

See Romi’s got a lot of layers of foundation but also layers of personality traits which are all wrapped tightly around a pretty strong core. Romi’s life often isn’t what she wants it to be because she doesn’t trust people (they always disappoint her) but she doesn’t want to be alone and she’s quick to fall in love. That’s a lot of shit going on.

romi and her mom hug

We return to our Dubious Lovebird Loveshack where Sajdah’s preparing heart-shaped waffles, some kind of omelette/frittata situation and, it appears, fresh-squeezed orange juice. What’s the occasion, Saj?

Sajdah: “Today’s Day 30¹ [of our relationship] and our birthday is January 30 and I’m starting to think 30 might be our number. “

You know, “your number.” It’s that thing you pick out after you pick out your song.

I'm iruneeng veffffles und jooeecing sume-a jooeece-a! Børk! Børk! Børk!

So it’s been 30 entire days and Sajdah, who just learned about masturbation last October and probably still isn’t doing it right, is more than ready to butch bottom her way down the river on a raft of Chanel’s vaginal fluids so she’s pulling out all the stops.

Sajdah presents her Breakfast Spread and — whopeee! — another Anias Nin quality entry in the Magic Journal in which Sajdah waxes poetic about the “ups and downs” of the last 30 days.

the book of "life"

This relationship would be more believable if it was set at summer camp. You know how you’d have a camp girlfriend/boyfriend and even though it was just a week, it was like, the most PASSIONATE WEEK OF YOUR LIFE?

and that's where i made a rough sketch of what our first baby will look like

Sajdah: “We just got our test results and there’s only one way to celebrate a good bill of health, and that’s with sex.”

I prefer a brisk jog or a three-day bender, but she’ll take what she can get here. Probably yesterday she was like “We just got our pizza in 20 minutes or less and there’s only one way to celebrate a timely pizza, and that’s with sex.” And then Marissa was like:

preach

Claire gets to Francine’s to see all her stuff’s been thrown onto the lawn, which confuses Claire because everything bad that ever happened is Francine’s fault so why is Claire being punished for just being honest and wanting things to be nice.

that guy's still waiting for his ride

Claire is dressed in a sleeveless pale-green hoodie, flip-flops and cargo capri pants, which makes her look like a Valley Girl who just got voted off the island. But in a good way.

dude, i could bone like 30 more chicks today, whatever, her loss, fucking loser

“Francine is a loser,” Claire repeats, reminding us all who’s boss.

Claire: “She’s got dirty now. Like she’s taking this to the level of filth in my opinion.”

EXCELLENT! JUST AS WE WERE PROMISED BY THIS PROVOCATIVE PROMOTIONAL POSTER!

Back in The Newly Co-Ed Den of Sinful Mixed Messages, Ilene Chaiken has found another way to get penises into this episode vis a vis Whitney, who has heaps of free time because nobody’s talking about Sara this episode. Whitney’s hatched a plan to help Cori & Kacy get preggers “the natural way.” Obviously this involves a penis, which is the Superior Method of Conception.

suddenly this is like 101 Dalmatians

Whitney: “I was like, is there a strap-on that like, blows a load? Like, I don’t know if there is. Cori and Kacy told me that you know, they’d been looking for a tool that could potentially be the inseminator. And they can’t find anything! I can’t believe we’re at a time — it’s 2011 — and there is nothing to use for lesbians. Or even if there is, I think we could make a better one.”

But of course they need a penis model and think immediately of Whitney’s bro/best friend, Caes. He has a “donkey dong” or something. Let’s call him! Lesbians and straight men – they can talk about pussy and penises all day! She’s certain he’ll rise to the challenge HAHAHAH!

it's like the difference between regular gatorade and extreme gatorade

Before we get any further into this storyline, let’s take a big TIMEOUT. Let me preface by saying I could be totally confused and wrong here, I’m not a gynecologist, maybe I’m missing something but from where I sit —

AHEM.

Jesus fucking Christ on a Cracker, this hijink knocks LA Fashion Week right outta the ballpark. The whole scenario is premised on an asinine pile of half-baked ideas and faulty logic, I’m actually insulted and/or confused that this steaming pile of shitstory is being served to us — three possibilities present themselves:

1. This show is for stupid people

2. The person who makes this show thinks all its viewers are stupid people

3. This show is for men who really need to stick their penis into it

So:

1. In order to squirt sperm out a prosthetic penis “the natural way” (Whitney/Alyssa’s specialty, as Alginate is the unsung hero of sex toys), one would first have to insert the sperm inside oneself. Right? So riddle me that, Batman.

OR one would have to find some kind of fantastic technological contraption to somehow make this happen somewhere between the head of the dildo and the wearer.

1a. Therefore, they need some kind of Inventor or Technological Person to figure this out, NOT a special effects team. That’s a different straight guy:

2. Let’s say that such a squirt is somehow possible, because I mean, Who Killed Jenny, am I right? We’ve got no idea where the jizz is gestating so in the interest of cutting to the chase, this product does, more or less, already exist!

2a. The Pee-Cock is one of many prosthetic devices intended for usage by trans guys or I guess anyone who wants to be able to pee standing up. I believe Max ordered one in the mail at some point? There’s lots of these but most of them aren’t suitable for sex but again, we’re already in the wilds of improbability, what’s another mile. There’s heaps of additional marvelous technological advancements on this website.

(Ilene I know you get hives just thinking about trans people and you practically ran a one-woman pro-transphobia campaign with your little teevee show, but just do me a solid, mmk?)

2b. Why would you need a REAL LIVE MAN’S PENIS to be your mold? It’s not Ancient Egypt, we have science now, shit does not need to get that complicated. Here. Here’s your model:

TA-DA!

3. If “pressing a button” is satisfactory to Kacy, then why not use a syringe to perform an at-home insemination?

4. If we acknowledge the inherent impossibility of The Sperm actually coming out of Kacy’s strap-on as the sperm is not inside Kacy, then we must conclude that this object is meant to be handled independently of the vadge area. So she’d just be using it like a standalone dildo, more or less, which only qualifies as ‘the natural way’ if you think everything in life has to involve a penis. WHICH APPARENTLY THIS EPISODE DOES.

ETA 6.14.2011: My purpose here is to comment on the story and characters presented to us by the show creators, not the actual lives behind them (which are none of my business/interest), but, if you’re interested in the ACTUAL Real-Life circumstances surrounding this creation rather than the sort of confusing crafts anatomy show presented to us on-screen, Real-For-Reals-Real Alyssa has shared the following:

+ She could not mold a dildo because that is copyright infringement.

+ She and Whitney “worked very closely with he advice of several fertility doctors to make sure I was designing something safe and potentially effective.”

+ She and Whitney did extensive research and found nothing designed for this purpose.

+ “There are several clients of ours that were really enthusiastic and hopeful that we could possibly create something they could maybe try using at home if they chose that route.”

+ “Ejaculating dildos would not work because the transfer method is not sterile.”

So there you go! Isn’t that like a kabillion times more interesting than what we saw on the show?! I would much rather watch an hour-long TLC special on the actual creation of this Inseminator — the research, the conversation with doctors, etc — than I would watch another episode of TRLW.

Furthermore, even within the context of this episode — the fact that Whitney & Alyssa did go through these other options (didlo, ejaculating dildo, etc) before having to resort to making a model of an actual penis makes that scene itself much more compelling/interesting. That’d be a story with an arc and stuff. But whatever, clearly if my ideas about stories were any good, I would have a job I didn’t have to create myself and probably paid off my credit card bills by now.

BACK TO THE PROGRAM!

Soooo anyway, Whitney calls Caes (where does she meet these people with these names, Romulus?) to ask him to be an inseminator and he’s like “yeah sure,” he doesn’t need details ’cause those were on the breakdowns the producer gave him earlier.

let's hear it for the boys

Whitney’s gamely summoning imaginary energy for this imaginary project, basically Whitney is going to change gynecology forever!

little did you know, she also has two medical degrees

Romi and Rachel are heading to Las Vegas for the Magic Fashionshow to Sell Lines. As they wait for their chariot, the girls gab about Rachel fucking Whitney and Kelsey ruining Romi’s life.

thank god someone remembered the fedora at the last minute

Will Romi & Rachel do sex? No.

Rachel: “We’re really good friends now and it’s just a friendship.”

Romi says “long story short” and then starts talking really slowly and saying “like” a lot. Rachel describes Romi’s relationship with Kelsey as Romi being “the caretaker of a 23-year-old child” which is just, you know, mean.

so i'm going to vegas, 'cause most of the people there are straight

Sajdah needed a way to break Chanel’s hymen prior to the sexual situation and after spending some time considering the pros and cons of tampons, has settled on horseback riding.

ride the pony

I thought I missed Michael Scott a bunch during the last three episodes of The Office but I miss him much more during this episode.

Sajdah: “I’m taking really good care of Chanel now in hopes of her taking really good care of me later.”

Chanel: “You’re my genie, I’m rubbing the lamp.”

Sajdah: “Hopefully she’ll enjoy [my other surprises] as much as she enjoyed this one.”

Chanel: (riding the horse) “HAY!!! I GOT THE RHYTHM!”

Can we just appreciate the complete bizarre randomness of this field trip to the “Rainbow Ranch”? It’s so benignly absurd that I can’t help but love it.

I hope Chanel is saving at least one orgasm for later!

Hey DUDE

Now it’s time to return to the Mega-Clean Boudoir, where Sajdah, because she is, as aforementioned, akin to a 13-year-old boy in her romantic aspirations, has lit all the cliches on fire. This bedroom looks sort of depressing though, can’t Chanel paint a giant heart on the wall or some puppies.

don't forget the hospital corners

Sajdah: “Though after a long day of horseback riding, I wanna make sure my girl feels good, so I’m going to give her a full body massage.”

Because nothing’s more entertaining than watching a nice, good, well-meaning individual execute the most time-intensive way of copping a feel. Not that I haven’t done this myself, but unlike Sajdah, I have professional training. So.

Here sajdah executes the secret Esalen technique of "vigorous inner thigh rub."

Sajdah: “I’m not a masseuse. I’m just taking this opportunity to rub all over Chanel. Hopefully I’ll rub her the right way.”

Chanel: “It was not the best massage. It definitely had more motives behind it.”

At this point in the episode I started screaming because it was so cheesy and clothes were coming off. I blacked out when Sajdah started talking about her mind, body and soul “quivering” like crazy.

¹Also known as “one month.”

Real L Word Episode 205 Recap: It’s About to Get Juicy Juice

I don’t know about you, but between last Sunday and this Sunday, I haven’t been able to think about anything besides Whitney Mixter. How many times fast can I say her name? Like a hundred times! There are so many questions left unanswered — Does Whitney drink Coke or Diet Coke? What does Whitney eat for breakfast? What’s Whitney’s favorite color? Not gonna lie, who does Whitney have feelings for? There are at least 13 Ways of Looking at Whitney Mixter, if not 14 or 15.

Thank Jesus Lord Christ of All Saints in the Glorious Lesbian Heavens above, Sunday finally came. (Much like Sajdah and Chanel. They both came too.) I was more than ready for another episode of That’s So Whitney.

Just kidding, for most of this episode I was trying to think of what it would sound like to microwave my television or if it’d be wiser to forget about blowing up the microwave and just run my face over with a tractor.

Claire, take it away:

Oddly, this week was light on Whitney and heavy on everyone else. I wonder if I could ever find this show entertaining if I had no investment in it (recapping = investment).

Maybe if I didn’t care so much, I’d just be like HAHAAHA THAT BITCH BACKED HER CAR INTO THAT OTHER CAR LOL! You know, how people are about whatever, other reality shows. The Desperately Real Housewives of WheretheFuck McEversville.

Many thanks this week to Intern Grace, my lovely intern who can see The Raptor from her house. She made 95% of these images, per my commands.

We open at an exotic lesbian outdoor party, where hot young sexy lesbians in short shorts/bikinis are having sexy feelings in and around a swimming pool. They’re eating cheeseburgers and aimlessly projecting sexual energy onto absolutely everyone else.

girls like sex with girls!

This is what hot sexy lesbians do on The Real L Word, a show about sex and the lesbians who have it. Oh! Whitney has another complicated literary device for us:

Whitney: “I am done with the back and forth with Sara. I need like a new relationship, new love. I am so done with that flip-flop action… there’s a switch that flips and like, it’s been flipped to the off position.”

What a provocative image!

we used to have a "clap on/clap off" light, but that got real crazy during sex

Instead she’s got her eye on Mel, another girl at the party. They didn’t mention this on the show, but Mel is the European Lovechild of Samantha Ronson and Lindsay Lohan, as illustrated below:

SamRo + Lilo = MEL

There’s just one problem — Mel’s young!

Whitney: “Not underage young, like over the age — but I don’t know how much girl experience she has and it’s kinda intriguing, I’m not gonna lie.”

Thank you for your honesty, Whitney.

In the next episode of In Your Box Office, Julie & Brandy will refer to men as “penis people” and, since I’ve already seen the episode, I’m gonna start using that right now to refer to these folks.

Jesus Christ stab me in the hip with a shrimp kabob and firecrack my head open, penis people.

Cori’s gonna be ovulating in two weeks. Meanwhile, Kacy doesn’t have a penis because she’s not an Important Man (like so many of you watching at home).

maybe we should just get one of them chinese babies

In lieu of Kacy directly delivering the hot beef injection to Cori’s sweet sweet babymaking vadgehole, Kacy would like to maybe press a button and be “integrated into the process in some way.” The doctor says that’s okay, whatever you need, my Gay Sister. After all, she didn’t open up a practice in West Hollywood hoping for a bunch of Mennonites with their legs clamped together.

how can we be bette and tina if we don't do it at home

so if we could find a like, magic spell or something, that'd be *AWESOME*

The doctor says if Cori wants to be extra-fertile, she’s gotta quit smoking. Number-one thing.

Cori: “I’m really scared because I love smoking.”

The doctor makes a facial expression that means, I think, “y’all are fucked.”

What say you, Claire?

Next up is Drew, Romi’s Favorite Penis Person EVER!

duh it's mario from mario kart

Romi: “I met Drew through a lot of friends at a party.”

The attention to detail here is stunning!

“I don’t have a lot of men in my life,” says Romi. Romi’s father died four years ago. Then [some time ago], Romi was single and needy and apparently lost her Mom’s phone number and There Was Drew! This is sad, maybe to me, because that was me right after my father died, or maybe forever-after: you miss that protective energy Dads usually give. But women can give that energy, too, and without the weird smell in the morning. There’s actually nothing inherently masculine about protecting someone.

So maybe Romi wanting Kelsey to get a job isn’t as much about a beach house in Malibu as it is about wanting to feel “cared for.” She wants to be the flower and she wants Kelsey to be the gardener. I got that phraseology from Rosie O’Donnell, who considered herself the flower and Kelli was the gardener. Now they’re divorced.

Anyhow Drew looks so much like Mario from Mario Kart that I can’t really focus on anything but that.

maybe later romi i could slice you open like an avocado and have a serious feast

BUT the important part to remember, all you manly men watching at home, is that women cannot conduct themselves / feel safe sans men. We just trip over our petticoats and burn eggs and drink ourselves to death. It’s terrible. We leave the butter out and slip on it!

Just kidding WATCH OUT PATRIARCHY.

Romi’s fave part of Drew, howevs, is his moustache ’cause it’s just like Romi’s Dad’s moustache, which is semi-weird, but whatever. Drew’s gonna be her shelter from the storm. More specifically, he will be sheltering her with his moustache:

this dude is not fucking around

Drew’s concerned that Kelsey’s drinkity-drink-drinking will drive Romi to drink and suggests Romi  provide Kelsey with an “ultimatum.” That sounds fun, but Romi has to go home to her wife.

Romi: “Drew is very protective of me. I think if Drew had it his way, I’d be with nobody but him.”

Well I think the “message” of this conversation is that lesbians in hot sexy bikinis love hot wild men.

Back to the WET ‘N WILD POOL PARTY. First, the Cliff’s Notes version:

But if you want a more detailed explanation, here we go:

When Rachel arrives with Alyssa and Scarlett, Whitney notices Ray-Ray looking especially sexy:

Whitney: “She like walks in with her little sassy flair and her high heels. I find Rachel attractive when she’s NOT fucked up.”

and then i was like "i still give great haircuts," you know?

Rachel’s gotta save face after last week’s emotional meltdown, so she’s gonna save face by getting head.

oh. my. god. becky.

Rachel: “I think Whitney and Mel are flirting at the party. But Mel’s really young. And you can’t send a girl in to do what a lady can do.”

Whitney and Rachel are a great match sexually ’cause they’re both willing to have sex on the teevee (and ’cause they dated for three years) so it’s no surprise that Whitney pulls her into a bathroom to get all Mature Audience on our asses.

To be honest I haven’t watched any of the sex scenes in TRLW, instead I cover my face and scream. I don’t know, I’m either 12 or 65.

At some point during this scene I left the room and when I came back and I thought Rachel was throwing up in the sink, but in turns out Whitney was just fucking her from behind.

Back to sajdahjustgotborn dot tumblr dot blogspot dot com, a subsidiary of justgotborn dot blogspot dot tumblr dot com, in which we witness Sajdah’s birth, early years, pre-adolescence, adolescence, etc. It’s like Benjamin Button backwards and gay.

This week we’ll be planning our Barbie Dream House and learning about the birds and the bees.

remember what happened when dana thought it was too soon to move in with alice? she died, chanel. she died.

Sajdah thinks she and Chanel should live together, because Sajdah just got hit on the head with a rock.

Sajdah: “We have to pick out a new apartment.”
Chanel: “Yeah we do… for you.”

Oh, massive sidenote: I force Marni, my very very special friend, to watch this show with me, and sometimes I write down the things she says. Like this:

Marni: “Oh my god, I can’t.”

Sajdah: “Chanel and I have been together for three weeks now. I’m ready for Chanel to move in.”

Oh jeez. I wonder if she’s told Marissa.

Okay, here’s the deal with Sajdah — and sidenote, her storyline gets less and less plausible as the show goes on — these things she’s picking out to explain why Chanel is her soulmate aren’t soulmate-things. You can’t stop thinking about her? You wanna have sex with her? When you fought, the thought of losing her tore you up? Good! You should be girlfriends! That’s how dating and relationships begin. All of those things. So they’re on a good track, and Sajdah needs to slow her roll. She feels me:

Sajdah: “You can’t really handle big gulps of Sadj. You gotta sip it slow and I’m serving her in really big gulps right now.”

G-damn she’s got a talent of blaming everything on something totally unrelated. One day Sajdah’s gonna break her leg and be like, “it’s ’cause you wouldn’t leave that party last week.”

can you handle this / CHANEL! I said 'can you handle this'

how can we paint the walls when i don't even know your favorite color?

Chanel: “I feel like opening up physically when I feel that we’ve really connected emotionally and mentally.”
Sajdah: “We had sex the other day. That was yesterday.”
Chanel: [nods no, laughs]
Sajdah: “Yes we did.”
Chanel: “When we messed around? That’s not really — that’s not — it doesn’t count as sex.”
Sajdah: “I came. You came. We both came. I’m confused.”

Chanel: [shaking her head, cracking up] “That’s not sex!”
Sajdah: “What’s the difference?”
Chanel: [hysterically laughing] “That’s all — [can’t talk, laughing too hard] —
Sajdah: “I have a question. What was that? Can we have sex then if that wasn’t sex?”
Chanel: “Yeah, that’s what I was gonna tell you.”
Sajdah: “What the fuck? What am I missing?”
Chanel: “A lot.”

“I’ve only been a lesbian for a year and I’ve never been in a relationship,” Sajdah reminds her/us. She can repeat that all night long, that’ll never make it true.

and i was like, "just wait til you see this body naked"

Marni: [eating her salad] “I would feel really bad watching this right now if this wasn’t one of the best salads I’ve ever made. I’m really into this salad.”

Chanel’s really pretty.

Whitney’s doing a photo shoot because she’s a Hot Dancytown Supreme Cheermaster Sexylesbianpants Celesbidykeathon who does lots of super-cool things like start a super juicy hot red wet lesbian sexmachine party night because she’s super-famous and lesbians love Whitney. LOVE HER.

give me you're "let's talk about whitney" face

Her co-conspirators for the Juicy Party include Leslie, a DJ you may remember from Season One — she’s Nat (Rose’s girlfriend)’s sister, and another girl who’s pretty and hasn’t fucked Whitney, so, whatever.

Obviously Sara shows up, because let’s face it, girlfriend lives and dies for The Whit, and Whitney’s like, wtf, I told you the switch was OFF, bitch!

i'm having lindsay lohan flashbacks

Sara tries to get all up on Whitney — aka do her job — but Whitney’s too up in her brain-head of feelingspace to remember the photo shoot’s about getting good photos, not entangling as many people as possible into your personal drama.

Whitney: “I asked Sara to go-go dance when we were on good terms and now we’re not together so…”

Whitney marvels at how Sara didn’t “get it” — that being broken up meant no more go-go dancing at photoshoots — “she didn’t get it” “she didn’t get it.” “What’s wrong with her?” I feel like she’s trying to tell us that Sara’s mute or mentally challenged or something.

this grapefruit reminds me of how you felt when i fisted you in the shower

In preparation for Doing Sex, Sajdah & Chanel are getting STD tests, because that’s both responsible and WILDLY ENTERTAINING.

Sajdah: “Since I just found out that we’re not actually having sex, Chanel thought it would be a good idea to go get tested before we have sex for the first time.”

do you want me to check for any viruses ilene chaiken may have injected into your asses to "tell the story" of lesbians who get poisoned by other lesbians

Marni: “They could be doing worse things than getting HIV tested on TV–”
Me: “Yeah, they could be actually having sex.”

there's graham crackers in the car!

Sajdah’s never heard of STDs before, probably thought Finn really did get Quinn pregnant in the hot-tub.

Sajdah: “I know my grandmother ain’t get no STD test. She didn’t even know what a tampon was.”

Anyhow good news they don’t have HIV but have to wait for the rest of the results.

 

This week’s episode brought to you by the United Gynecologists of America.

Real L Word 204 Recap: The Other L Word (I Think It’s “Limoncello”)

Welcome to my “recap” of The Real L Word Episode 204, entitled “The Other L Word,” which I’m 75% sure is a reference to Lettuce, Lizzie McGuire, Little House on the Prairie or Looney Tunes: Back in Action.

There are few feelings as singularly devastating as the feeling of watching an episode of The Real L Word after watching a brand-new episode of True Blood. I mean, how can “I’m not gonna lie, I have feelings for you” compare to “Sookie, you are mine”? It can’t, that’s how, regardless of how often Whitney resembles a vampire.

Anyhow, as we proceed today I’d like to remind everyone at home that in order to produce these recaps, I have to completely forget that these are real human people and devote myself entirely to the “characters” created by the production team.

That being said, this weekend, Kelsey pointed out a factual inaccuracy in a graphic constructed by Intern Grace several weeks back. This graphic explained “things Kelsey does” as those things had been explained to us by The Show: Cooking, Cleaning and Getting Alcohol. This was, of course, an incomplete picture which fails to illustrate the true breadth of Kelsey’s skills/talents.

I promised to fix it and so we did!  Ta-DA! Revised:

She’s a poet and you didn’t even KNOW IT.

We open in the Den of Whit, where Rachel’s sitting in a chair, eating a raw yellow pepper with all the enthusiasm of a tranquilized Keroppi doll. Whitney arrives on her chariot of sex, claims she’s not eaten in days, and submits herself to another session of impromptu psychoanalysis.

no seriously it makes your vadge smell good, it's like the pineapple of vegetables

But first! An enrapturing discussion about the weight of Whitney’s hair, the nutritional value of Rachel’s favorite snack (no, not Whitney’s vadge! PEPPERS!) and decapitation.

Whitney: “I haven’t eaten in days and the first thing I’m eating is raw pepper.”
Rachel: “Maybe you should eat because you don’t want to become — your head you have a lot of head so what’s gonna happen is you’re gonna end up like this -” [bends her neck to the side]
Whitney: “Like a lollipop?” [sidenote: that is A FUCKED UP LOLLIPOP]
Rachel: “Your body won’t be able to support the massive hair/head ratio.”
Whitney: “There’s a lot of brains in this head.”
Rachel: “Brains?”
Whitney: “Underneath these dreads.”
Rachel: “I don’t know about that.”

Rachel believes Whitney’s going down a ‘rabbit hole’ with Sara and it’s disappointing and nothing like the movie with the Mad Hatter and the Red Queen and so forth. Whitney makes the following “point”:

Whitney: “Maybe right now — maybe my decisions aren’t the best but right now I’m trying to sort out my emotions because that’s what they are behind them — they are emotions behind them. And sometimes unfortunately you can’t control emotions!”

and this is why rachel takes klonopin

I believe Angela Chase has some wisdom to share on this particular topic:

“It’s such a lie that you should do what’s in your heart. If we all did what was in our hearts, the world would grind to a halt.”

Whitney says Rachel’s being condescending, which is true, but also Whitney’s certainly got a better comeback in that giant-head-nest-dred-brain-holder of hers than “you can’t control emotions.”

Romi, sober and full of light, sleep, and hydration, is going to get her life on track.

if so could you pick up some beer on your way back?

Romi voiceovers that she feels “stuck” at Marc Jacobs, which is fair enough, security doors are complicated.

push it real good

Sober Romi is ready to grab life by its Vixskin balls and turn them into earrings. She’s right: giving up drinking helps you get your shit together quicker than you’d imagine. I say this while drinking, of course.

So thus Romi does some lunges and then runs around the pond in cute sweatpants and an unnecessary hat/doily thing and super-fancy headphones to the sweet sweet sounds of, I think, Enya.

i run for life

Claire, Queen of the Los Angeles Jungle, is moving out of the House of Thwarted College Romance into her own apartment. She’s dressed like Sue Sylvester for good luck.

there must be 50 better suitcases with which to leave your lover

Claire explains that because nobody likes her anymore, she’s gotta live by herself, which she’s never done before. But c’mon — LOOK AT THIS EXPOSED BRICK! I’d take exposed brick over two girlfriends any day.

it even comes with an end-table

Claire: “[Francine] should’ve told me before I moved out here that it was gonna be miserable, but she didn’t. She told me it was gonna be nice.”

How many people is it again that it takes to tango? Two, right? Yes, I believe it takes two to tango.

Cori and Kacy have mutual friends with Whitney and Sara, so they’re all together at the table, like monkeys at a picnic, NOT TALKING ABOUT SPERM. Instead, we get actual BACKSTORY! Like how they met, etc.

wow we are so much happier than those guys

After discussing her wanton party-girl youth and Kacy-permitted wild-oats-sowing period, Cori is forced to move on to a more sperm-focused convo ’cause Whitney asks about “the next step” in their storyline/relationship.

Whitney: “They’re like the perfect couple, they’re like the unicorn couple that you hear exists, but you never really see them out.”

It’s ’cause unicorn couples are always at home sperm-shopping, cuddling, shining their horns and watching Rachel.

and then i was like "i've never seen a femme with such a long horn before!"

So, are you guys together? Cori and Kacy ask Saritney. The two-second pause, muffled by Saritney’s awkward glances and chuckles, says more than their words ever could, and I’m not just saying that because Sara never talks and I can’t handle another Whitney Metaphor.

In fact, I have a metaphor of my own: Sara and Whitney, watching humans, are realizing that their relationship, much like vampires, melts in the sun.

oh my god we're so fucked

Whitney extracts some nonsense about being stubborn and being “into our own shit.” Somewhere over the rainbow, Samantha Jones is shaking her head and rolling her eyes and deadpanning; “Admit it, ladies. You’re just fucking and there’s nothing wrong with that.”

In addition to having the exact same crazytown feelings about relationships, Sajdah and Chanel have the EXACT SAME CRAZYTOWN BIRTHDAY.  Clearly both sets of parents were riding the hobby horse on the very same day, eventually leading to this fated moment when Sajdah would end up in Los Angeles, throwing a weird party filled with tiny pocket-sized scenes of Awkward!

i'd just like to note that a 2-year-old got a lower third and robin roemer didn't

AND A BABY!

Sajdah, being the Butch Gentlewoman that she is, is throwing a party for Chanel, a party she apparently planned despite only allegedly meeting Chanel two weeks ago. She’s rented a big fancy house “managed” by a girl named “Natasha” who is not, much to my disappointment, the same one who was engaged to Mr.Big.

flannel + dreadlocks = lesbian

Love stories!

that face means "this is crazy"

SO MUCH LOVE AT THE PARTY:

dead ringer for heather locklear in the lower right hand corner

Sajdah and Chanel aren’t having sex “currently,” but Sajdah is “planning for it” and “hoping for it.” I’m hoping it’ll be like when Donna Martin lost her virginity to David on 90210 and stacked a bunch of candles at the end of the bed (fire hazard!).

“The desire to have sex inspires me to do certain things,” Sajdah says. Story of my life. Actually, I believe that’s the story of every non-asexual human’s life. Desiring sex, doing things. Things like LAPDANCES!

this is never awkward for the rest of the guests

Sajdah, swept up by the power of Chanel’s ass and her own burning loins, literally hauls Chanel into the other room to execute the Seduction Plan she read about at the dentist. It starts with magical princess sexyloveface champagnesex drinkity-drink procured from Fairieland.

also, i bought you all the stars in the sky and put them in this bottle as a symbol of our love.

Sajdah could’ve gotten Chanel something boring like a pony, a Nintendo or a charm bracelet, but instead got Chanel a journal.

Chanel: Ooooo, I like the paper!

It’ll be a “tool” for them to express feelings to each other. Thank G-d. These kids need to stop fucking, hiking, watching sports and talking politics and get down to their FEELINGS.

(Also, maybe Showtime had a tie-in with Moleskin, ’cause I think Kelsey got a planner last week.)

There is not one thing in this scene that feels like it wants me to watch it.

Much like Shakespeare and Jeanette Winterson, Sajdah discovers, through the process of writing the first journal entry, that she’s in love with Chanel. Mmm-hm. What say you, Marissa?

Sajdah nabs three seconds of makeout heaven before Chanel has to get back to her guests, leaving Sajdah crawling on the floor like it’s that scene in Sesame Street where we learned the word “agua.”

the thing is that i feel like makin' love

a...g....u...aa

See the thing is —

and also with burberry and rainbows and butterflies and whole foods

Whitney and Sara are in bed together with their tattoos out, possibly naked.

that's so true about prop 8 being unconstitutional

Their mouths are moving and sometimes we snap over to another place, where it’s just Whitney sitting in front of the camera with her mouth moving. Then we go back to the first place where they’re in bed with their mouths moving, and sometimes not moving, and it appears that they then close their eyes and go to sleep.

it'd seem this was said

Oh fuck, I just had the mute button on. Oh well, NEXT!

Back in Sober House…

i hope you still found time to make me dinner, woman

Kelsey’s been walking all day. She walked up Melrose, Santa Monica, Hollywood, turned six tricks, stuck her hands in the Hollywood Walk of Stars, went to Ripley’s Believe it Or Not and applied to every California Pizza Kitchen in the whole g-ddamn state and thank Jesus Lord Christ Romi gives her a cuddle hug for her efforts. Aww.

Kelsey admits she’s been down lately but hasn’t said so ’cause Romi hasn’t been sympathetic. But that’s all in the past. Walking changes all that.

so can we have sex again

Romi: “When you find someone who’s like genuinely such a good human being and has such a good soul, you can work on that. Trying to fix someone’s soul and someone’s spirit is not something I’m interested in doing. Trying to fix somebody’s routine and agenda — I can do that.”

Gays have lots of practice with changing agendas.

Romi: “I need you to get rich or die trying.”
Kelsey: “I think that’s what’s gonna happen, I’m gonna die trying.”

Real L Word Episode 203 Recap: Back to Square One, Look What We’ve Become

Welcome to The Real L Word, Episode 203, “Blame it on the Alcohol,” named after the GLEE episode “Blame it on the Alcohol,” which was named after a song called “Blame it on the Alcohol” which was basically about when you do something unfortunate, and then say you only did it “because of the alcohol.”

Actually just kidding, it’s called “Back to Square One.” Before you get too excited, I should tell you that it’s not the Square One I thought it was.

not this square one

This week we re-learned that Real L Word Lesbians cannot handle their shit. These girls CANNOT. HANDLE. THEIR. SHIT. You girls need to get your shit together! Listen, take that zen-ninja-zoohoo-yazoo headband thing off your crazy alternative hairstyle situation and get off the stage and put your clothes on and stop letting strangers smell your hair.

No just kidding. Everyone on this show is really awesome and this show is SO AWESOME and it’s SO TOTALLY REAL. What’s cooler than real? Ice Real!

We open in trolly playground childland, where only steps away from frolicking toddlers, Kacy & Cori are sitting on a couch holding a mobile telephone, talking about sperm.

yeah totally sperm, it's like sea monkeys for your uterus!

Kacy and Cori are gonna purchase the hell out of those sperm units they found on the internet. How many? One? Two? THREE! They will purchase THREE of those units, from a dude who’s an “ID Donor” which means when their baby is 18 and hates her Two Moms she can call The Sperm Guy and see if he wants to hang out. You know, The Sperm Guy!

mark ruffalo, honorary lesbian and "Sperm Guy"

Glad we got sperm into the show within the first ten seconds. Never wanna take too long to make a tip of the hat to this program’s fine audience of sperm-producers. Ilene Chaiken, by the way, is the creator, director, writer and executive producer of not only this “hit series” but the hit series The L Word and also of SPERM.

Over in the Valley of Dashed Dreams, Claire’s trying on pants and Francine isn’t helping!

or no pants, too. is a thing.

Francine won’t be participating in Claire’s wardrobe dilemma because unlike Claire, Francine cannot simply set aside her feelings following Last Night’s illuminating life-changing fight of LESBIAN MEGADEATH and be like “yeah, wear those pants” or “wear those other pants.” You know?

look. your hair reminds me of van halen. okay? ok. i said it!

Claire has to move out, says Francine. They’ve been screaming at each other for so many years that both of them are getting permanent gravely-smokey-morning-after-death/sexy voices and it’s just not healthy.

+

Things Real L Word Girls Can’t Handle:

Pretending like nothing is wrong

Over at The Nail Salon, Sajdah is getting a pedicure (butches get pedicures too, guys!) with her straight friend Marissa, talking crazy about her new lady-love, Chanel.

So! This morning Sajdah and Chanel were exchanging the standard “good morning” texts shared between two lovers who just met and aren’t lovers yet, when Chanel busted out with:

“I just want you to always be excited about us and about me and support me and protect me in my time of need and I know that I’ll do the same for you.”

Well.

What say you on this, Marissa?

mhm

Marissa: “These kinds of messages, in text? You don’t even know her favorite color! And you’re at — “I need you to protect me”? Get the fuck outta here! I mean, are you kidding me?”

Sajdah likes it. She can’t think about any other girls, so she might as well marry this one. That’s rare, you know. When you meet someone you really like and then can’t stop thinking about them.

Marissa: “Support me? Protect me? I don’t even know your favorite color! I don’t even know if you like night or day!”

Sajdah admits these are uncharted waters, as she’s never been in a relationship before and lived in a tiny cave with her mother prior to moving to Los Angeles where she never heard anything about anyone else’s relationships ever. Marissa has been in relationships, and what does Marissa think, again?

Final answer?

Not so fast:

That’s not what Bailey told Callie:

but it sure is nice if you have 'em anyhow

Things a Real L Word Girl Can’t Handle:

Pretending like nothing is wrong

Dating

Whitney’s taking a little trip to San Francisco. San Francisco is her “playground” which makes me feel weird and like maybe I should move. “San Francisco is my Vegas,” says Whitney Queen of the Nile and Queen of the Metaphor.

ass titties ass titties ass as titties ass ass and titties

Whitney’s going to The Lexington, which she describes as “The Cheers of Lesbians,” aka “the dive bar where every dyke knows your name.”  And if they don’t know your name then they probably won’t let you play next at pool. Sorry bro.

Oh guess who’s in San Francisco?

same song, second verse, a little bit louder and a lot less worse

Once upon a time, Jaq & Whitney had a thing but then this one time Whitney and Jaq were in bed being sexy and then Whitney spied Jaq on THE FACEBOOK changing her relationship status and Whitney was like:

Whitney says there’s still chemistry with Jaq. Wow! Life gets curiouser and curiouser by the minute.

because L.A. is clearly the problem

Things a Real L Word Girl Can’t Handle:

Pretending like nothing is wrong

Dating

Facebook

Kelsey’s been sexually fantasizing about Romi all day whilst preparing a romantic candle-light dinner and now Romi has returned from the big bad world, sober as a judge, to spend the evening with her lanky lady-love.

Oh! Romi got Kelsey a present! It’s a planner!

Romi: “It’s gonna help you!… You can organize your schedule and get all your shit in here!”

Mhm, this is kinda like when your Mom gets you shoes so that you can’t stay at home all day, talking to your imaginary fairy-friends from your fantasy novels. Kelsey loves it though, ’cause she loves Romi.

this dinner's great. are you trying to get laid?

Romi’s given up the drink, which’ll be an issue ’cause Kelsey is still drinking and also ’cause they’ve been drunk pretty much since they met. For example, Kelsey is drinking right now! From a giant wine bottle! A GIANT wine bottle!

i can't believe we can almost see kelsey's underpants. so inappropriate

Kelsey loves wine! Drink drink drink. Poor Romi, seeing the sad sad world as it is through her new sober eyes, is like “why is everyone drunk.”

After Romi’s Roman Bath, the ladies retire/drink:

what, it's manichevitz

Romi tells Kelsey that Kelsey is drunk, but Kelsey insists that nnnnahhh she’s justt FESTIVE!

just one game of hide the salami just one game

When Kelsey’s drunk, she reminds Romi of Romi. So then sex is like Black Swan. And also:

Most important takeaway of this scene, however – Romi’s like super tan all of a sudden:

get this woman a make-up job on "jersey shore"

Things a Real L Word Girl Can’t Handle:

Pretending like nothing is wrong

Dating

Facebook

Large Bottles of Wine

Meanwhile, Whitney, wearing her Native Heatband, is stalking the streets of my city like a lesbian hulkstress of the evening, striking terror into everybody’s bones.

i thought this was maybe the rose part, and for a second i was like "i miss rose" and then i was like what the fuck is wrong with me

Hip-hop blares. Whitney enters CLUB TRIGGER, stands on stage, and yells some words. Everybody’s vadge explodes into the night. The party is on POW POW and Whitney’s gonna meet her fans and their tattoos! Whitney loves meeting her fans.

real fans have sleeve tattoos

“Girls always wanna smell my hair,” Whitney says, like she has no idea that it’s ’cause they wanna see if it smells so they can text everyone about it.

do we have to talk about this

Whitney wants to let Jaq know that Jaq still has “a place in [her] heart” and the way to Whitney’s heart is through her vagina.

Y’all, Whitney and Jaq are gonna have sex! I saw it on Jaq’s facebook. It’s gone now, but I swear it was there and I saw it and look:

backroom babylon

Whitney: “It’s refreshing to not have to deal with intense drama or confusing emotions.”

Whitney has simple emotions: she thinks about herself at all times. The rest of it is very confusing. This person’s emotions, that person’s emotions, etc. Yawn!

Good news! By placing her lips on Whitney’s lips and touching Whitney’s body parts with her body parts, Jaq is helping Whitney forget about all that trouble with Sara!

i give you the power of the jedi clam

Speaking of the Red Devil! Sara’s in Los Angeles where she’s dancing very sexily for her “roommate’s music video.”

"this is my barbie goes to the cherokee reservation look"

Sara’s kicking back a bottle of vino, Kelsey-style, in her litte gold hotpants:

I’m not sure if you knew this or not, but our design director Alex Vega has those exact same golden hotpants. True story. She bought them the day that we met. See:

alex vega, just caught napping

Before we get any further you might be thinking — Sara’s roommate? Who’s Sara’s roommate? This seems like a pretty involved video shoot, right? Like this is for a music video. For Sara’s roommate. Yet searching “Sara’s roommate” on iTunes you’ll come up empty.

I know this might surprise you, based on how Showtime decided to use footage from an Autostraddle photoshoot without crediting us, our photographer, or the project the photoshoot was for — but OOPS! THEY DID IT AGAIN!

Check out Lady Tragik. Here’s Lady Tragik’s video of that shoot, featuring ‘Dirty Bitch,’ the song the video was for (which is not the song that plays during the episode, though you may recognize the episode song (which is not by Lady Tragik or related in any way to the scene) from, I think, a Calendar Girls video).

I guess Ilene Chaiken forgets that The Chart isn’t just about who you fuck, it’s WHO GETS FUCKED, too.

Anyhow back to the “storyline” as it’s being sold to us —

“I just met this girl Erica, and I’m pretty into her,” Sara voice-overs while tripping over the photoshoot set while guzzling wine, a la Lindsay Lohan at that one photo shoot where she was talking about Samantha Ronson except with more making out.

no see, that's not much, i should probably drink all of it myself

Sara’s roommate says Sara’s not allowed to do footage takebacks tomorrow when she’s sober. Shouldn’t be a problem, I think Sara’s pretty comfortable with widely-distributed footage of herself drunk touching her vadge.

accurate representation of my visual situation during the real l word

Sara: “Whitney’s doing her thing in San Francisco so I’m gonna do mine.”

Here’s “her’s”:

armsleeve by keith haring, tattoo sleeve by west hollywood

Things a Real L Word Girl Can’t Handle:

Pretending like nothing is wrong

Dating

Facebook

Large Bottles of Wine

Reasonably-Sized Bottles of Wine

your shirt reminds me of the sunset, the kind i want to watch with chanel while she nurses our baby

Sajdah’s gotta find a new apartment. Maybe she’ll move in with whatshername.

Marissa: “It’s too soon!”
Sajdah: “Maybe I’m just that fucking amazing!”
Marissa: “Or maybe you’re fucking crazy too!”

Sajdah’s Mom calls to complain about Sajdah flaunting her sexuality on The Book of Face, which I’m imagining was in the form of an “I felt you in my legs before I ever met you/ And when I lay beside you for the first time I told you / I feel you in my heart and I don’t even know you” headline.

it's not like i'm pokin at you for real!

Sajdah: “Ma, it’s my personal facebook, everybody puts their personal stuff on facebook!”

That’s the thing about Moms of grown-up kids. They don’t realize that Facebook is where people put personal stuff, not just where they stalk their own children and other people’s children and then render unfair judgments about them to share with other Moms. Where’s your content, Mom.

Sajdah explains that growing up it was just Sajdah and her Mom. Just the two of them, building castles in the sky, just the two of them, and not one guy.

Sajdah seems to have faith her Mom will come around when she gets used to the idea. I’m sure this show will help.

Things a Real L Word Girl Can’t Handle:

Pretending like nothing is wrong

Dating

Facebook

Large Bottles of Wine

Reasonably-Sized Bottles of Wine

Mom

RETURNING TO THE TRAVELING DEN OF SIN! Whit-Me is all sleepyslutted out and Jaq in the Baq slips in for a morning-after steamroller.

hi baby these weird guys with cameras are following me around asking me to take my shirt off

Jaq’s got to go, but Whitney wants to cuddle. JK, she wants to talk about herself in an impromptu bedside interview:

hot mess party dress

Whitney: “Jaq is very pleasant to be with. She hasn’t burned bridges with people, I don’t know it’s just different from things lately I’ve been used to.”

Real L Word Episode 202 Recap: The Morning After We Got Drunkity Drunk Drunk

Welcome to Real L Word Episode 202, which I’m recapping because I didn’t make Intern Grace create 1,000 screencaps and a pie chart about Kelsey’s household duties just to quit!

This week on The Real L Word, everyone took turns repeating how they feel about Whitney, Sajdah did a cross-country triathlon to support the research of exotic airborne diseases afflicting super-super-underprivileged populations, Romi considered taking Kelsey to Mommy & Me Yoga to spice things up in the bedroom, Kacy and Cori were sitting in a tree T-A-L-K-I-N-G A-B-O-U-T S-P-E-R-M and then Showtime sent me a check and I bought everybody a trip to Disneyworld. They need a Real L Word Special where they visit Disneyworld, like when The Brady Bunch went to Kings Island.

Even though I don’t play video games, I think The Real L Word would be better as a video game, like Leisure Suit Larry.

Anyhow, let’s get this show on the road, hopefully it’ll get run over! I’m trying really hard to put aside my affections for humanity and treat these people like the “characters” the editors have turned them into, which is taking a toll on my soul. From The Frisky:

A large part of being a lesbian is sex. A large part of being a human is sex. But why does lesbian sex have to be the focus of the only reality show that’s on television claiming to be telling lesbian stories? When the women are not in the bedroom, they are discussing otherwise banal topics and quite obviously aren’t able to find a story that’s worth televising.

Worth noting:

Good morning! Would you like some eggs, waffles, or Sara’s tits? All three minus the first two? PERFECT!

Despite just waking up, Sara’s already prepared for a day in the cages:

guard your asshole, she’s got those heels on again

Whitney muses that, “it always feels good to be intimate with Sara.” Sara is the new Skintimate, pronounced “SkAN -TEH- MATE.” Also, Whitney is addicted to Sara, heroin and analogies. Today Whitney compares herself to Romeo from Shakespeare’s famous Romeo & Juliet.

Sara: “So should I like, fake my death sometime soon? Or wait, or you are, because you’re Juliet.”
Whitney: “Then I’d really die. That sounds actually accurate. Like you would get out alive and I’d be in the bedroom dying. You would be like ‘damn, I’m actually just sleeping, yeah bitch don’t take it so seriously.”

After a morning spent doing it doggy-style, the ladies take their dogs to the park, in style.

matchy-matchy

Sara and Whitme, looking very homeless chic, describe “the dog park” as “like Disneyland for dogs” except without rides, lines, food, people dressed as cartoon characters, Captain EO, or fireworks. Children, probably also led to this deserted land by adults promising Space Mountain, discover Disney Magic in Sahara’s face:

it’s ok, it’s just a tennis ball we were playing with last night

Just in case you’d forgotten and needed an update, Whitney reminds us that she’s conflicted about her feelings for Sara!

Rachel and an unidentified girl (probably she works for Autostraddle) brought a dog who wants to taste the Disney Magic/grass and are surprised to see that there’s another camera crew already on the land.

we’re supposed to be acting surprised, right?

After standing around and looking at each other for a little while they decide to go take their dogs somewhere else. Somewhere CLEANER. With FAIRY PRINCESSES.

Claire recaps last night in case it wasn’t exciting enough the first time. The way Claire figures it, Francine’s being an asshole ’cause she’s scared to let Claire in / get hurt again. Silly Francine, trying to protect her little baby heart! Someone get that girl a churro!

it’s true, francine is a vampire

Once again Claire addresses the most pressing issue currently facing out nation’s lesbians: a lack of a lesbian website/online magazine for people of our generation. My heart — it swells!

Then Claire hops on the telephono with Franny to talk nonsense. When Claire says “your behavior last night was not good,” it’s difficult to tell if she’s talking to Francine or the dog, which I think is a bad sign.

yes i’m eating your kix. what? just ’cause i’ve got cracklin’ oat bran in new york doesn’t mean i don’t crave Kix sometimes. It was my first cereal ever

Sadjah’s straight friend Marrisa is visiting and Sajdah wants to ensure the week isn’t too gay, besides the gay reality show cameras following them everywhere.

sajdah will take the heavy stuff

For example — before the gay pride march, Indigo Girls concert, flannel-shopping trip and Tomboiswagg party — they’re eating. Food! At a table. Just like straight people do every day.

why isn’t marissa eating her soup, i want some

“Did I tell you I’m stalking a girl?” Sajdah asks Marissa. Well she shouldn’t tell her that ’cause it’s not true, she wouldn’t know a real stalker if it was hiding in a bush in her front yard with a machete.

Sajdah says it’s Stalker Appreciation Month or Stalker Awareness Month. I think it’s the latter because I’m all too aware, but not so appreciative.

“Lesbians fall in love in all of 30 minutes,” says Sajdah, who’s allegedly been out for one year, never had a girlfriend or a gay scene and is an expert on lesbian life.

girls lol

I think Sajdah gets the award for getting her fake-story-self and her actual self mixed up most often. Also, her scenes have been tinged with sadness for me after discovering her twitter:

Kacy & Cori have left the privacy of their own home and are in a restaurant, talking about sperm.

did i leave the oven on

Kacy’s ovulating in a month and she’ll never ever ovulate again if they can’t find a guy to jerk off in a cup for them STAT.

What they should do is have a party — a screening of The Real L Word – invite all their straight male friends to come, line the floors with saran wrap, and let the jerkoff juice fall where it may. Then just mop that shit up, drop it into a sippy cup and turkey-baster-blast that baby right into rock ‘n roll heaven.

maybe i can get pregnant via black magic

The duo agrees that they’d underestimated the attachment men have to their sperm. I underestimated the attachment Ilene Chaiken has to men who have attachment to their sperm. Cori wants to find a man they know and suggests craigslist. Who edited this scene.

Also, this is Cori & Kacy a few weeks ago:

Just saying.

Romi, who’s rocking a Cleopatra/Mother-Hubbard/Ziggy Stardust ensemble, has brought her mother onto the program for a meal with her girlfriend, Kelsey, who still wants more attention/sex, but probs won’t get it as long as these cameras/booms are tracking them down.

“baby i don’t know how to tell you this, but you’re fucked.”

Romi is lamenting how tough life is for her and Kelsey in West Hollywood, with their home and food and jobs, and when Kelsey mentions making a mistake at work, Romi is like, “heads up to both of us, Kelsey might lose her job soon!” And then what. Then what? Who will feed Sean Jayden? Will everyone have to switch to Cover Girl?

for the first and last time in her life, kelsey found herself needing the same thing ilene chaiken needed

Romi talks about Kelsey while Kelsey stares at the table, like about how Romi’s paying for the roof over their heads. Who’s paying for the walls, huh? HUH? Kelsey’s 23, Romi explains, she’s never had to pay rent and pay for her bills. It’s really a wonder she even knows how to flush the toilet.

Kelsey: “She used to be so passionate and romantic, and you know, couldn’t keep her hands off me and now, she just–”
Romi: “I did. I would just want to rape her every time I saw her. I would just grab her and hug her — I get. I get– I’m — I get in my head, I have a lot going on — and I’ve been pissed off — and I don’t want to rip your clothes off–”
Kelsey: “Really? You’ve been pissed off at me?”
Romi: “Because of the whole like, money thing –”
Kelsey: “Yeah yeah yeah.” [looks down, sighs, looks up] “GOD.”

this facial expression situation is becoming rather common

Romi’s Mom gives wise words. Someone get this woman a spinoff, it could be like The View, with Ellen’s Mom and Debby Navotny.

Back to Whitneyhouse, where girls can be girls, and talk about girls!

so we’re uh… we’re having this conversation again? yeah? really?

I found the dialogue in this scene so captivating and reminiscent of Mamet, Stoppard and Tennessee Williams that I had to transcribe it for you:

Alyssa: “I just heard that you hooked up with Sara again.”
Whitney: “And who told you that?”
Alyssa: “Does it matter?”
Whitney: “Yeah, it does matter.”
Alyssa: “It doesn’t.”
Whitney: “It does.”
Alyssa: “It doesn’t matter.”
Whitney: “Who told you that?”
Alyssa: “I’m not telling you it doesn’t matter.”
Whitney: “Who told you that?”
Alyssa: “I’m not telling you! I said, it doesn’t matter.”
Whitney: “Who the fuck told you that?”
Alyssa: “I’m not telling you!”
Whitney: “Tell me the person–”
Alyssa: “No, I’m not telling you is what I just said. The point is — is — what happens? I can’t believe–”
Whitney: “No, hold on a second—”
Alyssa: “I have this weird feeling that you’re like — having an alternate life–”
Whitney: “What the fuck are you talking about dude?”

Alyssa’s exhausted from all this nonsense. Us too.

Whitney: “I’m a fucking adult, number one, and number two and I could either get butthurt over shit or I could just take it like I already did because I’m single and i do what I want to do.”

tinkerbell wants out

Who told Alyssa that Whitney hooked up with Sara? Probably the camera man. Alyssa’s got another little metaphor for Sara’s intense appeal.

Alyssa: “She liked sprinkled voodoo dust up on Whitney’s head!”

Well, nobody will ever find it in there.

The most important piece of information gleaned from this conversation is that Sara has breast implants.

i believe whitney has already done so

This is how Whitney feels:

This is how Rachel feels:

Speaking of SLAPPING THE VADGE!…

In the next scene, Rachel explains that she hasn’t seen Whitney much since moving there and therefore she has some pent-up sexual desire. Furthermore, Rachel reveals that she enjoys porn featuring straight girls sucking men’s dicks, a.k.a. “blow jobs.” (sidenote: many gay girls I know masturbate to straight porn, obvi, we like what we like, not an issue. But in this context — a lesbian show already being accused of going soft-core porn this season to appeal to male viewers — this is all sort of suspicious.)

Rachel then uses an erotic toy to stimulate herself while watching the straight porn of blow jobs. She makes a lot of noises that I believe are cinematic orgasmic sounds. At the end of this scene — no. Not even at the end. About 15 seconds into this scene, I began praying for a Grizzly Bear to smash my eyeballs into my skull like grapes. Little smushed up grapes.

I don’t know why this is happening. Why is this happening?

join the club

So, now that we’ve basically lost all hope for the future of lesbian entertainment, let’s return to Francine’s Love Lounge where Claire and Francine are preparing a meal. There are snags, like where’s the cutting board. Claire searched all over for the cutting board but couldn’t find it. Where will they cut? This issue is never resolved, unfortunately. How do you misplace a cutting board? Do you take it to your room to dice tomatoes before bed?

i never would’ve worn these pants in 2008, i’m like such a changed woman

Francine: “You know when I was little I used to love Ricky Martin I thought he was so sexy.”
Claire: “Now he’s gay, just like you.”

The “thing” is still there, but it’s kinda scary.

Francine: “Your first love will always have a special place in your heart.”

For the remainder of the scene Claire alternates between saying something to Francine and then telling Francine why that something she just said is indicative of Claire’s status as a “changed woman” who is “older now.” She’s 26. They dated from 19-23. So it’s been three years since they last steamed broccoli together.

cheers to whatever aspects of your storyline may be true

Claire: “I like this. Working out, cooking, she’s like a changed woman”

Claire points out that she’s purchased three lesbian magazines, look see:

magazines operated by people ilene chaiken doesn’t have a personal vendetta against

We catch up with Sajdah the Boi Scout at, literally, a “Martin Luther King Parade” with her Gay & Lesbian Center Cult-Buddies. Unfortunately for Marrissa, the memory of Martin Luther King Jr is probably the straightest thing at this event and her breakfast pastry knows it.

is this blueberry coffee cake gay

They catch up with Chanel and Sajdah reports on Chanel’s Parade Couture: “her breasts were all up and shit.” A rose by any other name…

Sajdah feels gay rights are the new civil rights/”race relations” and this fight is important to her.

Honestly the people marching in this parade in this scene look happier than anyone has ever looked on The Real L Word since the last time Jill and Nikki screamed about bunnies.

Sajdah says having Chanel close by during the parade gave it meaning and the emotional element. Is she talking about the intoxicating scent of Chanel No.5, or about the girl Chanel?  Stay tuned!

The Real L Word Recap: Episode 201 – Fresh Start Body Parts

HELLO WORLD HELLO NEW YORK HELLO CHICAGO I’m not gonna say “HELLO WEST HOLLYWOOD” because I don’t think anyone in West Hollywood watches this show.

Welcome to the very first week of an exercise in extended intellectual torture known as “The Real L Word recaps.” This week on The Real L Word, a show about hairstylists who like Whitney; Whitney made love to three girls/one banjo, Romi built a snowman and didn’t have sex with it, Kacy and Cori talked about male genitals, and the entire world exploded. It was like the big bang!

Then, back in Los Angeles and/or New York, a bunch of pretty girls in makeup, pants, shirts and sometimes skirts, talked to each other (mostly about vaginas) and did other day-to-day things, like grocery shopping. Then Kacy and Cori changed their names to Kaci and Cory (officially) and everyone took their shirts off. Let’s get this over with shall we? Just breathe. You might feel some cold metal but that’s perfectly normal.

Oh but FIRST! This year, my dear lambchops, is especially special. If you thought Ilene Chaiken peaked when she killed Dana or when she put us on her blacklist last year (which, to be honest, delighted me), you were very wrong. This year, if anyone in the comments asks “What’s your problem with this show/person?” I have a new, superior, fantastically spectacular specific-to-us reason to add to my pre-existing list ‘o reasons already long enough to wipe your ass backwards forwards and inside out with. I’ll get to that reason later.

Anyhow, in light of recent yet-undisclosed events (later!), I’ve got mixed feelings about writing these recaps, homos! I mean, it’s like so many layers of compromises and lessers of two evils and I’m so tired and sick of thinking about the right paragraphs to describe this and so! Later!

Here’s a message for life: large corporations are assholes. Period! Trust your friends and only your friends.

Here’s a tip for life: Watch this show like it’s a mockumentary and it’s actually really fucking funny. Think that this is like The Office except it’s lesbian life instead of a paper company!

opening the show by opening some girl’s legs

The opening credits begin and before you can say “OH MY GOD NOT THAT SONG AGAIN” (this is a familiar feeling w/r/t “lesbian teevee shows by Ilene Chaiken, eh?”) everything looks really fucking awesome and your heart explodes with happiness over the higher production value of the show. We will harvest these pebbles from your benevolent hand, Showtime. 

We open my slow descent into the firey pits of hell with Whitney in her car, wearing her Princess Lea/UFO-Communicator knitted helmet, listening to Sara leave her a voicemail about how she “feels bad about things being awkward between us,” like L.C. and Kristen Cavallari.

everybody exists in relation to whitney because she is the center of the ourchart solar system

It’s clear we’re gonna get to know Sara a little better this season:

Sara wants to talk about how much Whitney misses her and Whitney wants to talk about how much she misses being on television.

Whitney: “The lesbian wheel is my life. It’s lesbians entering and exiting and entering again and exiting in one constant flow. And at the center of that wheel is Sara.”

Spooky!

Sara & Whitney drink drinks and suggestively chew on vegetables while Sara tries to hypnotize Whitney with her cleavage. If you watch this scene stoned, it’s actually kinda hilarious.

i wonder if she’s cold with only one sleeve on

Whitney’s friends have warned her about Sara, because Sara is Vampire and Sara/Whitney have got too many tattoos so looking at them both at the same time is hard on the ol’ eyeballs. When Whitney resists the power of Sara’s clam Sara wants to shake her!  SHAKE HER TO PIECES.

“That’s your problem, you’re thinking too much,” Sara tells Whitney re: Whitney’s resistance to loving Sara forever. I’m concerned that if Whitney cut down any more on the amount of time she spends thinking about what she does to women, she might as well just stand on her porch with her strap-on out, waiting for visitors.

Whitney doesn’t know what happens next, she’ll have to meet with a script supervisor. Sara says she’s sick of living in the past. Showtime isn’t!

WHAT PAST? FLASHBACK!

Oh yeah. That past!

Whitney’s addicted to Sara and wants to be on Addicted but Sara’s worried that’s a lot of shows to be on at once and they’ll run out of eyeliner.

Sara: “Oh my god really you’re comparing this to heroin?”

I think Whit-me is wearing so many hats on purpose so that we can’t draw hats on her, like this:

Later on in the episode Whitney will be wearing TWO HATS! TWO! You’ll see.

Whitney: “You just get under my soul. Like some form of leprosy slowly eating away at my limbs and my skin.”

Sara: “I like those limbs.”

Me: “Oh my god you’re really comparing her to leprosy?”

In New York, New York, home of the Statue of Liberty, it’s Romi’s 29th birthday and she’s frolicking in the Central Park snow with her new lady-love, Kelsey.

another example of how the universe revolves around whitney

Romi waxes on her history with Whitney, which she now realizes wasn’t driven by their incredible intellectual connection or similar opinions on Murakami, but by lust/sexual desire.

Here’s evidence in the form of a FLASHBACK!

That was pretty much it for Romi right there. After that situation she’s sort of just wanted to cuddle. Kelsey wants more lady-kisses but Romi says the moment when she wants to kiss Kelsey will come when she’s drunk and Kelsey can take advantage of her. That’s not the only kind of sex, Romers.

this is just like “scent of a woman”

Romi says “from head to toe [Kelsey is] my type.” Here let me clarify that for you:

Also, they haven’t had sex in three weeks.

Let’s meet Claire!

also, whitney’s ex-ex-ex-ex-ex girlfriend’s ex-girlfriend’s friend’s friend

I black out while Claire explains she’s moving to LA to start a “website about lesbian life” to fill the void, because there aren’t any websites about lesbians anywhere. Mhm. I agree. Somebody better get on that!

For real though — Claire’s moving to Los Angeles because her first girlfriend lives there and she’s sick of masturbating to the same fantasy cross-continentally when it’d be so much more efficient to masturbate together in the same room/city/state.

rice is healthy and tastes great with stir-fry. I get that. That’s okay.

In order to REALLY commit to Vivian, Claire’s gotta go see if some other girl is Claire’s actual soulmate.

to a long career in party promotion and many gay pride appearances!

Vivian: “It’s kinda hard to just be okay with that.”

I’d argue it’s “impossible/improbable” to just be okay with that! What is going on here?!

also nancy, deb, carol, sue, marty and all the girls in the community women’s orchestra love you.

One of Claire’s friends at the Last Supper points out that “this is what you’re leaving” and she gestures around the table at all of Claire’s friends. That’s right Claire. You’re not just leaving Vivian you’re also leaving 12 silverware sets, a table, some chopsticks, and lots of cups. Lots and LOTS of cups.

We arrive at Francine’s mystery photo shoot, where Francine is posing — seemingly TOPLESS — for a bunch of unidentified strangers. What is this? Is it LA Fashion Week? School Picture Day? Romi’s Tragik School of Makeup?

who’s that girl in the back with the vest, i don’t trust her

Luckily I am close personal friends with world renowned fashion photographer Robin Roemer of Robin Roemer Photography and her Stylist Sara Medd and I can tell you with 100% certainty that this photoshoot was in fact for the 2012 Autostraddle Calendar! Francine’s been friends with Robin forever-ever and was an obvious choice for the calendar when Robin started setting up the LA shoot. Then Francine got cast on TRLW and now she’s Miss June for Autostraddle.com,  Ilene Chaiken’s favorite website besides OurChart!

behind the mask she sees the truth

[You’d ALL know this was an AS Calendar Shoot just from watching the show (and more importantly, ppl who’ve never heard of AS would know this) via verbal/visual mention on the show, but we ultimately lacked the power/money to force Showtime to adhere to the terms of the release contract Autostraddle/Alex and Robin signed with them. At least everyone got to experience the terror of being on television under misleading circumstances, just like the cast of Season One! (Although we actually anticipated said circumstances, thus our fastidiousness with aforementioned contracts.)

Needless to say, we’re all genuinely disappointed that only one end of the exchange established between AS/Robin and Showtime was fulfilled (our side!). We’re disappointed on a personal level, on a broader level, and on a purely logistical/technical level. It’s like a seven-layer dip of disappointment which I’ll talk about in a different post.]

Anyhow! Alex and Kelli and Robin and Sara and all the hair/makeup people and additional photographers/helpers/humans/vegan snack-bakers who pooled their resources to make this shoot happen had a great time, the crew from Magical Elves was super sweet, and we’re really pumped to have Francine in the calendar.

My intern wrote “Autostraddle.com Photoshoot on this picture” for me, just to be nice:

MY INTERN DID THIS, SHOWTIME. MY INTERN DID THIS.

Robin Roemer is such a good photographer of The Real L Word’s Francine photoshoot lesbian photograph lesbian calendar Francine Real L Word Evan Rachel Wood Bisexual photoshoot calendar lesbian sex beautiful lesbian beauties.

three girls one couch and also one photographer

The only note I have taken on this scene besides some animal noises of frustration is this quote:

Francine: “I can’t believe she’s actually moving here.”

WATCH OUT FOR THE STRANGER WITH THE TWEEZERS

Meanwhile on True Life: I’m a Lesbian in Los Angeles, our fine citizen Sajdah is having creamed-corn-sex with Scarlettor. Just kidding! She’s doing her job as a field organizer who recruits students to help reverse Prop 8. Basically they go out to voters, glamour them, suck out their blood, and tell them that Maggie Gallagher never happened.

Sajdah: “I’m new to LA life and LA lesbians — like I’ve only been out for a year. And I was on the ballot for prom queen in high school — things have changed a lot.”

Sajdah’s mom thought the gay thing was just a phase, like football and wearing light blue. Here’s the thing though:

Sadja’s still wearing light blue.

When a straight girl rebuffs Sajdah’s game, Sajdah assures her: “You’re one pride away from joining the rainbow coalition. We’re gonna give you a complementary pack of skittles.”

you could be tasting the rainbow. for sure.

Kacy & Cori are sitting on the couch, talking about ovulation. Just another day in Lesbian Clicheverse!

Kacy & Cori make me miss Nikki & Jill because Nikki & Jill were so much easier to make fun of. (Love you guys!)

Kaycor isn’t impressed with the internet’s donor-related offerings. They wanna “vibe” with someone. Also:

Also:

Cori: “I don’t want some Joe Shmoe that needed money for a six-pack so he went and beat off into a cup!”

This brought me to this –> ”the penis, the pussy, the baby, pfff!”

Sara’s invited Whitney over ’cause Sara’s got a couple of things she needs “done” around her apartment. You know, her lamp, a mirror, a strange voodoo wall ornament, her vagina.

“How many lesbians does it take to change a lightbulb,” Whitney asks. I think five — Whitney, three girls to flirt with Whitney and one to change the lightbulb. Probably Alyssa. So maybe just one, as long as it’s Alyssa.

Whitney: “I like taking care of people. It makes me feel good or comfortable. And Sara likes being taken care of.”

either i use this to fuck you or i use it to kill you. you decide.

Whitney knows in the depths of her brain that Sara is not good for her. (I was going to make a graphic representing Whitney’s brain here but I couldn’t think of enough things to fill it with).

Real L Word Returns for Season 2 With Extra Sexy Lesbian Sex

**WARNING: SPOILERS ABOUND**

Sex sex lesbian sex breasts vadge lesbian sex bang fingerblast sex nudity full frontal nudity lesbian nudity sex real sex real lesbians pretty hot lesbian sex sex sexathon sexville sexology sexternet sexxting lesbian sex sex xxx.

Welcome to Season Two of The Real L Word, a show about vaginas and the bodies attached to said vaginas! Season Two of The Real L Word debuts Sunday, June 5th on Showtime (though some will catch a special sneak peek tomorrow night in West Hollywood), the network famously known as having “no limits.”  For example there are no limits inhibiting the inclusion of this particular sex act between two hot sexy lesbians:

rollin' in the valley

The Real L World‘s first season was critically lamented and relatively unpopular, ratings-wise, and many fans worried it wouldn’t get picked up for a second go-’round. But bottom line: it’s cheap to make and it keeps lesbians subscribed to Showtime. So onward ho!

This season many things changed and a few things stayed the same. As the above poster states, there is an increased focus on “getting dirty.” In other words, there’s a more consistent focus on lesbians and the lesbian sex engaged in by sexy lesbians. Did you catch that? Lesbian sex. It’s a thing:

yogasm

Also? Shit looks good this year. Shit looks real good. The opening credits, in addition to containing at least 6 sex scene clips, are edgier and cuter and make the show seem way better than it did last year. Even the font is better and the cinematography feels fresher and — in a way — just BRIGHTER.

makeup artist at work

The group is younger and also more racially and gender-presentationally diverse.

Also there’s more sex. Did I mention that? Sex sex sex sex. Lesbians have sex and are sexy sexy sex. Sex sex sex! LESBIAN SEX!

what's that you're trying to do to me? sex? lesbian sex? is that the big idea?

Whereas Season One read like a miniseries length episode of MTV True Life: I’m a Lesbian in Los Angeles — telling several un-connected stories, documentary style, with no particular point — Season Two’s social fabric is more intertwined and they’ve discarded those boring Established Couples in favor of Hot Young Things. More importantly, there’s no LA Fashion Week.

Also, sex. Have you ever seen a lesbian vadge on the teevee before? Well you will so PREPARE YOURSELF.

So, what’s going down this season?

+

Whit-me is Back Again:

Every lesbian’s dream is to either date Shane or Be Shane, and that’s where the character of Whitney Mixter comes in — again! (ha) Not content to live the dream merely once, Whitney’s back for Season Two, reprising her Season One storyline more or less line-by-line but with a new brunette (Rachel) and one of the old brunettes (Sara pronounced SADJJAARONADA). Roommate Alyssa‘s back as the calm, motherly voice of reason attempting to temper Whitney’s roll of sexual terror. There are at least 27 more conversations about girls and feelings on that couch situation Whitney’s got on her backyard.

There’s a bit more about Whitney’s work, it seems like, and I hope that her starring role this season will serve to round out her character a bit more than they did last year because I think Real Whitney is much more complicated than TV Whitney.

During Whitney’s scenes I found myself asking questions like: “Did we finish that whole joint earlier?” and “Where’s Tinkerbell?”

See — I just wanna see The Character of Whitney Mixter evolve. Is that too much to ask? Shane evolved! Rather than building on perhaps some of the Tough Questions Whitney had to ask herself after last season’s fallout, this year just picks up where last season began. It’s Double Whitney with several cherries on top. More Whitney, All The Time. Maximum Whitney. Whitney 500. Someone give this girl a character arc! Ideally before she gets called back to outer space via that hat she’s wearing.

"that guy on the corner's got a hat just like this one except his is made out of tin foil"

Oh also there’s a scene where Rachel masturbates to orgasm while watching porn. Rachel is a lesbian. A lesbian who has lesbian sex. And masturbates!

it's so meta

Also in the morning, sometimes lesbians like to wake up and you know. Have lesbian sex!

college girls are easy

+

Romi Returns:

after we stop talking about how we don't have sex, we should go have sex

Our other returning character is Romi, upgraded from “Whitney’s fuck-buddy” to a full-on character with a new girlfriend and a Mom and everything!

Wearing slightly more makeup and a slightly larger feather-earring, Romi’s now dating Kelsey, a 23-year-old menswear aficionado who I’m told to watch out for because Kelsey is funny. It often seems that she’s intentionally fucking with the show’s production, like not saying her lines or veering a scene off-topic, which we appreciate.

lesbians have breasts

Much like Francine & Claire (which I’ll discuss later), the alleged driving impetus of conflict between these two feels slightly hollow/contrived. Romi and Kelsey are both upset that they haven’t had sex in three weeks, a problem that seems easily fixed by having sex. Like if they both want it. What’s stopping them. They live together. Who killed Jenny? Anyhow!

I’m pleased as punch over the introduction of Romi’s gay Mom, who helps to humanize her dear daughter and acts as a voice of reason to Romi/Kelsey. Near the end of the second episode she also gives us a little more insight into what makes Romi, Romi. I look forward to this and not just because my family history is identical to Romi’s (divorce, death, gay mom, etc).

I also watched all of Romi’s scenes, which is basically an endorsement.

Don’t worry though, there’s plenty of nudity (like A LOT!) and also — LESBIAN SEXXXXXX!

lesbians: they sure do love lesbian sex

+

Meanwhile, Sajdah:

then i said to her "prop 8 needs to be overturned RIGHT NOW!!!"

So while all this lesbian sex is going on we’ve got Sajdah talking about Martin Luther King Jr and Prop 8, marching in gay rights parades and working in the Gay & Lesbian Center. Where does she think she is, The Real World: Washington DC? GET NAKED ON CAMERA!

Just kidding! You can’t be mad at Sajdah. She’s really earnest, like she’s on a different show entirely, and seems genuinely excited to be there, like the kid in The Real World who can’t get over how cool the pool table is in the Real World house, except instead of “Pool Tables” we have “hot girls met on match.com.”

This is a relatively groundbreaking character — masculine black lesbian women are underrepresented, to say the least, just about everywhere. Aside from Tika Milan, cast member of I’m From Rolling Stone, a show nobody saw, Sajdah’s a lone ranger in this particular territory and is positioned to make a real impact by being on this show. I assume at some point she’ll probably take off her shirt.

+

In the Other Corner We Have the Lesbians Wanting to Have the Baby

who wouldn't want to give their sperm to these girls

Kacey & Cori are so cute and sweet and funny it’s a shame that their storyline is so — um — boring? It’s the baby storyline. You know the one. It was in the fictional show (The L Word) this reality show is based on, and is also the plot of several lesbian films.

+

Francine & Claire

autostraddle calendar shoot autostraddle calendar shoot

Francine’s first scene takes place at a mysterious photo shoot, where a beautiful female photographer is taking photos of Francine and other women for no apparent reason.

I wonder if this could maybe be Francine’s photo shoot for The 2012 Autostraddle Calendar. I wonder if that photographer woman is Robin Roemer, who’s been friends with Franny for a long time and says wonderful things about her both in public and private.

Anyhow! Franny, a graduate of NYU’s business school, works at Nami Wave Media (this is independently mined information, one gathers via Show that Franny’s primary occupation is “thinking about Claire”) and isn’t out to her Mom and seems like the only cast member totally oblivious to the camera’s presence — she’s down-to-earth, smart and level-headed, while also open emotionally.

Then there’s Claire, a raspy-voiced blonde with a fashion background who is moving to Los Angeles from New York for somewhat confounding reasons — stated purposes include starting a website about the lesbian lifestyle because there isn’t one aimed at our generation (AHEM) and figuring out why she’s “holding on” to Francine, her ex-girlfriend.

The latter reason has apparently been pre-approved by her girlfriend Vivian. In other words, it seems like maybe Claire came to Los Angeles for this show although her hair suggests a sort of beachy surfer-ish lifestyle.

Anyhow, we like Claire. Claire & Francine feel like whole entire people, flaws and beauty and all. This sort of complicated ex-relationship situation is an interesting contrast to the other’s on the show — from those just dating around (Sadjah), those in an almost LTR (Romi/Kelsey), those married with baby dreams (Kacey/Cori) and Whitney (Whitney).

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Because the lesbian media universe is so teeny-tiny, The Real L Word presents a really special challenge to the lesbian media — chances are good that anyone writing about the show knows one or all of the cast members and/or has friends who are friends with one or all of the cast members. I already feel weird making fun of actual people to begin with. Also chances are good you’ve been to these bars and to these restaurants and to Dinah Shore. Chances are good you see enough of this kind of dyke drama in your own life that you’re not really compelled to witness similar exploits on television. When Claire & Francine start fighting my #1 feeling is “I’m gonna go inside and drink some vodka, you girls work your shit out and let me know when it’s time for Yogurt Stop.”

I mention this ’cause I’m trying to figure out why this show, though seemingly far better this season, still ranks somewhere between “counting potatoes” and “painting my toenails” on my excitement scale. In addition to obvious reasons like “I hate reality teevee”, I think this might be ’cause the show’s primary selling point, like The Hills & The Real Housewives (which I’ve never seen), is the exoticism of good looking people living sexy sex lesbian sex glamour fashion sunshiney California lives.

Warwick Saint/SHOWTIME

This isn’t without merit — once upon a time The L Word was that kind of show for me and it changed my life by showing me people that seemed more like my friends than lesbians I’d seen in the media before The L Word. For lesbians not lucky enough to live in a gayborhood, it’s not just the sunny sexification that seems out of reach but the concept of having a lesbian network so large and diverse to begin with. When you’re the only gay in the village, finding one girl to bed let alone three is challenging. So that’s a value.

Reality TV isn’t ever about our actual lives — it’s exotic/aspirational (The Hills) or completely bizarre (Storage Wars) — and I suspect part of the lesbian critical disdain for this show comes from the fact that the show is kinda like our actual lives except you know, prettier.

photo by Warwick Saint/SHOWTIME

Are any of these characters sympathetic? Do you care about any of these storylines? Would you prefer a root canal? I look forward to garnering your thoughts as the season premieres, and I’ll be saving my jokes and my opinions for the recaps. (In order for us to do things like devote an entire month to talking about our favorite poets and forego SEO/page-view trickery we sometimes have to write about things that people actually care about, like lesbian reality television shows! Apparently a lot of you enjoy or enjoy hating my Real L Word recaps, which get a lot of traffic, although 25% of that traffic would rather see Rose submerge my entire body in a pit of dead vampires than laugh at any of my “jokes” or agree with any of my “commentary”, but, as they say on The Wire, it’s all in the game.)

Oh also should we talk about lesbian sex? I feel like we should. LESBIAN SEX LESBIAN SEX LESBIAN SEX. This’ll be controversial I’m sure — they’re pandering to straight men! But nah, I don’t think they are. With all the porn out there why would any het guy sit through all the drama just to see Romi’s vadge for two seconds? I mean I fast-forwarded through most of the show and I was supposed to write this review. One thing’s for sure: lesbians like having lesbian sex. Lesbian lesbian lesbian sex.

Do you wanna watch?

Real L Word Season 2 Deep Thoughts: Claire, Sajdah, Whitney & Romi

It won’t be long now ’til you’ll be seeing all these girls naked so you should probably get to know the The Real L Word Season Two girls a little bit more. Here we have interviews with Sadjah, Claire and Autostraddle Calendar Girl, Romi as well as even more about Whitney.

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Romi

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Claire

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Sadjah

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Whit-me