Yet another black superstar taken down by his personal life. Just like my favorite golfer, OJ Simpson.

Dear Tina,

It was announced this week that the new season of Jersey Shore will premiere July 29th. Sorry Dad, I can’t hang out on your birthday. We have gorilla juiceheads in the mist.

If you missed Kate Gosselin dancing to “Paparazzi” this week on Dancing With The Stars, here is a pretty accurate interpretation. Although I have to say, Jimmy appears to have more natural rhythm than Kate and pulls off the enormous side ponytail much better:

http://www.hulu.com/watch/140551/late-night-with-jimmy-fallon-kate-gosselins-paparazzi-dance

Tina will be hosting Saturday Night Live tomorrow night with musical guest Justin Bieber. It’s like the universe was trying to figure out the only sure fire way to get me to stay home on a Saturday night. My two favorite things combined. This is what it will feel like if they ever find a way to combine a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup with an Oreo. A couple of weeks ago my friend said to me “I never know if you’re kidding when you talk about Justin Bieber so enthusiastically.” I told her I never am.

I just read this sentence in an article:

Sad starlets Lindsay Lohan and Mischa Barton were spotted drinking and “chain-smoking” together at Nylon‘s eleventh-anniversary bash in L.A.

I think I’m starting to come around to those two again. Because they’re not even pretending they have it together anymore…or may ever have it together again. There’s something charming about that kind of destructive honesty. It’s how the two Coreys got their own reality TV show.

There was a big event on television this week. If you consider golf a big event, which I don’t and no one should. But Tiger Woods returned to the distinguished Masters Tournament this week and everyone, particularly Access Hollywood, was really excited about it. For the first time since Tiger’s infidelities came to light, he is resuming his role as one of the country’s top athletes. Personally, I don’t consider someone all that athletic if they can wear khaki pants while playing their sport but I can’t even figure out how to play Wii Golf so I’m not one to judge. Also, have you noticed that according to the media the biggest crime Tiger’s mistresses have committed is being unattractive? My biggest problem was that on February 19th, Tiger made his first public apology (if you noted the time ticker you would have thought he managed to squeeze in a dramatic reading of War and Peace) and he was pretty clear about taking an indefinite break from golf. So does indefinite normally mean until the next opportunity comes up to play? If it does then I would like to take this time to announce that I am taking an indefinite break from babysitting. I don’t know yet when I will return but it will most likely be this coming Monday at 7 am. Thank you for your time.

30 Rock Quote of the Day:

Tracy: I’m sorry. Would you like to stay at my guest house?
Frank: Yeah! Thanks. When’s good to go over there?
Tracy: Oh I’m not offering. I’m just doing a survey to gauge general interest.

Well I had a great summer too. I started a quilt. I did yoga twice a week. I wore flip flops in public.

Dear Tina,

Before I could even get my fist pumped all the way in the air, Jersey Shore ended last night, much to the chagrin of juicehead chasers everywhere. I think the hardest part for me was when I caught myself experiencing pangs of jealousy as these seven strangers picked to live in a house reminisced over their time together. I don’t mean to say that it was hard, like emotionally taxing. I mean hard like it’s hard to understand why I wish I had gone through this experience with them. Hard like a conundrum. Like Trigonometry. Or The Situation’s triceps. I have always said that the people who willingly sign up for shows like The Real World or The Bad Girls Club must be extremely narcissistic and self-loathing to flaunt what is bound to be the worst side of themselves for television entertainment. We all enjoy a nice social venture with cocktails every now and again but most of us are mindful enough not to invite along a camera crew. You know who else doesn’t want a camera crew following you around while you’re in your 20s? Your future children.

So I’m not sure why exactly I make an exception for the cast of Jersey Shore especially since so many of them provided all new insight into douchebagery. I think the answer is twofold. One, as I have said before, they don’t shy away from their intentions or try and portray something that they’re not. I truly believe had the cameras not been rolling, The Situation would have been equally creepy, Snooki would have worn just as many trucker hats, and Sammi would have stroked her extensions just as many times. Normally I don’t applaud people for embracing their questionable values. If someone said “I’m going to go punch that guy in the face” and then did it, I wouldn’t say “at least he was honest!” So I take this stance more as a viewer than a human. I’ve seen enough VH1 countdown specials of the craziest reality TV moments to know the tricks people use to get more air time. In this case, the cast genuinely seemed to enjoy each other and their summer much more than they cared about trotting around with MTV.

The second reason is what you might consider the beauty of a first season. The first season of any show, but particularly a reality show because they wrap before the first episode even airs, is that the people participating are going into the experience without any preconceived notions. You turn on The Real World now and the people on it are stereotypes to the 23rd power. We have the gay guy, the black guy, the two white guys who bond over being the two white guys, the small town and/or religious (read: Christian) girl, the girl with a borderline eating disorder, the slutty girl with a boyfriend at home. It’s all the same. I could log onto myspace.com right now and cast the next 10 seasons of the show if need be. With the Jersey Shore the only example to go by were the two True Life episodes that revolved around summer shares on the Shore. And although I’m being very generous here, True Life is much more in the style of a documentary than a reality show (my apologies to Ken Burns). So from start to finish there was no objective, no bar to raise, but their own. They were selected as prototypes and MTV struck gold because the reality of who these people were was exactly what the viewers were hoping for. Had they been carbon copies of a previous hit it would have felt as artificial as the proposals on The Bachelor (don’t hold your breath girlfriend, Us Weekly is already reporting your break up).

This being said the Jersey Shore that we have come to know and love will be tarnished in its inevitable second season. There are two possible directions MTV can take next season. One is to find an all new, freshly tanned group of eight to document for the summer a la The Real World. It may keep things fresh (important) but I didn’t tune into this show to learn about life in Seaside Heights, I tuned in because there was a man on it who had Cadillac tattooed up his side. Plus the new group will be working overtime to prove they are even more outrageous and more hilarious than this past season. Their efforts will be easy to detect and therefore pathetic and not funny. The second option is to film the same group for another season. I don’t want to say this option is worse but these people are now, like it or not, celebrities. They can’t spend their days working in a shirt shop and their nights dancing amongst the crowd at Karma. If and when any of them return to the Jersey Shore, they’ll be the main attraction.

So I don’t know what the ideal solution is. I guess my point is that there really isn’t one. I guess we’ll all just have to accept this and tune in regardless. It’s going to be hard for MTV to maintain a show where filming can only take place during one season. Spin-offs may be inevitable. Spending Thursday nights with the men and women of Jersey Shore was like the first time I got my eyebrows waxed: a pleasure I never saw coming. I don’t agree with a lot of the choices they made but I also don’t agree with Matthew Morrison rapping on Glee. It doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy them.

In honor of the season finale I checked out the internet service “Jersey Shore Nickname Generator.” Mine is Sookie. Doesn’t work for me considering when I think Sookie I think waitress from Bon Temps who has a thing for vampires, not guidette. Tina yours is Hot Spot. You win. You always do.

Line of the night goes to JWOWW for her adoration of all things gorilla.

I see a bunch of gorilla juiceheads. Tall, completely jacked, steroids, like multiple growth hormones. That’s, like, the type that I’m attracted to.

P.S. I just put your name in the nickname generator again and this time you got “The Ashley Simpson of Cape May.” I think that one might stick.

30 Rock Quote of the Day:

Floyd: Wow! Hot dog times, huh?
Liz: I only eat them on special occasions.
Floyd: What’s the occasion?
Liz: I decided to eat one.

He’s confided in me he has a little something going with one of the girls here. Maybe it’s that Russian dancer with the tattoos, which is the sex trifecta.

Dear Tina,

I’ve been pretty busy since Thursday night. Doctor appointment, work, I spent about 8.6 hours at a screening of Avatar. The point being, I am just now getting caught up on the two hours of  Jersey Shore I missed. The beginning of the episode featured a lot of grainy, home video-esque footage used for scene transitions. For a second I thought I was watching The Wonder Years but then Jenny “JWOWW” appeared and I was fairly certain that this wasn’t the episode Winnie got a tranny makeover. JWOWW was at the center of a tepid controversy this week when she hit Mike “The Situation” in the face after he refused to walk her back to the hotel room. After she threw up at the bar. In Atlantic City. Yes this story is lowbrow at every angle. Is there a silver lining there? Maybe that MTV was there to film it so you could watch it again on national television…with your parents. Hmm no that’s not it. Well thankfully Jenny and Mike were able to resolve their issues at the local bowling alley. There may be more parallels to The Wonder Years here than I thought.

When I first confessed to you my love for this show I debriefed you on four of the seven…we’ll call them characters, so I thought now would be a good time to clue you in on the other three. You’ll like Sammi. She’s the sweetest bitch you’ll ever meet. Her words.

Vinny is the youngest on the show. He turned 21 shortly before shooting for the series began. As someone that values the upkeep of her own eyebrows, I am amazed at the length and shape of this young man’s brows. Think Nicole Kidman in Moulin Rouge. The kid is a doll but he doesn’t appear to have the best taste in women. There was Tanya who appears to be enough years older than him for me to call in to question her level of class. The arm tattoos aren’t helping. Seriously though, if I found out that I was entertaining the idea of a 21 year old at a bar, the pain from that memory would hurt more than a white wine induced hangover. Then of course there was Mike’s little sister who, as noted by Pauly D, looks like Mike without the six pack. So Vinny clearly has yet to develop discernible taste but he still has many years ahead of him. Many of which will be spent on the Jersey Shore so he may find growing up to be a cyclical experience.

Ronnie is the type of guy that every girl wants to believe is the perfect guy because he says things like “I would suck on your big toe. That’s how much I care about you” but then you learn how much he loves to punch people in the face. I’m sure that there are some girls out there who find a man’s willingness to use his strength against someone’s head to be sexy. If you are wondering who these girls are, I would suggest tuning in to the latest episode of The Bad Girls Club on Oxygen. Personally, I think it’s grossly disturbing and watching Ronnie pretend to the police that he had not just triumphantly returned from knocking another man out made my skin crawl. It’s too bad really because Ronnie appears to have a lot going for him; he’s the most sensible of the men when it comes to knowing how to treat a woman (although that’s a bit like being the healthiest prostitute). He at least appears to be a man of good character when arguing with The Situation. If he would reduce the “bros” and “dudes” by 90%, I might even call him articulate. However, there are two lessons Ronnie could have benefited from had I been his babysitter: use your words and rough housing always leads to tears.

Finally, there’s Sammi. Where do I begin with Sammi? Well for one, she’s dating Ronnie. Which is actually the only tolerable thing about her. An indication of just how annoying she is. It was because of Sammi that Ronnie even had to offer to suck a big toe. In the aftermath of Ronnie comparing her big toe to Fred Flinstone’s (hilarious) Sammi scream-cries “I’m sorry for the way I look!” Oh Sammi. Here’s the thing. The only time it is ok to use that line is if you are doing an improvised version of The Elephant Man and there has been a ten second delay in the scene proving you can’t come up with anything better. As someone that has a brother and a handful of close male friends, she is my worst nightmare for them. I would compliment her on her hair but it’s fake and just as I didn’t compliment girls on their personality during sorority recruitment, I won’t compliment Sammi on her hair.

Jersey Shore line of the night should always go to Pauly D. but in the spirit of diversity I’ll give it to Snooki:

I told him to put me down because I’m not trashy. Unless I drink too much.

Amen. Right Tina?

30 Rock Quote of the Day:

Cerie referring to birth control pills.

Cerie: I think you’re supposed to take all of them, like, in a row.
Liz: Thank you Cerie, but I’ve been sexually active since I was 25.

Wow. Did you just come from working out or are you naturally veiny?

Dear Tina,

Well it has officially been one week since I began this journey with you. It has been pretty lonely so far, what with you not knowing about it and all and I’m ok with that. For now. Week 2 I may need to start being a little more aggressive. My sister has become my project manager. A title she made up and a position she designated to herself. I told her I could be my own project manager but then I remembered she was the one who pointed out that I had typed “tit” instead of “it” in one of my entries. So I may need to keep her around. Solely because she has an English degree.

I feel like I should preface what I am about to write with a few quick facts about myself.

1. I have never gone tanning in a tanning salon. Sprays, beds, etc. None of that. Think of what a person with really pale skin looks like. Now go five shades lighter. If you’re thinking Powder, go two shades darker. That’s me.

2. When I have felt the need to put a “poof” in my hair, the height has never exceeded 1 inch. I don’t even think that it can be legally recognized as a poof. I also try to avoid them in most situations as I hate saying the word poof. Or poofy.

3. My friend and I were going to wear Ed Hardy tee shirts to a white trash bash. Until we learned that they are really expensive and most people that wear them don’t think of them as white trash. Um, I do and they should.

Tina do you know where I’m going with this? I am LOVING on MTV’s Jersey Shore. I know what you’re thinking, I thought it too at first. You’re thinking I’m being sarcastic. Yes, in my head I was like “yeah I like this show sarcastically.” That is not the case anymore. I look forward to it. I sit attentively and I watch it. And laugh. Oh Tina how I laugh. Disagree with me if you must but what I find so enjoyable is that there’s no pretentiousness with this cast of clowns. They are so refreshingly honest about their intentions, their values, their taste in music. Lets go over a few of these tender spirits. Take Pauly D. Pauly D is like the Kate Gosselin of Jersey. He knows all of America (even that cotton ball Michael Cera) is making fun of him for his hair but he stands by it. If you look at pictures of him at recent events, that hair is styled as ridiculously as it was the first day he walked into the Jersey Shore house. Because that’s who he is. The kid is just trying to stay fresh.

Snooki. SNOOKI. Where do you even begin? Oh I know.

If one thing leads to another, I’m not gonna tell him to get off.

YES. I love when girls are complacent with their sluttiness. What events followed involving the man she was referring to at that moment? He left Snooks in hopes of meeting another girl, showed up at her house in a “you’re my last resort” type of situation and Snooki says to him…”Lick my ass.” Without flinching. The girl does not flinch. Other examples of this characteristic: getting punched in the face. Twice.

Then there’s JWOWW. Oops did I leave my caps lock on? Did my finger get stuck on the W briefly? Nope, that’s her name. It’s how she introduces herself. JWOWW. I think she earned the extra W when she showed America she is a woman of two dress codes: sweatpants + bikini top and sparkly corset + hot pants + fishnets. Both appropriate for all nighttime events.

And last and probably least, we have Mike “The Situation.” The Situation referring to both his abs and the epic process it takes for him to hook a girl. Something we have yet to see (the hook up not the abs). First of all, the guy looks like he’s pushing 40. I try not to be ageist; it is an unfortunate prejudice that happens to come out when I see a man my age or older trying to pass a red tank top off as a shirt. In the latest episode he invites one of the other roommates, Vinny, to go “gym tanning laundry” with him and Pauly D. Those are the tasks of the week required of The Situation, so he is not mistaken for someone’s dad, before they hit up Headliners to socialize creep. Also please keep in mind that “laundry” refers to going to a laundromat and picking up track pants in a plastic bag. As far as tanning goes, The Situation explains “You have to have a little color if you didn’t go to the beach.” Yes, fair point. My rebuttle would be, WHY DIDN’T YOU GO TO THE BEACH? What do you do all day? This is a hypothetical question I am posing him because I think my head would explode if his (likely) response was “gym laundry.”

Vinny really kept me grounded this week when he said to the producers during one of his interviews “Gym. Tanning. Laundry. Like, those aren’t even fun things.” No they’re not Vinny. No they’re not.

Jersey Shore line of the night goes to Pauly D. No surprise there.

Snooks, poor girl, gets hit in the face again. She needs to take some karate classes or something. She needs self-defense. Someone’s gotta teach her to fight…or duck.

Tina I swear if you embrace these people and use them as a moral compass, always checking to make sure you are heading in opposite directions, you may come to enjoy the program as much as I do. But if you want me to stop watching it when you put me on the 30 Rock payroll, I will. By then I’ll be in New York and I can spend my summers off beating beats.

30 Rock Quote of the Day:

Liz: He looked at me with those crazy handsome guy eyes. It was like the Death Star tractor beam when the Falcon …
Jenna: No Liz, do not talk about stuff like that on your date. Guys like that do not like Star Trek.
Liz: Wars!