Bachelor Brad & My January 31st Episode Observations

I've never seen so many women crying and more tears flowing than on last night's episode of The Bachelor. You'd think it was a soap opera or something. Except that these are real women and real tears flowing for Brad Womack, who, in my humble opinion, has still not won me over. I'm just not quite sure if he's worthy of all this adoration yet or not. I'm still a little unnerved by the fact that he needs to call up his therapist from time to time who tells him it's okay to "open up" and be "vulnerable". Is he going to have his therapist on speed dial during his marriage too? But let's move onward, shall we?

The remaining eleven ladies are told they have exactly one hour to pack their bags for Las Vegas, which sends them all squealing in delight (well maybe not Michelle) and running up the stairs to pack their worldly possessions. Shortly after arriving, the first one-on-one date is revealed and it is with Shawntel N. Brad picks her up early in the day and takes her to a really cool mall, where he proceeds to take her on a fabulous shopping spree. At one point, Shawntel is trying on some outfits for Brad, and she's such a pretty girl and with such a fantastic figure, that everything she comes out in looks terrific. Shawntel arrives back at the hotel with tons of bags and shows the girls all her goodies.

Shawntel said she felt a little weird displaying all the stuff Brad (or the show) bought for her that day, but she showed them anyway. And the jealousy was rampant in the room, although the girls tried to appear interested and happy for Shawntel. But they clearly were not. Later, Brad comes to pick her up for their nighttime romantic date. Shawntel appeared at the top of the stairs wearing a sexy black dress she got that day with some smokin' hot shoes on her feet. And to top it all off? She wore her long shiny beautiful dark hair in a messy ugly librarian bun at the back of her head. What was she thinking?! Her and Brad's dinner date was hysterical, by the way. She informed him that her job was to embalm people for funerals. Her discussion included horrid descriptions such as, "oozing orifices" and "body leakages". Not exactly romantic dinner date talk, but Shawntel received the rose anyway.

Up next was the group date that included the girls going to a Nascar race track and actually getting to drive race cars. Of course, OF COURSE, poor Emily was included on this group date. We were reminded once again of her dead fiance who was a Nascar racing car driver. Brad noticed she seemed a little sad while the other girls were all jumping up and down trying to look happy to be on this group date, so he took her aside to talk. Brad looked genuinely upset when Emily told him that this particular race track was the very one where her fiance had his career-ending crash. And we all know that he went on in an ownership capacity and then crashed in a helicopter doing Nascar business. I think that was hitting a new low for the producers of the show to do this to poor Emily, but she handled it as well as could be expected.

Emily really is a favorite among everyone, but I don't think she's ready to be Brad's woman or anyone else's woman just yet. She seems to miss her fiance way too much to be able to completely give herself to another man and another relationship. If I were Brad, I'd always feel second to her fiance. However, I think she may be ready when the next Bachelorette season rolls around. I'd love to see Emily fill that role. She'd have a ton of fans.

Getting back to the group date, one by one the girls shuffled in to ball their eyes out for Brad. Do they realize what a turn off they appear to be by doing that? They come across as pathetic, needy, and clingy, which are not attractive qualities. For some reason, Chantal O. seems to have a bit of an edge. Remember last week how he told her to shut up and kiss him? Well this week he said "Don't cry, Babe", which I thought was so cute. He called her "Babe". There's a closeness there between them that I don't see with the other girls, although Chantal really needs to stop the waterworks. It's getting old.

The next date was the dreaded two-on-one date where one of the girls are definitely going home at the end of the night. Unfortunately, it was the two Ashley girls - Ashley H. and Ashley S. - who had become fast friends back at the house. Brad took them to a rehearsal of "Viva Elvis" by Cirque de Soleil. Both girls had a chance to do a little practice part during rehearsal, but ultimately, during dinner, Brad chose Ashley H. to stay and escorted Ashley S. to the waiting limo of shame to whisk her away.

I must say that Ashley S. and her mini breakdown in the limo was heartbreaking to watch. Here's a girl who has everything going for her and she's crying, thinking her life is over and that she'll never be happy. All of these girls need to realize that their lives are not defined by the fact that this particular man, or any other man for that matter, did or did not work out for them. The girls who are the most appealing are the ones who actually enjoy living their own lives. They know they have a lot to offer someone and are not afraid to wait for the right one to come along before giving their heart away. I guess many of these girls are young and haven't discovered that about themselves yet. Ashley S. even had one of those little "silly bands" on her wrist in the limo. Did you catch that? Those are for ten year old little girls, not grown women, so maybe Brad knew what he was doing by sending her packing.

The cocktail party had one disturbing scene where our loco girl Michelle took Brad aside in a separate room and asked him not to talk. She told him none of the other girls were good for him, but that she was. Believe it or not, Brad seemed to actually like this little game, but I have no idea why. If you ask me, he should have been a little spooked. I could hear the song "Tubular Bells" from that old exorcism movie playing in my head while watching Michele. I wonder why Brad didn't hear that? Like I said, I'm still not sure Brad is playing with a full deck of cards so maybe obvious stuff like this passes him by.

After Brad had another corny therapy session with his therapist (ugh) where he was told it was okay to be strong, yet vulnerable, he was ready for the rose ceremony. He let Marissa and Lisa go who were two girls we hardly ever saw in front of the cameras. They both cried when they weren't chosen. They both thought they were going to find true love with Brad. (heavy sigh)

Next week finds our boy Brad and the remaining girls heading to Costa Rica. What's that? Someone is crying? And another one is crying? Oh how can that be? But yes, folks, lots of crying will be happening in Costa Rica. Hopefully some fun times as well. We'll see.