Family meeting week: the time when we finally get to see the root of all the contestants’ weirdness.
Last night marked the eighth week of Des and her remaining bachelors’ dogged quest for love a halfway decent-looking person to bring home to their families, and as the finale approaches, the boys continue to fall ever more deeply into delusion.
Family Visit #1:
The first stop of Des’s Tour de Family was Dallas, Texas, the hometown of Zak Looks-like-he’s-40 W. After greeting Des with a long-winded story about the incredibly uninteresting dream he had had about her (which totally did not bore or confuse Des at all), Zak decided to show Des the family business: a snow cone truck. #Normal.
As if that wasn’t enough, Zak and Des proceeded to take off in the Creep Mobile to the local elementary school. To give out free snow cones. While Zak danced about in a penguin suit.
Attention, children of Dallas: stay away from the snow cone truck.
After thoroughly irking us, Zak finally took Des home to meet his family. His family (initially) seemed surprisingly normal, and we found ourselves strangely attracted to his younger brother, mostly because his brother was as mortified as we were by Zak’s shirtless introduction in the season premiere. Des and Zak chatted with each family member in turn and while Zak gushed about his love for Des, Des told each member about what a great pal he was.
Zak’s sister: “So is he out of the friend zone yet?”
Des: “Uh, yeah, sure.”
Just when his family had convinced us they were sane, Zak W. whipped out his faithful guitar and his brother and sister accompanied him in a song Zak wrote in Des’s honor. The Partridge Family’s performance was so uncomfortable that it made Des’s eyes well with second-hand embarrassment. This whole family could stand to do less.
At the end of the date, Zak took Des to tell her, for the eighteenth time that evening, that he had almost given up on love, but Des had given him hope again. After, he gave her a promise ring, because that’s totally something 40-year-old adults do. Then they made out, because Des didn’t know what else to do. Des kiss count: 1.
Family Visit #2:
The next stop was Scotsdale, Arizona to meet the family of Delicate Drew. He looked devastatingly precious in his pink button-up when he greeted her, and he quickly made out with her, since he totally likes girls. Like, no question. Des kiss count: 2. The two then went off to meet his family who, as expected, was also devastatingly precious.
Between Drew’s tenderness towards his severely handicapped sister and the sweetness of his pink button-up-clad, recovered-alcoholic, cancer-ridden father, Des wanted to join that preciously devout though slightly dysfunctional family right then and there.
After dinner, Drew took Des outside to tell her for the first time that he loved her.
“I’ve never felt this way before.” – Drew, on his first heterosexual relationship.
Of course they made out again.
Family Visit #3:
The third visit was to McMinnville, Oregon to the hometown of Chris. Apparently, baseball is a very big part of Chris’s life (really?) since he used to be a professional baseball player (wait, really? Were we already supposed to have known this?), so he took Des to see his childhood baseball field.
Of course he came prepared with matching baseball tees for him and Des, and the two hit some balls and drew on each other’s faces and other normal date things. Afterwards they settled on the baseball diamond for a casual picnic, where Des revealed the memory sketchbook she thrown together in her spare time (because she’s also totally an artist now). ABC, stop trying to make memory sketchbooks happen, they’re not going to happen! This of course led to some making out. Des kiss count: 3.
While the other two families had appeared relatively normal at first, Chris’s family put up no such pretenses. Giving Zak’s family’s snow cone business a run for their money, Chris’s father greeted Des by offering to rub her back in his basement office. #Normal.
After working through the knots of the woman his son hopes to marry, Chris’s dad took his son down to the office to chat/clean out his nasal passages (or at least we think that’s what he did). #NORMAL. We would have preferred for them to write a poem together.
Meanwhile, Des spoke with Chris’s overprotective mother, who was seemingly devoid of human emotion. After Robo-Mom reluctantly gave her blessing to Des, she even shed her first tear – we hope it didn’t make her rust!
Family Visit #4:
The last stop was Salt Lake City, Utah to the home of Brooks, who looked like the Brawny Paper Towel Man with his flippy-haired ruggedness. #Hot. Des and Brooks sat in the mountains to talk about Brooks’ feelings for Des, which were, as usual, ambivalent. Des showed him the list she’d made of all the totally great times they’d had together, like that time Brooks broke his finger during the dodgeball game or that time they’d been on Cloud 9 together and…well, that was about it. Then they made out. Des kiss count: 4.
After a quick canoeing expedition, Brawny Man Brooks took Des home to meet his family, who had all considerately donned nametags, as there were about 30 of them. While Des socialized, Brooks hung out with his brothers, who grilled him with some totally tough questions.
Brother #1: “Do you think you can you make Des happy for the rest of her life?”
Brother #2: “Can she hang?”
Brooks, as expected, didn’t have the answers.
Des, have you ever heard of a book called “He’s Just Not That Into You”?
The Drama:
Before the rose ceremony, Des met up in the hotel with her tattooed brother, who had ruined her chances with Sean Lowe during her family meeting in last season’s The Bachelor. Though he claimed to be more open the idea of Des meeting the love of her life on a reality television dating show this time around, Des was still skeptical about allowing him to meet her bachelors in two weeks, mostly because he spent most of their meeting either scoffing or smirking.
As the bachelors entered the hotel for the ceremony, Des’s tattooed brother lurked in the shadows of the lobby and watched, a move that both creeped us out and made Tattooed Brother our favorite character on the show.
The Rose Ceremony:
In the end, it was Pedophiliac Zak W. who was sent packing and to say he was a little melodramatic would be a gross understatement. We guess Des will be the reason for the teardrops on his guitar.
Can’t wait to hear the boys tell all next week.
Image source:
http://www.wetpaint.com/the-bachelorette/articles/2013-07-15-recap-episode-8-hometown-dates