You need to back dat thang up and turn yo’ box around before anything else comes out of it.
And the award for Most Drama after hitting a wall and breaking a toenail goes to…
Gurrl, he was crying like Susan Lucci at the Lion King. It was the Emmys AND the Grammys.
Yeah, I came out the damn box, suckahs. And FedEx sez it came straight from Awesome Town.
We would’ve won if y’all had plugged the air holes in that box like I asked you to do yesterday.
This happened.
Put that thing down. It’s been sitting on a bus all the way from downtown Miami. That s*** nasty.
Bring It! Warning:
You better check yo’ self, Boo.
And brace yo’ self, cuz you ’bout to get sucker punched in the belly.
If you thought Montezuma’s Revenge almost did you in on your last Spring Break, just wait until some of this Miami Heat hits you hard again.
Dat’s rite. She’s baaaaack.
This week, Traci Young-Byron and her YCDT Supastarz packed up their Costco-sized attitudes and all the aerosol temporary hair color spray that the local Party City had in stock and headed to Mississippi for a rematch with the Dancing Dolls.
Miami was back in the hizzle, yo. And you know Traci.
She don’t take no prisoners. Or crap. Or (…Spoiler Alert…) carbs, apparently.
Which meant that Dianna Williams was gonna have to step up her game over at the Dollhouse Dance Factory as she prepped the girls for the upcoming Dance Explosion competition across town in Clarksdale, MS. Going up against YCDT again was going to require more than just another Grace Jones drag queen riding around in a chariot.
Way more.
This week, the Dolls would be competing in both the Creative Dance and Stand Battle categories, same as the YCDT crew. And since the Dolls can throw Stands in their sleep, the focus was going to be on an intricate, overly elaborate Silence of the Lambs routine that involved police tape, sirens, cops, two wheeled Sam’s Club warehouse dolly carts and enough straight jackets and Hannibal Lecter retainers to finally shut up every one of those Kardashians for good.
Psych. You wish.
Kim will still figure out a way to tweet about wearing flats for the first time.
As Miss D explained the intricacies of the dance, every one of the girls stared blankly into space without blinking or patting their heads, so I already had a really bad feeling about this one. The Dolls are a-maz-ing hip hop dancers (…to Infinity and Beyond amazing…) but none of them actually signed up to put on a senior play, so we’ll just have to wait and see how all these props work out in the end.
While the girls began fumbling through the routine, we scooted across the border to check in on Traci and her team down in Florida.
Lawd, that Traci.
Extra, Extra! Read all about it! Grab yo’ newspaper from the rack or sign up for home delivery of the New York Times, cuz that lady is Extra.
And proud of it.
The only person who loves Traci more than Traci loves Traci is nobody. Still over-the-top, still rocking her signature Taste The Rainbow Skittles pencil eraser hair and Supa Black Girl hoodie, Traci was not impressed by Dianna calling her out at the last competition.
Insult me with spray paint on a hight top fade? I don’t think so.
I don’t know if Dianna was scared. But I was.
I didn’t even dare ask Traci how she got that rock solid 8 pack stomach and it was totally on my To-Do List all week. Dang. When she started yelling at everyone to put one leg up against their right ear I just ’bout pulled my groinal abdominalis muscleis right there in the living room because I was afraid she might scream at me, too if I didn’t get my junk up.
Back in Jackson, the Mamas were outside doing what they do best: Being Awesome.
Love. These. Mamas.
Mimi’s hair, tho. Somebody went to the salon.
My girl was all dark on the bottom, light on the top and curled up like I don’t know what. It was like she took one hit from a curling iron for every APAC admissions office employee who got fired after they boned Camryn last season.
Side note: Yup. It certainly looks as though I’ll figure out some way to sneak in a subtle APAC jab each week, doesn’t it? Thanks for asking. Maybe it’ll be a contest for whoever finds it first and then Mimi will send you a handmade BeDazzled DD4L shirt or something.
After she sends one to me, I mean.
(Srsly. Why do I have to keep asking every week? I’m a size Medium.)
Sorry, but current Lifetime employees and former APAC staffers still collecting their unemployment benefits are ineligible to participate.
The Creative Dance rehearsal was not working out very well at all. The girls were confused by all the costume changing and dolly riding and the smell of that plastic mouthguard cutting off their oxygen supply.
Man, ZaTia still has a lot of hair for such a little pipsqueak.
I swear. A ton. From my lips to ZaTia’s head.
Eventually, after tripping over each other for a few hours, Sky, Star and a bunch of girls whose names I couldn’t pronounce all got cut from the Creative Dance, which didn’t sit well with Seloncé at all. And you know how she gets when something ain’t sitting well.
She got right up against the window so quickly trying to figure out what was going on with the twins that I don’t think she even realized that she had Mimi pinned up against the glass. I thought for sure that at least one of the three wigs Mimi had so stylishly layered together would get knocked right off her skull the way Sunjai‘s Mama was crawling up over her head trying to get a better view of the Dollhouse interior.
The result of all that Laverne & Shirley hilarity was Seloncé calling Dianna out onto the sidewalk to discuss the situation, Dianna cracking her knuckles like it was gonna go all the way downtown, Mimi doing some kind of MimiDance that should have involved bare feet and hot Island coals and then Miss D deciding not to crack Seloncé’s head open like a Gallagher watermelon because she didn’t want to go to prison right before competition.
I’m kinda liking this new and improved Seloncé. They cut off a couple inches of Krazy when she got her weave trimmed, but now she’s quite sassy and I rather enjoy it.
Over at the YCDT Superhero Fortress of Attitude, Traci was unveiling her Secret Weapon against the Dolls.
Live drums. From the Motherland.
Not gonna lie. I wasn’t really paying attention, so when I heard ‘Mothership’ I got all excited that Lifetime had finally read my emails and decided to have dancing Star Trek aliens on the show. Because dancing aliens would be pretty awesome, right?
Especially doing hip hop.
False Alarm. My bad. The drums were pretty cool, though.
But what about the Dancing Dolls’ Secret Weapon? Fair is fair.
It was André, the Dancing Boy! Or Andre. Or Andree. Or Andrée. Or, speaking of Toddlers & Tiaras: AnDray. Cuz you never know anymore.
Regardless of what his passport says, OhHeyAnDrey did a million gymnastic backflips straight into the mirrors, broke a toe nail, stumbled across the floor like he just crawled out of a 47 car pile up on a snowy interstate and then dramatically crumbled to the floor like Alexis Carrington did when she and Blake got shot during the Moldavian Massacre.
Google it, kids. Because it was pure shoulder pad DRAMA.
People stood and clapped. A Baby Dancing Doll ran out of the room into her waiting mother’s open arms. Women fainted. Grown men wept.
And then Kayla said “Suck It Up.”
Speaking of Baby Dolls. If nobody is going to use that DD4L race car anymore, I’ll take it off your hands. Picture me cruising around with the top down this summer in my new shredded Mimi shirt. Hooty Hoo, Girls. Hooty Hoo.
Finally, it was Showtime!
Helenor from the Dazzlin Starz was back, along with Fulvia from Virtuous Divine. The only thing missing from the party was Traci’s voice, which she lost somewhere along the line after talking about how awesome she was for 48 straight hours.
Side note: In her defense, some of this has to be Lifetime editing. It has to be. There’s no way that anyone could be so completely “OhYeahIt’sOnLikeDonkeyKongBitch” 24/7.
No way. That would be exhausting.
And speaking of exhausting. How ’bout that newbie Tawantza?
Don’t get me wrong. I love her. LOVE. But her thirst just wears me out sometimes.
True Story: She’s the only cast member they don’t have to mic before the cameras start rolling she’s so loud. Lawd Jeezis! Just fix it, please.
For those of you who missed it earlier: Love. These. Mamas.
Did you see Tawantza when YCDT came out on the floor in their Mothership grass skirts and African face paint? It was like that first day when Girl Scout cookies come out and you see the table already set up at the grocery store.
Thin Mints! Thank you, Jeezis! They have Thin Mints!
And then the drums came out. And then Traci came out.
In. A. Box. I know, right?
T**** In A Box! Just like on Saturday Night Live.
And then it was like that first day when Girl Scout cookies come out and you see the table already set up at the grocery store with a sign that says Buy One Get One and you forget what aisle you left the baby in because they have Thin Mints on sale, Jeezis.
Srsly. How much do we love this show?
Tawantza fell out her damn seat and onto the floor. She’s probably still there trying to hula dance on her back for all I know. To this day she still thinks she was at the Grammys.
The emcee guy moonwalked like your crazy uncle does at weddings. Traci did all her spins in slow motion. Dat bitch is cut up. She almost made Seloncé want to hit the gym. I didn’t know if I should spit out my donut or eat it faster to make it go away.
Miss D’s face, tho. Th-th-th-thhhat’s all folks.
Unfortunately for the Dolls, things didn’t go as well.
Between not being 100% confident in their routine after a shaky week of rehearsals and then becoming unnerved by Traci and her team’s choreography, the Dancing Dolls stumbled during their Silence of the Lambs dance.
A lot.
The energy was not there. Or the enthusiasm. Or even the actual moves.
It wasn’t their finest hour. Dianna knew it. And they knew it.
But you can’t win them all, so they headed backstage to regroup for the Stand Battle against YCDT, where Dianna gave them a quick beatdown and a motivational pep talk.
Taylor Swift says Shake It Off, girls. And TS is All-Knowing.
When they hit the floor for the Stands, the spark still wasn’t there. Miss D was nervous. The girls were nervous. You couldn’t tell what Traci was thinking, though, because she never stands still. Especially with all her bags and stage props.
She even had a fan. Like in Gone With The Wind. Lawsy it’s hot up in this big, lonely cardboard box, Rhett. And my Daddy won’t be home for hours.
Side note: I’m DD4L. Always. But the YCDT crew did look pretty dope coming out in their boxing robes and gloves and tube socks.
Never underestimate the power of a good pair of tube socks, I always say.
SashayAwayAndree managed to get his other nine toes back into the game and pulled off all his front and backflips without colliding into any more load bearing sheetrock, but it still wasn’t enough to save the day.
As much as anyone…myself included…hated to say it, the Dancing Dolls were not on their game in Clarksdale. Their Stands were on point, but even when they got their mojo back, it was only running on 5 out of 6 cylinders.
You can’t win them all. It’s true. And it’s ok. Because losing builds character and makes you hungrier. And that’s why winning feels so good the next time.
You just hate to lose to YCDT. I hear dat.
Especially when their coach keeps it klassy and forgets that it’s supposed to be about the kids and takes all the fun out of it by stating that you signed up for this a** whooping, so deal wid it. Because she totally said that.
One. Nice attitude for a coach. Two. Why you dressed like a Twilight vampire, bitch?
Cut to the chase: The Dolls didn’t win anything.
Nada. For the first time in forever. Nothing. Not cool at all.
Backstage, it was a somber scene. Everyone was sad. Dianna knew that she had to figure out how to turn all this negativity into something positive next week. Which she’ll do, cuz that’s kind of her thing.
And then Rittany cried. And gave a really good motivational speech through the tears.
These Mamas love their girls so much it hurts sometimes.
So they didn’t leave their stamp on Clarksdale this time. So what. It’s all good. Sometimes, during the worst storms, even the post office can’t always deliver.
But the Dolls will rise again. Trust me. It ain’t over yet.
Lawsy.
DD4L!