Sedate me.
Save me.
Fresh off last week’s Julia Roberts Hookergate Scandal, Toddlers & Tiaras was back for another round, this time trading in the pleather thigh highs for something which they hoped would be a little more palatable for the viewing public…like insanity and border line racism.
It was the International Fresh Faces Pageant being held somewhere Down South, which you could probably have guessed without even checking the Comcast box, and it brought out the usual parade of crazy faced Pageant Moms and blank faced baby girls that we have grown to know and love. The Director explained that to be in this pageant you need to be Facially Gifted, whatever that means.
I know that if you are Musically Gifted it means you can sing or play an instrument. So Facially Gifted must mean you have a face. Sign me up.
This show is whacked. I’m already feeling some separation anxiety for the upcoming end of the current season, even though I have no idea when that actually happens.
(Please tell me I did not just say that out loud. Please…)
By International I had foolishly assumed the Pageant Directors meant we would have the opportunity to view a lot of ethnic and culturally diverse costumed preemies poking their dimples and posing with pretty feet, much like an overly spray glittered Disney Small World After All kind of thing, or at the very least a Ramada check-in snack table full of Foods From Every Nation like Saturdays at Costco. My first clue that I might be off the track a little should have been that I was watching TLC.
The second should have been when Pageant Mom #2 got all gangstah and told her daughter to tip her crown sideways like the Homies do.
Yeah. First four minutes out of the gate and we are already working on making fun of our first race. This is gonna get good.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. We first get to meet 6 year old Paige, a little blond peanut stuck with those awkward kid glasses that apparently hide quite a vixen behind the thick lenses. Paige may be lacking in 20/20 vision and front teeth, but she knows what she’s got. She proudly yells…yes, yells…that when she takes off her glasses she is a Beauty Queen. Bam! Like those naughty school teachers who take off their thick specs, pull the pencil out of their hair and suddenly they have a wild mane of Farrah Fawcett layers cascading down over their shoulders and now everyone wants to stay after school. Like that. Except that Paige has to find her flipper, put it in, hot roll her hair, fight over which dress she wants to wear, get a layer of make up adhered to her little peanut face, drink some soda and then watch her mom pantomime her routine from across the ball room floor like a mime in a Kohl’s sweatshirt.
So maybe not so much like that.
Then we meet Sydney whose mom Marlo is loud, proud…and insane.
I didn’t say it. She did. And she said it a lot. And if you didn’t believe her the first time, Marlo made sure she proved it over and over again. Like an odd MTV Cribs episode, Sydney and mom were chillin’ up in da hizzle trying on some fake diamond pageant lid bling and flippin’ hardcore gangster rap fingers. Marlo said to twist the crown around to the side like the Homies do and then got all Word to Yo’ Pageant Momma in her face. Well…as Word to Yo’ Pageant Momma as you can get in a pastel blue v-neck tee shirt from Quacker Factory at least.
Oh, those crazy Homies. They must be the highlight of the PTA casserole potlucks.
After they checked one race off their hit list, Sydney and PMDiddy (Pageant Mom…don’t ruin the joke, please.) moved the party to the kitchen table so they could bust out some nail polish on Sydney’s toes. Unless their home is built on some ancient Indian Burial Ground and haunted by mystical forces, I don’t really have any idea how simply by walking through a door frame PMDiddy turned into the Love You Long Time Nail Tech. Check another one off her racial bucket list, because we just made fun of all the Asians in the world as she squinted her way through a mani & pedi for Little Round Eye Daughter.
Taking a break from Sydney prepping for the UN Glitz Pageant, we got to meet contestant #3 Madison. Much like Bravo TV is required to have crazy ass Housewives and whacky gay sidekicks on air at least once a night, TLC appears to require every other episode feature yet another Madison. I’m losing track, honestly. Maybe it’s because the Pageant emcees like saying the name. ”And next we have…Madisooooooooon.” Try it. It is kind of enjoyable.
Madison is Sydney’s major competition, so they are both trying to ramp up their A-Game. Madison’s mom is kind of hanging out a little, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on why two other women are doing all the Pageant Mom work.
Jamie is the Aunt. Tina is Jamie’s mom and they are totally unrelated to Madison, but are shlepping her around for every pageant and doing all the leg work while the real mom does…something else, I guess. Jamie seems to be ok with the whole set up, except for the part where Tina calls her out on national TV for never giving her any grand babies. Thanks, Mom. Really. Nice. You might want to put someone else on speed dial before you fall and break a hip all alone at home some night.
Little peanut Paige has only done lower glitz pageants, which must have something to do with how many rhinestones you hot glue on your dress or the weight of your hair piece. Not sure. But to ramp up her own A-Game they got her a coach, which was probably a good chunk of change and would explain why everyone got a little tightly wound up when Paige foreshadowed her upcoming performance and barely functioned and didn’t even turn around to do her living room practice walk.
Please tell me someone else noticed that gigantic tanning bed in the back? What the–?!
That is way cooler than any AeroBed when you have guests drop by unannounced. I totally know where I’m going for the Holidays.
Taking a break from race bashing, Sydney and Mom had to introduce us to Morgan. Morgan is a cute little nugget of a baby who goes everywhere with them, and gets treated like a precious little gem, and is Mom’s pride and joy. Hopefully Morgan will grow up to appreciate all the attention that is showered upon him by the family.
Except he never will.
Because he’ll never grow up.
Because he’s a freakin’ creepy rubber baby doll!
The expensive realistic kind that makes you spill your coffee when you come around the corner and it’s laying on the floor or when someone forgets where they put it and you find it in the kitchen cupboard when you go to get some cereal. Sydney thinks it’s a hoot to take Morgan places and mess with people…especially to Walmart.
Like Walmart shoppers don’t already have it rough enough, you have to bring in Morgan and play mind games? Thanks, but when I have an arm load of WD40, Hanes boxer briefs, fluoride rinse and 4 pounds of cheap sirloin weighing me down I really don’t need to scream like a little girl when I see a rubber baby peering at me from under the rack of cammo hunting overalls.
Krazy with a capitol “K” people. Hopefully Marlo carried baby Sydney around more carefully than she does baby Morgan, because that poor little niblet is dropped and tossed and bobble headed around the country like a $500 bag of kitty litter with a slow leak. Sydney does jokingly question her mother’s sanity early on in the show, probably using the secretly coded safe words that the nice lady from child services said to use if she ever made a phone call from a strange place. Mom is jolly and giggly. Can’t deny her that. Just sleep with the light on, honey.
The prep for the pageant was definitely more eventful than the final result. Trying to decide which dress peanut Paige was going to wear was quite fun. Keeping in mind that she can’t see without her glasses, Mom makes her spin around in a never ending circle so she can inspect her 360 degrees and determine whether or not the blue dress is the Holy Grail. By the time that little girl was cork screwed into the ground, she had no idea where she was.
That frame of mind unfortunately stuck with her throughout the entire pageant. Spoiler Alert: She didn’t do so good. When she tried to rock out with her Outfit of Choice flat guitar I had a bad flashback to Kate Gosselin on Dancing with the Stars.
For real. Hulu it. They look exactly alike.
Sydney and Madisoooooooon both had the same hairdresser and make up people. Yeeeouch. Bitch stole my beauty team.
They also both wore cowgirl outfits. Bitch stole my look.
Unfortunately neither of them won the big Uber Doober prize. New Bitch stole my crown.
And that’s pretty much how it went down. Marlo would say it was dope, homie.
I think a rubber baby just ran down the hall. Gotta go.
