Episode 41.5

Once the fall schedule was in swing, I knew that I’d be creating a new blog about a show that would be airing on Wednesdays. That blog is up now and is about CSI: Vegas. Here’s a link to it here in this post. I had updated it on Wednesday since I somehow wound up too busy for quite a time to finish this blog post. I should be better at getting it done before the episode airs, but even while I do find time to blog still, I often am rushing things with all of the other things that I have to do.

 

https://adamdeckercsivegas.blogspot.com/

 

While I don’t yet know whether or not the show (CSI: Vegas) will air beyond the ten episode order that they have now or if it will continue airing on Wednesdays, I have decided that if it is airing during the winter hiatus of Survivor on Wednesdays, I will put this blog on hiatus (outside of any posts on old seasons of it) and make it the main blog until this one returns. This could be important, or the show could be over by then anyways. The rule would only apply when a new episode of that show airs.

 

I’m now going to get to the one time challenges from the fifth season. Reading about them again makes me think of just how many mental challenges we saw this season. I wish that more of them would have been used again because these go beyond the usual puzzle.

 

Flying Your Flag (immunity challenge from The Importance of Being Eldest): In this challenge, all of the contestants would be on a boat where they’d have to get flags from a station. Each contestant and only one for each particular task can get each flag. They can’t switch out players at any task. I don’t think that this could be done while social distancing unless this was changed into a relay race instead. I’d like to see this challenge done again.

 

Tan-dy Gram (immunity challenge from Gender Bender): In this challenge, contestants had to solve a puzzle where they rearranged shapes to match two images in front of them. This challenge would be done in pairs. I think that it is possible for a solo version of this to be done while social distancing.

 

Catch of the Day (immunity challenge from The Ocean’s Surprise): In this challenge, each tribe would have to separate their bins of fishes into four separate groups for the four separate fishes. I do think that this challenge could be done while social distancing if an individual one were ever done. This does seem like a simple challenge, but it seems like it could work again.

 

Thai 21 (immunity challenge from The Power of One): In this challenge, contestants would have to gather a set of flags. There are 21 of them and another one is different than the rest of them. They could not gather that flag until all of the other flags were gathered first. One can only take flags in groups of one, two, or three. The last flag would win immunity. This could be done while social distancing. I know this challenge because it appeared in an episode of Cyberchase. I do not know what an official name for it might be, so I might have to do more research into it.

 

Breathing Space (immunity challenge from Sleeping with the Enemy): A take on waiting to exhale, in this challenge, contestants had to survive being submerged underwater only breathing through a bamboo snorkel. Their time stops once they come up for air. The tribe, or contestants, if it were ever done that way, with the longest cumulative time underwater would win. It could possibly be done while social distancing. I’m not sure if it would be done again since it is too similar to other challenges.

 

Thai Numbers (immunity challenge from Desperate Measures): This challenge came in two rounds. The first round had people having to memorize Thai numbers with numbers in English. The second round had them using these numbers as coordinates to find buried titles with each title giving the location of another tile. I think that it is possible to do this while social distancing.

 

Knock-Out (reward challenge from While the Cats are Away): In this challenge, contestants have to compete in an obstacle course that came in stages set to eliminate players along the way. It seems like one of the more complicated challenges in the game. In it, contestants had to pair up which eliminated a player. Pairs had to go to the next stage which would eliminate others. They then had to go under a belly crawl and then go a wall climb. It would end with a balance beam. I do not think that this could be done while social distancing and I’ve had to see it to know what it was like. I missed a lot of Thailand due to various reasons towards the end.

 

Slip Through Your Fingers (final immunity challenge from the episode of the same name): While doing this challenge, contestants had to do a certain pose while holding coins between their fingers in a hot place. If they run out of coins, they would lose the challenge, their chance of immunity literally slipping through their fingers. It is the first time the winner of the season won final immunity. It could easily be done while social distancing and I’m surprised that it has never been used again.

 

I realize that when I mentioned something in the previous post, you might not have known what I was talking about, although you probably did. I made a reference to the song Shake it off by Taylor Swift when I mentioned part of the chorus, I think, or a different part of the song.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfWlot6h_JM

 

With a challenge in the fourth season called Go Fly a Kite, I feel that it is worth mentioning the final song from the movie Mary Poppins. That song is Let’s Go Fly a Kite. It still is a standout from that movie that I’ve only seen once thus far, but still remembered quite well before watching this song again.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BA-g8YYPKVo

 

Now while there is still more to wonder about the advantages of this season, I’m just going to post one last paragraph before getting to the episode in question. You might want a better explanation as to why this blog is late. Well, it was a family visit at my house that started on Thursday and I knew was going to happen on Wednesday. They were here until Monday which prevented me from doing this post on Friday or Sunday. Thus, this post is on Tuesday. You should see tomorrow’s episode on time. But enough of my ramblings.

 

In the first segment of the show, Genie is glad that she survived tribal council and was on the right side of the votes this time. She also looks for an idol and finds an advantage. The whole tribe talks about it as a group, not wanting to open it. They leave it alone, unopened. Shan wants to open it while Genie is away. Ricard knows this. Ricard wants her extra vote in the meantime. He convinced Genie that Shan is going to say the phrase just to see if the other tribe has it and test it if you will.

 

Sydney wants to be a mermaid while also doing a lot of fishing as well. Danny, in the meantime, wants to turn on the women in his tribe since the men are getting voted out of others. That’s sexist! Not really. I see his point. He wants to work with Deshawn, but not so much Naseer. Naseer still learns that they want to work with him and that they want to throw the challenge.

 

Evvie wants to make Xander feel safe although Xander wants to do this. Xander and Evvie talk to each other about wanting to hide advantages while Tiffany is around Liana. Liana looks through his bag and sees the extra vote. He tells Tiffany about the idol, but lies and says it was found recently. She knows this isn’t true since he said the secret phrase. She also knows from him about the extra vote, I think.

 

In the second segment of the show, the tribes gather for the reward challenge and Naseer is revealed to have the beware advantage on his tribe that it appears that no one else on his tribe knows about yet. This is also an immunity challenge which seems early in the episode already. I guess that a lot of shit is going down after this challenge. Will there be another summit? The blue tribe does well. I guess that they weren’t trying to throw the challenge that well, or at all. The green tribe loses with blue tribe being second. Liana and Shan are taking a journey together. Wait, Shan is a pastor? Remind me not to ever go to her church. She should have stuck with Family Feud. Shan is nervous about the journey.

 

In the third segment of the show, Shan thinks that you can’t get through this game without trusting someone. Shan and Liana talk about some things while revealing some details to each other. They promise to work with each other. Shan says that if she’s voted out, Ricard is the reason why and can’t be trusted as a result. Shan reveals more of her back story and how she became a Christian. But she still seems too deceitful in some ways. Shan thinks that she’s going to protect her vote while Liana wants to risk hers. Is this always going to be the same decision most of the time? This time, she gets an advantage that can get her an advantage of theirs if they have it.

 

In the fourth segment of the show, Ricard wants to pretend that he’s on Genie’s side. Genie isn’t sure that she can trust him. Maybe now’s the time to make a wish. Shan is honest about what happened on the summit. She talks to Genie about what happened and Genie reveals that Ricard wanted to vote her out. Ricard is worried that he might be a target. I don’t think that Shan is going about this the right way. Ricard says that he is not voting for Shan. He doesn’t want to give the extra vote back. Shan isn’t sure who to vote for and this could be an interesting tribal council.

 

In the fifth segment of the show, we get to the tribal council. I do kind of like it getting a whole act to itself in the future. Jeff asks what happened between Ricard and Genie before Shan returned. He thinks that he could be unsure. Shan admits that she wanted to pit the person against each other. Ricard says that he and Shan have been together for every vote. Jeff thinks that there is no blood since there is not a jury yet. Ricard isn’t sure that this is true since the remaining members of his tribe could be targets. Shan thinks that voting is more powerful this time. Who is the individual she can trust? And will she play her idol? We’ve seen a lot of dumb players this time around. But will tonight have one of them in Shan? Or will she trust her alliance with Ricard? I’m surprised that Ricard gets a vote, but it is Genie that is voted out of the game in the end.

 

On the next Survivor, there is a drop your buffs moment, but it does not seem like it is a merge like they are hoping for instead. They say that there has never been anything like this before. But what is going on, exactly? Is this not a switch? Or not a typical switch? What else could it be if not a merge or a switch? What else is even left that it could even be instead?

 

Total confessional count: Deshawn- 7, Tiffany- 12, Sydney- 7, Shan- 12, Liana- 7, Heather- 1, Erika- 3, Genie- 7, Ricard- 10, Xander- 7, Evvie- 10, Danny- 10, Naseer- 7.

 

New confessionals this episode: Tiffany- 3, Sydney- 1, Shan- 3, Liana- 1, Heather- 0, Erika- 0, Genie- 2, Ricard- 2, Xander- 2, Evvie- 1, Danny- 1, Naseer- 2, Deshawn- 0.

 

I was going to post more on the confessional count, but I’m just going to wait just a bit. Note that there are some over 9 confessionals in the double digits now. I’m now going to post the new blog schedule for November. This isn’t much of a change and isn’t really changing that much. In fact, you still might see a post meant for Wednesday in this blog if I can’t get it done then. But you won’t see a post on an old Survivor season on any of those days.

 

Planned November blog posts (revised)

 

Sunday	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday
Not November	1: freebie	2: Madam Secretary	3: Survivor	4: The Good Fight	5: The Good Wife	6: TV
7: CSI: Vegas (maybe)	8: CSI: Cyber	9: The Good Wife	10: Survivor	11: freebie	12: CSI: Vegas (maybe)	13: TV
14: TV	15: Elementary	16: freebie	17: Survivor (next month calendar in this post)	18: freebie	19: freebie	20: Madam Secretary
21: CSI: Vegas (maybe)	22: Madam Secretary	23: freebie	24: Survivor	25: freebie	26: freebie	27: TV
28: CSI: Vegas (maybe)	29: freebie	30: freebie	Not November	Not November	Not November	Not November

 

There isn’t much else for me to say this time around. I just hope that I can get what I want to of all of the blogs that I want to do tomorrow and all of the other blogs that I have as I have majorly big posts to write in my TV and Good Fight blogs to have ready soon. I can only hope that something will be done pretty soon with all of the updates ready that need done. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.