The New Normal Recap: Intolerance, Baby Clothes and a Heartbeat

So last week, we found out that Goldie's pregnant with David (Justin Bartha) and Bryan's (Andrew Rannells) baby. Goldie leaves Clay for good, and moves in with David and Bryan, along with Shania, much to Grandma's disappointment and disapproval.

If you must know, David and Bryan are a gay couple who hires Goldie, played by Georgia King, as their surrogate mom. Goldie was raised in the Midwest by Jane Forrest (Ellen Barkin), her super conservative, old-fashioned 39-year-old grandmother. Yes, she's THAT young to be Shania's great-grandma! Goldie has an 9-year-old daughter named Shania (Bebe Wood) and had just left her husband Clay Clemmons (Jayson Blair), after seeing him in bed with another woman just a few minutes after leaving the house. She steals Grandma Jane's car and drives to LA with her kid.

Aaaanyway, this week, Bryan went on a shopping spree with Shania, buying baby clothes for their coming baby. David sees the clothes and tells Bryan to return ALL the baby stuff. He wanted them to buy the baby clothes in a later time, when all the test results come out, to make sure of the baby's gender, congenital anomalies, etc.

Things are doing great with Shania at school now. A boy sits with her in class and invites her to eat lunch because he likes her top (a baby skirt she bought with Bryan). Goldie learns about Shania's new friend and decides to buy her new clothes at Loehmann's. David and Bryan came along to help her out and end up having an argument with a man for being intolerant. The man says he's trying to protect his family and doesn't like gay couple flaunting their affection in public. I call BIGOT!

Nana Jane comes to Shania's school and walks in on Shania and her new friend kissing. She sees her new top and was mortified with what she's wearing. She brings the kids to a women's services office and asks for "birth control options" for Shania and her friend. The lady employee from the women's services desk calls the police.

Bryan's still upset with what happened at the store earlier. David comes over and talks to him, saying that there will always be stupid jerks in the world and they just need to ignore them. Bryan disagrees and says that he's been ignoring them his whole life, but thinks that the ignoring should stop since they're having a baby. He says that bringing a new life into a world where "idiot people are free to say and do the things they wanna say and do because we (gays) were trained to ignore them". He's scared that someday, when their kid gets bigger, he/she will be a witness to such intolerance and might get hurt being in such situation just because they ignore those people, instead of standing up for themselves. He wants to someday protect their baby from so much hate.

David came in late and upset at Goldie's check-up after punching a guy at the gym. He defends a man with down syndrome after the guy calls him a retard and for taking so long at the line, buying a smoothie. To his shock, the man with down syndrome gets mad for "fighting his battle" and calls him a fag. Goldie admits that she heard the scuffle at the department store and apologizes for not speaking up to defend them, saying that she was afraid of the man. Doctor comes in, aaaand we have a heartbeat! (Enter waterworks for Goldie, David and Bryan. Aaaaw!)

Next day, Goldie and Nana comes to Shania's school, along with Shania's friend's mom, to talk with the kids' teacher about what happened at the back classroom and their quick trip to Plan Parenthood. Turns out Nana and Shania's classmate's mom have the same point. Kids grow up so fast these days that they had "the talk" after finding out the Plan Parenthood trip. She thanks Nana Jane as she (Jane) asks the teacher to wrap their talk up. Shania's friend ends up hitting up on Jane this time. Jane talks to Goldie in private, telling her that she also need to have "the talk" with Shania soon. Goldie's defense is that Shania's just nine and that they still have a lot of time before she talks to Shania about it. Jane explains that Goldie, her mom, and Jane herself, thought of the same thing back then and she's far too young to be a great-great-grandmother, if Shania messes up and haves a kid at that age. She convinces Goldie that their young mom streak has got to end, and that Shania must break that cycle by talking to her soon. Goldie agrees and tells her that they'll have "the talk" that night.

Meanwhile at the gym, David patches things up with the guy he punched and learns that he's also gay and just got engaged with his boyfriend. However, they were both revoked of their membership and got kicked out from Equinox due to their fight, much to the delight of the intolerant guy with down syndrome, who David defended in the first place.

David comes home and admits to Bryan that he was right. That he should let go of his fears and start defending themselves from intolerance... and that they should start buying baby stuff even without the test results. He also tells him how happy he was of hearing the baby's heartbeat and that they should be celebrating that, instead of worrying about the tests.

The love fest was easily disrupted when Goldie, Shania and Jane came and returned the baby clothes to David and Bryan because it was too revealing, considering her size and how small the baby clothes were. Jane hands them a gift--a onesie that says "PLEASE HELP ME". Though I don't know if that's a gift or an insult. Haha! The couple asks them to stay for dinner. Jane and Bryan finds something in common when she asks them why didn't they just "order one of those unwanted pretty little Chinese girls for delivery, with six you get egg roll" (Jinx! Haha!). Episode ends with the five of them having Chinese food for dinner.

**The New Normal airs Tuesday (United States), created by Glee's Ryan Murphy.

Switched At Birth "The Shock of Being Seen"

In this week's episode of Switched at Birth, Bay stirs up trouble, Daphne's in love (and is up for a triangle soon), John and Angelo struggles with their new parenting setup, Regina wins the best mom award (well, not really!), and Kathryn gets drunk.

Last time, Bay aka Angry Girl, met a new friend. Remember that girl from the junk yard? You know the one who answered her piece with an octopus graffiti? Yes, her. Well, Bay sees her (Zarra) and her gang working on their new piece and she introduces herself as Bay Vasquez. She asks if she can join their group but the guys aren't convinced. Zarra gets her number and says she'd find out soon if she can be in their circle. Ahhh... Kids and their shenanigans.

Meanwhile, Daphne accidentally drops a perfect batch of cupcakes to be sent the next day to a bridal shower. Chef Jeff (Haha! Still gets me crackin til now.), walks in on a mortified Daphne and sees the ruined cupcakes. Daphne finds out that of all the things Jeff is good at, it's not making cupcakes--which is coincidentally, Daphne's forte. Jeff and Daphne pulls an overnighter to fix the cupcakes and finally gets in the chef's good side.

So last episode, we found out that Angelo Sorrento (Bay's bio dad) will be moving into the Kennishes, to Bay's favor. Since we all know how very much well-off the Kennishes are, Angelo has finally access to an awesome gym. John walks in and sees Angelo (to his disappointment) using his treadmill while watching Discovery's Shark Week. So yea, he ends up not using the gym and asks Angelo if he can clean up once he's done.

Now back in the kitchen, Daphne and Jeff talks about Daphne's being vegetarian, having a quick debate on why you should or should not be a vegetarian, and Jeff's MIT past and his love for cooking. He says being one is worse than the "deaf thing". If you may have seen the past few episodes, Jeff isn't happy with vegetarians in his kitchen. The night ended with them becoming friends, good talks and drinking coffee with animal fat, though I'm not sure how in the world that could sound appetizing.

Sam Page is back as Craig Tebbe aka the hot lawyer for the Kennishes. They're talking about the lawsuit, when suddenly John gets a call, leaving Kathryn and Craig alone. Yea, after that kiss, everything now seemed awkward between them two. Ugh! Thank gawd John comes back to tell K of his phone call! That was the school calling them to let them know how bad Bay's standing is at Buckner and that she's now under academic probation, causing J and K to put her under "Kennish house arrest". In comes Angelo and Bay includes him in the discussion. Angelo offers to teach her French (due to his French-Italian ancestry) and Bay willingly accepts rubbing it on John saying, "after all, what are dads for, right?" (you got burned, J!).

Now, as I have told you earlier, Regina suddenly earns the "Best Mom in the World" medal to boot, with the release of K's book on how their kids got switched at birth. Regina turns into a hero when she, as stated in the book, already had suspicions when Daphne was a baby, but shuts it down and thinks otherwise. And even with her suspicions, she still raised Daphne as her own, becoming a single mom, upon her separation with Angelo Sorrento. The interview, however, had gone sour for Kathryn. Unfortunately, her book made her look like a bad mom for not noticing anything when she was still a baby, and that she seemed like a stuck-up rich mom who knows nothing about her kid. Regina, felt really bad about the interview so she invited Kathryn on her night out with Melody.

Back at the casa de Kennish, Bay watches a French movie (instead of studying for the French Revolution) with Angelo, causing John some concerns. Bay then invites J into watching it with them, but John refuses and snarkily replies that he'd rather take advantage of the empty gym in his home.

So back at the resto, Regina surprises Daphne by bringing Kathryn with her on her supposed to be dinner-for-two with Melody. Daphne introduces her moms and Melody to Jeff. Melody starts flirting with Jeff at Maize, when he tries to serve them. Kathryn, on the other hand, is getting it on with the booze, still not over the interview with Marcie Grace earlier that morning.

Bay's still stuck at home with her French paper when she gets a text from Zarra to meet her. Still on Kennish house arrest so, she convinces Angelo to be her new alibi (formerly Toby's job), so she can go out and meet Zarra. They make this excuse to John that they'll go to a French cafe and make him believe that this whole immersion thing will totally help her out. John finally says yes, giving a 1030pm curfew. Bay finally shows up and finds out that it wasn't a group thing. She was told that Bay still needs to prove herself by making herself noticed by the other artists before they accept her in the group. Zarra says that if she gets noticed and they liked her work, they'll let her know soon if she's in.

After dinner, Regina drives Kathryn home, being boozed up and all. She was pretty much surprised on how very high-tech K's car is. Kathryn, still hung up on the interview, makes a reference on the culture shock and their fancy lifestyle. Apparently, Kathryn's been fed up on her being Mrs. John Kennish and wants to make a name for herself, thus making the book. However, the book made her appear like a spoiled brat--er mom instead. Regina then brings Kathryn to a hospital nursery to show how they could have not known in the first place about the switch that happened in the hospital years ago.

Angelo comes clean about her using him and French homework as an alibi to get out of the house. John teaches him about Parenting 101. He lectured him that it's not the friendship that Angelo's suppose to run after, but his kid's protection. Angelo asks what to do. John answers that, as parents, they just sit, worry and wait.

An almost sober Kathryn and Regina looks at newborns in the hospital where they gave birth. Regina comforts Kathryn and tells her that it was neither's fault that the kids got switched. On their way out, they met a nurse at the hospital, which Kathryn soon realizes that it was Angelo's contact, who turns out to be his ex. Kathryn calls her lawyer to inform him of this.

Daphne stayed in the kitchen after work for an overtime with Jeff and thanks him for being sweet to her moms. Jeff thinks that they were a gay couple. Daphne refuses to explain about her switched at birth story and offers to tell him some other time. Jeff assigns Daphne to kitchen duty--not dishwashing. Daphne got so excited that she hugged Jeff. Daphne's heart got broken when Jeff leaves, wine in tow, and leaves for the day to (gasp!) spend the night with Melody. I guess that's the end of her blabbing about the end of her dating! Emmett then sees him in the morning doing the "walk of shame". He doesn't know (yet!) that it was THE guy Daphne's confided to him that she's been crushing on.

Sunday morning at the Kennishes, when John receives a call about someone trashing his carwash by painting a graffiti on its wall. Bay comes with and offers to help clean up, not telling John it was her who did it. The episode ends with Bay covering up the artwork she made on her dad's carwash.

Reunited! Bones Season 8 Premiere.

Our fave crime-fighting duo is back! No, not Starsky and Hutch! I'm talking about Bones and Booth.

As we all know, last season, we were left off with a broken-hearted Seeley as Temperance (Emily Deschanel), along with little Christine and dad Max Keenan (Ryan O'Neil), leaving him and becoming a fugitive. Now, for those who haven't watched the previous season, Bones (Brennan) became a fugitive after killer-slash-computer-genius Christopher Pelant kills Ethan Sawyer and covers his tracks by making it all appear to be Brennan's doing. As a result, Brennan becomes THE murder suspect and Booth (David Boreanaz) was moved from his position in Major Crimes Unit to a simple FBI desk job due to conflict of interest.

Episode opens with a blonde Brennan carrying Christine on her lap (whose now three months older), showing pics of her "Dada" Seeley Booth. Seconds later, Tempe's father, Max comes in and tells her it's time to go. Seems that they have been there for too long that the FBI (or Pelant) may be catching up on them already.

Angela Montenegro has been obsessed for the past three months in cracking Pelant's code so Brennan can finally be cleared, and return to the Jeffersonian and of course, in Booth's arms.

Since Brennan is a wanted fugitive, with her father as an accomplice, the FBI's been trying to track them by checking up on Seeley periodically. But, as usual, Booth has no idea as to where his baby-momma and baby is. So the talk with Special Agent Hayes Flynn, the guy who replace Booth in Major Crimes, ended up with nothing but Booth's blabbing about who they should be checking up on--Brennan or Pelant. But since we all know how brilliant Pelant was into hiding his tracks, the FBI can't point any of the evidences to him. Thus, Booth becomes Pelant's stalker just so he can get his family back from hiding.

While Bones is out, someone has to keep her seat warm in the Jeffersonian. Enter Dr. Clark Edison. You know Booth's sort of assistant last season? Yea, he got promoted by Cam to fill in Brennan's big shoes in the lab. However, Hodges and Angela aren't delighted with the turn of things. Angela Montenegro says it's fine that Edison's taken over, BUT he could have said no into having Brennan's office. Oh and the binders! Yea, everyone's not happy about that too--including Dr. Cam Saroyan.

Now, the FBI was called by an "anonymous caller" (read: Temperance Brennan) due to an uncovered body dump in Pitt Meadows of what seems to be a person who was a part of Christopher Pelant's past. Brennan has been trying to investigate on the body, pin it to Pelant, along with the rest of the murders. Before Brennan leaves the dig site, she left something for Angela (yes, they were communicating the whole time!). She left her a snow drop flower, a sign of hope. As Angela has put it, solving this case would finally bring her back home.

Now, as we all know, Booth has been under investigation by the FBI. All calls, emails and whereabouts are pretty much monitored. Cam had this brilliant idea of sending Booth an email regarding new case. But more on that later.

Back to the Pelant. Seems our genius murderer has also caught up with Brennan's clues and is tracking her down as well. Apparently, the victim uncovered in Pitt Meadows was once a guidance counselor in Pelant's high school, making it more evident that Pelant may have killed her. So crazy-ass Pelant hacks into the Jeffersonian to find out who the uncovered body was. He finds out it was one of his previous victims, Carol Morrissey.

The search is on for Bones and the whole team, including Sweets, is now being checked up on by FBI. Sweets, however, is adamant he had no knowledge of Booth's or Brennan's whereabouts nor any idea on what's going on with Booth lately saying he would know because Seeley "doesn't want him to lie" to the FBI. Oh the codes!!! Everyone is soooo damn clever!

Now remember the snow drop and Cam's email? Seems to me, Booth got smarter while lady Bones was out. The snow drop appears to be a code for him to meet Bones in the SNOW DROP MOTEL. After a testosterone-filled combat between Booth and Bones (he didn't know it was her, so yea, they fought), comes the love fest. Three months of not seeing each other. You know what happened next! *wink, wink* So turns out, Brennan and Max were searching into Pelant's history and discovered that his guidance counselor went missing for no reason. Incidentally, Pelant needs a good high school recommendation letter to get into his dream college university--Stanford.

Back to the Jeffersonian. The team is trying hard to uncover the mystery behind Morrissey's death. They have proved how Pelant has made Caroline Julian's bank account got hacked and is now back in the case too. So Sweets and Julian is investigating on Pelant's history with the victim and learns that Pelant got in trouble back then for hacking into the schools system to forge a recommendation letter to make him look like a saint. Sweets figured out through the letters' idialect that Pelant's language pattern, his psychological fingerprints, were all over his letter, proving he forged his recommendation to Stanford and killed his guidance counselor when she finds out what he did.

Hodges finally learns that wifey, Montenegro, has been communicating with Bones the whole three months she was out, by sending flowers to each other. Every flower has a meaning and they send out those as a code. Hodges helps out Angela by sending a flower to a grave at the cemetery and sees Pelant, who has found out the codes. Hodges threatens Pelant and he taunts him back, saying he can never harm anyone. Unfortunately for Pelant, Hodges has changed due to the turn of events.

Flynn finds out that Angela has been in communication and is now back to investigating the team. Angela confesses of how she communicates with Bones through flowers. She tells Agent Flynn that she was sending the flower to let Brennan know that she has finally figured out how Pelant has framed her into killing Ethan Sawyer.

So Max comes to the graveyard and tells Pelant (who he knows is hiding somewhere) that he's not gonna lead him to his daughter. He says that if in case he wanna follow them, they're headed for the Mexican border, leaving Pelant furious.

So Hodges admits to Sweets of his recent interaction with Pelant (which he didn't admit to Flynn) and his murderous intent, that he just discovered. He tells Sweets, while in the elevator, that he almost chokes him to death until he snaps back into reality and thought of Brennan. Had he killed Pelant, there would be no way in hell now that they can help her clear her name and will be in more trouble than she is now. He says that he has discovered that part of Pelant wants to die. That while Hodges was choking him, he had this look in his eyes saying "do it! do it!".

Saroyan and Edison are investigating on the remains of the victim. Cam apologizes to Clark, knowing that once the case has been solved, he knew that soon he'll be back to his old position. She also thanks him (implied) for not sucking at his job, though he know that he'll someday give back Brennan her old position, and in turn might demote him, putting him back as Brennan's assistant in the lab.

Now that Max has figured out that Pelant has finally known of Booth's whereabouts, he uses Booth's car (which he bought under Dr. Edison's name), and makes it appear to have been stolen by him. He says that what he did was traceable, and that Pelant is now hot in finding them. So Max takes the car and Booth tips Flynn of where Max is headed to so the FBI will track him instead. However, he finds out that he's the second person to tip the car's whereabouts, and learns that Pelant was on to them. Booth throws away his phone so no one could finally trace him.

While Booth and Brennan, along with baby Christine, heads back to the Jeffersonian, Hodges asks Cam to leave, take ALL the employees with her, and turn off the security system. He'll be "working" overtime and will be looking after the whole lab while he's there the whole night and "see somebody you shouldn't see". Yes, that's code for "let's bring in a fugitive to solve the case"! Cam immediately closes up the lab, takes Edison out, and gets all employees--including the security guards out of the Jeffersonian just so Booth and Brennan could come in, without anyone knowing. Minutes later, when the coast is clear, Hodges and Angela lets them in and finally Angela reunites with BFF Tempe and her god daughter Christine.

Sweets comes in as he was called by Booth to protect everyone in the lab since he's got a gun and is quite a good marksman. Booth leaves for FBI office to show Flynn proof of how Pelant has hacked the Jeffersonian and the FBI network to buy them time while Brennan and team solves the Morrissey case.

Brennan proves how Pelant has killed Morrissey, saying that Pelant has tampered his high school photos online. Apparently, Max went to Pelant's old school and finds out through an actual paper yearbook that Pelant was once a 200-pound-kid, unlike what they see on the online copy of the yearbook. So Brennan explains how Christopher Pelant has killed Morrissey and what weapon was used (thanks to Hodges), pinning Pelant to the murder. They have also finally cracked the code Sawyer left on his wall and connects Pelant to his murder as well, leading to his arrest. While Seeley and Max watches FBI drags on Pelant, Max tells Booth that this guy needs to be killed knowing that he'll be back in no time (dun dun duuuun!!!).

Now that the gang's back. Special Agent Hayes Flynn relinquishes his position in Major Crimes, turns it over back to Booth, and moves to Domestic Terrorism. Caroline Julian announces that Brennan is no longer a suspect to Ethan Sawyer's death and that she can finally resume to her position back at the Jeffersonian as its Medico-legal laboratory's forensic anthropologist. Cam, later announces that they'll be needing another forensic anthropologist, who will be working on serious archaeological work. Booth confesses that he has been mad at Montenegro in the past three months as she is the only one who have knowledge of what's going on with Brennan, but also thanks her and the team for bringing his family back together.

Unfortunately, Pelant's one lucky bastard. Bones and Booth were called at the FBI late at night and learns that Pelant is not who he they all knew he was. Apparently, he was from Egypt with the name Bassam Al Fayat (I think that's how it's spelt!) and then moved to the United States under a different identity. He has been taken by the Egyptian government that night, but not without leaving Bones and Booth something to haunt them. He gives Brennan a marigold, and she slaps him. Hard. She says marigold is a symbol of pain and grief. Something tells me we haven't seen the last of Christopher Pelant--er Bassam Al Fayat. And I think upon his return, Hayes Flynn will be back as well, as we see him pick up the marigold flower in the last scene.

Saturday Night Live S38 Premiere... Political Gangnam Style!

Ahhhh... September. The time of the year when fall season premieres are at high.

As I come back from my hiatus from blogging, and the start of an all-new Shocking Ina, I bring you good news--and some bad too! (eep!) in the premiere of Saturday Night Live's 38th season.

As we all know, last season was the last of a few of awesome SNL faves--Andy Samberg, Abby Elliot and Kristen Wiig (I think there's sand in my eyes... lol). But never fear! Our dear Lorne Michaels shan't let us down that easy. With Samberg, Elliot and Wiig's departure, we get three new more. This season, we meet Aidy Bryant, Cecily Strong and Tim Robinson.

So, a quick rundown on SNL's new episode.

We all know US election's coming soon (read: November), SNL started off with an election skit. This is actually the first time Fred Armisen's NOT doing the Obama impression. Instead, funny man Jay Pharoah debuts his own version of le Prez. The new POTUS in town made a darn good impression, if I may say so myself. Although it was pretty shocking to me that Armisen has already passed the baton to Pharoah, it was not disappointing. Jason Sudeikis makes his impeccable impression of Mitt Romney and (surprise!) Taran Killam makes his of "Abercrombie boy" VP candidate, Paul Ryan.

Also featured was Bill Hader's impression of Clint Eastwood, doing a parody of his "Chair Talk" from the Republican Convention that happened a few weeks back. Hader appears with various chairs, which seems to be Obama, Chris Christie, Christopher Walken, etc. H-I-L-A-R-I-O-U-S!

Last week's host is Ted's Seth MacFarlane, with musical guest Frank Ocean (with guest on stage, crooner John Mayer). Seth opens with a musical, which features him doing the voices Stewie, Blake and Peter (Family Guy), Roger (American Dad), Kermit the Frog, George Takei, Marty McFly etc. He also starred in a few skits about some guy on a blind date, a man teaching in Puppet 101, an army man, and some guy needing sex pointers due to some erectile disfunction. Weekend Update with Seth Myers features Macfarlane with his impression of Olympic Swimmer-medalist (jeah!!!) Ryan Lochte, to which in reports say Lochte found harsh, considering how much of an imbecile he appeared to be in the skit. The skit features MacFarlane (as Lochte), who turns into a TV critic, stating his less-than-credible ratings of TV shows. Matthew Perry's sitcom Go On was included in it, where a Lochte MacFarlane calls "GOON", his love for shapes, which he realized by watching Elementary, and so on.

Weekend Update also featured a very hyper Honey Boo-boo (Vanessa Bayer) and her mom (Bobby Moynihan), which is soooo hilarious.

Now another thing that really got me crackin was SNL's Gangnam Style skit. At first, it was just a PSY impression done by Moynihan, coming out of a wall that's apparently a "secret door". Moynihan and crew (yes, including some horse heads! lol) comes out dancing and lip syncing. Later on, as Seth MacFarlane presses the red button for "Turbo", PSY comes out with Bobby Moynihan and company, dancing to Gangnam Style.

Now enough with the skits, let's move on to musical guest Frank Ocean (woot!!!). Now on his first performance, he sang "Thinking Bout You" and then later on, "Pyramids" with John Mayer in guitars.

With the coming of 3 new promising acts in SNL, I am pretty much excited with what's in store for them this season.



**Next week's host will be Joseph Gordon-Levitt and musical guest Mumford and Sons.

New Shocking Ina

Hello! I am currently in transition from a ranting person to a couch potato blabbing about TV shows and what not. So yea. Til my next post! :) -Shocking Ina

Tantrums: It's More Fun In The Philippines

BOOOOOOM!!! 'Nuff said.

Photoshop Wars: Charice Pempengco Vs. Jinkee Pacquiao

Happy new year me luvvies!!!

First blog for 2012. Does anyone recognize them?



Left, Jinkee Pacquiao for Mega Magazine's January 2012 cover and right, Charice Pempengco as Preview's January-February 2012 cover. Seems to me, everyone else is loving Photoshop retouches.

Love 'em or hate 'em? Comment away!