"Pageants can be very addictive. Once you start winning, there's no turning back," says one mother on this episode of Toddlers & Tiaras. Just like meth! We begin this episode deep in the heart of one of my favorite states, TEXAS! Hey, any place that has such a high regard for guns and the death penalty is okay by me! Plus, Ft. Worth is adorable.
Something in here stinks, and I think it's your attitude!
This pageant is the Texas Walk of Fame (or Shame, for the older kids) and it is a total blow-out glitz pageant unless, of course, you're a boy, then just show up (much like a wedding). The prize this week is $1000, so really the winner is probably seeking bailout money. And by the way, I want to let everyone know that I am currently wearing my new tiara, courtesy of a fan/former English teacher. But unlike the ones on TV, mine not only is bedazzled, it has purple feathers. In your faces, toddler bizzitches!
We are introduced to Jennifer and her five-year-old daughter, Faith, who hail from Humble, Texas. Not so much. Faith has been competing in pageants since she was 6 months old, when her mother bought her first wiglet. Jennifer says when she saw the glitz girls in some of the first pageants she attended, she couldn't believe what some of the moms were doing with the hair, makeup, spray tans...but now she's drinking the Kool-Aid like it's going out of style!
For only pennies a day, you can feed this poor show horse.
Over in Crowley, we see a ginormous house on a huge lot of land (there's a lot of it in Texas), and we meet bleach-blonde mom Traci and her four-year-old daughter Taralyn. You heard me. She's only been doing pageants 6 months. Damn, she's an amateur at four! Taralyn has that great combination of red hair and fair skin. Let's see her mom screw it up.
I'd kill for that skin! Well, not like Eva Braun, but you know what I mean.
We see Traci and Taralyn practicing a dance routine in the living room. Traci said she never competed in pageants but got a lot of the dancing she did years ago. Dancing or stripping? Hard to tell. "If you think about it," she says, "life is all about presentation. And if you have it, you will be successful in whatever you do." Brains help too. Initiative, maybe. Hard works sometimes pays off, just not as much as butt-kissing.
"Remember," she says, all up in Taralyn's business and holding her arm a little too hard, "cross, point, pause, and THEN kick." Taralyn says her mother is her "BFF." Soooo many acronym choices, how to choose just one?
Uh, mom? You know the camera guy is filming, right?
In Anna, Texas, we meet Hayden, age four, and Maverick, age 2, on machines of death as their mother allows them to go riding on ATVs. Enjoy quadroplegia, kids! Their mother, Heather, is vastly disappointed in her husband's ability to only produce Y-chromosome sperm. She enrolled the boys in pageants six months ago and they've won every one of them. I wonder if the pattern will continue with this pageant? Spoiler alert, it won't.
We're not afraid of death! Or having mom
feed us through a tube the rest of our lives!
"I always think I could turn my little boys into girls," she says. Not without Dr. Frankenstein. She says she loves to do their hair (how much can you do with crew cuts?) and she loves to buy them clothes. "These are my girls that I never had, so I'll just turn them into girls." All you need is a knife honey. Also, have you considered ordering a girl from China? I hear they are pretty easy to get if you use the right credit card and are married to Brad Pitt.
I'm just going to close my eyes and dream of daughters!
Taralyn's dad is being a good sport about wearing one of her crowns, and it's pretty clear where she gets her coloring. I'm guessing dad is an accountant or lawyer or something else that brings in a ton of money, and he is totally proud of his daughter. Her mom gives the whole "she's got more confidence" speech and I roll my eyes so far back into my head I can see my first day of school. Then I wet myself. Ah, memories.
« DOLLHOUSE: Mole, Baby, Mole! | Main | America's Next Top Model: Remixed, Reworked, Restyled and Remodeled »
Comments (8)
Great recap DC.
Everytime I see this show during the 1st half I am saying that these parents are crazy and so are the pagent directors and the judges. By the end of the show I'm thinking maybe if I have a daughter one day I would enter her in just 1 pagent, or maybe 2 .... but just a Natural pagent not a Glitz one...OK maybe 1 Glitz pagent since the crowns are bigger and the dresses prettier.
Then I'm like OK snap out it. Crazy is contagious and I wonder if Heather wanted her boys to be girls before she saw her first kiddie pagent.
1 of 8 | Posted by dreamkeeper | Posted on April 15, 2009 3:45 PM
"Whoa, whoa, whoa there Poindexter! I didn't know there would be math on the test! That's a word problem that I just don't have the energy or background in quantum physics to solve."
(This is where Stephen Hawkings comes in, I believe.)
"'my kids can really detect when I'm nervous.' I guess they're like cats in that way."
I think it's wild animals that can smell fear, isn't it?
Taralynn totally got the pity vote. Hey, after seeing that little tear-soaked face, who could help but vote for her?
I like the way that they rewarded Faith's sexed-up routine with the "talent" prize. What talent is that, exactly?
2 of 8 | Posted by pixielated | Posted on April 15, 2009 6:58 PM
Maybe that kid who licked the lollipop would've done better if she'd sucked on a popsicle. Or eaten a hot dog. (Ewwwww. I can't believe I said that, but I think it had to be said.)
3 of 8 | Posted by pixielated | Posted on April 15, 2009 7:00 PM
Taralynn was a natural beauty. Until her mom got hold of her. Why did she need a hairpiece?? She had beautiful red hair.
I noticed that Jennifer would pronounce taralynn's name as 'taraLEAN', what was up with that?
I think the highlite of this episode was when one of the moms' said that the glitz pagents have very experienced judges, then we get to meet a judge who is doing her FIRST pagent and likes natural kids!! WTFx2!
4 of 8 | Posted by fatgirlsrule | Posted on April 15, 2009 9:41 PM
Did anyone else think that Taralean's mom looked like Bernadette Peters. She even had the same lysp. And to Maverick and Hayden's Grams, when there is only one or two other boys in the whole competition, chances are your boys are going get something (whether they deserve it or not).
Can't wait for you to recap Brooklyn's pagent. Recappers gold!!
5 of 8 | Posted by featherhead | Posted on April 16, 2009 6:18 AM
ROFL! I read your recap with a migraine and now everything hurts, even the tears of laughter.
Your "fan/teacher" just happened to give you a purple-feathered tiara? Did s/he knock over a Vegas showgirl on her way home? And could s/he possibly get me one w/ green feathers?
So everything's bigger in Texas ... except the prize money. Hell, that $1000 won't keep a proper Texas lady in fake, nails and hair.
I was expecting more from my home state -- read somewhere a 14 y.o. girl's parents just petitioned the courts to allow their kid to get breast implants -- but I should have known the pageant girls would be exactly like the little t**ts I went to school with.
And the worst of them would be from Humble, Texas, where they shoot you if you say the name wrong. Or vote Democrat. Or possibly because Grams got into the moonshine again and took a joyride in the Dad's truck and who left his rifle laying on the gun rack again and you just happen to look at her crossways. Whoops.
Good ole 'Umble, named after Pleasant "Plez" Smith 'Umble. The "h" is silent, but it's citizenry is not. STFU, Faith. We get you like money. And getting your kit off. They may both get you far, considering how close to Houston you live. That's Houston not 'Ouston.
Poor Taralyn. Tanning and natural redheads are not a good combo. Fun Fact: The first ginger Irishman to sunbathe (ie, get pass-out drunk and lose all his clothes and money on Ireland's one sunny day a year) started all those rumors about orangey-skinned leprechauns running about with spare change). In the land of blue-skinned people, orange folks stand out!
But Taralyn was cute as long as her mouth was closed. Can't say the same about her mother.
"'She's going to be a way better dancer than I ever could be.' Yes, yes she will, but neither of you should quit your day job." I have to disagree, Crabby. It will most likely *be* her day job. She and Faith can open up a cabaret -- they already have the stage names and prancing down flat. Glad she beat Faith though. I'm a sucker for orange underdogs and Taralyn was looking like a particularly glossy Irish setter.
Maverick and Hayden. Aw, hell. You just know Maverick was named after John McCain. Or Tom Cruise. Some short person with a huge ego that's bad at pandering at any rate. :) My ovaries shriveled up and died at the thought of what Texas offspring might look like if I married a yahoo. I'd say that's the sort of birth control signs they need to put up in Sex Ed classes, but this is Texas, home of the highest unplanned teen pregnancy rate in the nation and the lowest amount of sex ed classes due to outraged parents, so who am I trying to kid?
6 of 8 | Posted by jennaboa | Posted on April 16, 2009 11:48 AM
Hilariously awesome recap.
Am I the only one who actually thought Faith was fairly smart and well spoken for such a young'n??
7 of 8 | Posted by Nemesiis | Posted on April 16, 2009 1:58 PM
Nemesiis, she sure has the bottom line figured out, doesn't she? She'll go far.
As for the boys, I kinda like a little hellraiser. Don't let 'em make you into a girl, young'un! Grab for that big plush horsie!
I'd rather see a hellraisin' young'un than a meltdown like that poor little Taralynn had. No 4-year-old should take anything that seriously.
8 of 8 | Posted by pixielated | Posted on April 16, 2009 6:26 PM