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to meet your expectations. To

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make sure a bad apple won't spoil the

0:06

whole bunch, we do up to a 27-point

0:09

inspection on our fruits and veggies. We

0:11

check for things like sunburns and scarring,

0:13

making sure you only get the crunchiest apples.

0:16

In fact, only the best produce like juicy

0:18

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comes to fresh, our higher standards

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mean fresher produce.

0:27

Kroger. Fresh for everyone. And

0:29

I'm still trying to find out who this lesbian

0:32

is. So if anybody knows what I'm talking about, season 11,

0:35

I feel like one of our listeners has

0:38

to know who is this Dyke.

0:40

Consult the chart. Who just walks up

0:42

to Sonia and starts making

0:44

out with her intensely

0:46

and then just walks away.

0:50

Hi and welcome to Dyking

0:52

Out, a podcast that

0:55

thinks Erika Jane knew.

0:58

I'm Carolyn

1:01

Berger.

1:09

I'm

1:16

Melody Kamali. And today we're Dyking

1:18

out with writer and pop culture critic

1:20

Kayla Kumari Upadhyay about The

1:22

Real Housewives.

1:24

Finally. We are doing

1:26

it. Melody, I'm so happy for you that

1:28

we are having this episode. And

1:31

to those of you who are not Housewives

1:33

fans, listen anyway,

1:35

because there's a lot of relatable

1:38

stuff in there. I think we make a great

1:40

case for it. And Kayla

1:42

is a super interesting,

1:45

fun person to hear from. So

1:48

we'll get to that very shortly.

1:51

Speaking of Kayla, who happens to be

1:53

recapping Gen

1:56

Q on the A.V. Club.

1:59

watching Gen Q

2:01

and you live in New York, why don't you come and

2:04

join us at Henrietta Hudson Friday

2:06

nights? Because we are the

2:08

only

2:09

Showtime sanctioned watch

2:12

party in

2:14

New York City. Can you believe it? I

2:16

can't believe it. You hear that? You

2:18

hear that $3 bill?

2:20

You hear that? Other venues?

2:24

We're the only one. Yeah, wherever

2:26

else you're watching it, you're not getting cool Showtime

2:29

swag, which is what we will have at Henrietta

2:31

Hudson. You're not getting the diking

2:33

out pre-show, which involves

2:35

a heavily animated Google

2:37

slide stock. And

2:40

a lot of opinions that I kind of have

2:42

to change each week because you

2:44

know, the last time I did it, I was not expecting

2:46

a Shane crowd, a Shane Tibet crowd,

2:49

which is a difficult crowd

2:51

to give Gen Q opinions to. Yeah,

2:55

difficult in general. Just accept it,

2:57

Gigi's the new Shane. Yeah, it's weird

2:59

that we haven't all completely caught

3:01

onto that yet, but you know, we're still just

3:03

a few episodes in. So if you're in the area,

3:06

the pre-show

3:08

that we do starts around eight

3:10

and then they screen at 8 30, but

3:12

people will be getting there and there'll be like a

3:14

photo booth set up as early as six 30.

3:17

So Fridays, just

3:19

keep looking at our Instagram for

3:21

that. And also

3:23

speaking of merch, you

3:26

can get diking out merch. We have an Etsy shop.

3:28

We're also on T public. If you're looking for your

3:31

own justice for Jenny Schechter

3:33

shirt, believe it or not, people buy them or

3:36

a mind your heterosexual business

3:38

shirt. We have those on Etsy.

3:40

Check it out. We haven't mentioned it in a while. We

3:42

also haven't updated it in a while, but we're hoping

3:44

we've got the wheels spinning on some merch

3:46

that we want to put out there.

3:51

I'm exhausted from having the

3:53

possibly the gayest week. Yeah. How

3:56

are you going to pick one? I need to know. Can

3:58

you? What's the gayest thing you did this week? You're

4:00

back from P-town.

4:02

I am, and let's remind listeners that

4:04

last week, because we recorded back-to-back

4:08

days and a whole week

4:10

hadn't passed for a new gayest thing, we

4:13

predicted what our gayest things would be. And

4:15

I was so wrong of what

4:18

my gayest thing would be in P-town. The

4:20

first 24 hours were more gay than

4:22

anything I could have imagined.

4:25

Shout out to Topless Tours

4:27

if you are looking for a Dune Tour, we

4:30

are gonna plug our friend, Kristen Becker, who

4:32

is

4:32

a comedian, who is a bonafide

4:35

dyke, and runs these Topless

4:37

Tours, and is very knowledgeable and very

4:39

fun, and also has sunscreen

4:42

and gum and all sorts of goodies in the back. Yeah,

4:45

and takes great pictures

4:47

of you. Very great pictures, yes.

4:50

Never had someone so expertly

4:52

take lesbian pictures.

4:54

You know, like, when you have

4:56

your girlfriend and you're sort of like, and you just take

4:58

a picture of us in front of a monument or something,

5:01

and it's just a quick awkward,

5:02

and you're not sure how cool the person is. I

5:04

don't know. She was directing us, she

5:06

was having us, you know, kiss, getting

5:08

shots from behind over the shoulders. Ugh,

5:12

with the dunes in the background. Shout out to Kristen

5:14

Becker.

5:15

We had so much fun. I'm gonna say what my gayest

5:17

thing in P-town was, but then when I came

5:19

back, I had a pretty gay thing happen immediately.

5:22

So first in P-town, it was actually

5:24

outside of P-town, believe it or not.

5:27

I was in Wellfleet one afternoon,

5:29

and we

5:30

were in this shop, and a woman

5:33

says something who happened, I think, to be

5:35

the shop owner about being from Buffalo.

5:38

So immediately I yell from across the store,

5:40

I'm from Buffalo. We

5:43

ask where, turns out we're from the same town,

5:45

which doesn't happen much. She

5:47

went to my high school, granted 20 years earlier,

5:51

and then I'm thinking, okay, do you know my aunt

5:53

and my uncle who went there, and we start playing

5:55

this game of who do you know? So

5:58

we're going back and forth, and then she... asked

6:00

if I knew Miss Dunn

6:03

and Miss Dunn was my middle school

6:05

gym teacher who was clearly

6:08

a lesbian and even

6:11

in middle school I could recognize this

6:13

as a fact and when

6:15

she said that she was like Miss Dunn actually lives

6:18

here in Wellfleet now and

6:20

I was like okay

6:22

I have to share this story by

6:25

this point everybody in the store is

6:27

listening to me talk and

6:29

I'm like picture me a young

6:32

lesbian in

6:33

this small town outside of

6:35

Buffalo I'm at the mall

6:37

I see Miss Dunn there with what

6:40

I assumed to be her girlfriend they're

6:42

at the food court I

6:44

cannot stop looking at them I don't

6:47

know I'm gay yet but there's something about it

6:49

and they have this big bag at their

6:51

feet and it's a Banana Republic bag and

6:54

from then on I was constantly

6:56

walking by Banana Republic looking inside

6:59

for more lesbians being like this

7:01

is where the lesbians are and then

7:03

this woman at the shop goes well she's

7:05

married to a Banana Republic

7:08

store manager I like

7:12

this is okay but everybody had to like hear

7:14

the story of kind of like a weird ring

7:16

of keys moment for me

7:19

involving Banana Republic and

7:21

I think

7:22

publicly sharing that oh yeah

7:25

finding a mutual from my middle school gym

7:27

teacher was totally the gayest

7:29

thing that happened but

7:32

also when we got back from P-town I hung

7:34

up some blinds

7:37

that I custom ordered for our

7:39

house they've been sitting around for months and I haven't

7:41

put them up yet because the instructions were a little

7:43

bit intimidating and it seemed like

7:45

a big task and then finally I'm like fuck

7:48

it I'm putting up these blinds

7:50

and I put them up nailed

7:52

it nailed it they look great and

7:55

Cecilia was so turned on that she

7:57

pleasured herself oh my Oh

8:00

my God. I

8:03

was not expecting that from you. So

8:06

I left the next morning. So yeah,

8:08

we got back from P-town. I hang

8:13

these blinds and they're like, you know, those like

8:15

floor length blinds covering

8:17

like a patio door type thing.

8:19

And the next morning I left to

8:21

go get a COVID test because

8:24

I'm testing regularly and I was in P-town.

8:27

I have family coming. And I

8:29

left to get the COVID test early in the morning. And she was like, I

8:31

woke up and was looking at the blinds and just got some

8:33

turned on. Oh my God. Wow.

8:36

So yeah,

8:38

I think like doing that handy

8:40

job so well that it turned on my

8:42

wife was the gayest thing. I think so. How

8:45

about you, Melody? Oh my God. How do I

8:48

even top

8:49

that? Pun intended. I

8:52

did recently, Ali, that might be

8:54

the gayest thing. I wasn't planning on this. I just turned

8:56

to, we were driving somewhere the other day and

8:59

it's just like, I think I'm officially a top

9:01

now out of nowhere to

9:04

Ali. And she was like, you know what? Yeah,

9:06

I think I've noticed that. And I was like, okay,

9:09

okay. And

9:11

we just rode another hour in silence. Was

9:14

it the hand sex episode that got you thinking about it?

9:17

Yeah.

9:18

Also, all you sick freaks

9:21

messaging me, I'm not gonna tell you every detail

9:23

of fisting my girlfriend, all right?

9:26

Can nothing be sacred? My

9:29

God. No, I'm very

9:31

open about that stuff, but I don't think I'm gonna get into

9:33

the mechanics of it and

9:36

my DMs with y'all. Save

9:40

it for the Patreon. That's

9:42

for the Patreon, of course. Oh, $5

9:45

a month. Yeah,

9:48

we were in the car when I said that because

9:50

we went to Connecticut. I

9:54

had gotten for Ali's birthday in May.

9:57

Her birthday present was tickets to...

9:59

a country concert. We

10:02

know from the Brook Eden episode, I don't know much

10:04

about country. I know what

10:06

I don't like. And I don't know, I projected

10:09

it onto this band. But then Ally told

10:11

me one of them came out as

10:13

gay. So I was like, hell yeah. Suddenly I'm like

10:16

listening to all their music. That's all it takes. We're

10:19

completely, representation is important. So

10:21

the Brothers Osborne is

10:24

the band. And we went

10:26

down, we had gotten a hotel, down

10:29

the street. And Ally,

10:31

we talked about on our Patreon episode, all

10:34

the fun we had with Kristen Becker in P-town.

10:38

She gave Ally

10:40

a shirt that she sells, I believe,

10:43

some of her merch that says, vagina

10:45

is for lovers

10:46

in the same sort of logo font as

10:48

the Virginia is for lovers. Brilliant.

10:51

Brilliant. See, Ally

10:53

and I

10:54

got to the hotel room. We

10:56

have high THC tolerances. So we're like,

10:59

she got the biggest dosage of

11:01

an edible she could find and was like, we'll split this no problem.

11:04

And it was like such a classic mistake you would

11:06

make if you were 10 years younger.

11:08

Like we got way

11:11

too high. Like we were like crawling down

11:13

this main street. Five minute walk was like 15, just

11:16

like getting to this venue. Huge

11:19

new amphitheater in Bridgeport, Connecticut. It was

11:21

really actually gorgeous. Like

11:23

you had Metro North, you could see just like skirting

11:25

past it right next to the

11:27

stage. But of

11:30

course we were seated behind the

11:32

chattiest, like waspiest Connecticut

11:35

drunk couple in the whole state,

11:37

of course. This woman was like

11:39

performing for us. You ever like at a concert

11:41

or just like a public space where someone they're

11:43

talking loudly and they just assume you're listening,

11:46

but you're not. And they'll just keep turning and

11:48

catching your eye and just like

11:51

making sure you're laughing

11:52

at whatever they just said in their private

11:54

conversation you couldn't care less about. That

11:57

happened to us in line for ice

11:59

cream. It's so annoying.

12:01

Yeah, this guy thought he was so funny. And I kept,

12:03

I'm like, Cecilia, stop reacting. Or

12:05

he's gonna keep doing it. He's putting on a show for us

12:07

and I don't want it. Anyway. Yeah, Ally

12:10

got so high. All she was capable of was

12:13

like nodding and smiling. And

12:15

I was like, even that is too much,

12:18

this woman. So yeah,

12:20

there was a couple opening

12:21

acts. Sorry, I'm blanking on the name, but one of

12:23

them was woman fronted and they were really

12:25

good. I can't remember the name, but this

12:27

woman between each opening act

12:30

would get up. She was the most Connecticut

12:32

woman. I can't even, I don't know how to explain it. It's

12:34

just,

12:34

this is all trauma from growing up there, but

12:36

she would stand up in her like spares

12:39

and just clap, like the

12:43

most annoying golf clap and go, bravo,

12:45

bravo, bravo, bravo. In

12:49

turn to us, me and Ally be like, you know, you're

12:51

supposed to say bravo. I

12:53

don't know if you've ever gone to the theater.

12:57

We're like, excuse me? And

13:00

we're just too high to be snappy with,

13:03

Ally's trained acting theater

13:06

apprenticeships, very

13:08

much a theater person.

13:12

And I was just like, yeah, we live

13:14

in New York. We go to shows, we know. She's trying

13:16

to brush her off short terse sentences.

13:20

And she just wouldn't stop turning back,

13:22

turning to us, asking

13:25

us questions about us. Eventually, she

13:27

stopped and then she was doing one of those things

13:29

where she kept turning to see if we could catch

13:31

her joke shoes cracking. And she caught

13:34

Ally's shirt. She was wearing vaginas for

13:36

lovers and goes, oh my God,

13:38

I'm from Virginia. I'm from

13:40

Virginia. Where in

13:42

Virginia? Have you been recently?

13:44

Because yeah, I haven't been in years. And just

13:47

like was staring at the shirt and couldn't

13:50

read the word. And we were

13:52

too high to do anything about it. But

13:55

we just like cracked up in her face and eventually

13:57

did have to move to some free seats that

13:59

we'd been.

15:59

I was screaming about that and then she passed last

16:02

summer. Okay, cut to this last weekend

16:04

in Connecticut. I finally

16:06

meet Lauren, Max's wife. I'd never met

16:09

her. And one of the first things she says is, by

16:11

the way, I've thought about it a lot and

16:13

you can have Max's sperm. Wow.

16:18

And then I'm like, oh my God, amazing.

16:20

Cause Max is so sweet.

16:23

He's very attractive.

16:25

He's like, it's good sperm. I

16:27

would be like in a way related to like

16:29

that my second mom would in a way be like my

16:32

daughter. I would carry the baby. And

16:35

it would just be like connected to my best friend's family.

16:38

We like dreamed about this, right? Max

16:41

is, he's okay with it at the

16:43

beginning of the memorial. Then we go to their sister's

16:45

house for like more friends and family

16:47

and we're hanging out. I can see him getting more

16:49

and more uncomfortable with the idea as we talk

16:51

about it. The more he drinks, the more there's just this

16:53

like middle distance stare. Oh

16:56

boy. And then someone brought up there like

16:58

way to go Max. I'm coming around on that. And he's

17:00

just, he looks absolutely shook by the end of the

17:02

day. He's like, yeah, it's

17:04

a lot to

17:05

consider. It's really crazy

17:07

if you think about it. And I was like, don't think about

17:09

it. But

17:12

we were just kind of like jabbing, but

17:14

it's what Barb would have wanted. Do you know Barb

17:16

really wanted that? And he was like, yeah,

17:18

you're right. So now I've guilted through

17:20

morning, through

17:24

him morning his mom, I've like guilt secured

17:27

sperm. That's gotta be the gayest thing

17:29

of the summer. Cause I'm over just every

17:31

time you would start to be like, I don't know.

17:34

We're like, come on, it's what your mom wanted.

17:38

She really wanted it more than anyone. Yeah.

17:42

You're not really being manipulative because that's what

17:45

she wanted. Truly. Made it very

17:47

clear. And when

17:49

you're remembering someone's life,

17:51

why not talk about creating new life and

17:53

continuing the legacy of Barb through

17:56

sperm donation. I would love nothing more.

17:59

I love it. I love it. That's

18:02

great. I guess our joint gayest thing was

18:04

keeping our eyes peeled for Rachel Maddow while

18:06

we were in P-town. Oh yes, that was my

18:08

gayest thing. Yeah, we did slowly. We were tipped

18:11

off. Yeah, we were tipped off. We slowly

18:13

drove past Rachel Maddow's

18:15

house. We saw lights run

18:16

and Kristen was like, oh, you know what that means?

18:18

We go for a walk in this neighborhood early in the

18:20

morning around lesbian dog walking an hour. We're

18:23

gonna see Rachel Maddow. Yeah, we'll shoot you. Yeah,

18:25

all the lesbians walk their dogs at the same

18:28

time in P-town and then you never see him

18:30

again. It's really crazy.

18:34

Oh, speaking of crazy, I think it's

18:36

time to get into our topic because

18:39

today we are diking out with writer

18:42

Kayla Kumari, Upajah

18:44

about the real housewives

18:47

and life as a hashtag

18:50

Bravo Dyke. We're making it happen. Hashtag

18:52

Bravo Dykes. Kayla is the assistant

18:54

managing editor at Tri Quarterly and

18:56

a writer for Auto Straddle. Wow,

18:59

two Auto Straddle writers

19:01

so close together. I love it. She

19:04

made her fiction debut McSweeney's Quarterly

19:06

Concern and her short stories also

19:09

appear in Catapult, The Offing, Joyland

19:11

and others. Some of her pop culture

19:13

writing can be found in The Cut, AV

19:15

Club, as I mentioned earlier, Vulture and

19:17

Refinery29.

19:18

Let's get to

19:20

it.

19:21

Kayla, thank you so much for joining

19:24

us today. We're so

19:26

excited to have you to talk about

19:29

one of my favorite topics. But before we

19:31

get into that, let's learn

19:33

a little bit more about you. Do you mind

19:35

telling our listeners just a little bit

19:37

about your background? Imagine

19:40

if she minded, if she came on this podcast and

19:42

was like, how dare you? Well, I prefer to remain

19:45

anonymous because I'm

19:47

not a fan of the fact that

19:49

I prefer to remain anonymous. Yeah,

19:51

so my name is Kayla Kumari Paja.

19:58

I am a writer for Auto Straddle.

19:59

I've written there for, I think

20:02

it's gonna be six years in November, I'm

20:04

pretty sure. Yeah,

20:08

I write for a bunch of other places online. I write

20:10

about TV, I write about film, I write about

20:13

kind of queer pop culture type stuff. In

20:15

addition to being a critic, I'm also a writer

20:18

myself. I write fiction and nonfiction,

20:21

and I'm an editor at Tri

20:24

Quarterly, which is a literary journal based

20:26

out of Chicago.

20:27

And yeah, I think

20:30

that about covers it about me. And

20:32

I know that, Melody, you have

20:34

known about Kayla for a while. Kayla, you

20:37

came into my orbit specifically

20:40

because of your spot

20:43

on reviews of L

20:45

Word Generation Q. And I've

20:47

never, I had a look at the byline and be

20:49

like, did I write that, like these are all

20:52

of my thoughts and feelings captured

20:55

in a review.

20:57

So congrats on having great opinions. If

21:01

anybody wants to read them, they're with the AV

21:04

Club. Tell

21:06

us a little bit about this. Yeah,

21:09

so I wrote

21:12

about the original series

21:14

for the AV Club

21:16

way after the original series had ended.

21:19

Because I didn't actually watch

21:21

the show until after it had ended. I

21:23

was like, you know, closeted in my dorm

21:25

watching the original series, like, it was

21:27

like getting the DVDs

21:30

because it was on Netflix at the time. But

21:33

I was too scared to watch it on Netflix because somebody would

21:35

see. And so then

21:38

because I think I had like a shared account with my family at

21:40

the time. So I went to like

21:42

the media library on my college's

21:44

campus to rent the DVDs. Wow.

21:47

To watch it. Which in retrospect,

21:49

I've heard is the right way to watch

21:52

it because they changed the music

21:54

for Netflix. Like Netflix. I

21:57

recently heard this. Yeah. Netflix

21:59

has like stream. streaming rights thing. So they

22:01

change all the songs and the songs are kind of a big

22:04

part of the original and Generation Q actually.

22:06

So yeah, really are.

22:08

Yeah. So I

22:10

am glad that I watched it that way. But anyways,

22:13

so then I think it was in like 2015 or so

22:15

the AV club had

22:18

asked me to do a kind

22:21

of breakdown of the 10 essential

22:23

episodes of the original

22:26

series. And that was the first time I actually

22:28

wrote about the show and like my professional

22:30

life.

22:32

And I was like, Oh, right. How do I make like my

22:34

thoughts coherent about this? And

22:37

not just like talk about like how hot

22:39

bet is or like any of these like, I'm

22:41

like, how do I, you know, be a critic about this

22:43

right now? But it's actually very fun. I had to pick 10

22:46

episodes of the original series. How? Yeah,

22:49

it was hard. Because I think like the way that

22:51

that feature at AV club works, it's

22:53

not even necessarily like the 10 best.

22:56

But it's almost as if like here if

22:58

somebody was only going to watch 10 episodes

23:01

of the series, which ones should

23:02

they be like which are kind of the most exemplary

23:05

of the series? Yeah, I

23:07

had to pull it up because yeah, I

23:10

really want to. Sure. I'm sure

23:12

I've actually read this

23:14

at some point. It has

23:16

it has pretty solid SEO on it. So

23:19

anyone that like searches like best episodes of

23:21

the L word or whatever, it usually

23:23

comes up. But that was like, that was

23:25

also that was like an interesting time for

23:27

me because it was the very beginning of like

23:30

my career in TV criticism,

23:32

but also like very early on, when in

23:35

like my coming out process. So it was like kind of

23:37

those two things at once. But

23:39

that was that was the first time I wrote about the show. And

23:41

then what I

23:43

think,

23:44

pretty much as soon as Generation Q

23:46

was announced, like as soon as it was announced that it was

23:48

a thing that was happening, I reached

23:51

out to the editor at AV club and

23:54

was basically because I'm a freelancer there, like

23:56

I'm not on staff. So you know, I kind

23:58

of have to like pitch to cover certain shows.

23:59

but I remember sending this email as like the

24:02

most kind of just like glib I'd ever

24:04

been with him where I was just like like this has

24:06

to be like there's no There's

24:09

just no other person. It has to be

24:11

me and I mean she

24:13

agreed. She's like, yes, this is you So

24:17

and that's when I started doing season one

24:19

last season. Yeah Well,

24:22

I love it and I do

24:24

have to ask because this isn't part of Gen

24:27

Q

24:27

But what is your overall opinion on one

24:30

miss Jenny Schechter? so

24:32

I have an interesting

24:34

journey with Jenny Schechter because I feel like

24:36

I Used to ascribe

24:39

to like the dominant narrative of like

24:41

Jenny Schechter is the worst character ever

24:43

on television And

24:45

like she's terrible. She's horrible. I have

24:48

a lot of Jenny apologists

24:50

in my life We

24:53

might be two of those Have a

24:55

lot of dear friends who love Jenny and they

24:58

have they have made me see the other side

25:00

and I kind of

25:02

Find Jenny to be delightful

25:04

and how horrible she is now. I like

25:07

yes, I like her chaos I also

25:09

think like I mean obviously every writer

25:11

I know like makes fun of just like her writing

25:14

career and how ridiculous it is and stuff But I'm

25:16

also like she is such a writer

25:18

like I know other writers were exactly

25:21

like this Just like so

25:24

my so many insufferable writers

25:26

out there. Yeah I

25:30

have come around on Jenny.

25:32

I really have Same.

25:34

I mean for me it definitely wasn't love

25:36

at first watch It really was

25:39

upon revisiting the series that I'm like

25:41

actually

25:42

she is delightful in her chaos You

25:44

put it so well And I really had to ask

25:47

you not knowing but having a feeling you

25:49

might feel the same way And I wanted our listeners

25:51

to hear it from somebody Who

25:54

is smarter and more eloquent than me? So

25:56

thank you for saying that and

25:58

well

25:59

I also just think Mia Kirchner is like a

26:02

really great actor. Like she's great. I

26:04

know. I know. We miss her.

26:06

We want her on this podcast so

26:09

bad. And I just,

26:10

I've tried all my angles and

26:13

I don't know how to do it. One of

26:15

my like claim to fame that is not a real

26:17

claim to fame is that, and I don't know

26:19

if it's still true, I hope it is, but I know Wikipedia changes

26:21

all the time. But at one point I

26:23

was referenced in the footnotes on

26:26

Mia Kirchner's Wikipedia page. Oh

26:28

my God. Oh my God.

26:31

Huge.

26:35

I'll reach out again. I'll be like, you may know this

26:37

name. We've also had this. That'll do

26:39

it. They were in your Wiki notes.

26:43

That's great. Yeah. I

26:45

love it because when I read your recaps

26:47

for Gen Q,

26:49

I thought great.

26:51

These opinions are like the opinions

26:53

we're all having about Gen

26:55

Q, but we're hosting these watch parties

26:58

and Rietta Hudson. So then I go back

27:00

and I recap the episode

27:02

and people are not on board. Like the

27:05

last one I did, I was shocked at how

27:07

many people were groaning about Carrie

27:10

and Tina. And I'm like, how could you? They're

27:12

stuck in mid aughts.

27:14

Like, and they're all

27:16

young. Like, yeah, they

27:18

don't want it. They're all Tibet. They love Shane.

27:21

They're not a GG crap. I don't know. Tibet

27:23

has almost like turned into this thing where

27:26

like, I'm scared to say it because

27:28

like those fans are so intense and

27:30

like. They're like Swifties or just

27:33

like any other rabid stan community.

27:36

They put in their 10,000 hours on YouTube

27:38

videos and they're

27:40

not gonna throw all that away on Rosie

27:42

O'Donnell. Those montages take

27:44

time. Yeah. Okay.

27:49

Well, I think enough of that. We really need to get

27:52

into more important questions. Like what is

27:54

the gayest thing you did this week? Well,

27:56

honestly, I feel like this

27:58

is related because.

27:59

I'm struggling to think of something gayer than this. The

28:02

other night, my girlfriend and

28:04

I laid in bed and watched

28:07

my Generation Q screeners while

28:10

drinking like bed whiskey, basically.

28:14

Bed whiskey. I,

28:17

in researching you, learned that you

28:19

have a librarian girlfriend,

28:21

is that true? That makes it 10 times

28:23

gayer. She's

28:26

a librarian and novelist. I

28:30

love it. Yeah, she gets, you know, one of the

28:32

best perks

28:33

of dating me, I feel like, is getting those advanced

28:35

screeners so Gen. K.O. Yeah.

28:40

We're not here to talk about the L word today. No,

28:43

we're not. We're here to talk about

28:46

another channel. We're not here to talk about Showtime.

28:48

We're here to talk about Bravo.

28:50

I am so excited to have

28:53

another Housewives fam on this podcast.

28:55

I've been dying to speak to just

28:58

another queer person. There are a lot of podcasts

29:00

with gay men, but just like you don't

29:02

ever get to really dike out

29:05

about Housewives. I feel like there

29:07

are a lot of us out there, but I haven't

29:09

heard a lot of the discourse.

29:11

So I'm so excited to get into it. Can

29:14

you tell us about your Housewives journey? Yes,

29:16

I can. How you get into it. And

29:20

yes, I do like to believe that there are

29:22

at least dozens of us out there.

29:25

I have- I'm slowly becoming

29:28

one. I got her into New York this

29:30

year.

29:30

Yeah. That's usually like a starter

29:33

one that I use for people. Yeah. If not

29:35

Beverly Hills, then New York. Like New York is

29:37

gayer than Beverly Hills in the beginning. Yeah.

29:40

Those first few seasons of New York. I mean, we get like

29:42

a whole friendship breakup arc. Like

29:45

that's the gayest shit ever. But anyways, my

29:48

journey with Housewives, I was

29:50

living in Chicago and

29:52

it was Chicago winter. And

29:54

it was really cold. And

29:57

the only place that was warm in my whole-

29:59

apartment was literally my bathroom

30:02

because the radiator was in there. And

30:05

it was like, I was toward the beginning

30:07

of my kind of freelance career.

30:10

So I was like working

30:13

a lot, but kind of working

30:15

weird hours and just literally working

30:17

on the floor of my bathroom. And

30:19

I realized that I wanted to have

30:22

a TV show that I

30:24

was not writing about. That wasn't

30:26

for work. And at the

30:28

time, I only

30:29

covered scripted television. So I

30:32

was like, I'm going to get really into reality TV.

30:35

I had dabbled in reality TV for sure.

30:38

I watched Laguna back in the day. I watched The

30:40

Hills. I had a basis for

30:42

things. But I had never really

30:45

fully invested in it, especially just in

30:48

the way that I am with scripted television, where

30:50

yes, it's kind of my job, but it's also a

30:52

big passion of mine. So I was just like, what

30:54

can I watch that's going to be fun? I can

30:56

kind of lose myself in, and I'm like, never,

30:59

ever, ever going to write

30:59

about. And I chose

31:02

Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. I started with that

31:04

one, actually. Oh, OK. And

31:06

jokes on me, I absolutely have written about The Housewives.

31:09

Like, I have been like, oh, shah, shah. I've read your

31:11

writing about The Housewives, not even knowing it was you,

31:13

but like double checking today. I'm like, of course

31:16

she wrote that one. She wrote that one. Yes.

31:18

No, it's like, it's not possible for me

31:21

to become obsessed with something and then not

31:23

eventually write it. Like, that's just not a thing.

31:26

But for a while, it was just like, yeah, my kind

31:28

of like, I'm cold and depressed

31:29

in Chicago. I just want

31:32

to watch TV and shut out the

31:34

world. And that was, yeah, that was Beverly

31:36

Hills for me. And then I think I

31:38

went from Beverly Hills to

31:40

Vanderpump Rules, actually, before

31:42

I even started in New York. And

31:45

then I did all of New York very

31:47

fast. But it was interesting, because the first time I

31:49

was watching New York, I did not live there.

31:52

I was still living in Chicago. I think I

31:54

watched some of the mid seasons.

31:57

It's in season 13 or some shit

31:59

right now.

31:59

Yeah, I think some of the mid seasons

32:02

I did end up seeing in New York, I then

32:04

rewatched all of New York and

32:07

Beverly Hills with my current girlfriend because

32:09

she never watched Bravo shows before me. And

32:12

I would kind of watch them as I was cooking and increasingly

32:14

she was kind of like looking over my shoulder

32:17

like what's going on? What are people shouting

32:19

about right now? And so I was like, okay,

32:21

you're either like in or out. If you're in,

32:24

you're all in. Let's go back and rewatch

32:26

these. And it was fun to rewatch New York

32:28

after having lived there.

32:29

I don't live there anymore, but like it

32:32

was I was like, oh, I'm kind of picking up on some

32:34

things that I wouldn't have before this whole kind of like uptown

32:36

downtown craziness that they talk

32:38

about all the time. Yeah. Where

32:41

they try to turn it into some weird like

32:43

drawn line.

32:46

Yeah, even where they

32:48

spend their weekends and their summers,

32:50

it's like the Berkshires crowd versus the Hamptons

32:53

crowd. Oh yeah. I had

32:55

to like look up where Quag was. Right.

33:00

Yeah. Yeah. So that was

33:03

my housewife's journey. And now it's just like

33:05

there's no turning back. Like I watched

33:07

several franchises. My

33:10

girlfriend and I have been working our way through Atlanta,

33:13

which has been fun because a lot of that has been

33:15

new to

33:16

both of us. Yeah, very gay. And

33:19

we did Salt Lake City. The

33:24

newest and the wildest. And

33:27

yeah, get on board. There's just one season

33:29

everybody. There's still time before

33:31

the September premiere season two. It is

33:33

a doozy. It's a doozy. And it's going

33:35

to be a good second season because we've got somebody

33:37

probably getting arrested

33:40

and indicted. I mean

33:43

defrauding a lot of vulnerable Americans.

33:46

This is happening with two franchises right

33:48

now. I mean, grand does every does

33:50

every like city have

33:53

people who get arrested? Well,

33:55

actually a lot. We

33:57

had Teresa Judice.

33:59

The Jews guys went

34:02

to prison and we

34:04

have Salt Lake City now is

34:06

happening where it's ongoing.

34:09

Beverly Hills, there's an ongoing case as

34:11

well. New York, there's been

34:13

a lot of arrests, a lot of

34:16

one night in jail type stuff. It's almost

34:18

all alcohol related, DUI

34:21

type stuff. Right, more belligerent. Yeah.

34:23

I think Tinsley, it was a stocking

34:26

charge or something like that. Yeah.

34:29

I mean, a lot of mug

34:29

shots across the board on the housewives.

34:34

And yeah, but the, I mean, the legal

34:36

drama of Beverly Hills is like

34:38

keeping that franchise alive right

34:40

now. I feel like.

34:42

Who would have thought it just took someone's life

34:45

falling apart for the ratings to

34:47

go up on Beverly Hills. And that's what we're seeing

34:49

now. Right. We've had like a lot of one night in

34:51

jail, like drunk arrests here and there, but

34:54

like now congruently

34:56

to season two franchises where

34:58

we have people either

35:00

knowingly participating in like a

35:02

lot of embezzlement and like

35:04

defrauding vulnerable people

35:07

and like really facing the consequences

35:10

while they're filming, like we're going to see

35:13

a full on arrest in

35:15

season two of Salt Lake City with Jen Shaw,

35:18

Erica Jane. We're watching her

35:20

learn more and more about like

35:22

all the legal ramifications she's

35:24

facing for her husband defrauding

35:27

and stealing money embezzling from

35:30

plane crash victims, burn victims. He

35:33

would do a lot of class action lawsuits. We've never

35:35

seen crime on this level

35:37

and it's sort of happening with two franchises

35:39

right now. So anyone getting into it now,

35:42

I'm like, this is the top, like, I don't know. It's

35:44

a true crime. It's never been better to

35:46

get in. Basically a true crime series

35:48

at this point. And I don't

35:51

I don't know how you feel, but I fully think Erica

35:53

is lying. Me too.

35:55

Yeah. I'm acting. She's

35:59

she knew.

35:59

So yeah, she is guilty. Yeah, there's

36:02

just no way. This

36:05

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and the L word, but that's because

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it's where I learn about my patterns. No,

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Kroger, fresh for everyone. So

38:29

it's not the

38:30

promise of crime that got me

38:32

to start watching it. For

38:35

those of our listeners who really

38:37

are like, no, I'm not watching the show. Melody

38:40

kept insisting to me

38:42

week after week, how

38:44

gay it is. In lockdown, I was like, you

38:47

have to now. The way

38:49

that she was describing it, I was picturing

38:51

normal

38:53

stuff that I've seen my straight

38:55

friends do or straight people

38:57

in my orbit do. They go out, they

38:59

get a little bit handsy.

39:02

This is possibly

39:04

one of the most sapphic shows

39:07

on television. The

39:10

amount of affection,

39:12

both physical and emotional, between

39:15

these women is insane.

39:17

And then there are just

39:19

so many moments where I'm texting Melody

39:22

like, oh my gosh. I

39:24

just watched an episode the other night where

39:28

Sonya had a feature

39:31

and a magazine and she had a party.

39:34

And then this lesbian just approaches

39:36

her. And I'm still trying to find out

39:38

who this lesbian is. So if anybody

39:41

knows what I'm talking about, season 11,

39:43

I feel like one of our listeners has

39:45

to know who is this

39:47

dyke who just walks

39:49

up to Sonya and starts making

39:52

out with her intensely,

39:54

and then just walks away.

39:57

What is that? What's going

39:59

on here?

39:59

Morgan drive by lesbian

40:02

moment. Yeah,

40:04

right. And she has so many moments

40:06

and she's one who I really do feel like

40:08

she's bisexual and for whatever

40:11

reason is not owning

40:14

up to it. But I just watched an episode last

40:16

night where they were playing Truth or Dare

40:18

and Luann dares Bethany to

40:20

kiss Barbara with her tongue.

40:23

And she goes right into it without

40:25

hesitating. And Sonia is so

40:28

jealous. She's so jealous

40:30

and upset by watching this. I'm like,

40:32

Sonia, you're

40:34

gay. She

40:36

has raised millions for the LGBT. Yeah,

40:39

the LGBT.

40:42

Yeah, no, I mean, she's like always

40:45

come like literally this close to

40:47

say she's bisexual, I feel like. And like,

40:49

yeah, she has, you know, admitted

40:51

many times that she's very attracted to Luann.

40:55

She loves Luann. She was trying to kiss Bethany

40:57

in a pool at one point and yeah.

41:02

And yeah, she was definitely very jealous of

41:04

that Barbara moment. And Barbara does

41:07

identify as bi, right? Yeah, Barbara is bi.

41:09

Yeah, yes. That's what I thought.

41:11

I don't know. Sonia is always

41:12

like so close to it. And Sonia is very

41:15

clearly like self-destructive and unhappy

41:17

with any man that she tries to

41:19

be with. And I'm just like, why don't you just try

41:22

this? Yeah, it doesn't occur

41:24

to them. It's because they were just like of the

41:26

80s. I don't know. Like they

41:29

just it seems like it's just their generation

41:32

is holding them back from coming out. She also got

41:34

mad that Carol Radzewil wasn't like flirting

41:37

back. I don't know. She was mad because she was like, oh, Carol's

41:39

flirty. But she I think Sonia

41:41

even says like Carol's a bullshit lesbian

41:44

or something like. Yes, it

41:46

was bullshit bisexual. Because she's like, we

41:48

flirt. But then she won't actually like kiss

41:50

me basically. And she's like, right,

41:53

right. And that that's another

41:55

one, too, that Carol has something about

41:57

her that like every woman on the show.

43:59

She says it's like watching a train wreck. She's

44:02

embarrassed. She

44:05

believes it's all contrived, artificial storylines.

44:07

She hates how much plastic surgery there is. And

44:09

then Roxanne Gaye joined the conversation towards

44:13

the end of 2010s and went on, watch what

44:15

happens live, and says, this franchise

44:18

allows them to be their truest selves. We

44:20

see the mess and we see the amazing friendships

44:23

and everything in between where women are allowed to be

44:25

themselves and that's actually the most feminist thing

44:27

we can do.

44:27

So

44:30

I love reading about this like quarrel

44:32

between Roxanne Gaye and Gloria Steinem.

44:35

They've apparently like confronted each other

44:37

about this once they've gotten like rumblings

44:39

about what the other has said about the housewives.

44:42

So these conversations are happening

44:45

everywhere. And

44:48

I feel like if Camila Paglia

44:50

says

44:51

it's gay and feminist, it is. I mean,

44:53

have you seen her? Just a dike,

44:55

just such a dike. Yeah,

44:58

I feel like culturally we're moving towards

45:00

conversations about how it is at least

45:03

like good for women. I

45:05

feel like I was ashamed to tell people I

45:07

watched for the longest time and then

45:09

it took like Roxanne Gaye on watch what

45:11

happens live saying these things for me like,

45:13

you know what, no, it is important.

45:15

The show is important, but I actually don't know how to back

45:18

up why. Well, I

45:20

mean, this is something that I think about a lot actually.

45:22

And like for me, and this is often

45:25

where I fall. And sometimes I feel like it sounds like

45:27

a little bit of a cop

45:28

out, but I'm just like, well, I

45:30

think it's too simple to say that this kind

45:33

of stuff is bad for women. I also think

45:35

sometimes it's too simple to be like, this is like

45:37

super feminist and empowering or something like

45:39

that. I mean, especially like

45:42

feminist, that gets complicated

45:44

because yeah, the shows are like very

45:47

steeped in capitalism, steeped

45:49

in the patriarchy for sure. And like

45:51

all these kinds of systems. So

45:54

I personally don't think it's one or the other. I think it's

45:57

more nuanced than that. It's like somewhere in between. What

45:59

I will say is.

45:59

is that there are things that happen on

46:02

these shows across all franchises,

46:04

I would venture to say that we don't see

46:07

in any other TV. And like, sometimes

46:09

it's as like, simple as like literally women

46:12

over 50 just like horny

46:14

as hell. Like that is not

46:17

something or like when it is on TV, it's

46:19

sometimes like almost like a joke or like,

46:21

I don't know, the golden girls. Exactly,

46:23

exactly. And it's like, these are women,

46:26

not only horny, like they want to be like fucking all

46:28

the time, but they're also like

46:29

dating a lot. They're dating around.

46:32

Like, I mean, Ramona singer

46:34

is in her 60s now. And she's doing

46:36

that. Like, it's like, you

46:39

know, and you know, I'm not

46:41

saying that Ramona singer is good for television and

46:43

think I think her or

46:45

feminism or yeah, I

46:48

think that her time is finally up.

46:50

Like I kind of think that she might

46:52

be gone after the season. And I never would have

46:54

said that before, just because I felt

46:56

like she was such a fixture and Bravo is

46:59

like,

47:00

just sees her as like a compelling character

47:02

because of how like,

47:05

kind of volatile she

47:07

is. But now I think she has finally crossed

47:09

that line into like, maybe we're not gonna see any more

47:12

Ramona singer. But also I might be wrong. I don't

47:14

know. Bravo is a weird institution to like,

47:16

yeah, yeah, they,

47:19

especially in the past like year

47:22

or so, I have

47:24

been thinking a lot about like the way that

47:26

Bravo has done certain hirings and firings.

47:30

And there's like a lot of double standards in there.

47:32

Like there were a lot of cast members of Vanderpump

47:34

rules that were fired

47:35

for off camera, like

47:38

racist tweets that they did and stuff like that.

47:40

And I'm not saying that they shouldn't have been fired.

47:43

They absolutely should have been. But at

47:45

the same time, we have people on

47:47

Southern Charm who like own plantations

47:50

and stuff. Yeah, literally. And it's

47:52

just like, because that never really gets talked

47:54

about on the show, there's not the opportunity for

47:57

those people because that's the other thing

47:59

like so many of these.

47:59

reality people exist in bubbles. And

48:02

so they're not going to

48:04

say kind of racist stuff on camera

48:08

because they're almost in situations where

48:10

it's not going to come up because they're just around people

48:12

that are too like them. I think that's

48:14

the case for Southern Charm for sure. And

48:16

I haven't seen the current season. I've heard that race gets

48:18

addressed in the... And that's not house-wise, but I'm kind of talking

48:20

about Bravo. Yeah, we can talk about

48:22

Bravo at large. Multiverse now. But

48:25

yeah, I'm just like, okay, these people

48:27

live on plantations, have plantations.

48:30

But because they never talk about that or it's

48:32

like never a conversation on the show, that's

48:35

somehow okay. I don't know.

48:38

I've

48:38

been thinking about this a lot with Bravo lately. Because

48:41

also, Bravo has done some

48:44

more inclusive hirings in the past couple of

48:46

years, but also it took like 13 seasons

48:49

of New York to get a black woman. Not

48:51

only to get a black woman. In New York. Yeah,

48:53

like in New York. This is

48:55

wild. But then it also just feels so

48:57

surface level because they're like, well, now we're going to force

48:59

these people to talk about race and it's

49:01

going to be entertaining.

49:03

Yeah. We're kind of watching that

49:05

devolve right now on New York. It's

49:08

really sad too. Because

49:10

now the average viewer is watching Bravo. They've

49:12

never seen any women of color really

49:15

on New York. And now they're seeing the first

49:18

black housewife

49:20

try to carry the show, all these

49:22

conversations, doing so much emotional

49:24

labor and still

49:27

filming mid-pandemic. It's

49:29

boring and it's Ebony's fault

49:31

because of all these conversations about race

49:33

when really like there's only so much

49:36

they can do this season. They're

49:38

in a quarantine and it's

49:40

just really unfortunate that that's how

49:42

it's worked out and the blame has been

49:44

shifted to like the one

49:47

woman of color who's actually. Yeah,

49:49

it's not fair for her. Yeah,

49:51

like she feels like she has to kind

49:54

of have these conversations and stuff. And then

49:56

as a result, we don't get the real her and then.

49:58

Yeah.

49:59

Yeah, that then there

50:02

becomes this backlash against her where it's like, be real,

50:04

be real. It's like, no, she is being real. These

50:07

are the exact things she would be talking about

50:09

with these dumbass white women. They really

50:11

are. Right. It's like, I

50:14

don't know. New York has been tough this

50:16

season, I feel like. There's been a

50:18

real kind of swap with New

50:21

York and Beverly Hills for me, where it's like, for

50:23

a while I was like, Beverly Hills needs

50:25

this, although that's Denise Richards storyline

50:27

last season. You wanna talk about like- Some

50:30

dike drama. Let's talk about

50:32

the dike drama of Beverly Hills,

50:34

which she so eloquently wrote about

50:37

for auto straddle. And I remember reading

50:39

as it was happening. And that's when I first,

50:42

like your mind, your

50:44

name, sorry, popped in my mind and it stayed there

50:47

for having a Housewives episode. Was

50:49

that article? I actually read

50:51

it just so I could understand what Melody was

50:53

talking about. Screaming about

50:55

every week last spring. So we always

50:57

talk about the sort

51:00

of covert lesbian tension

51:03

in these franchises, but

51:05

we had overt lesbian

51:08

drama on Real Housewives of Beverly

51:10

Hills. Can you sort of tell our listeners

51:12

about this? Can you tell, I'm just trying to get all of our

51:15

listeners on board with these goddamn

51:17

franchises. And if this doesn't do

51:19

it, I don't know what will. Yes. Yeah,

51:23

this is such a hard one to summarize

51:25

because it was very complicated

51:27

and strange, but basically like the

51:30

gist of it is Denise Richards, who

51:32

like, I already knew a lot of lesbians who

51:35

were obsessed with Denise Richards. I feel like- Oh, come on.

51:37

Wild things. Wild things, yeah. Exactly.

51:40

So, you know, already an icon in our community.

51:43

She joined Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and

51:46

a rumor started circulating about

51:48

her

51:48

and a past Housewife named Brandy

51:51

Glamville, who is a chaos demon.

51:54

I kind of like Brandy Glamville almost in like

51:56

a Jenny Schechter way. It's like, she

51:58

knows how-

51:59

to like deliver the drama,

52:02

the chaos, like she

52:04

really does. Well, now I want to watch Beverly Hills. Yeah. If

52:07

you say there's a Jenny Schechter in the mix, I'm

52:09

going to watch. Rumors started circulating

52:11

that they had hooked

52:14

up, basically,

52:16

and maybe had like an ongoing

52:19

thing. Now Denise Richards is

52:21

married. She's married to a man

52:23

who specializes in like weird

52:25

sound

52:27

therapy. It's not really

52:29

therapy. He claims he can

52:31

cure cancer with it. He claims he can cure cancer

52:33

with like certain frequencies. Yes.

52:37

And that's really all you need to know about

52:39

it. Yeah, truly.

52:42

So she's married to him.

52:44

This rumor starts circulating. Brandon Glanville,

52:46

chaos demon, confirms the rumor,

52:49

you know, says, yes, we had

52:51

intimate relations. And now

52:53

she is like denying it

52:56

and kind of gaslighting me and all this stuff.

52:59

And the rest of the housewives, including

53:01

Lisa Rinna, who at the time was

53:04

very close with Denise Richards, confronted

53:06

her about it on camera.

53:07

That, you know, have you

53:09

been sleeping with Brandi Glanville,

53:12

basically, in the middle of a dinner on a cast

53:14

trip? And you know,

53:16

which like

53:17

not great to do. Overseas,

53:21

right? Overseas, this is your friend.

53:24

And you're not only like putting them on the spot, but

53:26

also like potentially outing them.

53:29

And Denise Richards tried to fix

53:32

that by just shouting bravo, which

53:34

like so think about the housewives is

53:37

that there are very

53:39

rarely breaks in the fourth wall. In fact, if

53:41

the fourth wall is being broken, that means something

53:44

good is happening. I

53:46

know. It's happened a lot over the last couple of

53:48

years, a lot more fourth wall

53:50

breaking. Yes. That's how you know it's been getting

53:52

real good. Exactly. There are some

53:55

iconic kind of fourth wall breakings

53:57

in the past, but yeah. So

53:59

she.

53:59

just starts shouting Bravo, because she

54:02

thinks that that means that they'll kind of cut out

54:04

this footage. And she's

54:06

talking about how she's a married woman, and she

54:08

you know, is not having an affair. And it

54:11

turns into a whole thing. It's like stretched

54:14

over a few episodes. And then Brandi

54:16

Glanville is continuing to insist that this

54:18

happened. And Denise overcorrects

54:22

and is not even just like this didn't happen.

54:24

But I barely know this woman.

54:26

We're not friends. We're not close.

54:28

And there's tons

54:29

of evidence to the contrary. She

54:31

yeah, she like full pivots to just like, who

54:34

is she? I don't know. Yeah. And then they're like

54:36

all these texts being like, I love you like, ha

54:38

ha, like, see you soon. And like they did

54:40

very Donald Trump offer. Yeah, I was

54:43

like, Oh, no, it's the coffee guy. Where

54:45

she's like, she could have fixed it. And that's the

54:47

thing about the housewives, like a lot

54:49

of them get caught lying on camera all

54:51

the time, which is interesting. Because sometimes they'll

54:53

be literal proof. Otherwise, like,

54:56

they'll

54:56

roll the tapes quite literally.

54:58

And be like, No, you said this before. Or yeah, they just

55:02

like, overcorrect the lie

55:04

to the point where it's just like, well, now we

55:07

know this is true. Yeah,

55:10

it's like you didn't have to say like, Oh, I've never

55:12

met this woman. Like there's so much there's

55:14

a whole scene between them where they get like dinner

55:17

on the show before these guys

55:19

come out. And they're being very pretty.

55:22

Yes, they do cut to it a lot. So

55:24

that that's like the date drama with Denise Richards.

55:26

And it turned out a whole thing. She left the show.

55:29

She continued to deny it. She's

55:31

no longer friends with Lisa Rinna. It has

55:34

continued to have kind of ripple effects. And

55:36

it still comes up in the current season. So

55:38

are you ready for

55:41

potentially Bravo to cast an actual

55:43

open and out lesbian or would that

55:46

sort of ruin the franchise? Like, do

55:48

you like watching these straight women

55:50

and escaping into their antics,

55:53

belligerents, just like out

55:56

of control storylines? Or

55:58

would you want to see

55:59

like

56:00

a lesbian and

56:03

let her face that same scrutiny we

56:06

all give when watching the Housewives. I'm

56:09

definitely mixed on it. Cause that, well, so

56:12

technically Orange County does

56:14

have a lesbian now. She came out later

56:17

though. Like she's been on the show for a while and

56:20

then came out and that I don't

56:22

really follow. I don't watch Orange

56:24

County. I follow the needs. That's like the one I don't watch

56:26

too. Yeah. For any friend, for

56:29

anything that I don't watch I still like follow the

56:31

news on it. Yeah.

56:33

And that all

56:35

seems like a wild situation because

56:37

she's been married to a man for a long time. She

56:40

comes out as a lesbian. She

56:42

gets a much younger girlfriend, which great. Love

56:44

that for her. I follow her

56:47

on Instagram and she like doesn't

56:49

want her husband who

56:52

I think they're separated, but I think they're

56:54

still living together. They have a lot of kids together. She

56:56

doesn't want him to date. She's like jealous

56:58

of him dating. And she's really like, I

57:01

know that this is like, you know,

57:03

this doesn't make sense. And I'm being

57:05

like super jealous and whatever, but she's just like,

57:07

yeah, like she's like, I'm a lesbian. I'm

57:09

living my life, but I don't want him to live his

57:11

life. But

57:14

that kind of brings me to my point of like,

57:17

I know that like any lesbians on these

57:19

shows are just going to be like

57:21

not people that I want to associate.

57:24

Right. She's

57:26

like, no, we don't claim her or it's, I

57:30

know it's not confirmed yet. It's still just

57:32

a rumor. Real Housewives of Miami

57:34

is rebooting. That part is confirmed. Like they're

57:36

doing a new Real Housewives of Miami. I live

57:38

in Miami and they

57:42

are filming right now. And there's

57:44

just been like leaks based on like,

57:46

cause they haven't announced cast, but based on

57:48

where they're filming and where they've been seen, they've been kind

57:50

of like piecing together the cast. And I guess there

57:52

is going to be a queer woman. It's

57:55

actually tennis legend, Martina

57:58

Navratilova's wife.

58:00

Oh, like a former

58:02

supermodel. She is going

58:05

to be on Real Housewives of Miami.

58:07

So I'm like, not only is there like, you know,

58:09

a lesbian housewife coming, it's like

58:11

in the city that I live in now. That's

58:15

awesome. That's so exciting. And I do wonder if like

58:17

that means Martina Navratilova is gonna

58:19

like show up on the show at some point, cause I feel

58:21

like spouses always show up.

58:23

Yeah.

58:24

Yeah, some franchises more than others.

58:27

For sure. They'll feature characters

58:30

basically. Real Housewives of New Jersey is

58:32

like, yeah, the husbands are their own cast

58:34

and a lot revolves around them. Well,

58:36

that's cool. I know Andy Cohen went on

58:39

Garcelle Bouvet, Real Housewives

58:41

of Beverly Hills cast members podcast

58:43

and said, we've almost cast several

58:45

lesbians. So I just

58:48

thought that would mean

58:49

like more of the same. We would never get one.

58:51

And we would just speculate for the longest time. But

58:53

that's exciting news potentially.

58:58

I do wanna go back to one of the things

59:00

you said earlier about what

59:02

makes Housewives such a good show

59:05

and about how it covers topics

59:08

that you don't see anywhere

59:10

else. Like a lot of this stuff, you really can't

59:13

write it. It's things that most

59:15

your average person would never think

59:18

of as a subplot

59:20

in a show. But it's kind of the same reasons

59:22

why I like like the original L

59:24

word, even though it was a mess. It

59:26

was like, lesbians are all cheating

59:29

and transphobic and butrophobic

59:32

and whatever. And it wasn't a good look

59:34

for lesbians, but I was like, for women,

59:37

look at all these things we're talking about. We're focusing

59:40

on careers. We're focusing on friendship,

59:43

on healthcare, on all these

59:45

different things

59:47

that you don't see elsewhere. So that's

59:50

what I like about Housewives when you're talking about,

59:52

is it feminists? Is it not

59:54

like, again, I was watching last night

59:57

and Tinsley, who's one of those characters,

59:59

who feels not

1:00:02

feminist at all. And she just wants to be like,

1:00:05

I kept woman. But then it's like her friends

1:00:07

being like,

1:00:07

you need to stand up for yourself and like

1:00:10

really challenging her on these maybe

1:00:12

outdated ideas that

1:00:15

she has from the way that she

1:00:17

grew up and just like hearing those conversations

1:00:20

between friends and also the career

1:00:22

stuff and just seeing like, how aggressive

1:00:25

Bethany is with

1:00:27

self promotion and all that. Like you don't

1:00:30

really see that much unless it's

1:00:32

like a villain type character or something

1:00:35

on a show. Yeah, I would like I

1:00:37

had been thinking about this kind of at

1:00:39

the beginning of our conversation. I was like, oh, I think

1:00:41

there actually is like weirdly a clear through

1:00:43

line between the L word and the housewives

1:00:46

where it's just like, first of all, it's just like men

1:00:48

are taking a backseat. Like it really

1:00:51

is like an ensemble of women in

1:00:53

this specific way. And

1:00:56

with the exception of Jersey. Yes. But

1:00:59

also my favorite thing ultimately about

1:01:00

both the L word and

1:01:06

the housewives are the friendships like

1:01:09

so yeah, you talking about that. It's just like

1:01:11

I've always loved the friendships in the

1:01:13

L word like even just scenes

1:01:15

where like friends are all kind of like piled on a bed together like talking or whatever

1:01:18

like talking about their drama. Yeah,

1:01:21

yeah, I love this. Like this is very real

1:01:23

and the housewives I feel the same way. I

1:01:25

feel like some of the best like storylines which

1:01:27

like they really are storylines like it's

1:01:29

you know, it's reality but it's produced and

1:01:32

some of the best ones have involved major

1:01:34

friendship breakups like or

1:01:37

like friends kind of breaking up and getting back together

1:01:40

like New York in particular like

1:01:42

that that show like they hate

1:01:44

men on that show like they straight up hate men.

1:01:49

They all have like bad exes

1:01:52

they're like

1:01:53

and then Beverly Hills some of the early season too. They're

1:01:55

always talking about like well, I only want like

1:01:57

to hang out with girls girls like I like girls.

1:01:59

girls. And like, okay,

1:02:02

just say lesbian. But

1:02:05

no, I like I love the friendship

1:02:08

storylines a lot. There have been some really

1:02:10

good, very real again,

1:02:12

because they are real friendship

1:02:15

breakups where it's like those people don't talk to each

1:02:17

other anymore in actual

1:02:19

life off camera. And

1:02:21

I think that's kind of good.

1:02:23

I think friendship breakups are a hard thing.

1:02:25

Like TV so rarely wants to do that

1:02:28

because that messes up scripted

1:02:29

television because then it's just like, how do we

1:02:32

get these characters in a scene together if they've gone through

1:02:34

this friendship breakup? But housewives,

1:02:36

we kind of see it a lot and it leads to like

1:02:38

people leaving the show. And so then

1:02:41

like basically kind of changing their job

1:02:43

because it is a job because they've

1:02:45

gone through these like intense

1:02:47

friendship breakups that are as intense as they are because

1:02:50

these people like care about each other

1:02:52

as much as they do.

1:02:53

Right here so much. They're

1:02:56

intense, but they also for

1:02:58

some of them, they happen over like an entire

1:03:00

season. I mean, again, it's it's Purdue.

1:03:03

So who knows the actual time, but it feels like you're

1:03:05

kind of watching things

1:03:07

disintegrate like with Bethany and Carol

1:03:10

and all the factors that go into that.

1:03:12

And any other type of

1:03:14

show wouldn't give something like that that amount

1:03:17

of time or nuance.

1:03:19

I felt like the Bethany and Carol thing. I mean,

1:03:22

I have opinions about it that I'm

1:03:24

like what was really at play, but

1:03:26

it wasn't like it was one clear thing

1:03:29

that's like, oh, they had a falling out over

1:03:31

this and then that ended the friendship.

1:03:34

Like it was just like this really complex

1:03:36

thing that you don't get to see. But the other thing

1:03:39

I

1:03:40

want to talk about relative

1:03:42

to that is the fighting because this

1:03:45

is the reason why I

1:03:48

didn't want to watch Housewives,

1:03:50

why I resist a lot of reality TV

1:03:52

is I hate watching

1:03:55

fighting and

1:03:56

I because I feel

1:03:58

like you're capturing people.

1:03:59

when they're at their worst. And

1:04:03

it just makes me feel sad. But

1:04:05

the fighting and housewives,

1:04:08

like there's also so much apologizing

1:04:11

and making up and

1:04:13

then really trying to navigate how

1:04:16

do you make up with this person? What

1:04:19

does this person need to hear

1:04:21

in this case? And then it doesn't always

1:04:23

work. And then they have to like try again. And

1:04:26

it's kind of beautiful. It's just like a lot like

1:04:28

romantic relationships. And then they come

1:04:30

out either stronger on the other

1:04:33

side or there's like lingering trust issues.

1:04:35

But the way that they fight,

1:04:37

like, yeah, some of them are really ridiculous

1:04:40

and crazy, but others

1:04:42

I'm like, this kind of teaches you

1:04:45

how to fight and get

1:04:48

over it and move past things. Yeah,

1:04:50

because I do feel like, you know, not everyone,

1:04:53

but the vast majority

1:04:55

of us do not fight in the way that they fight

1:04:57

on the housewives. Like we're not screaming in the middle

1:04:59

of a restaurant at friends. Like

1:05:02

that is not happening. At

1:05:04

the same time, I do think that friends

1:05:07

fight a lot. Obviously people in like

1:05:09

romantic relationships fight a lot,

1:05:12

but also like

1:05:13

that whole process of like apologizing

1:05:16

or taking accountability, being like, this

1:05:18

is what I did. Like that's really hard

1:05:20

and people don't do that all the time. They're

1:05:22

just kind of like, oh, like let's move on. Let's

1:05:24

like not talk about it or whatever on the housewives

1:05:27

because of the nature of like the fact that

1:05:29

it's spectacle on four TV, they have to talk

1:05:31

about it. Like they have to be like, we're going

1:05:33

to talk about this. So even though the fights are

1:05:35

so much more extreme and like

1:05:37

almost theatrical, like compared

1:05:40

to real life, the actual apology

1:05:42

and like accountability process is like really interesting

1:05:45

to see because that's what we technically

1:05:47

should all be doing in our lives,

1:05:49

even when we have like normal fights that are not,

1:05:51

you know, screaming at each other in the middle of a restaurant,

1:05:54

like a 10 person table,

1:05:56

seeing each other. But like we should be doing

1:05:58

these same things. We should be.

1:05:59

like, you know, apologizing, like coming

1:06:02

over for coffee the next day and being like, look,

1:06:04

like, I know that I did this or

1:06:06

whatever. And to see that on TV is kind

1:06:08

of interesting. Because I mean,

1:06:11

I like the fighting on reality

1:06:13

TV. I really do. I'm a sucker for it. It's

1:06:15

like, it does feel like spectacle to me.

1:06:17

It feels like theater. It's like, yeah,

1:06:20

my girlfriend's funny, because that's definitely her least favorite

1:06:22

part of it.

1:06:23

She I mean, she likes reunions,

1:06:26

she likes to watch them, but I always make fun of her because she

1:06:28

always kind of has to be like on her phone

1:06:30

while she's watching. I always

1:06:33

like I'm like, you can't make eye contact.

1:06:35

She doesn't like to make eye contact with with

1:06:38

reunions. And I live

1:06:40

for the reunions. I love them. But that is

1:06:42

definitely where you know, the most kind of like

1:06:45

absurd yelling and screaming and fighting.

1:06:47

Oh, yeah.

1:06:48

There is like a full on

1:06:51

lesbian encounter and

1:06:53

a fight that spawns from

1:06:55

it just because one of them doesn't want to

1:06:57

acknowledge that she did like

1:07:00

try to hook up with the other one when she was drunk

1:07:02

and the cameras were down. And

1:07:04

the way she sort of confronts her about

1:07:06

it

1:07:07

at that reunion for that season

1:07:09

is just so

1:07:11

it's I don't know. They're

1:07:14

closeted. Like some of them are

1:07:17

in fact bisexuals who won't say

1:07:19

and when they're off camera are like

1:07:22

hooking up, making out here and there. But

1:07:24

one of them went as far as trying to like pressure

1:07:26

the one another one and her husband

1:07:29

into a threesome. And when the

1:07:31

one who didn't want to do

1:07:32

it because the one who is being pressured

1:07:34

into it doesn't drink candy. She

1:07:37

remembers everything and was like, I wasn't going to try

1:07:39

to do that with you. You were really drunk. But she tried

1:07:41

to then have that conversation on the

1:07:43

show and that crossed a line for

1:07:45

Portia and was like, you don't

1:07:47

talk about my queerness on the show. Like that was at

1:07:49

the heart of a lot. They're fighting

1:07:51

that season. So

1:07:53

I don't know. There's like so much covert

1:07:56

and overt homosexuality. But Atlanta

1:07:59

feels like. the gayest one, and I

1:08:01

know there's a lot of homophobia within the black community,

1:08:03

a lot of different factors at play where they

1:08:05

just don't acknowledge

1:08:08

it, don't highlight it, but that to me

1:08:10

does feel like the most genuinely

1:08:12

gay franchise. Especially

1:08:15

this last season, there was one Bachelorette party

1:08:17

where they all were in leather and lingerie and

1:08:21

in a sex dungeon whipping each

1:08:24

other, grinding on each other, like

1:08:26

humping each other and really

1:08:29

into it, the more they drank, the more

1:08:32

free they got with it, and then the

1:08:34

next day, they're okay, they don't talk about

1:08:36

it. But yeah, if

1:08:37

anyone's looking for gay, just

1:08:41

gay housewives, Atlanta is the gayest

1:08:43

to me. But the most complicated

1:08:46

to talk about. For sure, and Atlanta's

1:08:48

just really good. It's

1:08:50

like, I don't know, that franchise does

1:08:53

a lot of things and there are

1:08:55

some long time people on that show that

1:08:58

I just love, like

1:09:00

Candy. Candy is great,

1:09:02

she's a great housewife. And

1:09:05

there are also people on there

1:09:07

for

1:09:07

a very short amount of time that also really

1:09:10

make their splash. Yeah,

1:09:13

Atlanta's got a lot going on for sure. It's

1:09:15

so interesting because I feel like, especially in the past

1:09:17

couple of years, so many of the franchises, there

1:09:20

have been not just some

1:09:22

textual gay things happening, but actual

1:09:25

kind of queer things happening. But

1:09:27

these are still

1:09:29

such kind of heteronormative

1:09:31

spaces that all of these franchises

1:09:34

exist in,

1:09:35

and how they kind of reckon with that and stuff.

1:09:37

What is your favorite franchise then, and

1:09:40

why? And then your favorite housewife?

1:09:42

Yeah, favorite

1:09:45

franchise. So this is

1:09:47

another thing that I feel like was a journey for me because

1:09:50

back in the day, it was definitely

1:09:52

Beverly Hills. Like early

1:09:54

and mid seasons, Beverly Hills, I loved.

1:09:56

There's something about the artifice of

1:09:59

Beverly Hills.

1:09:59

itself as a place that just like,

1:10:02

I loved it felt like theater,

1:10:04

it felt like I don't know. And back

1:10:06

in those days, like Kyle Richards was like

1:10:08

my favorite housewife for sure. And like Kyle

1:10:11

and Lisa Vanderpump in particular, I was

1:10:13

like very invested in their friendship and everything.

1:10:15

And

1:10:16

then for a while,

1:10:18

it was New York,

1:10:21

I was

1:10:21

all in on New York. And then for a while out

1:10:24

New York was outperforming Beverly Hills, which I now

1:10:26

feel like has flipped in Beverly Hills is more interesting.

1:10:29

But my favorite at the moment, I do

1:10:31

think is Atlanta. Like

1:10:33

I really love Atlanta so

1:10:35

much.

1:10:37

The funniest. I've it's it's so

1:10:39

funny. It's very funny. It's like,

1:10:42

like I was saying before, it kind of has everything. It's

1:10:44

just good. I love this is such a small

1:10:46

thing. But like, they do eat on

1:10:49

that show. And all these other shows,

1:10:51

they don't fucking eat on camera ever.

1:10:54

Like they're like, you know, there are

1:10:56

some kind of more extreme instances

1:10:59

on some of these housewife shows of like really

1:11:01

intense dieting and eating disorder stuff type

1:11:03

stuff. But like, they also just like they don't

1:11:06

eat on camera on Atlanta.

1:11:07

They eat on camera.

1:11:09

They get angry when there's not enough food.

1:11:12

Like it's like they'll make

1:11:14

it a point to talk about it until they're properly

1:11:16

fed like they eat so much.

1:11:19

Yeah, I love I like that they eat on Atlanta.

1:11:23

I'm in a group chat with two friends of mine.

1:11:25

And we periodically

1:11:28

will send each other like housewives prompt

1:11:30

questions. And the whole idea of it is like

1:11:32

you just have to answer as quickly as possible.

1:11:34

And a lot of times it's like, rank everyone on

1:11:36

Beverly Hills right now. These rankings change

1:11:39

like week to week though. And our favorites

1:11:41

change week to week also. Yeah,

1:11:44

who's your favorite housewife of all time, but

1:11:46

the all of all time changes

1:11:49

kind of often. I

1:11:49

like the answer I most

1:11:52

often give is Sonia Morgan. I

1:11:55

love Sonia Morgan so

1:11:57

much. She is just like,

1:11:59

So funny. I mean lately

1:12:02

she's been a little too dark for me. I feel

1:12:04

like it's getting dark with the drinking Yeah,

1:12:07

getting dark. It's like maybe I'm

1:12:09

not there yet. It's just like she

1:12:11

probably reality

1:12:13

TV anymore like

1:12:16

But but she is the answer I usually come

1:12:18

back to I feel myself edging closer

1:12:20

and closer to Portia Williams Like she

1:12:23

couldn't become one of my favorite small she's like

1:12:25

one of my best friends She's her favorite of

1:12:27

all time and then another one of my best friends Bethany

1:12:30

and Kyle are like her top ones at one point

1:12:32

Kyle was really high up there for me, which seems kind

1:12:34

of random like Kyle's not high drama

1:12:37

or anything Like but I don't know she's

1:12:39

good at reality some of those Beverly Hills girls

1:12:41

are just like good at being on TV

1:12:44

Yeah, Kyle. I mean she's been on TV her

1:12:46

whole life kind of in a way little

1:12:48

house on the prairie Carolyn and

1:12:52

Yeah, she She's

1:12:55

good when she's trying to be the funny one I love

1:12:58

and that's how it started off before she was just like the kooky

1:13:00

like class clown of the cast and then like in The

1:13:02

last few seasons I feel like she's been trying

1:13:04

to be like the head bitch in charge Like

1:13:07

I'm like the Regina George

1:13:09

and I didn't like her in that role And then

1:13:11

I think she's backed off of that vanderpump

1:13:14

a little yeah, and it's just like yeah

1:13:16

Yeah, no, I agree. I I still like

1:13:19

Kyle, but she's not like high ranking to me

1:13:21

anymore I don't know

1:13:22

my favorite thing also on like the bitch sesh

1:13:24

podcast is they're like our opinions change every

1:13:26

week and the thing about The housewives is like

1:13:29

it's true that like you could really like

1:13:31

someone and they can just like say or do

1:13:33

something Awful like the next oh,

1:13:35

yeah, and you're just like okay Or

1:13:37

even like for an entire season just kind of be

1:13:40

horrible and you're like alright I'm done done with

1:13:42

you on to the next one. I guess like

1:13:45

Yeah, it changes so quickly.

1:13:47

There's one cast member on Beverly

1:13:49

Hills. I hated hated Up

1:13:51

until a couple weeks ago Sutton Strack

1:13:54

on Beverly Hills. I thought she was just like

1:13:56

an old or just like a

1:13:58

racist white lady

1:13:59

from the South with too much

1:14:02

money. And then now

1:14:04

that we're getting into the Erika Jane

1:14:07

lawsuit, she's the only one not blindly

1:14:09

defending her and being like, she defrauded

1:14:12

innocent people. And it was like, she

1:14:14

knew. And she's just speaking that

1:14:17

truth that no one is. And now I love

1:14:19

her, but I could go from like screaming

1:14:22

at my TV, like this racist bitch,

1:14:24

just to like, well, look at that voice

1:14:26

of reason. Yes,

1:14:29

I feel that all the time. Like it's like constant

1:14:32

kind

1:14:32

of like, I love you this week. I

1:14:34

hate you this week, whatever. I definitely felt that a lot

1:14:37

on Salt Lake City. I felt like I, when I first

1:14:39

went into it, I was pretty into Genshaa.

1:14:41

Then toward the end of that season, I was like, no, I'm

1:14:44

scared of Genshaa in a bad way. And that was

1:14:46

before I even found out she was like, you know,

1:14:49

scamming old people. Yeah.

1:14:52

God, so dark.

1:14:53

People think it's fluff, but there's so much darkness.

1:14:56

There is a lot of darkness. I also like

1:14:59

the one thing that I have to say

1:15:01

is that I feel like it's under talked

1:15:04

about that almost every psychic that

1:15:06

has been brought on to these housewrest shows has

1:15:08

been correct. Yes, thank

1:15:10

you for bringing that up. Oh

1:15:12

yes, there is this witchy psychic element.

1:15:15

There is. Every season, there's

1:15:17

always some type of. When they bring you

1:15:19

a psychic or a psychic. Even like a coffee leaf

1:15:21

reader or like any kind

1:15:23

of medium psychic type has

1:15:25

been correct. Yeah. Yes. And

1:15:28

every time a couple has

1:15:30

gotten their vows renewed on

1:15:33

any franchise, they have then

1:15:35

been doomed to crash and

1:15:37

burn and break up. That's a curse. That's

1:15:39

happened every time. That's another curse.

1:15:42

Did we go to. I

1:15:44

feel like that's a real life curse. Yeah. Just

1:15:47

don't do that. Don't do that. Did

1:15:50

we convince our listeners, Carolyn? I've

1:15:54

been trying to articulate

1:15:56

the queerness of the housewives

1:15:58

for years.

1:15:59

if you're a Housewives fan, this has been

1:16:02

a fun episode. If you are

1:16:04

not, I still think it's very

1:16:07

interesting. I think you've made a very

1:16:09

compelling case for it, and I would

1:16:11

recommend to go watch it.

1:16:13

I know what helped me in getting into it

1:16:16

was on the past episode

1:16:18

when Jess said, start with

1:16:20

Roni season seven so

1:16:24

that you can appreciate season 10. And

1:16:26

I'm like, that's a doable assignment.

1:16:29

And now I'm like fully on board and willing

1:16:31

to explore the others based on

1:16:33

recommendations. But Kayla, do you

1:16:35

have a recommended starting

1:16:38

point for people? Because it is overwhelming.

1:16:40

It is overwhelming. Yeah. And keeps people away

1:16:42

for that reason. Yeah, I think that's how I felt in the beginning.

1:16:47

Yeah, I think, I honestly

1:16:49

think seasons one of

1:16:52

Beverly Hills and seasons one of Roni

1:16:56

are like the places to start. Those

1:17:00

early seasons, I feel like

1:17:02

kind of trap you a little bit, because it's

1:17:04

also very old school reality in those

1:17:07

seasons. Like it's kind of like DIY

1:17:09

feeling a little bit. Yeah, pre-social

1:17:11

media, there's something about watching the Housewives

1:17:13

the old seasons before the

1:17:17

Instagram industrial complex and

1:17:21

like the Housewives to influencer pipeline,

1:17:24

all that. Like when they didn't realize

1:17:26

there would be like commentary

1:17:28

as they were

1:17:29

talking, as things would air, like they

1:17:31

were a lot more free and

1:17:34

there's no inhibition. I don't know. They

1:17:36

were a lot more

1:17:37

themselves, I feel before, I

1:17:40

don't know, whenever Instagram got

1:17:43

popular.

1:17:44

There's something extra reckless

1:17:47

about those seasons that I love. Yeah,

1:17:49

I agree. First three seasons of Roni

1:17:51

in particular are like very good. Like

1:17:53

New York in those first three seasons,

1:17:56

it's just good.

1:17:58

I just want more lesbians talking.

1:17:59

about Housewives. More Bravo Dykes.

1:18:02

More Bravo Dykes. I do think

1:18:05

every single verb from

1:18:07

the L word original theme song

1:18:11

happens on the Housewives. Yes. Yes.

1:18:14

That should be the theme song for Housewives. They should

1:18:16

repurpose it. I'm

1:18:18

obsessed with all these parallels now and I should

1:18:21

have mentioned earlier, but you, as

1:18:23

we were stalking you, I sent Carolyn,

1:18:25

you had

1:18:26

made a tweet in like 2015 and it was like linked

1:18:29

to an auto straddle article and it was embedded

1:18:31

and that's how I saw it. But like you're

1:18:34

like the similarities,

1:18:36

like the look and feel between the L word and

1:18:38

the Housewives were

1:18:40

so spot on these screen grabs. You

1:18:43

could have confused

1:18:45

any for either show. Yes.

1:18:48

There are so many parallels between

1:18:50

the two shows I will be thinking about for the rest of the

1:18:52

night. Well,

1:18:54

Kayla, where can people follow you

1:18:56

on social media and read your amazing reviews

1:19:01

and other works that you have? Yeah.

1:19:04

So I'm at Kayla Kumari on

1:19:06

literally everything, all social media.

1:19:10

And I am recapping Generation

1:19:13

Q season two for the AV Club right

1:19:15

now. I write about other stuff for them, but

1:19:17

like the gayest thing I'm doing right now is those.

1:19:21

And also

1:19:21

always writing stuff for auto straddle.

1:19:24

I write about TV for them. I give relationship

1:19:26

advice. If any of your listeners need relationship

1:19:28

advice, you can write auto straddle and I will

1:19:31

probably answer it. That is one of my kind of

1:19:33

like little side gigs. Yes. And

1:19:35

yeah, yeah, that's where you can find me. Awesome.

1:19:39

Amazing. Thank

1:19:40

you, Kayla, so much for diking

1:19:42

down with the Housewives with us.

1:19:49

And another quick reminder to

1:19:52

read Kayla's recaps

1:19:54

of Elbert Gen Q.

1:19:56

And a reminder to myself to start watching

1:19:59

Beverly Hills.

1:19:59

because now you have

1:20:02

piqued my interest in that. All right,

1:20:05

I think it's time to get to our listener question,

1:20:07

non-Housewives related, but- We'll

1:20:09

see, let's see if I can bring it back to that.

1:20:12

All right, you know how annoying it can be when

1:20:14

straight women really need the

1:20:16

validation of Brian or Josh

1:20:18

or whoever? I feel like I do the same

1:20:21

thing with women in my life. There are certain ladies

1:20:23

that I just constantly wanna know if I'm

1:20:25

pretty enough or smart enough or

1:20:27

sexy enough to raise their

1:20:29

eyebrows and get their attention. I've

1:20:31

been obsessed with this for far too long.

1:20:34

It's never about genuinely wanting to be

1:20:36

with them to cultivate a relationship.

1:20:39

It's as annoying as, do you think I'm pretty?

1:20:42

What are some ways that a person can find

1:20:44

that confidence in themselves? Huh.

1:20:47

Hmm. Hmm. Hmm.

1:20:50

I think you're pretty.

1:20:51

Yeah. I think

1:20:53

you're pretty because I'm looking at you

1:20:55

right now. Oh, I

1:20:57

don't even know who sent it. Well, I

1:20:59

can see not, we don't always get a photo

1:21:02

in someone's Gmail

1:21:04

account, but how do

1:21:06

we get that confidence? Yeah.

1:21:10

Carolyn,

1:21:12

this is sad. I

1:21:15

feel like I should have thought about this more in advance

1:21:19

because I don't think I've necessarily

1:21:21

been

1:21:27

in a position where I've felt that way

1:21:29

of just wanting to know if people are attracted

1:21:31

to me, but not because I wanted anything to

1:21:33

happen. Like for me, it's always been very specific

1:21:35

to like,

1:21:37

I need to know if they find

1:21:39

me attractive so that

1:21:41

I can make a move and have it be low

1:21:44

risk. Yeah.

1:21:47

But just for the

1:21:49

sake of knowing, I mean, if you're looking

1:21:51

for the confidence to not

1:21:54

need that, there

1:21:56

are things you could do. I don't know.

1:21:59

some hot pictures taken of you and

1:22:02

keep them on hand and look at them and be

1:22:04

like, hey, Smoke Show. Yeah. That's

1:22:07

me. Our friend, Alicia Brown, every year

1:22:09

for her birthday will book a photo

1:22:12

shoot. I mean, she is such a Leo, but,

1:22:15

and she needs no

1:22:17

more confidence. She's got so

1:22:19

much, but it probably helps. And she gets these

1:22:22

awesome photos taken of herself

1:22:24

and that makes her feel great. And

1:22:26

yeah, she's got them on hand. She does

1:22:28

look at them and she's like, God, I'm attractive

1:22:31

when she needs a boost. Get a photo

1:22:34

shoot. And then whether or not

1:22:36

you're looking for someone, just go on

1:22:38

a dating app and then see

1:22:40

if compliments come in. Though, you

1:22:42

know, from what I hear, I've never used the

1:22:45

apps, but I've heard that women

1:22:47

aren't great at making a pass at

1:22:49

you or saying like you're pretty

1:22:51

or giving compliments like that, like that they just match

1:22:53

and then are silent and never talk again, right?

1:22:56

That's how I remember it. Yeah,

1:22:58

so maybe that's not

1:23:00

a good strategy.

1:23:03

You're saying it's like- Well, we're trying to get it from the inside

1:23:06

out. Like we're trying to look within. So

1:23:09

we don't need external validation. And

1:23:11

this coming from two standup comedians, we're

1:23:13

gonna try to figure out how to get it without

1:23:16

external validation. I,

1:23:19

when I'm feeling bad about myself and

1:23:21

not confident, I will exercise

1:23:23

not with the goal of how it'll like make me

1:23:25

look, but how it'll make me feel. Like I will

1:23:27

just put on music and dance.

1:23:30

I don't know. It does boost endorphins.

1:23:32

It makes you feel a little more accomplished

1:23:35

in your day. It helps me.

1:23:37

You're looking at me like that's not good enough. Okay,

1:23:39

Carolyn, what else? No. I'm

1:23:43

still trying to think while you're trying to be

1:23:45

helpful. I

1:23:48

don't know, flirt.

1:23:51

Like flirting can be, as long as you're not flirting

1:23:53

in a way that's like wrongfully leading

1:23:56

people on, but I think you could be a little flirty

1:23:58

and then get a sense of people are. are

1:24:00

digging what you're putting out there if you really

1:24:02

need that validation. But no, again, we're

1:24:04

not talking about actually getting that

1:24:07

kind of superficial, whatever,

1:24:09

validation. How

1:24:11

do we find the confident? What

1:24:13

do I do to feel? Because yeah, I'm all about

1:24:15

getting external validation to feel

1:24:18

confident. And

1:24:22

I get most of it from my wife. I'm just not

1:24:24

helpful. This question has stumped

1:24:26

me. I mean, we're on

1:24:28

this is episode 199. And

1:24:30

this question might be one of the hardest ones

1:24:32

for me to

1:24:34

answer. I

1:24:37

mean, I really like

1:24:40

we heard bits and pieces of my

1:24:42

little workshops over quarantine,

1:24:45

my meditation things, and

1:24:47

my journaling. But it really did help. Journaling

1:24:50

really does help even if there's a

1:24:53

mantra that you don't necessarily

1:24:55

start out your day believing it. If

1:24:58

you just write it repeatedly, I will have

1:25:00

to write things repeatedly because I do morning

1:25:01

pages. And the goal is to write anything, three

1:25:04

pages free hand every morning. So sometimes

1:25:06

if I feel like I have nothing to offer and I'm feeling

1:25:08

bad about that, I will just pick one

1:25:10

of my mantras. I'm not telling

1:25:12

you guys because I'm embarrassed. Over

1:25:16

and over. I have one that

1:25:18

might be helpful.

1:25:20

Why don't you think about what

1:25:22

makes other people attractive?

1:25:25

So what are the qualities that you find attractive

1:25:27

in other people? And then see

1:25:30

if those are some things that you feel are

1:25:32

true

1:25:33

for yourself. Is

1:25:36

that helpful? Yeah. Are

1:25:39

you someone who also does negative

1:25:41

self-talk? Because

1:25:43

continuing to do that doesn't help, obviously.

1:25:46

And just as simple as being mindful

1:25:49

about that and trying to eliminate that

1:25:51

does help with your confidence. Does

1:25:55

that mean that the real answer is that

1:25:58

if you're pretty enough or smart enough or sexy.

1:25:59

enough for you, then you'll

1:26:02

be enough for everybody else because it's just

1:26:04

you who matters.

1:26:06

That's it, that's the answer.

1:26:08

Nailed it. Okay, moving on. If you have a question,

1:26:10

you can send it to us. Dykingoutatgmail.com,

1:26:14

look at my confidence in nailing that question

1:26:17

at the end. It was a journey, but we got there.

1:26:19

Dykingoutatgmail.com, send your

1:26:21

questions. If you're a patron, you get to the top of

1:26:23

the list. You can follow

1:26:25

us on social media, at Dykingouteverywhere,

1:26:28

which we have an intern

1:26:31

now. So our social media is about to

1:26:33

get lit. Yeah, thank you, Julia.

1:26:36

Our

1:26:36

new intern Julia will be just doing

1:26:39

everything we can't. I mean. Yeah,

1:26:42

we've been struggling. We don't, we're too

1:26:44

old. It's a lot, it's a lot, it's

1:26:46

a lot to keep up with, but we're

1:26:48

trying. So follow us at Dykingouteverywhere,

1:26:51

follow me personally at TGICarolyn.

1:26:53

Please do that if you haven't already, it would

1:26:55

make me smile. Oh my God, it would

1:26:57

really build my confidence and maybe

1:27:00

not the best way, but definitely one kind

1:27:02

of way if you followed me at Melody

1:27:04

Kamali on Instagram. It would also

1:27:06

build my confidence if you

1:27:09

did not go to pictures of me

1:27:11

with the former co-host of this podcast

1:27:14

and only comment on how the former

1:27:16

co-host is looking hot.