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The L Word: recaps: Episode 3.8 "Latecomer" (page 2)
by Scribe Grrrl

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Another unharmonious bed — Carmen is a restless sleeper. She's thwapping Shane in the face and flailing and mumbling, and I wish the writers would let Sarah Shahi be funny more often because she's pretty good at it.

Shane finally wakes her up and tells her she's having a bad dream.

Carmen: "I had this dream that we were inside of Wax, but it was, like, really trippy, and there were all these like, paintings that were floating around, and you were there and I was there and there was this lady... it was Cherie. It was Cherie Jaffe. You were giving a tattoo to Cherie Jaffe. Like the one that we have that's on the back of our necks. Why did you do that?"
Shane: "Do what?"
Carmen: "Give her a tattoo."
Shane: "I didn't."
Carmen: "That was something that's really sacred to us. That's just between us."
Shane: "But I, I didn't give a ta--"
Carmen: "Goddammit, Shane, that's so fucked up."

Carmen hops out of bed, leaving Shane with her befuddlement and her bed head. Well, it might be bed head, but really, how can you tell?

Dana's place — Alice is making a yummy-looking smoothie of some sort. I am not saying this just because Alice is yummy; it really does look good. Perhaps I'm just thirsty or hungry or something — generally I don't consume much of anything while I watch this show because it robs me of my appetite and my optimism. But a Pieszecki smoothie might hit the spot. I didn't mean that spot. Or maybe I did.

In the bedroom, Dana doesn't have much of an appetite or much optimism either, because her hair has begun to fall out. She calls to Alice, who thinks she's just calling for the smoothie. Alice can only stop and stare when she sees the swaths of hair in Dana's hands.

Dana: "Check it out. Hot hot hot, isn't it? Too bad Lara's not around to see this. Maybe I'll save it and sell it on eBay."
Alice: "All right, can you not be so morbid? And drink this. Drink your shake."
Dana: "I can't. I feel nauseous."

Okay. I let it go last week, but I can't let it go twice: old-school prescriptivists like me still believe that "nauseous" means "inducing nausea," and that the proper word for what one feels is "nauseated." But it's completely inappropriate of me to care about it at all at a moment like this, so I apologize for being nauseous.

And then Alice calls in the reinforcements, in the form of wigs, which are all horrible. Dana resists, but Alice says "just humor me," but it's really Alice who's bringing the funny, and we all know it.

The phone rings; it's Dana's mom. Dana doesn't want to talk to her, but Alice says Mrs. Fairbanks is just trying to help, and shutting her out won't make Dana feel better.

Dana: "Well then, what is gonna make me feel better, Al? I mean, look at me. I'm disappearing. I'm just disappearing."

Painful on so many levels — Moira/Max and Jenny are typing away on their respective laptops. Moira (who's now sporting some facial hair) has written an e-mail: "This is to inform all of my friends and acquaintances that from now on I'll be going by the name Max. Please use only the male pronoun when referring to me. Yours truly."

Jenny says, "Why don't you sign off like this?" and then IMs Max from two feet away: "Max, the transgender formerly known as Moira."

Urgh. It's an adjective, not a noun! Do you call yourself "a gay," Jenny? Right, I must stop ranting about grammar. It's just not worth it.

This is worth saying, though: when Jenny looks at Max, she looks like she's indulging a little kid who has presented her with a painting that is not much more than a gloppy mess. And why does she do that? Because compared to Mia Kirshner's, Daniela Sea's acting skills are a gloppy mess. At best. What a way to ruin a potentially interesting storyline.

A studio — Great. There's Betty. Oh, but seriously great, there's Nona Hendryx! She and Kit fall all over each other and it's all good until "the Betty girls" show up. Mange is sort of hovering in the background until Kit introduces him as her "main squeeze." Blah.

The house of pain — Bette's cab is waiting; she's heading to that retreat. She says she's going to "hike down to the lake" every day to call Angelica.

Bette: "So I expect you to put her on the phone with me."
Tina: "Of course I'll put her on the phone with you."
Bette: "I wanna call her from the road this afternoon, so where will you be?"
Tina: "I was thinking of going to visit Kit and everyone in the recording studio."
Bette: "You're kidding me."
Tina: "No. Is there a problem?"
Bette: "Well, the problem is that you no longer have the privileges of being my life partner."
Tina: "Whoa! What?"
Bette: "Don't get all galled and affronted. You're the one who's breaking up the family."
Tina: "I am not breaking up -- "
Bette: "Yes you are, Tina. You don't love me. You're changing who you are, and yes, you are breaking up this family, and it's about time that we both just got real about it. So while I'm away meditating, I'm gonna try and --"

And then there's the sound of someone clearing her throat; it's Roberta, that social worker, who might have heard the whole thing. She asks how they're doing, and though they say "fine" and "wonderful," Roberta asks if there's anything they want to tell her.

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