"Hosea's personal behavior was so 'chessy'..." In case it's not obvious: think Leah.

(First of all, I loved Carla but disagree she was even arguably the frontrunner going into...)

Hosea's personal behavior was so 'cheesy' it should have been enough to have him eliminated. Stefan's comments regarding this made him a winner in my mind. Think about it: Who seems like a cleaner guy cooking up food in a restaurant you'd want to be eating at?

Stefan should have won, utensils down! I wish him well.

There's your first mistake.

There is an insider-aspect in journalism and writing these days that’s getting a bit much.

Whatever happened to the subject being a regular person – like you and me? Sometimes they can muddle through the putting together of their story. Sometimes they can’t and need the assistance of an editor. Either way they are still the main subjects.

Not only is everything by a media insider, it’s about a media insider:

I observed this and made a comment recently after reading a medical piece in a newspaper. I’ll spare the details…but all the subjects appeared at first to be regular folks, sharing heartfelt thoughts and experiences. It took something away when I realized all of them worked in medical journalism and were contemporaries of the piece’s writer. Honestly, it seemed kind of lazy on the writer’s part that she didn’t go beyond her own world to write about.

The same goes for TV. How many TV news stories start out with, “Our own….” (Maybe the over-the-top coverage upon the death of Tim Russert, whom I admired, is an example of this.)

I work, not in the field of journalism, but in a field that deals with getting subjects. I try to hold one rule of thumb - don’t make your world the subject.

Back to print journalism… Frankly, I’d rather hear from a troubled person who writes than a writer who’s a troubled person.

Would you please start turning in the hypochondriacs? It seems to me that would save money.

What did the hypochondriac have engraved on his tombstone?

Seeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

I too agree with the admiration for the way Stephanie handled Dale making an honest mistake of leaving the dish out overnight. Others might have started rolling the ‘he’s trying to sabotage me’ film. But she didn’t seem to do that. It really was a show of rising above it all, excusing the mistakes of those under you and making the best of it. Talk about a cultured person!

But still, I would’ve been okay with sacrificing the first female winner in favor of a tie between Stephanie and Richard. I really liked Richard.

What’s funny about the show is that when they lose a challenge or get eliminated, it’s like they appear to be the worst chef on the planet. In reality, they’re still better than most chefs. And they’re definitely better than most of us slugs sitting home watching. Heck, they can come to my house and mess up a meal anytime - I’d probably still eat it.

Though I don’t think she should’ve been in the top three either, I do like Lisa’s naughty girl chutzpah. Her look is a great example of why moms came up with:

‘…you wipe that smirk off your face right now, young lady!’

“…so the fact that that a black woman was the first to ridicule the black dancer for admitting she hadn't studied hip-hop is neither here nor there,…”

Really, well that’s not you thought above, when you wrote:

“The black woman was ridiculed by the white judges…”

This implied that all the judges were white and ganging up on this woman. That simply is not true. Obviously, you acknowledge that I’m correct. But have now morphed your skewed observations into yet another unfounded qualm by adding:

“…she made it ok for the whites to jump on, too…”

Have you watched the rerun yet? I didn’t think so. When you do you’ll see no one was jumping on anybody. Again, I suggest you watch again before commenting again. It will help you get your facts straight.

Yes, there is racism in this country (it was one of my parent’s first observations upon coming to this country). And there are enough blatant example of it to make a case. But when you cite it in situations where it’s really not happening, it deminishes the cause. Also, it makes one wonder about the validity other citings. Like when you degress into bringing up issues regarding the leader of the anti-affirmative action movement, the Supreme Court justice and the leading presidential candidate. How are we suppose believe anything you write on these issues when you can’t even get the facts of a simple pop-culture television show right?

“You seemed not to have noticed...The black woman was ridiculed by the white judges, as a black, for admittedly not knowing how to dance hip hop. Pure racism.”

Well, you seemed not to have noticed, the judge who first used the word ‘black,’ was herself ‘black.’ In fact, not one of the other judges made any remarks and they certainly didn’t ridicule in any way. What they did do was chuckle. But that seemed not so much at what she said but the candor in which she expressed it.

Why do I like these shows? Does anyone know. Answer that for my husband too, who's commented about how corny they are from across the room. It started as something to make time go by at the gym. That's all fine but then I brought it home.

BTW - If my husband acted any other way, I'd worry.