Survivor Week 2

The Episode

In this episode, we got to see a lot of the inner workings over at Kota, where we learned that the tribe could be subdivided into 1) the foursome of Charlie, Marcus, Corinne, and Jacquie; 2) two close pairs, being Ace/Sugar and Paloma/Kelly; and 3) solo agent Bob. The episode wasted no time in establishing that Ace and Paloma disliked each other, which let us know that the foursome would prevail against the majority of unorganized tribe members.

Meanwhile, over at Fang, Randy and Danny (aka GC) began squabbling. In his solo interviews, Randy hasn't exactly been a charmer, but he now looks good in comparison to Danny. The simmering tensions came to a boil when Randy pointed out to the tribe that the rice was running low and would not last long at their current rate of consumption. He asked, in a surprisingly tactful way, whether everyone could agree to go from 3 daily meals to 2. Everyone agreed except for Danny, who first took the jerky position that he shouldn't reduce his consumption just because some of his tribemates were wasteful during the first few days. He then approached Randy and basically told him that he was acting like a leader and should therefore be the official leader. Randy of course refused to accept that he was "the leader," and when Danny pressed the point, told him he should just drop it. Danny immediately went into the same argument he had manufactured with Gillian, which was "I'm a grown man and no one can tell me what to do, so I won't drop it," after which Randy threatened to ignore his badgering.

The first challenge was by far the most entertaining, due to its physicality. One tribe member from each tribe attempted to hang onto a wooden post in the ground, while two members of the opposing tribe attempted to physically pry them off of the pole and drag them across a line some distance away. Fang won some comfortable bedding after Kota took Ace's suggestion and sat out their three strongest women on the reasoning that they should bring their strongest people to the immunity challenge. On the plus side, Charlie got to roll around in the dirt with Marcus, and that was probably better than bedding to him.

Sugar was sent to Exile and successfully followed three or four clues to the hidden immunity idol. She told only Ace, who immediately assumed half-ownership of it on behalf of their alliance.

During the immunity challenge, Kota's strategy didn't help them enough. The first part of the challenge involved team members shooting down a waterslide into a lake, and then wading into the water to get one of six puzzle pieces. One member of each team then had to solve the puzzle, and even though Bob had a small lead going into the puzzle portion, Ken took it for Fang's first immunity win.

This was good news for Ken. It was a difficult puzzle (a logic problem in which you had to arrange a sequence of digits so that it fit multiple criteria), and he was up against physics teacher Bob, who seems to be a formidable contender in this kind of thing. It's not often that an individual can take sole credit for a difficult immunity win based solely on their puzzling abilities, but there you go. No one seemed to be holding Bob's loss against him, though.

With tribal council looming, Paloma campaigned against Ace, Ace campaigned against Paloma, and the foursome recruited Bob, at least for this vote, to solidify their stranglehold on the tribe.

The controlling powers admitted that the prospect of voting out the power-hungry Ace was attractive, but they eventually decided to keep their tribe strong by voting out the littlest Kota of all. Paloma didn't help her image any at tribal council by being overjoyed when a second vote for Ace was announced. Unfortunately for her, it was the last one, and she was sent home by a 7-2 vote.










The Pool

The shocking immunity win by Fang had some big implications for our pool. Who was rooting for the underdog with their vote? Mom and Kim, that's who. For being correct about such an unpopular position, they took down 12 big bonus points each. That made them the big winners for the week, while Jen and Dawn took a tough hit for their faith in Paloma. Mike and Paul, meanwhile, continue to be twinsers at the top of the pack. I bet they sleep in matching sleeping bags. In the same room.


1st: Mike 107 (-2 +0)
1st: Paul 107 (-2 +0)
3rd: Mom 98 (-7 +12)
4th: Jen 95 (-9 +0)
4th: Kim 95 (-2 +12)
6th: Matt 92 (-1 +0)
7th: Carl 85 (-3 +0)
8th: Dawn 72 (-12 +0)