The Amazing Race 29: Eps 6 to 10
May. 27th, 2017 10:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
spiderbraidsLeg 6:
1. So anyways, everyone is heading to Milan, and even get lent a smartphone to do the reservation for the trip... but first, we get to see Liz/Michael resolve things re: last leg's big tiff as they're making their reservations (DAWW, sort of) In Italy, turns out that Tara/Joey (Team Mom and Dad) have good command of italiano, which is pretty cool :-) The more pressing issue is there's a Double U-Turn on this leg, and everyone's agreed to U-Turn Vanck/Ashton (the most different team on the race, in their own opinion)
2. First stop is a Roadblock: "Who's hungry for the next clue?" Of course it involves eating, with two twists: One, contestants have to look for three specific signs hinting at the next location while eating, and two, they're doing it on a tram (!) There are two trams, each taking 4 contestants, and there are 7 teams remaining, so enough room for everyone right? Well, Tara and Michael are the only ones taking the first tram, which mean someone will be left waiting, and that someone is Logan (/London, Team LoLo) Plus he ends up having to take two goes to get all three signs (to be fair, he's not alone on this), but after all is said and done, they'll only be half an hour behind first, as the next stop is a luxury ship at Lake Como with a departure time pickup... and even more food (yum!)
2.1 And because the show always loves showing regular people butchering place names, we get plenty of footage of guys pronouncing "Cernobbio" (one of the signs, and name of the town where the luxury ship is parked) like a certain nuclear power plant :-)
3. U-Turn comes before Detours again, and after Mom and Dad choose to pass it up, L/M Detours V/A, while Becca/Floyd (Team Fun) neutralize the other half by "using" it on L/M... and V/A take their nice sweet time just to find the U-Turn board, and then it appears that they assume they'll have to go up against L/M to avoid elimination...
4. The Detours are making a mold of a ghost (involving having one wearing a chicken coop wire mold over their head and the other wrapping it with cloths dipped in wet plaster), and doing some rock climbing (your cue, Becca ;-)) Brooke has a really big tantrum while climbing the cliff side over Scott not supporting her (in the literal sense; he's supposed to be keeping her up by pulling a rope), but at least she has the decency to acknowledge how much she b!tched during the task afterwards :-D
5. It's a chauffeured boat race to Tremezzo between Team Fun and Matt/Redmond (The Boys) for the win, and by dint of their boat docking first, Team Fun get themselves a trip to Argentina... and (surprise surprise) V/A finish last, and have a nice departure confession about how in spite of their differences, they were beginning to gel as a team...
Leg 7:
1. Next stop is Venice (last visited WAAAY back in S4), and the first clue pickup... is from a street sweeper in a square :-) This precipitates quite a bit of drama, as L/M and B/S chew out Team LoLo for not helping them in return for the help they've given them...
2. Detour is between singing in a gondola (replete with the iconic red-white striped shirts, which those teams get to keep wearing for the rest of the leg) and delivering luggage to a hotel (The Boys, and Mom and Dad do this one, cue hilarious footage of luggage falling off carts). Not only do singing contestants need to get the words right, they also have to be sufficiently theatrical about it as well... and they get to perform their singing to couples riding their gondolas too :-)
3. While on the way to the next task, much time is spent on B/S bickering about while trying to get a water taxi (meanwhile, LoLo manage to snag a ride with a family heading to the airport. HUH.) Roadblock asks about "masked intentions", and it doesn't take much imagination to figure out that it involves Commedia dell'Arte masks :-)
4. In this case, painting one to match a model of their choosing... and just to spice things up, the masked players put on a show, which includes the hilarious mock removal of some guy's intestines LOL. Obviously, attention to detail and technique are key here... Meanwhile, outside the task, (I think) Scott (to another contestant wearing a striped shirt): "Don't ever change that shirt" :-D
5. Pitstop at Camp San Vio, where The Boys get a trip to Grenada, and also finally get to make a "leg" joke, as Phil asks them if this is the best leg they've ever had... and of course Redmond shows off his prosthetic and says that this is the best leg they've ever had, with the TAR leg coming in a close second :-) Last three teams to finish their masks are London, Brooke, and Liz, in that order, and B/S and LoLo finish closely in 4th and 5th, putting L/M in last, but they're spared again by a regular non-elim (that is, with a Speed Bump in the next leg), and L/M are confident it'll take more than a Speed Bump to take them out...
Leg 8:
1. After another "leg" joke from The Boys (R: "What's the name of my other leg?" M: "First place"), next stop is Arahova, Greece, by way to plane (to Bari), ferry (to Patras), and self-drive... and of course, there will be teams that have trouble with self-drive, those teams being Team Fun and L/M: Team Fun takes forever to get across the Rio-Antirrio bridge (to the point that they even narrate their own relief at finally getting across after driving around the bridge for 40 km), while L/M miss a turn and spend forever bickering before eventually turning back to that missed turn (!)
2. Over in Arahova, the last U-Turn of the race is at a big fat Greek wedding party ;-) Mom/Dad manage to enjoy the party for a few minutes before finally spotting the U-Turn, where L/M and Team Fun get U-Turned by B/S and Mom/Dad respectively, and so have to do both Detours, involving the delivery of two wedding gifts: goats for the groom, and cheese for the bride (which all of the non-U-Turned teams pick) Cheese delivery involves delivering some milk with donkeys to the cheese ladies (and in a nice touch, Mom and Dad thank the first cheese lady with an "Evcharisto" ;-)) Goats involves running up a large staircase against locals up to a church before getting one goat each (this will be important)
3. L/M are really ticked off that B/S U-Turned them, since Mike helped Brooke with her ladle back in Dar es Salaam (insert flashback here, with emphasis on Mike telling Brooke not to U-Turn them) The Boys call their donkey Seabiscuit, while later Team Fun name their donkey Speedy McSpeederson... and a name-tag shows up on screen (with the tag of "professional donkey" LOL!) Michael's lungs are shot after running up the stair case, and on top of that, after returning to the wedding party, turns out they have to go back to get a 2nd goat (!)
4. More self-drive to Athens, for a task at the original (modern) Olympic stadium (where Phil is there to announce Mom and Dad's arrival), which involves running a single lap around the track. Needless to say, Mom and Dad comment on how it feels like turning back the clock ;-) Speed Bump's here, but we'll get to that when L/M do... and that'll be a while...
5. Roadblock at the Zappeion: "Who thinks they can step in time?" It's a changing of the guard task (ooh, deja vu), and this is Tara's cue ;-) Tara's a major and only needs two goes to take it, and get their pitstop clue for Acropolis (where else?) You think that's impressive, Matt gets it in one (!) Meanwhile, my mom thought the pompoms on the Greek soldiers' shoes looked weird :-D
6. Acropolis, where Mom and Dad get $7500 each, and B/S end up taking so long to find the way up the Acropolis, The Boys manage to get into second, and when B/S finally check in the early evening in 3rd, Brooke snarks: "Six months later" before having a chat with Phil about the U-Turn on L/M (nothing unexpected here)
7. Over to the race between L/M and Team Fun, who apparently reach the Athens stadium at the same time... Speed Bump for L/M is to wrap a "Kokoretsi" with intestines... It's a bunch of skewered meat and organs, and Liz is all yuck, but Michael takes it all in stride, because he's a butcher... and when asked by Michael, Liz says she doesn't want to know what's in sausage (LOL)
8. Both L/M and TeamFun are comparing the Roadblock to marching band... but Becca will be doing this one, even if Floyd tells her to "Channel your inner Floyd" (HEH!) Becca manages to have enough of a lead to make two attempts in a row and gets it on the 2nd, which she definitely needed, since Liz takes only one...
9. After a really hard day, Team Fun gets to fun another day, while L/M are a bit more graceful with their exit than they were the rest of the leg, as Mike considers Liz like a sister, and even points out that they even fight like siblings... and Mike makes his exit promising to look out for undesirables on Liz's Facebook :-)
Leg 9:
1. Another two-hour block of TAR opens by staying in Greece for now, with a Roadblock at a big bridge across a canal. Scott has to do this one, and he's hoping that, after washing windows and climbing pallets, he isn't being made to do another height-based task like bungee jumping... one guess what it is (!) There's a major contrast between Scott's major tantrum that ironically Brooke has to talk him down from (and after Scott does it, he says he won't do it again)... and Logan just taking the jump with no questions asked :-D
2. Next stop... Hanoi, Vietnam, where it's hot and humid (this will be important), with a respectful clue pickup at Quan Su temple for a Detour between retrieving a birdcage with a bamboo ladder and arranging mannequins in a shop window... Twist is that both tasks have a limit on the number of teams, and since Scott/Brooke end up losing the race for the last ladder to LoLo, Brooke end up spending much of the walk to the other task and carrying the mannequins to the store all teed off at Scott for making them have to do this task :-\ Another twist is that the ladder has to be carried down a narrow street and maneuvered through a narrow house to get to the birdcages, and let's just say that some people really do live in narrow alleys and houses like that...
3. Mom and Dad are taking the carrying in stride, with Joey even making a joke about "breaking up" after their female mannequin falls apart :-D However, what's really important is that B/S are carrying all three of the mannequins they need, as Mom and Dad only bring two to their shop, and despite seemingly knowing they need one more... they still call on the judge for a check after arranging their first two, and take about 15 seconds to realize they don't have their third mannequin (!) (To be clear, even if they did notice earlier, they have to remain next to each other outside of Roadblocks)
4. Pitstop at a local park, where Team Fun (now calling themselves Team Funstoppable) edge out The Boys (who can only muster up an "un-boy-lievable" :-D :-D) and earn themselves a trip to the Galapagos, while at the other end of the pack, B/S narrowly edge out Mom and Dad, and Joey (who I've noticed is starting to talk with more of a stereotypical Boston accent, or maybe I just haven't been noticing it that much) damn nears collapses into Scott's arms, before having a nice long tiff about the whole issue with B/S not telling Mom/Dad about the lack of ladders (in which we get a B/S confessional about not wanting to make friends, yawn)... and being told that Mom and Dad have been spared by a non-elimination...
Leg 10:
1. Domestic leg sends teams by bus to Ninh Binh... Team Fun and The Boys get the first bus, while it's a major race against time for B/S and Mom/Dad to catch LoLo's bus half an hour later, which they catch by almost-literally one minute (!) A clue pickup at a temple called Bich Dong (the "ch" is a pronounced like a "k"... insert Beavis and Butthead laughter here ;-)) contains the Speed Bump, plus gnomes for the contestants to pick up to strap to their bikes. Oh yeah, it's mostly self-bike this week, and Scott gets snarky about Brooke complaining about biking, even though (in Scott's own words) she takes spin class every week... Scott even compares her screaming to giving birth :-D
2. Roadblock: "Who's feeling trapped?" The task calls for loading a bike with bundles and bundles of shrimp traps and delivering to a checkpoint... and this isn't the first time the show's done it, as we get a flashback to season three's Flo (/Zach) struggling mightily (and loudly!) with the task. Matt manages to ride his bike quite well (!) while Floyd's bike hilariously falls over (it won't be funny later, but...) Floyd's dropping traps left and right, but he's under the impression that he can go back to get them once he's offloaded what he's left with, and this is where things begin to go south for Team Fun, as at the checkpoint, Floyd's told that he has to double back with the fully-loaded bike to get the missing traps, and to add insult to injury, he manages to drop another while accompanying London, making him double back again... and in a nice touch, we see Becca push back the fun meter to negative :-\ Meanwhile, Mom and Dad's speed bump involves gathering 6 dozen duck eggs in baskets, and it's... about as exciting as it sounds (which is "not very" ;-))
3. In lieu of a Detour, there's a task involves carrying ritual goods on an unusual rowboat... oared using feet (!) But while everyone else is trying to get the hang of this unconventional rowing method (Scott is apparently too tall to foot-row properly), Floyd keels over on his bike while trying to hustle to the task (replete with a "dizzy haze" edit just before the fall) and needs medical attention (!)
4. Scott continues snarking about Brooke's propensity towards whining, as he jokes about Brooke giving birth to twins while biking :-D The Pitstop is at a temple on the top of a mountain (yep, more stairs!) The Boys get themselves to the top (in more ways than one) and get a trip to Costa Rica... and manage to make yet another leg joke, as Red describes the leg as "reinforced carbon-fiber" ;-) And looks like Team Fun's self-re-christening as Team Funstoppable was a bit premature, as they never got anywhere past where Floyd keeled over, and Phil has to come down from the mountain to eliminate them... and I agree with Becca that this is no way to go out... especially such a likeable team :-\ But they do admit that they've grown to become friends, and even sign off with a nice mini-rap ;-)
1. So anyways, everyone is heading to Milan, and even get lent a smartphone to do the reservation for the trip... but first, we get to see Liz/Michael resolve things re: last leg's big tiff as they're making their reservations (DAWW, sort of) In Italy, turns out that Tara/Joey (Team Mom and Dad) have good command of italiano, which is pretty cool :-) The more pressing issue is there's a Double U-Turn on this leg, and everyone's agreed to U-Turn Vanck/Ashton (the most different team on the race, in their own opinion)
2. First stop is a Roadblock: "Who's hungry for the next clue?" Of course it involves eating, with two twists: One, contestants have to look for three specific signs hinting at the next location while eating, and two, they're doing it on a tram (!) There are two trams, each taking 4 contestants, and there are 7 teams remaining, so enough room for everyone right? Well, Tara and Michael are the only ones taking the first tram, which mean someone will be left waiting, and that someone is Logan (/London, Team LoLo) Plus he ends up having to take two goes to get all three signs (to be fair, he's not alone on this), but after all is said and done, they'll only be half an hour behind first, as the next stop is a luxury ship at Lake Como with a departure time pickup... and even more food (yum!)
2.1 And because the show always loves showing regular people butchering place names, we get plenty of footage of guys pronouncing "Cernobbio" (one of the signs, and name of the town where the luxury ship is parked) like a certain nuclear power plant :-)
3. U-Turn comes before Detours again, and after Mom and Dad choose to pass it up, L/M Detours V/A, while Becca/Floyd (Team Fun) neutralize the other half by "using" it on L/M... and V/A take their nice sweet time just to find the U-Turn board, and then it appears that they assume they'll have to go up against L/M to avoid elimination...
4. The Detours are making a mold of a ghost (involving having one wearing a chicken coop wire mold over their head and the other wrapping it with cloths dipped in wet plaster), and doing some rock climbing (your cue, Becca ;-)) Brooke has a really big tantrum while climbing the cliff side over Scott not supporting her (in the literal sense; he's supposed to be keeping her up by pulling a rope), but at least she has the decency to acknowledge how much she b!tched during the task afterwards :-D
5. It's a chauffeured boat race to Tremezzo between Team Fun and Matt/Redmond (The Boys) for the win, and by dint of their boat docking first, Team Fun get themselves a trip to Argentina... and (surprise surprise) V/A finish last, and have a nice departure confession about how in spite of their differences, they were beginning to gel as a team...
Leg 7:
1. Next stop is Venice (last visited WAAAY back in S4), and the first clue pickup... is from a street sweeper in a square :-) This precipitates quite a bit of drama, as L/M and B/S chew out Team LoLo for not helping them in return for the help they've given them...
2. Detour is between singing in a gondola (replete with the iconic red-white striped shirts, which those teams get to keep wearing for the rest of the leg) and delivering luggage to a hotel (The Boys, and Mom and Dad do this one, cue hilarious footage of luggage falling off carts). Not only do singing contestants need to get the words right, they also have to be sufficiently theatrical about it as well... and they get to perform their singing to couples riding their gondolas too :-)
3. While on the way to the next task, much time is spent on B/S bickering about while trying to get a water taxi (meanwhile, LoLo manage to snag a ride with a family heading to the airport. HUH.) Roadblock asks about "masked intentions", and it doesn't take much imagination to figure out that it involves Commedia dell'Arte masks :-)
4. In this case, painting one to match a model of their choosing... and just to spice things up, the masked players put on a show, which includes the hilarious mock removal of some guy's intestines LOL. Obviously, attention to detail and technique are key here... Meanwhile, outside the task, (I think) Scott (to another contestant wearing a striped shirt): "Don't ever change that shirt" :-D
5. Pitstop at Camp San Vio, where The Boys get a trip to Grenada, and also finally get to make a "leg" joke, as Phil asks them if this is the best leg they've ever had... and of course Redmond shows off his prosthetic and says that this is the best leg they've ever had, with the TAR leg coming in a close second :-) Last three teams to finish their masks are London, Brooke, and Liz, in that order, and B/S and LoLo finish closely in 4th and 5th, putting L/M in last, but they're spared again by a regular non-elim (that is, with a Speed Bump in the next leg), and L/M are confident it'll take more than a Speed Bump to take them out...
Leg 8:
1. After another "leg" joke from The Boys (R: "What's the name of my other leg?" M: "First place"), next stop is Arahova, Greece, by way to plane (to Bari), ferry (to Patras), and self-drive... and of course, there will be teams that have trouble with self-drive, those teams being Team Fun and L/M: Team Fun takes forever to get across the Rio-Antirrio bridge (to the point that they even narrate their own relief at finally getting across after driving around the bridge for 40 km), while L/M miss a turn and spend forever bickering before eventually turning back to that missed turn (!)
2. Over in Arahova, the last U-Turn of the race is at a big fat Greek wedding party ;-) Mom/Dad manage to enjoy the party for a few minutes before finally spotting the U-Turn, where L/M and Team Fun get U-Turned by B/S and Mom/Dad respectively, and so have to do both Detours, involving the delivery of two wedding gifts: goats for the groom, and cheese for the bride (which all of the non-U-Turned teams pick) Cheese delivery involves delivering some milk with donkeys to the cheese ladies (and in a nice touch, Mom and Dad thank the first cheese lady with an "Evcharisto" ;-)) Goats involves running up a large staircase against locals up to a church before getting one goat each (this will be important)
3. L/M are really ticked off that B/S U-Turned them, since Mike helped Brooke with her ladle back in Dar es Salaam (insert flashback here, with emphasis on Mike telling Brooke not to U-Turn them) The Boys call their donkey Seabiscuit, while later Team Fun name their donkey Speedy McSpeederson... and a name-tag shows up on screen (with the tag of "professional donkey" LOL!) Michael's lungs are shot after running up the stair case, and on top of that, after returning to the wedding party, turns out they have to go back to get a 2nd goat (!)
4. More self-drive to Athens, for a task at the original (modern) Olympic stadium (where Phil is there to announce Mom and Dad's arrival), which involves running a single lap around the track. Needless to say, Mom and Dad comment on how it feels like turning back the clock ;-) Speed Bump's here, but we'll get to that when L/M do... and that'll be a while...
5. Roadblock at the Zappeion: "Who thinks they can step in time?" It's a changing of the guard task (ooh, deja vu), and this is Tara's cue ;-) Tara's a major and only needs two goes to take it, and get their pitstop clue for Acropolis (where else?) You think that's impressive, Matt gets it in one (!) Meanwhile, my mom thought the pompoms on the Greek soldiers' shoes looked weird :-D
6. Acropolis, where Mom and Dad get $7500 each, and B/S end up taking so long to find the way up the Acropolis, The Boys manage to get into second, and when B/S finally check in the early evening in 3rd, Brooke snarks: "Six months later" before having a chat with Phil about the U-Turn on L/M (nothing unexpected here)
7. Over to the race between L/M and Team Fun, who apparently reach the Athens stadium at the same time... Speed Bump for L/M is to wrap a "Kokoretsi" with intestines... It's a bunch of skewered meat and organs, and Liz is all yuck, but Michael takes it all in stride, because he's a butcher... and when asked by Michael, Liz says she doesn't want to know what's in sausage (LOL)
8. Both L/M and TeamFun are comparing the Roadblock to marching band... but Becca will be doing this one, even if Floyd tells her to "Channel your inner Floyd" (HEH!) Becca manages to have enough of a lead to make two attempts in a row and gets it on the 2nd, which she definitely needed, since Liz takes only one...
9. After a really hard day, Team Fun gets to fun another day, while L/M are a bit more graceful with their exit than they were the rest of the leg, as Mike considers Liz like a sister, and even points out that they even fight like siblings... and Mike makes his exit promising to look out for undesirables on Liz's Facebook :-)
Leg 9:
1. Another two-hour block of TAR opens by staying in Greece for now, with a Roadblock at a big bridge across a canal. Scott has to do this one, and he's hoping that, after washing windows and climbing pallets, he isn't being made to do another height-based task like bungee jumping... one guess what it is (!) There's a major contrast between Scott's major tantrum that ironically Brooke has to talk him down from (and after Scott does it, he says he won't do it again)... and Logan just taking the jump with no questions asked :-D
2. Next stop... Hanoi, Vietnam, where it's hot and humid (this will be important), with a respectful clue pickup at Quan Su temple for a Detour between retrieving a birdcage with a bamboo ladder and arranging mannequins in a shop window... Twist is that both tasks have a limit on the number of teams, and since Scott/Brooke end up losing the race for the last ladder to LoLo, Brooke end up spending much of the walk to the other task and carrying the mannequins to the store all teed off at Scott for making them have to do this task :-\ Another twist is that the ladder has to be carried down a narrow street and maneuvered through a narrow house to get to the birdcages, and let's just say that some people really do live in narrow alleys and houses like that...
3. Mom and Dad are taking the carrying in stride, with Joey even making a joke about "breaking up" after their female mannequin falls apart :-D However, what's really important is that B/S are carrying all three of the mannequins they need, as Mom and Dad only bring two to their shop, and despite seemingly knowing they need one more... they still call on the judge for a check after arranging their first two, and take about 15 seconds to realize they don't have their third mannequin (!) (To be clear, even if they did notice earlier, they have to remain next to each other outside of Roadblocks)
4. Pitstop at a local park, where Team Fun (now calling themselves Team Funstoppable) edge out The Boys (who can only muster up an "un-boy-lievable" :-D :-D) and earn themselves a trip to the Galapagos, while at the other end of the pack, B/S narrowly edge out Mom and Dad, and Joey (who I've noticed is starting to talk with more of a stereotypical Boston accent, or maybe I just haven't been noticing it that much) damn nears collapses into Scott's arms, before having a nice long tiff about the whole issue with B/S not telling Mom/Dad about the lack of ladders (in which we get a B/S confessional about not wanting to make friends, yawn)... and being told that Mom and Dad have been spared by a non-elimination...
Leg 10:
1. Domestic leg sends teams by bus to Ninh Binh... Team Fun and The Boys get the first bus, while it's a major race against time for B/S and Mom/Dad to catch LoLo's bus half an hour later, which they catch by almost-literally one minute (!) A clue pickup at a temple called Bich Dong (the "ch" is a pronounced like a "k"... insert Beavis and Butthead laughter here ;-)) contains the Speed Bump, plus gnomes for the contestants to pick up to strap to their bikes. Oh yeah, it's mostly self-bike this week, and Scott gets snarky about Brooke complaining about biking, even though (in Scott's own words) she takes spin class every week... Scott even compares her screaming to giving birth :-D
2. Roadblock: "Who's feeling trapped?" The task calls for loading a bike with bundles and bundles of shrimp traps and delivering to a checkpoint... and this isn't the first time the show's done it, as we get a flashback to season three's Flo (/Zach) struggling mightily (and loudly!) with the task. Matt manages to ride his bike quite well (!) while Floyd's bike hilariously falls over (it won't be funny later, but...) Floyd's dropping traps left and right, but he's under the impression that he can go back to get them once he's offloaded what he's left with, and this is where things begin to go south for Team Fun, as at the checkpoint, Floyd's told that he has to double back with the fully-loaded bike to get the missing traps, and to add insult to injury, he manages to drop another while accompanying London, making him double back again... and in a nice touch, we see Becca push back the fun meter to negative :-\ Meanwhile, Mom and Dad's speed bump involves gathering 6 dozen duck eggs in baskets, and it's... about as exciting as it sounds (which is "not very" ;-))
3. In lieu of a Detour, there's a task involves carrying ritual goods on an unusual rowboat... oared using feet (!) But while everyone else is trying to get the hang of this unconventional rowing method (Scott is apparently too tall to foot-row properly), Floyd keels over on his bike while trying to hustle to the task (replete with a "dizzy haze" edit just before the fall) and needs medical attention (!)
4. Scott continues snarking about Brooke's propensity towards whining, as he jokes about Brooke giving birth to twins while biking :-D The Pitstop is at a temple on the top of a mountain (yep, more stairs!) The Boys get themselves to the top (in more ways than one) and get a trip to Costa Rica... and manage to make yet another leg joke, as Red describes the leg as "reinforced carbon-fiber" ;-) And looks like Team Fun's self-re-christening as Team Funstoppable was a bit premature, as they never got anywhere past where Floyd keeled over, and Phil has to come down from the mountain to eliminate them... and I agree with Becca that this is no way to go out... especially such a likeable team :-\ But they do admit that they've grown to become friends, and even sign off with a nice mini-rap ;-)
