Bachelorette Blog: Thinking "aBOAT" Things (Week 4)

Another week of Bachelorette madness. Here. We. Go. The new format dictates that we must wrap up the previous week's cocktail party and have a rose ceremony. They seem to be embracing this long term, so I guess I have to too. There's just no getting around it.

First up we have to resolve the Clint cliff hanger. Kaitlyn pulled Clint aside and he totally tried to play her. We all know he's not in to her, but as Kaitlyn said "this isn't about [Clint's] relationship with JJ." In the end she just couldn't trust him and asked him to say his good byes. When he went inside to say bye to the guys JJ told him that he should apologize to everyone for monopolizing so much of Kaitlyn's time on drama and taking away from their quality time with her, which completely set Clint off. JJ threw his best friend in the house under the bus which not only made Clint flip on him, but also dropped his respect levels with all the other guys to an even lower level.

So Clint took off in a huff, clearly pretty distraught about how he was leaving things with JJ and JJ boo-hooed. But don't worry he slapped himself in the face to "suck it up" and reminded himself that he's "not there to make boyfriends" he's there "to make girlfriends". Or find a wife, I think that's what the answer is supposed to be, right? Anyway, after all this Kaitlyn was really conflicted and felt she hadn't had enough time to make a good decision so she cancelled the rose ceremony and kept everyone. Everyone except Clint that is.

After Kaitlyn announced that there would be no rose ceremony, Chris Harrison told the group to pack their bags because they're heading to New York City.

Group Date #1 - Rap Battles with Doug E. Fresh

Am I the only person who doesn't know who Doug E. Fresh is? Anyway this was a shit show, or to quote Kaitlyn again (she had some very quotable moments last night) "This is the worst rap battle I've ever seen. There's never been a rap battle between two guys in khakis." The big news of the rap battle was that there were some past Bachelor/Bachelorette peeps in the audience and we got our first glimpse of Nick (and so did Kaitlyn).

After the rap battles Kaitlyn went to say hi to her friend (Ashley I.) and found out Nick was there. Here's the scoop on Kaitlyn and Nick - after last season Nick contacted Kaitlyn because he thought she handled herself well and they struck up a friendship via social media and texting. They had never met in person before and it was not super deep, they were not dating. So Nick decided he'd like to have a shot at dating her and came to the show. Which leaves Kaitlyn with this huge decision as to whether or not to let him stay, which took up most of the rest of the episode.

She filled the guys on the group date in on what was happening and needless to say they were not too pleased. In particular Shawn and Tanner who have a pretty low impression of Nick based on his reputation from the show.

Can you tell this episode is basically not about any of the existing guys? Seriously the whole episode centered on Clint/JJ and Nick. Kaitlyn was so torn she sought out advice from crazy Ashley S! Yay, Ashley S is back! Weirdly she had really solid advice. But even after that Kaitlyn decided she would let Nick stay because she felt like she would regret not giving it a chance. This all happened while she was getting ready for her one-on-one date with Jared.

One-on-One - Jared

This was the go-to, every season has one, big romantic date. They got all dressed up, went to a fancy location and had a private dinner. Then they went on a helicopter ride! Kaitlyn's excitement about the helicopter was too cute. And we've found out that Jared is already falling in love with Kaitlyn and she really likes him too, especially after he recited a nerdy rhyming poem that he wrote for her. After the date with Jared, Kaitlyn is thinking "maybe she doesn't need Nick." So that's something I guess.

Group Date #2 - Broadway

Before they started the group date, Kaitlyn hit up the guy's hotel room and filled them in that Nick would be staying and moving in that night. Didn't go particularly well, but who thought it would. Then they were off on their date. Kaitlyn took the guys to Broadway to do a full audition (singing, dancing and acting). Oh man, they all really sucked. Chris ended up "winning" the audition with his very animated/flamboyant performance of "A Whole New World". Since he won he got to continue the date and the rest of the guys had to head back to the hotel. Chris and Kaitlyn got to "perform" in the live Aladdin show. And by "perform" I mean stand around in the back ground. Seriously, all that auditioning and they didn't have to sing, dance or speak. Probably for the best (for the audience anyway).

PS - Kaitlyn's white gloves totally made her look like Mickey Mouse. I couldn't get over it.

So we left last night's episode with Kaitlyn and Chris still on their date, all the guys waiting around the hotel for Nick to show up, and Nick taking a really awkward elevator ride. And another TBC.

With all that being said it's really hard to tell who Kaitlyn is actually making connections with. I think Ben Z is still solid, Shawn B is too (although he's pretty pissed about the Nick thing so we'll see how that goes over), and Jared appears to be doing pretty well. Outside of those guys, it's unclear to me who's "in the lead". Hopefully, she'll get rid of a bunch of guys next week and we can start to get down to the real good stuff of the show, because all this crap at the beginning of the season has been less than progressive for her relationships.

Until next week, PS I kind of hope Nick doesn't make it far, but he kind of might.