The Amazing Race Season 15: Globetrotters Eliminated, Las Vegas Final Destination Next Sunday

I watched The Amazing Race last night thinking it was the finale episode. Why I thought this, I do not know.

Meghan & Cheyne came in first again, once more with the Pitstop in Prague. The Harlem Globetrotters made it to the mat last and were eliminated.

Big Easy had way too much trouble figuring out the Kafka Roadblock and arranging N A F R Z to spell Kafka's first name. He gave up and took the 4 hour penalty. And thus their last place finish.

Brian, the teetotaler, & Erika got drunk on their Speed Bump, drinking Absinthe. Then Brian sailed through the Kafka Roadblock. The pair sort of stumbled in choosing the Detour option that had them carrying beer through the rowdy Prague streets. Erika did her usual amount of shrieking, while Brian stayed calm.

Meanwhile the Bickering Brothers, Sam & Dan and Meghan & Cheyne chose the 'Legend' Detour option and had to build a big Golem statue to push through the streets to a Synagogue to get told to go to the next Pitstop.

Prior to getting to the 'Legend or Lager' detour teams had to get as naked as possible and enter a deep freeze called the Kryocentrum where if they could tolerate the extreme sub-zero temperatures for 2 minutes they'd get their clue directing them to the Detour.

So, now I am almost 100% that next week is the actual end of Season 15 of The Amazing Race. It appears the final destination is Las Vegas. With Elvis in the house.

The Amazing Race Season 15 Finale Tonight

UPDATE: I was wrong. Last night was not The Amazing Race Finale.

I don't remember when it was that I quit being as entertained by The Amazing Race as I was when it first appeared on my TV.

Did the show change? Or did it just quit seeming so unique and interesting? The race still goes to some interesting places. But in the first few seasons the race managed to go to some rather exotic spots that I'd never heard of.

Anyway, I'm not at all invested in who wins. It usually comes down to a taxi race to the end, with little suspense as to who is in the lead taxi.

Of the 4 remaining teams all have gotten on my nerves at times. I can't quite pinpoint why I find Meghan & Cheyne annoying. But I do. They sort of look alike. Meghan getting mad at a Globetrotter, last week, for slowing up their descent from the pull yourself on a cable above a river challenge, and then getting mad at Cheyne for grabbing a taxi after agreeing to work with the Trotters to find their way to the Opera House in Prague was annoying, but not as annoying as Meghan screeching Cheyne over and over again while he was searching for the teeny violin.

Prague, now that brings up something else. Sam & Dan. They can be likable when they aren't bickering like a pair of brothers. But. When they got the clue to fly to Prague, one asked if they spoke Spanish there and then one, maybe it was the same brother, said Prague was a country. I'm thinking if you don't know Prague is the capital of the Czech Republic you don't deserve to be on The Amazing Race.

Then there is the only married pair remaining, Brian & the former Miss America, Ericka. Ericka is quite a piece of work. Her husband seems a bit hen-picked. I would not mind if they are the winners, but I don't think they have a chance. They make a lot of mistakes. And they have a Speed Bump to overcome tonight due to coming in last last week, after Erica took a long time to find the teeny violin in the Opera House.

That brings us to the Globetrotters, known as Flight Time & Big Easy. Real names Herbert & Nathaniel. This pair has done the least to cause me to dislike them. They are pretty funny. Do Harlem Globetrotters make a lot of money? Would the million bucks be a big deal to this pair?

I'll be watching tonight, hopefully without a delay due to a football game running long.

Adam Lambert's American Music Award's For Your Entertainment

Lady Gaga's heat started a piano fire on Sunday's American Music Awards show. Adam Lambert did not start a fire during his performance, but there was some smoke as he sang For Your Entertainment from his first album. And he fondled a couple females and himself and kissed either a female or male, I could not determine the gender for certain. I like Adam Lambert, but I am not a big fan of the screaming/shrieking part of his singing style.

YouTube removed the video of Adam Lambert's American Music Award's controversial performance due to Dick Clark Productions claiming copyright violation.

There is no shortage of opinion spewing from the Internet regarding Adam Lambert's closing act of the AMA's. Opinion seems to lean to he made a massive mistake. Some think he destroyed his career before it really began. Others think his act was pure publicity genius.

Me? I think Adam needs someone around him to tell him, no, that is not a good idea. Like Elvis would have been so much better off, and maybe still alive, if he had someone who could tell him, no, Elvis, you are not going to eat that deep-fried peanut butter and banana sandwich.

Below are a couple comments from a couple of random Adam Lambert fans....

Overwhelmingly, people seem to have seen the suckitude in that performance,but now you have the die-hard Lambert fans who are riding all over people saying stuff like: "You just don't get it. Adam doesn't need fans like you. Now that I've rewatched his performance 8 times, is was freaking brilliant!"

It's so freaking emperor's new clothes to me. And now I'm reading that the face in the crotch and the make out scene were unplanned, impromptu events? And Adam is on twitter saying his performance was artistic expression. Wow, he's drinking his own koolaid.

Everyone who knows me knows what a huge fan I am of Adam Lambert because I think he's one of the most talented and exciting entertainers to come down the pike in a while BUT my problem with the performance was the vocals. A group of us had made a party of it and waited in great anticipation to see our favorite singer again. To be honest, a few seconds into the song we were stunned into silence - and not in a good way. Where was the confident performer from the Zodiac shows on YouTube with the amazing vocals? What we heard was thin, kind of pitchy, and the looks he gave were scary - not sexy. Especially the wierd cross-eyed look at the end. Not really attractive.

Survivor Samoa: Russell Best Survivor Ever With Laura Out

The CBS promos leading up to this week's Survivor focused on Russell Hantz, saying he would either be Survivor's best ever or biggest fool ever. Or something like that.

By the end of last night's episode it was clear Russell is not a fool, which makes him, according to CBS, the best Survivor ever.

I think I would have to agree with that. He certainly has made Survivor Samoa the most entertaining Survivor season, so far, in a long long time.

And now he's found yet on more Hidden Immunity Idol, though this time he had pretty good clues via a cell phone that was part of winning a Reward Challenge that had half the Survivors flown to another island for a picnic by a waterfall.

Who would have thought that Foa Foa would manage to whittle down Galu's 8 to 4 lead, to now have a 5 to 4 lead, with Shambo switched to Foa Foa, or a 6 to 3 lead if you count John on the Foa Foa side after he voted to get rid of Laura after the 5 to 5 tie at the Tribal Council.

I don't recollect that type of tie before on Survivor. I'm sure it's happened before, but I don't remember. I do remember a tie getting decided by a purple rock or by who could start a fire faster.

Top Chef Las Vegas: Kevin Wins Culinary Olympics

Kevin Gillespie won the final Elimination Challenge and $30K on this week's Top Chef. I think he won more challenges than any other chef. I like Kevin. Seems like a real nice guy who can cook well. But, please, lose that awful beard. Or wear a beard net.

Jennifer got her confidence back by winning the Quickfire. A chef I'd never heard of had them making a dish I'd never heard of, something to do with a protein in a protein in a protein.

Then for the Elimination Challenge the 5 remaining chefs had to cook in a competition modeled after another thing I'd never heard of, the Bocuse d'Or. Apparently the Olympics of the culinary world.

The chefs were very exciting and knew all about the Food Olympics and the chefs who would be judging them. All apparently very famous. I am apparently very ignorant about the culinary world.

Jennifer got an extra half hour to cook due to winning the Quickfire. She helped Bryan out when he got a bit overwhelmed by the complexity of what he was putting on his platter. Bryan came off more likable this episode. Laughing, acting funny and wearing a baseball cap backwards. And answering Kevin's questions about how to cook lamb.

The judges had problems with everyone's food platter. But the least problems with Kevin's, even though they seemed to think what he cooked was too easy and safe. The other chefs had issues like lamb being undercooked, or, in Michael Voltaggio's case, a fish bone left in his salmon, which apparently would get you the instant boot at the Food Olympics.

It seemed like they were disliking what Michael did the most, but it was Eli who was sent home for badly cooked fatty lamb.

But, even though the judges and famous chefs were highly critical, they also heaped praise on the 5 for managing to do what they did in such a short time. It was all very positive and Eli took it real well. In the end, even Eli turned likable.

Michael V., not so much. It keeps burning Michael that Kevin keeps winning for cooking simple things that Michael says he cooks on his day off.

The previews for the finale on a train going through the California wine country looked interesting. It appears everyone had some time off, because everyone has different hair. Tom is still bald, but Padma's has long bangs, Jennifer all curly, the Voltaggio's appeared to be a new color and Kevin looked less shaggy, but still with that awful beard. I want to get a look at his wife.

Nielsen Rating's Top 20 for November 9 - 16

The Nielsen Rating's Top 20 TV Shows for November 9 - 16. The first number is the ranking, the second number is the season average, then the show name and network. The last number represents the number of viewers in millions. An asterisk * indicates a tie.

Rank	Season average	Show name	Network	Viewers in millions	Season-to-date average
1.	2	Patriots/Colts	NBC	22.4	19.7
2.	1	NCIS	CBS	21.0	21.9
3.	3	Dancing with the Stars	ABC	17.6	17.7
4.	7	CSI	CBS	17.4	16.8
5.		CMA Awards	ABC	17.2
6.	11	Dancing with the Stars Results	ABC	16.2	14.9
*	5	NCIS: Los Angeles	CBS	16.2	17.1
*	5	The Mentalist	CBS	16.2	17.4
9.	3	Grey's Anatomy	ABC	14.9	17.7
10.	9	Desperate Housewives	ABC	14.7	15.5
11.	18	CSI: NY	CBS	14.5	14.0
12.	15	CSI: Miami	CBS	14.4	14.6
*	11	Two and a Half Men	CBS	14.4	14.8
14.	18	The Good Wife	CBS	13.4	14.1
15.	7	House	Fox	13.3	16.6
16.	16	60 Minutes	CBS	13.1	14.2
17.	22	Survivor: Samoa	CBS	12.9	13.1
18.	11	Criminal Minds	CBS	12.8	15.0
*	16	The Big Bang Theory	CBS	12.8	14.2
20.		Football Night in America Pt 3	NBC	11.9	10.4

The Amazing Race: Dan & Flight Time Take a Tumble

If I remember right, during the first few seasons of The Amazing Race the race followed a west to east or east to west direction, sometimes going south, sometimes north, but always gaining on an around the world journey.

The current Amazing Race went west and north from Dubai to Holland, then back east to Sweden, then further east to this week's Tallinn, Estonia and next week south and a bit west to the Czech Republic.

It's a zig zag race around the world.

This week's Detours and Roadblocks were entertaining. Particularly the mud volleyball. The Candelabra Roadblock in Mustpeade, the home of the Brotherhood of the Blackheads, was amusing. Particularly when Matt had no idea what a Candelabra was.

The Globetrotters, Sam & Dan and Erica & Brian all running together, trying to find the marked route to the detour, was funny. The 4 boys beat Brian & Erica to the 2 volley ball courts, so the married pair opted to take slingshot vegetable shots at a moose target.

Meghan & Cheyne had already won their 5 volleyball points and had checked in at 1st place at the Pitstop before the next 3 teams found the detour.

It was neck and neck between the Globetrotters and Sam & Dan to get the 5 points. Flight Time & Big Easy got 5 first and took off running to where they thought the Pitstop was. Then Sam & Dan got their 5 and took off running the correct direction, over a boardwalk to a wooden tower. The Globetrotters realized their mistake, turned around, and quickly caught up with the brothers. Flight Time fell down twice trying to overtake Dan & Sam, taking down Dan with him on the second fall. Dan got up and running faster than the big guy, so Dan & Sam made it ahead of the Globetrotters to the mat to claim the #2 spot.

Big Easy was not pleased about being manhandled by the much smaller brothers, claiming that Dan had knocked the much bigger Flight Time down, saying "I'm 6'10", 260, so we're gonna do what we gotta do." I think Big Easy needs to watch the incident on re-play.

In the end, the dad and son team of Gary & Matt could not recover from their mistakes, including the illusive candelabra, and came in last and were eliminated.

I have to say, the Sauna Bus that Gary & Matt had to take a 5 minute sauna in for their Speed Bump, was a very bizarre thing.

Dancing With The Stars: Joanna Krupa & Derek Hough Not In Finals

I was hoping it would be Donny Osmond no longer on my TV screen, but instead it was Joanna Krupa who got the boot last night on Dancing with the Stars.

I've never been much of a Donny Osmond fan. I like Marie. She's funny. I don't find Donny funny. His efforts at humor seem way too forced. I had no idea he had reproduced so many times til I saw his bio clip on Monday's show.

I thought Joanna Krupa's bio would have made people more inclined to vote for her. Then again, it did not cause me to vote for her. I've never voted on any of the vote for the winner type reality shows.

Of the 3 remaining I knew who 2/3's of them were before this season started. I'm still not clear who Mya is. I fast forwarded through her Monday night bio.

I'm not much invested in who wins this thing. If I had to pick who I'd like to see take home the coveted disco ball trophy I guess it'd be Kelly Osborne. She has sort of transformed herself during the course of the show, making her, for me, the most interesting person to watch. I'm thinking Kelly Osborne really was not a star before she got this dancing job, but I think Dancing with the Stars may have turned Kelly into a star. She's just so darn cute.

Dancing With The Stars: Mya & Dmitry Are Perfect Again

I am fairly certain that Barack Obama and Sarah Palin will not be dancing on tonight's results show on Dancing with the Stars.

Last night was the so-called semi-finals, with 4 couples dancing 3 dances each.

Kym Johnson and Donny Osmond did not do too well with their first dance, a Tango, getting only 21 points. For their second dance, a Samba, the pair did better, getting 26. Their final dance was a Jitterbug that got them 27 points.

Then we had Derek Hough and Joanna Krupa getting 27 points for their Vienna Waltz, followed by the Cha Cha getting them 27 again, followed by the Salsa which also got them 27 points.

Sharon Osborne was back in the audience, crying and cheering for daughter Kelly who with Louis Van Amstel got 24 points for their Rumba. Their next dance was the Quickstep which got them 27 points. Followed by the Cha Cha which also got them 27.

And then there was the best of the night, again, Dmitry Chaplin and Mya with no last name. The waltz was their first dance, getting them a score of 28. They followed that up with a Salsa that got them a perfect 30. Their final dance, another Cha Cha, got 29 points, giving this pair the highest total for the evening.

So, who gets the boot tonight? I'm guessing Kelly Osborne. I hope its Donny Osmond. But I really don't much care.

Survivor Samoa: Season 19: Episode 9: Russell Hantz Hidden Immunity Idol Coup

When Russell Hantz first appeared on my Survivor screen, I thought him to be an arrogant, Texas blowhard, suffering from little man syndrome who would quickly get his comeuppance with a fast boot off the show.

I was wrong. I'm thinking that now, with the airing of Episode 8 of the 19th season of Survivor that Russell Hantz has cemented himself a spot in the Top Ten all time best on Survivor. Even if he gets kicked out next week.

Russell has altered the Survivor game. Few have managed that. From this point forward if Survivor continues with the Hidden Immunity Idol thing, everyone is going to be looking for it, clue or not.

It was surprise enough that Russell found the first Hidden Immunity Idol without a clue, but then to do it a second time and then use it to blindside the former Galu, whittling the Galu numbers down by one more. If this were scripted TV the plot would not be believable.

And now in the previews we see the Galu members chasing Russell around, afraid he'll find a third idol. I may have the numbers wrong, but I think it is now 6 Galu to 4 Foa Foa. But, Shambo has pretty much said she is with Foa Foa. That makes it even.

I'm thinking Russell is going to engineer some little coup and keep himself on the island. Or he will win Immunity. That would be entertaining.

Top Chef Las Vegas: Robin Leventhal Packs Her Knives & Goes

Robin really was a bird with extra lives on Top Chef, outlasting many who seemed to be more highly evolved in the cooking ability department. I liked Robin. She seemed nice. I'm a little surprised she has a little bistro in Seattle called Crave that went under in the current bad times. She did not seem like a Seattle girl to me. Why? I don't know.

This week the chefs had to cook a dish for 185 or so, inspired by a casino. Robin drew Bellagio. She walked in and saw the huge Chihuly glassworks on the ceiling. Somehow that inspired her to make a dessert using gelatin and sheets of melted sugar. The sugar failed, as did the dessert bearing any resemblance to anything Chihuly ever cooked in one of his glass ovens.

I did not really understand why Robin was the one to go. Eli Kirshtein's Circus Circus raspberry popcorn white chocolate soup seemed so much worse and had both Padma and the nice English guest judge, hating it.

The Voltaggio boys and Kevin were on top again. Jennifer Carroll joined Eli and Robin at the bottom. Michael Voltaggio was once more acting jealous of the praise Kevin gets, even though Michael won this round with his chicken wings inspired by New York, New York.

A person claiming to be a friend of Robin's wrote an interesting blurb at one of the ubiquitous TV forums...

"As a "friend" of Robin's, I feel obliged to stand up for her. But I also know her, so I think a great deal of what you saw there...the scattered behavior, the inability to focus and find her footing is, pretty much, oddly, not her. I have been around her and yes she is a mover in a kitchen and is hyper. That said, she is a good cook. A cook, not a chef. I asked her why she went on (Top Chef) and (she said) she knew it would be something out of her element, but the money and exposure was something she needed. Her own place closed earlier this year and she is working, but not enough. She has huge medical bills, etc. And is genuinely one of the nicest women I know.

I have another friend who turned this show down because of both Tom and Padma. I have always hated Chef Kojak and with each passing episode I come to loathe him a little more. I prodded Robin about these two and she was gracious, and by the way she just calls the brothers intense and Eli immature. I am hoping to get her drunk and maybe she will be more forthcoming."

Nielsen Rating's Top 20 for November 3 - 10

The Nielsen Rating's Top 20 TV Shows for November 3 - 10. The first number is the ranking, the second number is the season average, then the show name and network. The last number represents the number of viewers in millions. An asterisk * indicates a tie.

Rank	Season average	Show name	Network	Viewers in millions	Season-to-date average
1.	x	World Series Game 6	Fox	22.3
2.	2	Cowboys/Eagles	NBC	21.9	19.3
3.	1	NCIS	CBS	20.2	21.7
4.	x	World Series Game 5	Fox	17.1
5.	15	60 Minutes	CBS	16.9	14.3
6.	3	Dancing with the Stars	ABC	16.7	17.5
7.	7	The Mentalist	CBS	16.2	16.6
8.	8	CSI	CBS	15.6	16.1
9.	6	NCIS: Los Angeles	CBS	15.3	17.0
10.	12	Dancing with the Stars Results	ABC	15.1	14.5
11.	15	V	ABC	14.3	14.3
12.	4	Grey's Anatomy	ABC	14.0	17.3
13.	10	Desperate Housewives	ABC	13.8	15.1
14.	12	Two and a Half Men	CBS	13.5	14.5
15.	18	Big Bang Theory	CBS	12.7	13.9
*	18	The Good Wife	CBS	12.7	14.0
17.	11	Criminal Minds	CBS	12.5	14.9
*	15	CSI: Miami	CBS	12.5	14.4
19.	22	Survivor: Samoa	CBS	12.4	12.8
20.		CSI: NY	CBS	12.0	13.7