It begins with Charlotte out on the street saying goodbye to her newest first date. They are about to share a kiss, and Narrator Carrie is narrating how hopeful she is about the possible magic that's about to happen.
It starts out OK, and then his tongue is outside her mouth, licking her mouth area and chin. It is gross.
So, obviously the foursome have to talk about how bad bad kissers are.
There's the clam mouth ("Get that thing out of my mouth, put it in a cab, and take its lazy ass home") the stabby pointy mouth, and well, Charlotte's boyfriend with his wandering tongue.
Sam sagely advises Charlotte to break up with him because a bad kisser is a non-negotiable. (hence the title of the episode) She thinks she can retrain him.
Just then the chef at the restaurant where they are eating comes over to talk to the foursome about the delicious food she's been whipping up. She is the master of fusion, trendy food with soul food. For some reason the foursome applaud her after she tells them to take it down a notch. I always found that odd:
"Hey ladies take it down, this is a respectable restaurant."
:applause:
Adeena, the chef, happens to be black (this is important to the plot) and her very attractive brother pops up chat with her sister-- and to flirt with Samantha. They leave the scene, and Samantha gets all atwitter about her future lay.
Charlotte chides Sam for her "African American" talk, and Sam defends herself, "It's not black talk it's sex talk."
Charlotte seems to think it's rude and politically incorrect for Sam to flirt with a black man.
Everyone reminds her that Sam is rude and politically incorrect-- an equal opportunity offender.
"Exactly," Sam explains, "I don't see color. I see conquests."
(I HATE that phrase 'I don't see color' but I won't go into that here. shorthand snark: This show is so dated!)
I still don't understand what is so wrong about Sam's 'atwittering,' so I'm moving on.
--
Carrie is hanging out at home, she's settled in with coffee and fashion magazines when someone is knocking at her door. It's her best gay friend Stanford! He tells her to get dressed because there's a sexy new furniture designer in town that they need to scout.
Carrie doesn't want to go, until Stanford points out that he's straight and she says she'll get her purse.
"All these people with nothing better to do than to ogle some lowly craftsman? pathetic!" She jokes to Stanford.
She turns over a price tag and winces. Stanny tells her that she can get a discount if she lies about being a designer.
Just then, Stanny points out Aiden somewhere on the other end of the store, and Narrator Carrie describes him. "His name was Aiden Shaw. He was warm, masculine and classic American, just like his furniture."
And then Carrie adds, "Jesus Christ, the dog is overkill."
[I just have to add that the writing on the show from this point on is near-perfection]
Stanford encourages Carrie to go get him, that he's perfect for her and ends with "I'll come visit you and the children at your country cabin upstate." (FORESHADOW)
Before she goes over to him and abandons her friend, Stanford points out a perfect, classic gay designer in the showroom. Carrie encourages Stanny to go get him: "I'll come and visit you and the swatches at your country cabin upstate."
That out of the way, Carrie walks over to the sexy furniture designer and is promptly humped by aforementioned dog.
"You should get that creature a chew toy!"
She flirts with him, and he is picking up what she's laying down. and vice versa. Literally. He takes her hand to run it down the back of a leather club chair, and "suddenly I had to have whatever it was I just felt"
The club chair in question costs nearly four thousand dollars, so Carrie whips out the lie Stanford prepped her with, and he gives her two discounts, the extra one was for the dog humping.
(ooh! I never saw what she paid cause pencil and TV distance, but she gets a twelve hundred dollar discount on the chair!)
"How soon can it be delivered?"
"I can get it to you by the end of the week."
Narrator Carrie explains that in NYC retail lingo, that means "I kind of like you."
On what planet does "I can get it to you by the end of the week" mean THAT?! I've been furniture shopping wrong my whole life, that's for sure.
--
Steve is rampaging through Miranda's life at the moment, bouncing his basketball against her Ralph Lauren brand painted walls. I just looked it up, and they were really just name dropping here. I was thinking this paint must be so much more expensive than Behr, but it's exactly the same price and, at the time of filming, available from any Home Depot store.
Steve has news that is making him rampage! He won a contest at Sam Goody (hey! remember those?!) where he gets to try for a million dollars-- if he sinks a half-court shot at a knicks game. He's thrilled! Miranda is significantly less excited. She reminds him that it is a kind of hard shot and that he shouldn't get his hopes up and that he needs to stop bouncing his basketball against her walls.
what a downer!
Steve asks her nicely to come down to the playground to watch him shoot hoops and practice, and Miranda says that she is busy and can't today, but will another day.
This is about the time that Miranda begins her role as "Steve's Mother." It isn't pretty.
She has to talk about it with Carrie while eating a cupcake. I don't know about you, but people eating while they're talking in shows is gross, and people eating cupcakes while they're talking is EXTRA gross, the cake gets all caught in their throat and it makes their voices sound all deep and weird. grosses me right out.
You're welcome.
Carrie asks her why she can't just support her boyfriend, since that is what 'you people with boyfriends' do, and Miranda's like, "You're asking me?"
And Carrie has to talk about her new crush, Aiden, and how she bought a very expensive chair she didn't need from him because he was so cute. Miranda says the chair is a write off since he asked her out.
Miranda says she's crush proof, since she hasn't had a crush since Shaun Cassidy. Carrie asks about her boyfriend, and I'm kinda on Miranda's side here-- you can date someone and not have a crush on them. Crushes are juvenile. But anyway, Miranda thinks she's broken and asks if she's normal. "You're asking me?" Carrie responds.
--
Aiden and Carrie have a marvelous first date. Near the end of it, they are sitting on her stoop, talking about stuff, flirting and being very friendly. Then.
And then Carrie lights up a cigarette.
This is a clear non-negotiable for Aiden. He doesn't date smokers. He is friendly about it, but is clearly drawing the line. It is a deal breaker.
She couldn't believe it. She was crushed.
So bemused Carrie goes up to her little laptop to write about it. Since when did dating get so dump-friendly?
(oh honey, just wait till the age of the internet when you can be dumped before you even MEET your date!!)
--
Meanwhile, Charlotte is trying again with Brad the bad kisser. If you can believe it, he's gotten even worse. She has to stop him from sucking on her chin to tell him he's a bad kisser.
"Come on! it's my thing!" (god, he is such a guy!)
--
Stanny is on a date with the perfect gay-designer, Marty from a few scenes ago. They've made it to Marty's bedroom and are about to do it! So exciting for Stanford! But his room is completely filled with expensive china dolls. There are dolls on all the tables, on shelves and several on the bed.
They have to painstakingly move each doll-- and they can't go just anywhere: "No no no, the southern belle sits on the table!" This is going to be a problem, I think.
On their next date, oh about ten scenes from now, Stanford and Marty get so excited in their passion, they *don't* move the dolls and one of the dolls' faces ends up shattered on the floor. Poor Marty. He breaks it off with Stanny immediately. A broken face is a non-negotiable.
--
Sam continues dating Chivon, Adeena's brother. They are actually eating dinner at Adeena's restaurant. She comes over to chat with her brother, and find an excuse to get him out of the scene. Then the true Adeena comes out. She doesn't want Samantha dating him because she is white.
Samantha doesn't let Adeena stop her.
She complains (in vivid "African American" talk) to her friends about how Adeena can't tell her to to date. Charlotte thinks she should back down, and Carrie thinks she should stick to her guns. Carrie compares Adeena and her deal-breaker, to Carrie choosing cigarettes over Aiden.
Woah, woah, woah! Says everyone at the table (and the audience).
"You're choosing cigarettes over a cute guy?" Miranda voices everyone's opinion.
"He's not that cute." Carrie maintains.
"You bought furniture he was so cute!"
Carrie rationalizes that it wasn't OK for Aiden to dump her over a little thing like smoking, and Sam and Charlotte remind her that it isn't a little thing, and she's killing herself and they only put up with it cause they love her.
And Carrie, rightly, feels attacked.
But.
But he is really cute.
This is around the time that Carrie tells her second, third and fourth lies to Aiden.
She lies that she only has a cigarette occasionally, like with cocktails. (and also waiting for a first kiss on a first date?)
Aiden reconsiders and decides to close up shop to go out with her immediately to get some coffee.
"The second I heard him say coffee I knew I kind of wanted a cigarette" Says Narrator Carrie.
"I'd love it," Carrie says out loud.
The date lasts MUCH longer than she was expecting-- at least without a cigarette break-- and she is sweating bullets out there waiting for an out so she can go smoke her emergency stashed cigarette. But just then he just looks so cute, inviting her to dinner, and she thinks about how much she is willing to give up for a cigarette.
--
Steve is at it again with the basketball. He's there to remind Miranda that she promised to go to playground with him to watch him shoot hoops.
She is busy again, and he loses it. "I ask you to do one thing for me one time for me and you can't do it, wtf is that?!"
"wtf is with the attitude?"
"Do you know how many law things I've been to? How many times I do what you want?"
"Why are you getting so upset, it's just a stupid half-court shot?!"
"Not to me it's not!" (beat-- in the form of him throwing his basketball and retrieving it) "Why do you always have to be so pessimistic you can't make that shot? ...It's not just the shot it's everything... If this is ever gonna work I need you to believe in us a little more. I need you to believe in me even if you do think it is fucking stupid."
And finally, finally Miranda gets it and she shows up for Steve. He misses his practice shot, and eventually misses the contest shot, but she showed up for him and that was almost better than winning a million dollars.
d'aww.
Sam is out dancing with Chivon, having a ball and getting on with his friends. Out of nowhere pops Adeena, out for blood. She tells Sam to leave, and Sam stands her ground yet again.
"Adeena I'm a lovely person. At least get to know me first and then you can hate me."
(Well, at least she's honest)
Adeena is adamant that it isn't a game, that she is concerned about her brother and doesn't want him dating a white person, that Sam will never really understand because it's a black thing.
Sam almost buys it, starts to leave and reminds herself that she doesn't let anyone tell her who she can and cannot date-- she says almost exactly that to Adeena who shouts at her to get her little white ass out of the club and away from her brother.
Sam then criticizes her food, and pokes her hard in the shoulder and turns to walk away. That's when Adeena grabs her by the hair and pulls it.
Chivon shows up to break up the fight.
Later on, while breaking up with Sam, Chivon says that she didn't have to criticize his sisters food.
Sam walks away from him-- unwilling to be with someone who won't stand up to his sister, which is a major deal breaker to her.
--
"7 hours into the world's longest date," Carrie is shaking like a chihuahua,"all I could think was five more minutes and I can dump this bozo and smoke the emergency cigarette hidden in my purse."
The waitress comes by to ask if they'd like a dessert menu, Carrie is trying to say no, but Aiden does want to take a look and it's too much for her and she flies out of there so fast she forgets her jacket on the back of her seat.
Outside the restaurant, she flings the cigarette so fast that it lands in the gutter. She is absolutely desperate, so she kneels down, picks it out of the puddle, pinches off the wet part and lights it up anyway.
"Carrie. We got a little problem."
oops.
In the last scene, Narrator Carrie is narrating Carrie dumping the last of her cigarettes in the toilet.
"In the end I really did it for me... I just hope he's worth it."
Excellent Episode! Until next time!
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