Brian's Banter

[Brian]

(Just so you know, I'll be away at my cottage with family+friends from Friday evening until sometime Sunday, so I'll be unavailable during that time.)

With everything having wound down a little, I'd say this has been a pretty all over the place, exciting, and enlightening round. I'm not just talking about my house either. Matt and Mike winning BOTB and Sofia Vetoing Neda were both things that came a bit out of left field (Sofia using the Veto not as much), and seemed like a bit in the way of eye-openers, as is Drew being the replacement nominee for House 1. Initially I thought Keith being the replacement nominee for Christine was a bit surprising, but with all this talk of him being close to Ash, I'm not so sure.

Speaking of Ash, he made a big scene about the idea of Keith being a replacement and totally ditched Ika for greener pastures. Not only that, but there's been some speculation among people that Christine won the POV as a result of shall we say..."questionable methods" that Ash may or may not be a part of. While I've seen and heard enough to fully understand why people think that, it's not my place to make a big deal about it, demand action be taken, and make accusations. Regardless of what I may think, or may have wished happened, it didn't, and all me going on about it on the board or over AIM is going to do is reflect negatively on me. That's not really something I need considering me being away for a bit.

Ika's going because Heather refuses to vote out Keith on account of being close with him (something Nicole informed me of on her way out), and of him being close with Ash. Pretty much to me, this makes it seem clear that in Ash's original Heaven plan, the 4 votes to get Heaven out were planned to be me(or Ash himself)/Christine/Ika/Keith. It also leads me to believe he figured he could get a 4th vote to go with Christine/Ika/Keith (possibly Heaven) easily enough. Apparently people really figure Drew is with Ash (which is possible) and that's why he's up and targeted, but Neda being Veto'd over Candice, and Zach saying he didn't plan to go against Sofia/Heaven/Ryan since they were targeting people he wanted out makes me wonder if the "U.N." is back together again. With how early it still is though, I'm mainly looking at things from an individual connections perspective. I learned my lesson on making a big group early.

[Brian]

Okay, so Mike and Sofia winning HOH is hilarious and I wish I was going to be online to see a bunch more of it play out. Please let them be planning some secret alliance or something between them. I don't care how improbable or unlikely it may be, I'm only half-joking when I say I want it because I can't stop laughing at the idea.

[Brian]

I know it's probably in my best interests to let Sofia get her way and have Shilpa go since I can try and scoop up Rachelle, but...Shilpa sticking around and being against Sofia could also be nice.

[Brian]

Well, after this past hour, I'm starting to take back that bit about having Shilpa stick around. Yeah, it's looking more like she really should go.

[Brian]

So wow, I get back from my cottaging and find I only really missed the nominations and the Battle of the Block. Thankfully that didn't really impact me as directly as it could have since I didn't get nominated and have to win BOTB. Truth be told, I know Sofia said she wouldn't nominate me and that I wasn't her target, but even with us sort of deciding not to make it a point to overly fuck over each other for the time being, seeing is believing. It was sort of funny when I got back and Ryan won Veto because everybody was like "Sofia wants to backdoor someone but I don't know who the hell it is". Granted, being away for a weekend means I probably missed a bunch of it when she put up Shilpa, but I still thought it was kind of funny for...some reason at least.

Ever since Shilpa went up next to Hayley, things have been going crazy though. Heather, Keith, and Christine have said they "can't vote Shilpa" (apparently they're friends), along with Ash, Mike, and Matt voting Hayley. I heard Boog wants to keep Shilpa too. Conversely, Neda, Ryan, Heaven, Nick, Rachelle, Memphis, and Zach are evicting Shilpa. Candice I'm not sure on, but I've heard she's evicting Shilpa and it might not matter if she doesn't since at an 8-8 tie, Sofia (at the risk of saying the completely freaking obvious) is most likely evicting Shilpa. People who want to keep Shilpa are coming to me with surprising persistence under the claim of saying the majority really is looking to keeping Shilpa. My guess is they must be thinking I'm the swing vote, which would be kinda crazy to have me be in that position after an absence.

I'm really thinking I should evict Shilpa in this case and I feel 99% sure that that's what I'm going to do. It's not just about making an enemy of Sofia's group if I do, though that does factor in, it's because of things like the amount of people that would keep Shilpa over me. Some of them are people that I like and might need later, and would have a harder time going with from a game perspective with Shilpa being there. I like Shilpa from a person to person point, but I also think if she stays then it winds up painting a clear divide in the house, and I don't want that. If she goes, yeah some of the people keeping her will be close with each other, but I think it'll be like groups of 2 or 3, instead of say, a group of 8. I've just gotta do what's best for me, ultimately.

[Brian]

Okay, what the hell? Every time there's some sort of "everyone press the button" thing, Matt freaking goes and presses it within like 3 minutes of me. If the button comes back again, I'm not doing a damn thing with it until AFTER he's posted, because this shit's getting really annoying.

[Brian]

You know, I'm more finding it hilarious that Mike and Sofia are together yet again, than I am upset by the Matt thing (which was a silly thing to get upset by since at least 1 Button would be bad). At this rate, these two are going to win Best Duo and Best Rivalry at the same time.

[Brian]

That Ash speech...Man, he can't honestly think that's going to have any effect other than making Christine an even bigger target and possibly straight up dooming her to get evicted. Like...he says he and Christine aren't a duo and that them being called that upsets him, then does and contradicts what he just said by saying what he said. Christine claims they're not a pair either to me, but then contradicts it a bit later.

She talks about how "who's going to be targeted by the 'trio'" and how she thinks everyone who kept Shilpa isn't that badly off when they might well be the "targeted next" ones. The thing is, either way it's not just as simple as "down with the trio", and I have to think there's a bigger picture. I mean, yeah I might be skeptical of some people, but naturally they'll realize they have to take out the bigger threats at some point, so I'm not worried about that. The main thing that worries me though, even though people like Zach, Neda, and Nick haven't given me reason to doubt them, I don't want to be that idiot who sticks with people that are just using me and don't see me as more than just a number. Even if I do like being on civil terms with them again.

[Brian]

Pretty much I'm going to guess Mifia or Boother's going to win HOH, but I'm guessing I'd be alright with that. At least as long as Veto doesn't get used, in case Boother wins. I sent Ryan an Offline IM last night and a PM this morning asking about when he wanted to set stuff up for/do the HOH, and when he wanted to talk about it. Hopefully he gets back to me soon, because truth be told, I'm not even sure this is an HOH I can fully win with him helping me, let alone without him.

[Brian]

So, it's looking like Boog's putting Ryan and I up, mostly from her telling me last night that she was leaning that way. She said she doesn't talk to Ryan, and I'm pretty sure me going up has to do with that I put her up Week 1. I'd like to think that if we go up and stay up that Ryan's going to go for being seen as a threat, but I'm not going to pretend I wouldn't be facing some danger. Ryan probably has a couple of friends, and people might want him around as either a flak shield, or to use his comp skills to take someone down later. I may be a bit better about things lately, but I can't pull off clutch wins one after the other like Ryan potentially can.

Mike said that Heather asked him to throw the POV, so it'd seem like she's putting him and Sofia up, which would make it at least look like Sofia and Ryan are the targets this week. Hopefully Zach/Heaven get picked for POV and potentially win it, since that could potentially stir things up. While the idea of one of the whole "Trio" thing that people keep talking about leaving, I obviously don't want to be nominated when it happens (even if I sort of think they'd veto Mike/Sofia over me). Plus, the idea of me sticking around and 1 of those 3 going, just means 2 of them can go up at a later time, instead of putting 1 up next to someone that can potentially beat them in Veto and just hoping.

[Brian]

Well, this isn't surprising. Veto is pretty much going to come down to Ryan vs Sofia with me competing with Mike for "who can drag their partner down the least".

[Brian]

Well, we lost POV to Mifia in a 3-way tie after they just killed it time-wise. Personally though, while I was really upset at the time I was doing the comp that Imgur was messing up and not letting me upload stuff (I messed around with it for 4-5 minutes before saying screw it and going to Tinypic)), that 5 minutes really wouldn't have made a difference towards who won. I could beat myself up over missing 2 of the Vetos in the picture that I did and how "just one more would've had us win" but that's just time I can spend getting votes to ensure that I stay. If I had the power to choose myself who goes and who stays, I'd have both Ryan and Hayley go. This would serve the purpose of giving me a strong partner if the pair twist continues, it'd potentially allow me to work directly with Rachelle, and it'd keep somebody that Heather wants gone so that she'd maybe be a bit more dependent on me when it comes to vote numbers. Granted, I think with nominations this week she probably could've done a bit more to make it easier for me if she really wanted to, but I can worry about that if I stay.

Looking at how the votes might go (from purely a keeping me vs evicting me perspective, ignoring the other parts), I'm thinking it'll go like this:

Votes to evict me: - Keith (has barely said anything, apparently told others he was evicting Rachelle and I)
- Sofia (doesn't really like me much, and likes Hayley and Ryan more)
- Heaven (friends with Ryan, was allied with Hayley in S6)

Votes to keep me: - Zach (has at least seemed to have my back so far)
- Matt (approached me to reinforce an alliance with him and Mike)
- Mike (alliance reason above and we're on good terms)
- Memphis (keeps reassuring me I'm safe, I've heard people say he's a supporter to me staying)

Votes in the middle/unsure: - Nick (I THINK he's keeping me because we've been oddly aligned, but I haven't gotten to talk to him since briefly yesterday)
- Candice (I think we've been on good/alright terms, but I'm not sure if she thinks I'm useful to her. She and Neda seem the true question marks/swing votes to me)
- Neda (We buried the hatchet at the start of the game, and she's at least to my face, been more approachable and open, but...I don't know if she has deals with the people I'm up against)

I'm trying not to overthink and go crazy from this since that helps nothing, but I certainly feel like this vote could go either way. Besides, my S7 eviction came during nominations that I certainly thought I'd be staying through and well...we saw how that went.

[Brian]

So uh...the less said about that HOH, the better I think. Yeahhh...

[Kat]

So how do you feel about the HOH?

[Brian]

Let's see...how do I put this? With some of them it felt like eating cereal with a fork. You can try it sure, but as you're doing it you know "yeah, this ain't gonna work out". Totally didn't go hop on my PS3 for a bit after and play some Street Fighter to stop myself from getting a bit worked up. I mean, that'd just be silly.