Amazing Race: Season 3, Episode 1

Of COURSE I’ve been catching up on the first 2 seasons of TAR, which have just been re-run on GSN. I’m so happy to finally feel the love for Kevin and Drew (TAR1 fan favorites) and Danny and Oswald (TAR2 fan favorites). Last night was the finale of the second season, which saw Chris/Alex, Tara/Wil, and Blake/Paige battle it out to the finish line in San Francisco. Incidentally, now I finally feel the hate for Taraweasel.

But tonight, we’re finally cooking with gas, because it’s the premiere of the third season. My season. The season when I tuned in on a whim and became instantly hooked, within 5 minutes after the opening credits rolled. The season where I would attempt to look up the flights and routes on SABRE at work the day after each episode, estimating the actual travel date based on information found at TWOP.

I missed the first three episodes, the last of which ends up in a part of England that I visited on my first trip there with Mom (fifteen or so years ago). On a later visit with my friend Christine, I took a walking tour and became fond of the very English pasttime of walking in the countryside. This requires you to navigate footpaths, do your own routefinding, and juggle bus and train schedules in order to reach starting and ending points. When David and I went on our trip to England, I was determined to do some more walking, and fortunately, David loved it too. The uncertainty of finding your way to the next village, and the sense of accomplishment when you actually get there, makes for a very rewarding ramble (and the end-of-day beer or cider tastes even better).

Anyway.

So when the fourth episode started, I recognized the area (Mousehole, near Penzance), and started laughing at how the racers were 1) misprounouncing place names (it’s actually prounounced “Mooz’ul”), and 2) using a shortcut to the next location that was obviously a footpath, and 3)frantically trying to get to a major airport and book flights to another country. Oh ho! A sport that’s already dear to my heart, and it’s on TV! Let’s watch these hapless folks bumble their way around the world, and laugh heartily when they screw up, and cheer when they figure it out!

That’s how it got started. I’ve got several more “new” episodes to watch before I get to familiar territory, and I missed a couple more. I’m happy to get to see more of my favorite team of that season, Ken and Gerard (otherwise known as “Oh Brother,” or “YAAAY!”). I’m also happy to see my least favorite team get eliminated again. That was another reason I loved this show so intensely after just one episode, because the duo that irked me the most that night were out at the end, in a particularly just and satisfying way. Tonight or tomorrow night, I get to see them struggle with a form of transportation, in an incident that became one of the legends of Comedy Gold among Race fans. Oh, boy! I’ve been looking forward to this since I read it in Miss Alli’s recap!

I’m not so happy having to hear Flo screech her way around the back half of the course, but I understand she’s a very nice person in real life.

The theme of this season, as it turns out, was “Animals Is Always Funny” You’ll see why when we get to the finale.

The theme of the fourth season was apparently “Around The World of Poop.”