Survivor: Abyss Island – Day 36 Immunity Challenge
Life force snuffed out. Ouchies.
Abyss Island: S1E12 – A Good Day To Cry Hard
And so it comes down to this. Day 36 and only three days to go. I figured my next challenge was going to be for a brand new car! Okay, so I was only slightly off on that score.
With the end of the tunnel now in sight, Survivors have to remain cognizant that challenge difficulty is going to be ramped up. This is where the best of the best truly shine and the people like me go home empty handed.
Tree mail, like always, sounded the just right ominous tone:
At first you won’t be able to see
You won’t think it’s fair, but it is to meNext you will find it puzzling to see
But the picture will be clear to meGet it together for all to see
If you lose you will have to submit to me
Oh, great. A blindfold challenge and a puzzle. All the best elements of Survivor. Not. This does not bode well for me. Am I mistaken or does the word “submit” ring out just like the creep duh-duh music from the movie Jaws?
To top it off my wife spent all day taunting me. “Are you practicing, Tom? Big challenge tonight.” Practicing what? Being blindfolded? And how does one practice for a freaking puzzle, smart ass?
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Survivor: Abyss Island – Day 33 Reward Challenge
Our camera ated the video.
Abyss Island: S1E11 – They’re Gonna Put Me In The Movies / A Night To Dismember
Last night was a heady time on Abyss Island. Lots of comings and goings and what nots and so forths. It was almost too much for a lonely rice-eating bean-eating castaway to deal with. Almost.
It was Day 33 of 39 of my exile from deliciousness. The agenda for the evening included a reward challenge and then watching some weenies on TV try to duplicate my greatness. Ha!
Dinner consisted of, you guess it, a serving a plain white rice. I was out of beans. (They got replenished this morning and the crock pot is crocking them.)
Tree mail hinted at the promise of a reward:
Keep your eye on the ball
Try not to fall
Keep your balance true
And you’ll be A-mazed when you’re thru
Hmm. Sounds like one of those marble labyrinth thingies. Finally! A nice relaxing challenge.
Never underestimate the viciousness of the host.
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Survivor: Abyss Island – Day 30 Immunity Challenge
Cabazon. It’s what’s for dinner.
Abyss Island: S1E10 – Down To The Wire
Always a guessing game on Survivor it is, hmmm? And apparently talking like Yoda helps me deal with the stress. No, I’m not losing it. Not at all. But when my baby tells me, “I’ll blow your planet up,” I don’t take any chances. Usually she means it. With host, one does not mess.
It’s early in the morning on Day 31 (out of 39) as I write this recap post. Only eight more days to the big finale. There was supposed to be an immunity challenge on Day 29 but it never happened. Tree mail on Saturday never came. What did the Survivor gods have in store?
Friday – Gone Fishin’
Per the official rules, I have to cook my own food. Provided for me is an all-you-can-eat supply of red kidney beans and plain white rice. This has been the staple of my existence for an entire month. I’m also expected to eat three servings of fruit per day.
Since arriving on the island I’ve opened a coconut with an ordinary hammer (MacGyver-style), learned how to break down a pineapple and can expertly skin a kiwi. It’s amazing how blandness in your diet suddenly makes you receptive to learning that which you avoided all your life. “Sure, I’ll eat your pineapple, but only if I don’t have to do any of the slicing myself.” On the island you can’t live like that.
During the second reward challenge I won a fishing net. Normally I bend over and squat a bit and use the net to simulate the game of tennis. Whoosh! Uhhh!!! Whoosh! Uhhh!!!
Sometimes, though, if I put the net in the sink, I can fish up a real lunker.
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Survivor: Abyss Island – Splurge and Reward
Abyss Island: S1E9 – Splurge for Super Bowels Into Reward Darkness
Day 27
Dear Diary: I’m shaken by a vision of a well-protected note safely ensconced in the loving embrace of a pristine bottle and sealed with a cork. A note that contains my innermost thoughts protected against the ravages of time for all humanity to benefit.
Such luxury! Bottle? Pfffft! Cork? Pffft! Note? Pfffft!
For 27 days I have been lampooned marooned on this above-sea-level pile of sharp rocks. I barely have the energy to scratch this message using my own blood with the tip of a seagull quill on the back of a crab shell. Urgency compels me onward even in the face of certain defeat. It’s not like I have anything better to do.
I’m still exhausted from what felt like near rescue at the time. I did the You Can’t Touch This dance on the beach for a passing ship. Hopes quickly dashed to nopes as the ship failed to take notice of my Herculean gyrations. No, I don’t think I can dance.
If I ever get out of this mess I swear to you that I will enact a law that requires all ships on horizons to carefully observe the islands they pass within shouting distance. Seems like only good form.
I just had another vision, this time one of terrible darkness. That reminds me. It’s time to watch the Super Bowel.
Survivor: Abyss Island – Days 21, 22 and 23
The challenge scene upon my arrival.
Abyss Island: S1E8 – A Filthy Scramble for Immunity and a Splurge
Day 21
I was informed by the producers of Survivor: Abyss Island that even though I’m the only contestant, it has already been decided by the powers that be I will not be invited back to participate in season two, All Stars – the Re-Abyssening.
That was a body blow to the ego. That hurt. Whatever. I haven’t got time for the pain. I have to do what I always do and soldier on, chin up, and all that. I still got a job to do.
Day 22
It was a week of twists and turns, including a reward challenge and the delicious taste of victory (jalapeño poppers, pizza and chicken). The producers inexplicably delayed the reward challenge until Thursday throwing off the timing of my entire existence.
Suddenly another Saturday and another immunity challenge was at hand. Tree mail contained cryptic portends:
Fuck, damn, shit
Boobs and gonadIf you don’t find them fast
It will really be too bad
I have to admit. I had no clue (aside from the actual one in my hands) about what to expect.
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Survivor: Abyss Island – Day 20 Reward Challenge
Baby, do I look nerdy in this?
Abyss Island: S1E7 – Set Phasers on Food / The Trouble With Kibbles
My wife named this challenge: “Star Trek or Star Wife”
I strolled into the challenge sportin’ my official tribe buff and hoisting the toilet plunger the proudly bears the ZeitGuru team flag. I was feeling cocky and confident. After all, I was batting .750. I had won three challenges in a row (after losing that initial house of cards travesty of justice). I’m on a win streak. What could possibly go wrong?
Rumor had it that this reward was going to be one “worth playing for” and I was more than ready. My tummy was in a twitter of anticipation. It growled ominously like a Rigellian ox as I stepped in and assumed my station on the pad.
“Energize.”
“Belay that order, mister! We’ve got a challenge to finish and Starfleet ain’t yella.”
As usual, the Priority One communiqué from the Federation only served to muddle my mind. I took it in my ready room on a secure channel:
To boldly go where no man has gone before
To know your wife and make the score.James, Spock, Scotty and George Takei
If you’re not careful you’ll make your wife cry.Outer space is where you’ll do well.
Upsetting your wife…
You’ll wish you lived in Hell.
Obviously I was going to be quizzed on my knowledge of my wife, like some variation of the Newlywed Game. But how in the hell would Star Trek fit into this? Dammit, man, I’m a negativist philosopher, not a doctor!
Leave it to my wife to up the stakes. I found myself in the Neutral Zone with a lot more than a meal to worry about. Failure in this challenge could mean the end of the Organian Marital Peace Treaty itself.
Fiendishly clever.
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Survivor: Abyss Island – Day 15 Immunity Challenge
The challenging challenge course.
Abyss Island: S1E6 – Nice Cans
Life on the island of late has been pretty good. The spice kit reward has been a tasty boon to my existence and my persistence with the fishing gear finally paid off – I caught a tiny lobster tail!
With my win in this week’s reward challenge I also picked up the second clue to the location of the hidden immunity idol. The clue said something about “stinkin'” and a place where I do my “best thinkin’.” Methinks I should prioritize my search patterns to the bathroom.
On the actual show persnickety survivors start looking for the idol even before they have clues. And somehow, against all odds, there have been times when they’ve been able to find the damn thing even before clues have been released. I smell a rat. (Oh, wait. That was season one.) The producers wouldn’t influence the action, would they?
I can assure you that at least on Abyss Island the producers show no favoritism. It’s sink or swim. Find it your own damn self.
Unlike my televised counterparts, I take a more lackadaisical approach. Even so, I decided to carefully check the bathrooms. I noticed a few things that have been there for years as if seeing them for the very first time. I’d bring them to my wife and say, “This must be the idol!” and she’d heartily laugh at me.
“You’ll know it when you see it,” is the only cryptic response I got. Damn.
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Shouts from the Abyss 
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