Image via Bravo.

Good lord.

Where do we even start? This week, Orange County skips across the globe to Ireland to play out some tenuous storyline about Meghan wanting to learn more about her ancestors. The ladies arrive, admire their beautiful gratis hotel rooms and then proceed to behave like lunatics.


The clan is having what seemed like a great time on their Irish pub crawl, knocking back shots, pouring pints and watching Heather pretend to drink hard alcohol. But like anyone who has ever been on a pub crawl knows, it’s only a matter of time before things go south—sometime around bar three.

Kelly, who is lit, keeps playfully bopping the women on the nose like a precocious 7-year-old because that’s around the time her arrested development kicked in. The ladies have an out-of-proportion reaction to her antics (though that shit did look annoying), causing Kelly and her blood alcohol level to also overreact by taunting Tamra.


I think it’s important to remember here—though it probably doesn’t need to be said—that everyone other than Heather is very drunk.

Tamra could have kept walking, told herself that it’s 2 pm, Kelly is wasted and kept the peace. Instead, she leans into the fight and she leans in hard. One minute we’re talking about nose bops and the next we’re talking about Kelly getting her real estate friend to look into whether or not Heather had to take out a loan to buy a plot of land and I don’t know, rich people shit.

Now, I’m going to preface the episode’s Big Drama with my official interpretation of Tamra. I have zero desire to know her personally, but I enjoy Tamra because Tamra is good television. Also, I maintain that half the psychotic shit she does is for the purpose of the show. Consider that any of the women continue to be friends with her. They must know, to know extent, she’s exaggerating her behavior because ratings don’t raise themselves. Otherwise, there’s no reason anyone would continue to spend a moment of time with her.

With that said, Tamra and the others seem to recognize the difference between a regular reality television fight and serious real life boundaries.


Kelly does not.

For starters, I have no idea why Kelly thought Shannon wasn’t going to immediately run and tell Tamra what she said. Shannon does not like you. You said that Shannon deserved her husband’s infidelity. Shannon don’t give a fuck about you.


Kelly’s retort about Tamra’s daughter was a profoundly shitty thing to say and wasn’t even on the same continent as Tamra’s supposed lie about the real estate agent friend. What’s even more confusing is why Tamra and Kelly suddenly went after each other. You could argue that Tamra was trying to defend Heather, but she obviously didn’t need to bring up whatever silly piece of gossip Kelly told her.

Kelly’s psychotic reaction to Tamra lying almost suggests that Tamra maybe was telling the truth because Tamra lies all the time so why lose your mind over this one specifically? Either way, Kelly again revealed her complete inability to exert even an ounce of self-control in a given situation and, frankly, it’s getting old.


The Bravo gods are benevolent gods but they are not indulgent gods. For that reason, we didn’t have any footage of Tamra confronting Kelly but we did have some very hot mics.

My favorite part is how Kelly somehow doesn’t understand what Tamra is so upset about, as if she hadn’t just said the woman’s daughter hates her not five minutes ago. Kelly will later say Tamra hit her, but via Vicki, Shannon and Tamra’s own borderline apology, it sounds like it was more like a push.


Violence is bad, but people can also be provoked within an inch of their limits and them’s fighting words. Again, don’t touch people, but if Tamra was my friend and someone had said that about her child, I would have mimicked Heather’s brilliant response to the situation.


It’s also worth pointing out that Kelly has not relaxed at all and continued talking about Tamra’s children last night on Twitter.


The Real Housewives always like to say kids are off limits, which they only sometimes abide by. Tamra has commented on other people’s children but I don’t think her words were in the same territory as Kelly’s comment. This reminds me of the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills episode when Brandi tries to bring up Adrienne using a surrogate and everyone else at the table goes silent. A Housewife’s gotta have a code.




I guess we also have to talk about the “racist” incident.

In trying to explain a DUMB joke, drunk Kelly starts lecturing Heather, who is Jewish, about the magnificent sense of humor all Jewish people (other than Heather) supposedly have. Heather calls her racist, which was the correct spirit but the wrong word and Kelly counters with: “I’m Mexican!” which has literally nothing to do with the situation at hand.


This is also relevant because it’s now the second time we’ve heard Kelly say something very off color. Because Kelly is not smart and not fun, she doubled down, again.


Last night was an interesting conundrum for me. I enjoy crazy—oh, how I love it so—but there’s a distinction I can’t quite put my finger on between, say, the Berkshires insane and Ireland insane.

As my colleague Madeleine pointed out, Kelly “is crazy in a scary way and not in a fun way.” Even Meghan, her only real friend, is weary. Speaking of Meghan, shoutout to her perfectly on-point reactions to these bitches.