This is the 70th entry into my deep-dive into the Netflix show Orange Is The New Black from the perspective of a formerly incarcerated person (now 2 formerly incarcerated people).

Not too much to share this week in terms of news, I have been very busy working to help support the passage of the First Step Act.

I hope you have been listening to my podcast Decarceration Nation, last week I had a discussion with Beverly Parenti, co-founder and Executive Director of The Last Mile. I am totally in the tank for The Last Mile, they train people in soft skills and next economy skills and create on-ramps for employment after release. On Monday I am publishing my interview with Julian Adler co-author of the book “Start Here: A Road Map To Reducing Mass Incarceration” and Director of Policy and Research at the Center for Court Innovation.

We are on iTunes, Google Play, Spotify, Stitcher and now Tune-In (which means that you can simply tell your phone to “play Decarceration Nation” and it should play the most recent episode). You can also find every episode at DecarcerationNation.com.

Remember, the whole point of this is you get two recaps for the price of one (well it's free, but you get the point). Kathy's recap comes first and my traditional "Five Things" recap comes after hers. This week, as an extra added bonus, we even have my short Twitter discussion with the real Piper about a recent protest she was witness to (around the August 21st prison strike).

If you have not watched OITNB before *Spoiler Alert*

Kathy’s Take

“Strange Bedfellows”

“Ben”

What is more perfect than holding the draft for “Fantasy Inmate” on mischief night as Luschek's house is under siege by the neighborhood kids (bombing it with eggs, toilet paper and other unknown liquids) - the “team owners” all bravely pass through this assault to attend the “first” actual in-person “draft” of the league.

It’s interesting to see these fools out of uniform and to see them as ordinary people, they put that uniform on and it gives them this power, not like Superman because they are certainly no heroes! Luschek has a surprise up his sleeve, something he has been working on, rather something he hacked online. With futuristic music playing, he presents the ‘visual inmate draft’...watching these nincompoop officers participate in this ‘draft’ and then intentionally set-up the “players” just to score points at works is absurd. But more importantly, it shows the extremes they will go to just to win at something.

Ruiz continues to be isolated and just by looking at her you can tell she can no longer take it, she has reached that breaking point, and I can understand and completely appreciate that.

During her job cleaning bathrooms (I too had that job n the visiting room, nursing home floor of the inmate hospital, and at a housing unit) there where many times when I would go into the stall just like Ruiz did and cry out of frustration and out of being overwhelmed, But I never had someone come up behind me who tried to shove my face in the toilet to drown me...still shaking off that feeling today after watching it last night.

Meet my daughter, Andrea.

What lives and thrives in the air vents within correctional facilities. Commonly referred to as the “air telephone” which inmates use to shout through to the cell in the floor above or below or using a string or a strip from your sheets so you could pass snacks or notes or other items when we were locked in our cells during lockdown which sometimes could run hours or even days.

Knowing that it is possible that rats could flourish in this catacomb of vents - no I cannot think about it (I do not like vermin). Throughout the facility, they have these huge 3 inch high black boxes with 2 or 3 holes in it that are rat traps so I have hope that the air vents in the facilities where I was did not have families of rats living in them. However, I took great pleasure when those creatures were used to play a prank, captured and relocated to the cheese packing room when the cleaning crew came in, payback for what I am not too sure, it was all part of the weird mischief night activities at Litchfield.

The image of those hairy rodents climbing up the leg of someone's pant is now seared in my brain forever, running around squealing, even one getting split by an inmate using the work boot on their foot. The only thing missing to make it complete would have been the playing of Michael Jackson’s song, “Ben.”

Suzanne (over in Florida) just wants a friend, she just wants someone to go out in the yard with, get some fresh air, see the sky and clouds and the only one on the unit she knows is Frieda. Forget that, Frieda is not the warmest and fuzziest of individuals. Mischief night comes to Florida as we see Frieda’s cellmate being wheeled out of the cell on a stretcher with her body and face covered by a sheet.

Just so you know, when an inmate dies in their cell (yes I have been a witness to this on more than one occasion) the facility is required to leave the body there, the unit is placed on lockdown and all are required to remain in their cells while the outside authorities (police and medical examiner or coroner) come in and conduct an investigation of the ‘crime scene’ then the body is removed in a black body bag by the medical examiner.

Once this is done everyone is released from their cells and life on the housing unit continues as if nothing out of the ordinary happened. Suzanne seeing the dead body removed from Frieda’s cells seizes on the opportunity to suggest to Frieda that they become cellmates, well Frieda is having no part of this arrangement until hours later when Suzanne comes into her cell with this small bundle of shivs, well at least Frieda is sharp enough to realize a shiv and it’s usefulness, while Suzanne merely thinks of them has slats for a fence. Frieda is suddenly warming up to having Suzanne as a cellie - and those shivs might come in handy.

5 Things About Season 6 Episode 5 “Mischief Mischief”