''The Amazing Race'': Uncivil Wars

And then there was the S.S. Misery, otherwise known as Jen and Nate's dinghy. It was tough watching them bicker, because there's no one to root for. It's like a Möbius strip of irritation that you keep following around and around, never able to alight on a terminus of blame: She demands he learn how to row a boat immediately, and you think, ''Well, she's unreasonable and so hard on him.'' But then he whines, ''Let me figure it out without you yapping in my ear every second!'' and you think, ''Then again, he's incredibly frustrating since he won't listen to constructive criticism.'' And she replies, ''You're the meanest person I've ever met sometimes!'' and you think, ''He didn't really deserve that.'' And by the time it devolves into ''I hate you I hate you, I'm never going to be with you ever again.''/''Good!'' you're so dizzy you start blaming the innocent Croatians frolicking in the sea in the background.

There is more and more evidence accumulating that the world hates Nate and Jen, though. First there were the spiteful donkey and the camel, and last night they got rejected by a cab driver just for being ''wet''; because of this, they hitched a ride and then were penalized by Phil for not taking official transportation. (''To have this happen is the cherry on top of the ice cream sundae...that's already melted,'' grumbled Nate, in his most clever line of the show. Although I'm surprised he didn't give it that Nate tweak to become ''To have this happen is the biggest cherry ever on top of the most sugary ice cream sundae ever...that's already melted to a degree that even the smartest melting theoretician can not explain.'')

After they nearly crapped their pants when they were startled by the pit-stop musket blaster, only to be sent back to the end of the detour, I kind of wished that they'd been eliminated this week because I can't stand to see what other abuse the world has in store for them. I have a bad feeling it ends with them traveling to Rome and getting sucker-punched by the Pope.

It was Ronald and Christina who nabbed first place, winning a catamaran. I'm happy for them, although that's a sailing excursion I'm happy to be left out of. (''You are fossilizing your mind with this rudder! I am giving you navigation with full truth!'') When Jen and Nate finally arrived, greeted by a red-beret-wearing local who looked like either Anthony Quinn or a gone-to-pot Frank Vincent from The Sopranos, they congratulated each other with a mere handshake. This motivated Phil into a rare bit of analysis: ''Not a lot of affection there.'' This was only slightly less obvious than turning to his co-greeter and saying, ''Really taking a fashion risk with that cape, aren't you?''

Hendekia and Azaria ended up being eliminated, but Nate and Jen's spirit seemed the most crushed. At the beginning of the episode, she said that this race was going to be the deciding point of their future relationship. Which is odd, since anyone watching this show could have made that decision the first week.

What do you think about the episode, Azaria and Hendekia's elimination, or Jen and Nate's future? Weigh in below!

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