We cried from the couch: "We do! You're all good, Vaz!"
The show's mindless banter and stupid games fell away as wet-faced Vaz stared miserably at the camera. The Bachelorette is tough, man.
"It's the first time I've ever put myself out there," said Jake.
He looked like he'd been run over by a truck. The moral of The Bachelorette is: don't put yourself out there. It's less about who gets the rose than who gets nothing.
"Say your goodbyes," creaked the show's wooden host, Art Green, as Jake and Vaz took their leave. The show has travelled to Queenstown and it looked like the rose ceremony was held beside a swamp. The sky was dark. A wind had got up. Failure rang like a distant bell that got louder and louder.
There are now eight contestants left. After six episodes of gazing at the assembled drongos of love, I've learned most of their names. There's Drongo Paul and Drongo Todd and Drongo Joe the Builder …and…um…Every now and then an unidentified drongo looms into camera, and my daughter and I ask each other, "Who the hell is that?"
It usually turns out to be the tremendously unmemorable Drongo Aidan.
Non-drongo Vaz was among the show's most memorable contestants and not merely because he was 6' 7" and had an incredible body.
He was emotional. He was deep. He wasn't sure of his place in the world and didn't know the right things to say and was afraid of the dark night of the soul.
He was worried about not being understood but maybe his real problem was that he couldn't be bothered understanding Hottie Lexie.
Before the rose ceremony, he wondered out loud that if Hottie Lexie gave him a rose, he might tell her to shove it. It seemed much more likely that he'd have clung on to it for dear life.
Farewell, Vaz! It's true, you know: you're all good.
