I saved my journal entry in Word, so I will share below. My first big mistake was staying quiet in the middle of the game. As psap mentioned in one of his forum posts, I was “late to the ballgame”. I was lazy communicating with people (until Big Brother) and thus was not as highly trusted. My second big mistake was choosing to trust psap over csudak. Now looking back, I really do believe that csudak was playing a straight-up game….and that an alliance with csudak, Ahrens, pola, and thebish would have been a better option. Also, psap’s goal from early in this game was to beat polabonez in the finals. As I wrote in my diary, I thought one of the big positives in aligning with polabonez was that he would be seen as a bigger target and would get eliminated before I….and with psap having so much control and wanting polabonez to stick around, I was destined to be dead meat at some point down the stretch.
I don’t see keeping the Diamond Power of Veto in my pocket as being a mistake. My best chance at that point was trusting in an alliance of pola, psap, geos, and I. Everybody was taking turns being a pawn, and it was my turn. Psap was the HOH at the time and polabonez was on the block with me. If I had used the special veto, I would have aggravated psap and put pola’s life in danger….so I would have damaged trust with two of the players whom I planned to work with down the stretch. My other option would have been to team up with Ahrens & thebish, but I had already nominated thebish twice for elimination, and flipped from Ahrens/csudak…so flipping back wouldn’t do much good with my jury popularity. I would be interested to find out what would have happened if I had used the veto. Psap also won the POV that week (due to a rainout) and seemed to have a lot of say in who coachbug and geos voted for, so he would have determined who went home. I’m assuming he would have kept polabonez safe and eliminated either Ahrens or thebish…..and that I’d be on the chopping block the following week.
Journal Entry:
While we wait for the voting results, here's something else to think about. We are going to do another "Letter's Home". We would like each of the final 10 participants to send a letter home to dubs, red and myself. Included in the letter should be:
- What is the best move you've made so far.
- What move by someone else has hurt your game the most.
- How you expect to play down the home stretch.
- Who are your important allies coming down to the end.
- How you expect the game to end (who's gonna get voted out, how you expect to finish, who will win the game).
If you send in a letter to all three hosts by Saturday at 6PM ET, that includes the above conditions, there will be a "special opportunity" for you, regarding the game (mysterious eh?). As always, letters are optional, and will not be revealed (of course we may show the highlights in the post game). It's up to you, but I would say it's def worth it to submit one.
Q1: The best move I’ve made so far was saving Team Hubris from elimination with my picks twice in the Amazing Race portion of the game. The first time, we were u-turned and toward the bottom of the pack. The detour was the NBA & NCAA challenge where teams got points for the 2nd most in each category. Polabonez was out of town, so I had to complete both legs of the detour. We did so well that we ended up in 3rd place overall for that week. The second time was the final week of Amazing Race. We were tied with another team for last, and whoever was further from 57 NCAA rebounds would be eliminated. I made the picks, and hit 57 exactly.
Q2: There hasn’t been much, and I can’t think of anything during Big Brother. One move that could have hurt me was when Hufflepuff voted out Ghutton early in the game. I might have been likely to align with him at some point in the game. Another was when tubby, onside, and shoe were eliminated in Amazing Race…Polabonez and I were planning to work with them in the Big Brother portion of the game. I can’t remember if they were u-turned…but if they were, that was a big move.
Q3 & Q4: While playing Big Brother last time, I learned that it’s important to play both sides without getting caught, as I need to keep myself safe when the power shifts from week to week. My top ally right now is polabonez (although I had a hunch for a while that he has a final 2 deal with psap). I don’t think that pola would dump me because he has done most of the strategizing and believes that he can easily beat me if we make the final 2. Right now, I am pretty sure that we are in a great position. We have been playing the game closely with csudak/Ahrens (who have ties to thebish/usfbully), and showed our loyalty when pola gave them an idol during Amazing Race. We did a big favor for psap in the most recent vote by saving geos, and I don’t think we damaged the relationship with csudak/Ahrens in the process. Coachbug (who has ties to hardknox) and I honored our deals to keep each other safe when we were HOH in back-to-back weeks, so I feel like I can count on him down the stretch.
How do I plan to play it down the stretch? The great thing about our current position is I’m pretty sure that csudak/ahrens will go after psap/geos if one of them wins HOH…..and psap/geos will go after csudak/Ahrens. So we won’t have to do any dirty work and can then continue to play with the side that survives. Honestly, I’m hoping that csudak and Ahrens get eliminated first because I believe that they are more connected than psap and geos. I’ve also surrounded myself with players who are bigger threats than I (polabonez, csudak, psap), so I don’t think that I will be anybody’s #1 target…and can make my way deeper into the game.
Q5: Of the final 10, there seem to be five pairs: polabonez/me, csudak/Ahrens, coachbug/hardknox, psap/geos, thebish/usfbully. The players that are most likely to win will be the ones who can adjust when their partner is eliminated. Also, as we get closer to the end, the houseguests will want to eliminate strategic threats (polabonez, csudak, psap), who are likely to win the game if they make it to the end.
There are so many possibilities for a winner! My top choice right now is Ahrens. He has quality connections with me, polabonez, csudak, thebish, and usfbully. But I’m pretty sure that he is psap’s #1 target, so he will have to survive longer than psap. Csudak, psap, and polabonez have all played outstanding strategic games….if one of them can make the finals, they have a great chance of winning. Two possible picks for a surprise winner are usfbully or coachbug. Coachbug has stayed “under the radar” and is connected to polabonez, myself, psap, and geos. Usfbully made some interesting moves as HOH last week…he kept some players safe who nominated him the previous 2 weeks…that will either turn out to be stupid or will put him in a good position down the stretch.
In order for me to win, I need to find my ruthless side. If players help me get further in a game or if I screw somebody over in a game, I feel like I need to pay them back in future games (which is what hurt me in the last survivor game with dubs). It will be difficult to eliminate players like polabonez, csudak, Ahrens, psap, and usfbully:
-I’ve played all 3 phases of this game (over a 5 month period) closely with polabonez
-I took ghutton over csudak to the finals of Survivor 11, and took ghutton over Ahrens to the finals of Big Brother 2…after they both kept me alive earlier in those games
-Psap kept me alive in Survivor 11 (when I was put on a tribe with no allies) and I turned on him in Big Brother…it would be difficult to turn on him again
-usfbully kept me off the block last week after I put his game in danger the week before…it would be difficult to put him on the block a second time if I won HOH