Tonight, Survivor‘s self-proclaimed King of the Jungle, Russell, was out-smarted…and he didn’t even know it! Man, I wish I could have been in Russell’s living room  tonight, while he was watching this episode play out. I would have loved to see his face when he realized he got played….and worse, played by a useless Walking Stick of a human being Courtney and the grumpy-faced nobody in the corner, Sandra.

 Of course, they are useless in challenges (as was evident tonight in the disgusting mud challenge, where their partners literally had to drag them behind. One of my personal favorite moments of this season was when Sandra literally got stuck in a mud hole and was flopping around like a fish out of water. LOL overload.) But tonight showed that they may be two underdogs to watch out for when they put their heads together.

Sandra came up with the great idea to tell Russell that Coach was gunning for him so that Russell would in turn vote Coach out, saving Courtney from inevitable elimination. (There is a brain under Sandra’s hat after all!) Russell took the bait and launched a campaign to get Coach out. (We had lots of third-person Russell moments here, “If you’re not with Russell Hantz, you’re against him.”) He even bitched out Danielle for disagreeing with him. She argued that the tribe needed Coach for challenges.

So what the hell happened here? When they showed the votes Russell ended up voting for Courtney, and Danielle voted for Coach…um…WTF?! I think CBS did some seriously bad editing, leaving vital details of what caused the switch on the cutting room floor.

Other thoughts on tonight’s episode:

• Courtney is getting skinnier by the moment. I know it’s not big news or anything, and people have always said she has an eating disorder, blah blah blah…but really, I would have tossed her a pepperoni or something during the pizza reward if I were the heroes. I would have felt so guilty eating in front of someone who is literally withering away by the day. I wonder if there’s some sort of rule, like, if you hit 65 pounds, we will main-line fried chicken into your veins or something.
• No more Coach equals no more group meditating moments. I’m sad because those things always cracked me up. I wish I could have known Coach in high school. He was probably that drama creepo that was out back behind the theater practicing his Jedi sword moves.
• The mud challenge was absolutely horrific. It was gross to even watch, probably because the mud honestly resembled crap. When it was dripping off Rupert’s beard I almost threw up. Anyone else?
• Amanda, please pull your butt cheeks back into your underwear. Seriously, I’ve seen more crack than Whitney Houston because of you.