Ben H Week One: Gettin' Higgy Wit It

Welcome back, Baches!

It feels like years since the last time we were graced with the wise words of Chris Harrison, our Lord and Savior. He's back in all of his therapeutic glory and we couldn't be happier.

My winter just got 28 degrees warmer.

The Roses to Riches Fantasy League has grown exponentially since the amateur days of Desiree's season. We're up to over 70 players in 6+ states! We have satellite conferences in Nashville, Lexington, and New York City. Yours truly is playing in the Remote Conference (aka Hoes in Different Area Codes) with competition from all over the country. The Chicago Conference is up to 5 pools of players and even conducted their draft at a sponsor bar. Congrats, folks. We've hit the big time. If we get any bigger, we might have to institute a bowl playoff system with a totally biased selection committee.

Let's get down to business, shall we? Judging by the season previews, we are in for a classically dramatic season. Night one was no disappointment. Ben H's season is full of just enough weirdos to keep our game fun. Personal favorites from draft night include the crazy chicken lady, drunk girl already stirring up trouble, and Lil' Sebastian's hillbilly friend.

RIP lil' buddy. You will always be missed.

Can we halt for a moment and talk about how Ben H is 26 and from almost the same hometown as me? He might as well be all the losers I wanted to date in high school. I don't even pay my own cell phone bill yet and this kid is talking about marriage. How could a town an hour away produce Ben H but my hometown only produced meth-addicts and Best Buy employees? SO MANY QUESTIONS.

All angsty thoughts aside, Ben H is quite good at playing the Bachelor game. He and Christ Chris Harrison are already best bros, and as we learned from 'ole Juan Pablo, that is the key to success and positive PR.

Straight out of the limo some ladies make swift advances. Lace says "hi" with an awkward kiss (does not count for points.) Leah uses a football ruse as an excuse to hike up her dress and show off the goods. JoJo terrifies us all with a unicorn mask. Lauren R confessed her social media stalking skills. The twins say and do the exact same things all night, raising suspicions of cloning and/or robot parts.

Props go out to my girl Izzy for wearing a comfy pajama onesie to such an uncomfortable formal event. You da real MVP.

Becca and Amber, the two girls from prior seasons, show up fashionably late with smug got-this-in-the-bag expressions. Naturally, the other girls already hate them.

Speaking of hate, Lace has a fewww too many glasses of pinot and has already brought our her crazy and her claws. Instead of hiding her inner-lunatic for just one night like the rest of the contestants, she decides to start shit talking and asking Ben for more attention. Not the smoothest of moves. Lace turns out to be quite the point-cow, however, thanks to her knack for insulting others and stealing Ben during one-on-one times.

Lace is the type to burn all of your stuff because your phone died.

The first impression rose, and 10 beautiful points, goes to Olivia. She's was an obvious front-runner from her introduction, but the first impression rose, aka kiss of death, almost certainly means she doesn't win. I hope she has a contingency plan, because she quit her new anchor gig to embarrass herself on television.

Thank goodness ABC followed protocol this season and gave us a rose ceremony on the first night. They tried to get all tricky last season which just flared up my stress ulcer. The rose ceremony happens at what appears to be 6am. The gals are all nervous and Lace is having trouble standing up straight. Some surprising keeps, other than Miss Inebriation, are the mother of two and the girl who never spoke English.

Our eliminated one-night-wonders are:
Breanne (the gluten hater)
Tiara (crazy chicken lady)
Maegan (can we keep Lil' Sebastian?)
Izzy (onesie hero)
Laura (intelligent redhead - who saw that coming? Sorry, Eliz)
Jessica (I don't remember anything distinct about her)

Too bad, so sad ladies.

League members, check your points and rosters on your conference page. For the sake of efficiency, Lexington is listed as part of the Nashville Conference. Don't forget to send us your team name and Tweet your watch party photos to @RosestoRiches. The league is much more fun when trash talking is involved, so pool texts/emails are highly encouraged. Feel free to also leave those thoughts and feelings in the comment section of this post.

May the roses be ever in your favor.

Love and Roses,
Julie
League Co-commissioner

Special thanks this week goes out to Conor at Gaslight Pub in Chicago. We appreciate your patience, accommodating spirit, and sense of humor. We'll be back with bells on, if you'll have us! We may even bring you a rose.