I’m watching tonight from my friend’s apartment in Williamsburg, so I feel very close to Little J in spirit. (NOT REALLY– when I was 16 I was running around in Umbros and braces, not foot long platinum hair extensions and Phillip Lim!) opens with Dan and Georgina making out in Blair and Georgina’s dorm room.  Shock and awe, people. Clearly the fire that was Dan and Georgina’s drunken lust was not put out by sobriety.

Blair is fast approaching the room she shares with Georgina, and we watch as she puts a delicate black glove on to open the grimy door handle to her dim little dorm room.  Even though there’s a sock on the door knob, she proceeds. When she sees the make out sesh, she says exactly what we’re thinking, that moving from Serena to Georgina is a huge step down.
Dan scurries out, and runs into Serena (who doesn’t even go to NYU but we’ll let that slide). Serena realizes she’s catching him “on a walk of shame,”  and slowly starts to put it together as Vanessa walks out of her room, and now Dan’s two exes have him cornered. And now we’ve gotta suspend our disbelief a little bit: they both say they don’t mind Dan fooling around with Georgina. “Who doesn’t have a Georgina in their closet,” Serena says, referring to her own liaison with Carter Baizon. Vanessa agrees to allow the hook up, on the condition she can make fun of him. The only thing we’re agreeing with in this scene is Serena’s dress. It’s an insanely expensive Matthew Williamson.

courtesy of gossipgirlfashion.net

Vanessa is getting more and more nervous about Scott, as she should be. This time, it seems he’s lied about Comp Theory class– he’s says that’s where he’ll be all morning, but Dan says he knows that class is in the afternoons. V calls him to question him, and he worms his way out of it. This guy is always worming his way out of things, and he’s also terrible at worming his way out of things: he never has an excuse he just says “I can’t, gotta go.” I mean he doesn’t even try.

Turns out Scott is actually playing guitar with his secret father, Rufus, and then Little J and her platinum extensions walk in. She notes that Scott’s been spending a bunch of time in their Williamsburg loft, and Rufus says he’s a good kid and a “good guitar player.” We know, it’s boring, we just fell asleep blogging it! Seriously this Scott plot better pick up fast, GG.

Vanessa heads to admissions office to do a little detective work on Scott, she’s trying to find out if he’s even actually enrolled. About time, V! The girl at the desk sympathizes: “my last boyfriend told me his dad invented the battery,” she snorts, and then she tells Vanessa he’s not in the system.

Turns out Chuck and Blair haven’t had alone time in a week, and she’s getting pretty desperate. She heads to Chuck’s apartment, in the cutest lingerie set we’ve ever seen in an attempt to seduce him. He basically tells her to put her perfect navy trench coat back on, he needs to focus on his next investor meeting with a NYC hotelier  named Sean McPherson. He says, “I only get one shot with him,” and Blair, who always has the best lines, says “as opposed me, whose just some endless vault of do-overs.” B leaves in a huff, and when she arrives home an embossed invitation to a secret society called “Table Elitaire” falls to the floor. B looks at getting into the society as an opportunity to expend all her pent up energy, and to be part of something elite once more.

We think Blair is a little sharper than this, but we go with it. All her pent up frustrations are making her a little batty.

Dan realizes he needs to make sure he and Georgina are on the same page: he fumbles through a “no strings attached” speech to Georgina while she just stands there, smiling. “You’re adorable,” she tells him when he’s finished, and then she kisses him. Gag.  They head off to pizza. We would talk about Georgina’s outfit but we’re really never interested in her style, sorry G!

Blair and Serena are quibbling about Carter Baizon, and Serena tries to defend their relationship—“its different, he actually knows me,” she says. Blair shoots back, “Who are you trying to convince, him or me?” She tells Serena that “guys like Carter don’t change.” We tend to agree, but Chuck changed, didnt he? And Carter can stick around a little longer because he’s super cute.

Chuck heads to his investor meeting, only to be met by a real bulldog in a blue dress. She tells Chuck that if he wants a chance with MacPherson, he should nab a particular vintage Patrick McMullan for the bossman, to “show respect for his past.”  The photo will be up for auction that night at Sotheby’s, and Chuck plans to buy it as a gift to warm the hotelier up.

Super boring Bree and Nate hatch a plan to show up to the Sotheby’s auction together, as if anyone will care, but they think it’s a sensational plan! Anyway, back to a far more interesting couple: Blair tells Chuck that the secret society asks one thing of Blair: to acquire that specific vintage McMullan for their “art collection.” Hmm, besides a huge, tacky  name check for McMullan, we also smell a rat! They bicker over and it, and it’s adorable and funny and perks us up.

V finds out there’s no Scott Adler enrolled in NYC. Finally… she’s starting to get with the program. She tells Scott to pony up: “Tell me the truth or we’re over.” Or, an even better idea, don’t tell her the truth so it’s over!! Unfortch, he fesses up that he’s Lily and Rufus’ son. She says he’s got to tell Rufus, and Scott says, “it’s been twenty years, what’s a day or two more.”

Chuck comes to Blair’s door, squinty-eyed, holding champagne and glasses. “I came to apologize,” he says. Blair tells him to do so, and Chuck goes, “that was it.” Zing!

Chuck proposes that neither of them go the auction that night, and Blair says it’s too late, “I’ve already got my bidding paddle,” and Chuck says he’s pretty sure they could find another use for the paddle, totally teasing her with a roll in the hay because he knows she’s desperate for a little loving. But Blair is hip to his tricks, and she runs out, but not before stealing his shoes!

Dan and Vanessa meet in their stupid coffee shop. Georgina just happens to show up and bust the party. Dan tells G about Scott not being enrolled in NYU, and G is happy to take the speculative spotlight off of her, and to have a mission involving Dan that could possibly bring them closer. He could be dangerous, she says, and they’ll have to get to the bottom of it.

Outside of Sotheby’s, Bree and Nate kiss for paparazzi and it’s really boring, but they seem to think it’s really special.

courtesy of poplife.com

Vanessa tells Scott it’s time to tell Rufus, and he says he will, but then he sees his mother from across the way. Scott’s mother says she’s not there to stop him, but to support him.

Outside, Chuck fumes at Blair: “My Bottegas. Where are they.” Blair retorts: “Consider them prisoners of war.” Chuck can’t help but look pleased with his little firecracker.

Then the bidding begins, and because Blair and Chuck get caught up in a fight, Serena, in an insanely hot burgundy Herve Leger, places the winning bid—because she realizes they’ve been plotting to make Carter look worse than he is so Serena will stay away from him. By the way, Blair’s floral shimmery dress is adorable, but her hair is pulled back far too tightly and they’ve triple-wrapped too many braids tightly together in the back. The milkmaid look works far better when it’s messy.

Scott tells Rufus a half truth, not a whole: that he’s the brother of Rufus’ long lost love child, not actually the child. V looks terribly disappointed in him, but come on, when has this guy ever been someone to depend on?

Serena, with the vintage Patrick McMullan in hand, confronts Chuck and Blair, who confess to starting a spear campaign to destroy his credibility and even put a warrant out for his arrest! At Serena’s insistence, Chuck and Blair agree to call off the dogs, and Chuck even says “I’ll call my guy at the precinct.” OF COURSE Chuck Bass has ties with a cop on the inside!

Serena gives Blair the framed photo, and tells her she knows what to do with it. When Blair takes the photo, she leaves behind her Secret Society invite, and Serena recognizes the handwriting. “No way,” she mutters under her breath.  Blair gives the photo to Chuck, and says she’s offering it because she believes in him. “If this is what it takes for you to believe in yourself then it’s worth it,” she says.

Serena confronts Georgina about the invite. G just shrugs. “When it comes to Blair I just have to sit back light a match and watch her go up in flames.”

Serena tells Georgina she’s had enough of her for one night, and everyone but Georgina leaves in a limo and heads to dinner. Georgina looks miffed, left all alone on the sidewalk, in her navy Foley & Corrina dress.

courtesy of gossipgirlfashion.net

Dan calls Georgina out on her prank the next day, but Georgina, who has a photo of her and Dan AS HER LAP TOP WALLPAPER, says, “It’s Blair and Chuck! I mean, talk about a victimless crime.” Dan says, regardless, it’s time for them to take a break. Georgina isn’t psyched, but she agrees. “We did say no strings,” she concedes. But as we know Georgina can go “from zero to crazy” when she likes a guy. (We’ve never done that, btw!)

Chuck goes back to the McPherson’s office and confronts the bulldog assistant on starting that war over the photo between Blair and G. He figures she must have been in on it with Georgina—she was.

Scott goes to Vanessa’s door: she’s in a neon print shirt with a huge tacky yellow neon bangle—it’s not a good look.  We’re over neon, V. Scott defends himself, saying that Rufus and Lily gave him up, and that was their choice, and now it’s time for him to have a choice.

V asks him to promise he’ll come back and tell Lily and Rufus one day, and Scott says he can’t. When he leaves, we see Georgina has been listening the whole time.

Then Serena and Carter share a tender moment, she takes him inside the penthouse to breakfast with her ever-expanding family, and we see Dan shake Carter’s hand to welcome him in.

Blair and Chuck meet in the park—she’s wearing the sweetest little silk YAYA AFLALO Garland Ruffle Top andMarc by Marc Jacobs “Pansy” skirt. Chuck tells Blair he was thinking too small before– why settle for some club in a hotel when you could just buy the whole hotel?

courtesy of gossipgirlfashion.net

He says he  told Bass industries to cash his shares out, and that he believes in himself because Blair believes in him. Even when he’s wearing a super fruity salmon bowtie. The two sally off the to penthouse, where Blair might finally have alone time with her man.

Bree stops Carter on the street after his kissing session with Serena, and tells him that since she’s going back to her family and dealing with “the firing squad,” she knows she can lessen her punishment by telling them where to find Carter, “considering what Carter’s done to her family.” She tells him to go ahead and try to run, because her dad enjoys the hunt.

In the last scene, Georgina kills her screensaver of Dan, and books herself the next train to Boston, to go blackmail Scott. We like it when G is very, very evil, and it seems, especially by the tone of Kirsten Bell’s  narrator voice that totally rips off SJP’s in SATC, that we can expect some delicious deviance next ep.

OK, I’m going to TRY to make this a shorter recap than last week’s premiere…As I mentioned in my Feng Shui blog post, I am in the process of moving, and girlfriends, it is not what you would call easy.  But don’t worry,  I’m moving—not changing! I’ll still take an hour to soak in a little GG, no matter what’s going on in my life.

OK, so this Gossip Girl goes-to-college episode kicks off with a bang– and it’s all thanks to the absolutely fabulous red dress that  Blair’s sporting while she’s kissing Chuck next to a limo. Interestingly enough, it was designed by Victoria Beckham, and it’s called the Victoria Beckham Fall 2009 ‘Carmontelle’ Dress , and it retails for over $3,000. What did you wear to your first day of college? Something a little less fabu? We honestly think we sported a tie dyed Grateful Dead t-shirt, but we’d expect nothing less than this fabulousness from Blair.  She tops off her look with a little “Blair Flair,”  a Paige Gamble Stingray Headband, and one that costs a little more than the one you picked up from J. Crew last summer (it sells for $290.00)

courtesy of stylehop.com

Ok so Blair and Chuck are  kissing like the crazy lovebirds they are.  Chuck pulls away to give his little frisky lovefinch a bit of Upper East Side wisdom;  “I have to object to you living in the dorms,” he says.”Florescent lighting, communal showers, public school girls. There’s a place for that, and it’s in the back of a video store.” We agree about the florescent lighting and the communal showers. What we don’t agree with? Blair even considering living in a dingy dorm room when a Park Ave penthouse was just a town car ride away.

At a coffee shop, Dan Humphrey  gets approached by an annoying girl named Katie. She’s perky, she’s scratchy voiced, she doesn’t shut up. She flounces and bounces around Dan, and he eats up the attention– She knows who Dan is from the New Yorker’s “Twenty Under Twenty.” A little note about this girl: she is the one at Freshman orientation who is waaay too excited about college:  she can’t wait to meet new friends! start her own clique! “nosh” together in the dorms! form study groups for Spanish! And she probably doesn’t even drink!  You get the point.

Meanwhile, Serena is acting all shifty about attending Brown, and when she gets a text from her mother (this the episode’s only nod to Kelly Rutherford, who must have  still been on maternity leave) saying she is totally proud of Serena. Serena sighs, and  she sassily flips her phone closed (we thought it was weird she still  has a flip phone, too).

Rufus tells her how proud he is of her too, and gives her a hug. Serena acts put out, but we still sense there’s chemistry between Rufus and Serena. Are we totally right, or just totally creepy?

Cut to Vanessa kissing the original creepazoid, Scott, the lovechild of Lily and Rufus. He is not good looking enough, certainly not up to GG standards, and he is starting to remind us of a D-List Ralph Macchio.

Scott and V kiss, and Dan runs into them (because NYC is really just that small…) Scott then exits, and Blair then bumps into  Dan  and V. Blair says,  “Let’s make this clear from the start, we don’t know each other here.” She’s brilliant. Although even icy Blair would be hard-pressed to pretend she didn’t recognize V’s hair from 700 miles away. That hair is HUGE. Vanessa looks so much like Teresa from Real Housewives of New Jersey that we keep waiting for her to knock over a tables loaded down with red wine and baked ziti.

When Serena pretends to “head off to school,” she’s really just fleeing for Chuck Bass’ apartment, or, as The Bassman likes to call it, “the Bass Cave.” Chuck actually tries, in his own way to be of assistance to Serena (btw this is one of those episodes where they remind you to actually feel something for Chuck, just so he can undo all of his progress by the next episode, thereby breaking your heart all over again. And that’s how we like our Bass served: crispy on the outside, tender in the middle.) Chuck also says, “Look, Sis, to people like you and me, a diploma is just an accessory. Like a Malwai baby or a poodle.” How sweet!

Meanwhile, back at the dorms, Blair and Georgina meet again– as roommates!!  Evil Georgina plays dumb (and the girl is really good at it, chillingly so) as if she didn’t orchestrate the whole roommate plan.  Blair asks her what happened to being a Jesus freak, and  Georgina responds: “Jesus and I have re-defined our relationship.” Blair retorts “I’ll win you know. I ruled at Constance and I’ll rule here.” Vanessa runs into the two bickering, and upon realizing her proximity to the two,  V makes us laugh for the first time ever. “My room’s just down the hall, so that’s, awesome.” You have to see it, but her timing is perfect.

courtesy of daemonstv.vom

Vanessa and Dan are chatting at a campus bookstore when Georgina “bumps into them,” and throws a bunch of lies their way, including the promise she’s “got her all meds straightened out.” She pleads with them to just  get a coffee with her, but Dan declines- he doesn’t think it’s possible she’s changed. (Bingo Dan! It’s not!) But Vanessa thinks Georgina deserves another chance. (We’re starting to think, that with radar like Vanessa’s, who trusts both Scott and Georgina, she needs to hire an emotional bodyguard.) Dan and V argue and V then heads over to Georgina. This is not the battle you want to choose Vanessa! You know why? Because you’re sticking up for the two shadiest characters the scribes of GG could draw! Next time you stick up for someone or something, no one will have your back!

Anyway, now we come to the Nate and Bree segment, otherwise known as your bathroom/wine refill/get a new box of crackers break. Rest assured dear GG watchers, you will miss nothing if you take your potty break during Nate and Bree time.

The snoozy-twosome are pillow-talking in bed. Bree says “You. Me. This apartment. Til we get sick of each other.” What about us? The audience? When do we get to leave?!

Meanwhile back at the Bass Cave, Chuck has investors over to his apartment for his current pipe dream: a speak easy hidden inside a restaurant. The catch here is that the investors only think of it as a quiet restaurant– not as a restaurant with a booming coke den hidden behind a vaulted door. But he neglected to tell Serena this, and with all the disastrous decisions S has  been making of late, you would have thought he would have covered that base. But he doesn’t, and Serena loses the deal for Chuck.  She says something clueless like, “Isn’t it brilliant that he thought of that club behind the vault?” Chuck narrows his eyes and does his pissed off Mongoose stare.

Blair attempts to throw her first college mixer, but Georgina beats her to it– she hosts a party in celebration of Vanessa’s documentary on like, inner city gardens. They eat pizza, while Blair has toro  and sake being served in another room- for no one. Blair walks in on the party, aghast.

Serena goes to crash at Dan’s after her blow up with Chuck– who didn’t miss the opportunity to call her a “trainwreck” as she left his apartment. It was so mean, so perfect, even our friend who never watches GG said, “Oooh, burn!”

Chuck makes it his business to tell Rufus that Serena is having second thoughts about Brown, and when Rufus confronts Serena about her colosal lie (she said she was going to college, but she just… didn’t) Serena throws an absolute diva fit and tells Rufus, “You can go ahead and call 9my mom), and tell her I’m not going to Brown. Thanks for the talk.” We know we should be more into this plot line but we’re staring at this silky orange jumper Serena is wearing. Orange is definitely her color, as we saw from the Marchesa she wore to the polo match last episode.  Serena then decides to use cute Carter Baizon to get back at Chuck– she’s got that look in her eye like she’s got something up her never-existent sleeve. Dan is meanwhile holding court like a king at his new book club hosted by that super annoying scratchy-voiced freshman girl. Blair seems to cave and give in to Dan’s new found popularity, going so far as to ask Dan to accompany her to Georgina’s party that night, to avoid ” social extinction.”

Dan and Blair walk up to a party together, and the party’s theme isn’t even “Hell Freezing Over” or “Pigs Take Flight.” Everyone stands in awe because this is a very rare moment. Well I did anyway.

courtesy of gossipgirlfashion.net

Blair tells Dan she feels like she got off on the wrong foot, and she thanks him for taking her.  She says something like “So thanks for bringing me, Humphrey.”  Dan tries to give Blair a little fashion advice: he takes off her headband and says something like,  “no headbands in college,” and he tosses it! This made us cringe for two reasons: one, we know that’s like a $250 headband, easy, and 2) we’re willing to bet Blair’s power comes from her headbands… it’s like taking the queen’s crown!

Anyway, Blair needs no fashion advice, especially not from Lonelyboy– her outfit for this party is smashing. She’s wearing a gold and black blouse Diane von Furstenberg ‘Alcott’ Blouse, and tiny goldish green shorts from Milly’s Spring/Summer 2009 line. Something else to note? The song Leighton Meester sang with Cobra Starship also makes an appearance: twice, at this party. That’s two times too many for us.

Somewhere in a Park Avenue apartment, Bree is going through Nate’s pants pockets to “figure him out” and somewhere, the rest of us are overdosing on cheese and fighting falling into a coma. Bree discovers Nate kept his boarding pass from their flight from London to NYC. She mumbles something under her breath like “and, he has a sentimental streak.” She kisses him. we’re out of crackers.

Serena and Carter are out at a bar, drinking, when they see Chuck and a new round of investors meeting. (Again, GG makes NYC seem about four blocks wide).  Serena is trying to get Carter to agree to a plot against Chuck.  “Since when do you run away from Chuck Bass?” she asks in her kitty purr seductive whisper. They head over to Chuck’s table, and Chuck gives them the squinty weasel look and hisses that it’s “not a good time,” but Serena is such a hot mess in this episode that they proceed to ruin his second attempt at an investment deal, guilt-free.

Back at the party, Creepy Scott lashes out at Vanessa when he’s conversationally asked about his favorite teachers are at school. “I’m at a party,” he barks, ” I really don’t feel like taking a test right now!” he yips. Again, no one is asking this guy to take a paternity test or grilling him on why is last girlfriend dumped him, he’s just a total loose canon and he’s ready to blow. He’s totally not cut out for this furtive stake out work.  And Vanessa, whose whole M.O. is laid back intellectual hippy chick,  does not think this is cool. Finally she reveals she has a semblance of a filter! We’ll see how long this lasts.

Then it’s Blair’s moment: she goes up to the DJ table, and pretends to toast Georgina’s party– only to reveal her host as a Jesus loving Christian freak. On cue, a veritable congo line of Christian teamsters barges into the party. “Oh my God,” Blair cries, “this is like a conversion party!”   It’s actually kind of an amazing moment, more like what we were looking for in the season premiere. But Blair’s moment will only be fleeting…

courtesy of collegecandy.com

Just as Carter is discovering he was a pawn in Serena’s game, Dan sees that’s all he was to Blair, too. Blair says something like “you were a casualty in the battle for social dominance.” Blair is trying to corral the entire party out to Monkey Bar, but Dan uses his new found popularity to get everyone to stay at Georgina’s, leaving Blair looking like, well, a total loser. But if we know our Queen B, she won’t take this lying down.

OK let’s tie up some loose ends here: Serena defers for a year at Brown, and everyone seems happy with that, but we can only think, does she ALWAYS get her way? But clearly, we need S to stick around for the drama quotient.

Nate and Bree are going to take a risk and “be together.” We’re at the edge of our seats.

Blair and Serena have a heart to heart at their old meeting ground,  the Met steps, we’re trying to listen to the conversation but Serena is wearing an amazing tie dye pink vest from Chelsea Flower.  Blair says to Serena, “I’m glad you’re not going to Brown, I need you here.” It’s a tender, vulnerable moment for Blair. Serena walks off and leaves Blair all by herself on the steps, and the camera just lingers on lonely Blair before she holds her little head high and saunters down the steps.

Vanessa learned nothing from Scott’s totally uncalled for outburst at the party, and she meets up with him. We feel bad for V, she must be really desperate. He says he’s sorry he’s late, but he has a super weird excuse. He was typing up a REPORT of all his favorite professors (that he clearly never knew)– “I even gave them grades,” he says.  Protest too much ever? Look buddy, we’re giving you a grade, and if you’re still not sure what it is,  it’s a “C” for creepy.

couresy of coolspotters.com

Serena then goes back to Carter, and she says something  like, “there’s a reason I want to be with you and it’s not because you’re my bad habit,” she says he truly understood her need to see her father during the summer. He says anyone would have gone with her, but she says he’s different. They kiss on the street.

And then Blair slips in bed with Chuck for a spooning session.  “You were right about the dorms,” Blair says, snuggling up behind Chuck, suddenly cuddling like she’s done this before. “The lighting is awful,” she says. Chuck’s stoic face spreads into  a smile, and what do you know? We’re melting! He’s smiling because she there! It’s adorable. Like a Grinch love story.   “Are you ok?” Blair asks, and he says, “I am now,” taking her hand.

OK and here’s the kicker: the next day Vanessa calls Dan to meet her and Slimy Scott to talk about Georgina’s party. He’s talking from the roof top we last saw him on. He says he’s still “too wrecked” to go. You know why? He’s not just wrecked from too much Natural Light, he’s wrecking his life, people, because he’s with the devil herself. Georgina is even SLEEPING ON HIS LAP. And then they kiss!! Totally revolting but totally amazing. Stay tuned…