Jersey Shore Recap: "Sammi's Like a Spider Monkey With a Pitbull Lock"

Apparently, Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino spent the time between the second and third seasons of Jersey Shore meditating and doing crunches at some Buddhist temple in the Himalayas, because he's gone from repugnant douche-hole to zen-like wise man. Or, so he thinks. Last night's episode started with The Sitch saying what we've all been thinking about the Ronnie and Sammi situation (god, I hate that word now) since the day those two hooked up: "Just break the f*ck up." It's only a matter of time before you start finding Sitch quotes in your fortune cookies.

Mike tries to play peacemaker between Ronnie and Sammi (or stir the turd to create some drama for the cameras, and set the stage for banging Sammi, depending on your outlook) by asking Sam about the relationship and her feelings regarding Ron. Fortunately, Ronnie's not as dumb as he looks (Because, seriously, he looks like he'd be really dumb, doesn't he?) and he sees through Mike's "sensitive friend" routine. "Mike plays both courts...The second I turn my back, you're all about girl code, b!tch." Nah, dude. Girl code is being nice to a chick's face and then talking sh!t about her shoes when she leaves the room. Guy code is trying to get it in whenever possible, even if your friend has already been there. Mike is definitely practicing guy code.

Sam is the one practicing girl code. Now that she's alone, she pretends to be friends with Deena and decides to make Ron (who she's not even with) jealous by skanking it up on the boardwalk with guys wearing backpacks, but no shirts. While she's hanging out with ex-Congressman Chris Lee, though, Ron is is planning his confrontation with Mike, which I was hoping would result in the first guy-on-guy throwdown in Jersey Shore history. No such luck. "If any of us says something wrong, there could be a fight. So I decided to man up and take the high road," The Sitch says. Christ, I think I liked Mike more when he was an open a-hole last season, as opposed to now when he tries to hide his douchiness behind bullsh!t moralizing. Yet again, the guys on this show prove that they're the sensitive flowers in the house. Mike admits he's wrong and apologizes, but it's an obvious ploy to avoid getting the sh!t kicked out of him by Ron. Hopefully, these two will spend some time apart soon. It's no good for anyone when their menstrual cycles are all synced-up like this.

We find out that JWoww's middle-aged roid case is famous in Seaside taco shops, and then it's right back to Ron and Sam drama. I like the new ballsy Ron, but I have no idea why he continues to indulge Sam's drama queen BS. While they're both getting ready to go out and pretend to be sane and single, they decide to get gussied up in front of the same mirror, and - surprise! - they get in the kind of violent domestic situation that probably had Jerry Springer booking the next flight to Jersey. I've actually known people that tried to breakup and still live together, and, yeah, that's usually how it ends up. While Ron and Sam were reaching for each other's throats, MTV producers were probably running around downstairs hiding all the sharp objects in the house. This thing is going from funny reality show drama to future court case with the quickness.

The girls move Sam's stuff to their room and have some trouble fitting the bed through the door. "It's kind of an analogy of Vinny's penis fitting through my pinhole," says Snooki, the last great poet of our times. Nice try, Snooks, but comparing your snatch to a pinhole is like comparing the Grand Canyon to a crack in the sidewalk. Next, Sammi hits the club for the sole purpose of making Ron jealous, and knowing what level-headed grown-ups they both are, there's no way that can end badly. Of course, Ron goes home and trashes their room for the 14th time, because somehow Sammi owns some stuff that he hasn't already destroyed. At this point, it's getting seriously difficult to side with either one of these idiots.

Then it finally happens, Sammi announces to the girls that she's leaving the house, and the whole nation reacts like it would have if Bush announced he was stepping down halfway through his second term: "Thank god, and about f*cking time!" This is about the 400th time that Sam threatened to bounce, so I was skeptical until she actually got in the cab. Wtf? Sam talked about how much she can't wait to get home and see her family, and all I could think about was how much these kids get paid to party and act like idiots. Why do they all act like it's Vietnam? For that kind of cash and free booze I'd live on a diet of broken glass and Taco Bell for 12 weeks. Anyway, sh!t's been a little too real for my liking my so far this season. Here's hoping that with Sam gone, we can get back to the fun, dumb Jersey Shore we all know and love.