'The Apprentice: L.A.' Season Premiere -or- "I don't like the way you talk."

Let me preface this with saying, "I don't like Donald Trump." I never really did like him, but his latest publicity fiasco isn't going to stop me from watching the show. I've watched it since the first season. Hey, I don't even like the corporate world much. But I usually enjoy this show despite myself.

One thing I didn't do this season was check out the website prior to the season premiere. I usually do that to get a handle on the names with the faces and such. But this season, I went in blind to anything but first impressions or what I get from the candidates from watching the show itself.

Go figure... the two candidates I decided I liked the least ended up in the boardroom and the one I thought should go, did. But I'm getting ahead of myself here, aren't I? There are a lot of changes this season which need to be addressed before anyone gets fired.

• The Los Angeles location instead of New York City. Now, I enjoyed the NYC location as I know the area so much better. I moved away from the L.A. area after first grade. I don't remember much more than mountain fires and Disneyland. Due to the location, unlike filming in winter in NY, lots of bugs were flying around. Perhaps one will fly into someone's mouth?
  
• No more Carolyn as she's "no longer with the company" as they say. Unless I missed the news, George is still a lawyer on Trump's staff, but not on the show. Instead, there's dear daughter Ivanka and, in the beginning, an empty chair to accompany her on the board with Daddy Trump. I won't be surprised if Donald Jr. doesn't show before the end of the season, but he wasn't in the premiere.
• The Project Manager of the winning team remains the same as long as the team is winning. I'm not sure how much I like this change. It's going to affect the dynamics of the other team members who might not get the chance to step up to the plate if one team keeps trumping. (I couldn't resist.)
• The winning Project Manager fills the empty chair in the boardroom and discusses who will be fired with Trump and Ivanka. Odd move, that one.
• The winning team stays in a luxurious house overlooking the valley, all amenities you could imagine.
• The losing team stays in Tent City. Everything is outdoors, including their showers. They're close enough to peek at the Have's pool and hear them, but they're the Have Nots.
• There's a butler named Otto.
• One of the candidates, Angela, was a winter Olympics gold medalist.
  

With bugs buzzing about their heads, Trump first assigned the whole mob the task of building a huge tent without telling them the losers would be living in it. During the task, they ran amok until one of the women, Heidi, spoke up as she was familiar with camping and tents. Then this really loud excitable boy Frank just took over. Even Trump, who's way too loud for such a teeny mouth himself, told Frank to tone it down. Oh, and Martin, who wears striped suits with checkered shirts (red and white like a picnic tablecloth) and differently patterned tie, decided he was the supervisor and didn't do much at all.

Right off the bat, I didn't like either Frank or Martin. Martin also, upon first meeting Trump during introductions, asked about going to the bathroom. Can you just see my eyes rolling? @@

From the tent-building, Trump met up with the candidates in the boardroom and asked them who they thought took over the task and displayed leadership. Heidi and Frank were chosen by their peers as the leaders and became the Project Managers getting to choose their teams. Martin was the last chosen despite his high opinion of himself.

Teams then went off to run a car wash - the team earning the most money would win. Heidi's team played it right. They enlisted two shirtless guys in a mainly gay area to hold up cardboard signs touting a free lunch (hot dog) with a car wash. They went for quantity more than quality - get the cars in and out as quickly as they could. They ended up backlogged, but the whole team really hustled and worked hard.

With Frank's team, I don't know what the hell was going on. Frank and Aaron went off to make flyers for handing out on a busy street? Duh, guys. They wanted to push detailing vehicles for $100. Now, if I decided to have an impromptu wash of my car, it wouldn't be a full detailing. The team didn't work together at all.

What surprised me was that Heidi's team didn't win by a huge margin. Less than a hundred dollars separated the winners from the losers. The winners got to go off to dinner with Donald Trump at Wolfgang Puck's restaurant Spago. Trump told the losers they'd have to build another tent and live outdoors while the others moved into their fancy digs.

Excitable Boy Frank got all excited and Martin thought he got shrewd and psychological as both campaigned against each other in the tent talks before the boardroom. I expected Frank to thump his chest and, by golly, he did! All their actions really did was to conceal any faults others might have had and make them larger targets for the rest of the team. Silly boys.

In the boardroom, most of the candidates seemed to think the Frank or both should go. If it was time for a double firing, I'm sure both would be gone. Ivanka is sounding more like Dad as she talks - her voice seems to be lower even. She's pursing her lips. We better watch her hair! She came across as quite surly at times... to the point of telling Martin, "I don't like how you talk." Huh? Say what? What kind of reasoning is that? If she's going to mention that, she should have mentioned the checkered shirt business, right?

Even though Excitable Boy lost his composure on a major basis, it was still Martin who heard the words...

"Martin, you're fired."

A good choice, but I don't think Frank's long for the show. Passion is a good thing, but self-control in stressful situations is a much better thing.

A few random closing thoughts after this week:

• I think that the man named Tim looks like Fred Savage.
• A perfect pot calling the kettle black scenario happened - Trump to candidate Stefani in the boardroom - "You're very vicious... oh, but you're a lawyer." Reality check. Trump isn't a lawyer.

Dollar bills, y'all...