Handy tips from Aunt Tamilu

Men would never try to chase down gangsters in a pair of strappy sandals or shiny pumps.

Dear Ladies, should you find it necessary to single-handedly go after a pack of gangsters like the Lopez Brothers, I suggest you wear sensible footwear, like say sneakers, so as not to twist your ankle while running away from said gangsters when they catch you. And they will catch you. While some of you will think I am sexist for addressing this only to ladies, the truth is, men already know this rule. Men would never try to chase down gangsters in a pair of strappy sandals or shiny pumps.

Also, if you need a place to hide, it turns out the best place to hide is NOT in the gangsters' drug- and gun-filled getaway van.

Now men, I have advice for you, too. Should you have a daredevil girlfriend who is prone to chasing criminals on her own, I suggest implanting her with one of those GPS dog chips so when she gets herself in a jam, you can find her when she's unable to accurately describe her location while trapped in the back of the aforementioned windowless gangster-mobile.

Back to the gals...Ladies, if your husband's ex girlfriend from college suddenly shows up in your town where she's never lived before and gets a job, this is NOT a coincidence. She has her sights set on your man and once she seduces him, she will go batcrap crazy and start cutting your face out of wedding photos and tossing out your vital medication.

Men, seriously, if your ex appears out of nowhere and gets hired at your office -- run for your life.

People of all genders, just in general -- if you live in a high-crime town, like Port Corruption, I mean Port Charles, always make sure to look out your window every few minutes so you can be the star witness in some thug's defense when he is falsely accused of something. Sure, said thug is probably guilty of a lot of crimes he got away with, but he didn't commit *this* crime, so keep your eyes open!

And sons, cut your old man some slack. Even if he once shot you point-blank in the chest while you were unarmed, that doesn't mean if he shoots someone else in the chest point-blank that they were unarmed. Look into his dimples and believe!

I am dying to know what distracted Johnny and made him look away long enough for Sonny to draw and fire his weapon. I mean seriously, if Johnny is that A.D.D. he needs to give up the mob and stick to piano lessons.

Men, if some chick calls you and says there is an emergency and you should meet her at the bar, and when you arrive, her big emergency is that she needs to confess to someone that she suffers from "panic attacks" -- do not, repeat Do Not drink anything she sets in front of you.

And, to princes who live in foreboding castles -- if you overhear your baby mama telling someone she doesn't feel at home in your creepy, gloomy, gargoyle-laced abode, instead of shipping her off to her sister's house you could always say... move.

Readers, it was a week of very dumb decisions in Port Charles, and most of the characters need some sort of serious therapy. Lainey Winters should be way busier than she is.

The Robin/Patrick/Lisa debacle made for some delicious soapy drama at GH. No offense, but in my humble opinion, Kimberly McCullough's been phoning it in for years. However, this storyline gave her the inspiration to actually...act again. It's not really her fault because Robin is mostly written as someone who just snipes at people. It doesn't really take mad acting skills to be a b-word. This week though, I remembered the Robin that was engaged and passionate -/- that Robin was a character that I actually cared about once.

So, Kimberly McCullough did such a stellar piece of work this week that I actually cared about what happen to Robin, which is borderline miraculous. Kudos Kimberly. Remember last week when I told you crazy Lisa was going to throw herself in front of Robin's car? Some of you wrote letters and accused me of making that up. I'd like your apologies in my in-box by Friday please. Lisa has gone totally mental. But the thing is, sometimes she is so convincing in her explanations that I almost want to believe her myself.

My friend Joe lamented this week that he fears they will get rid of Lisa being as how they made her so crazy that she won't be able to be redeemed...Here's my plan -- they can pull a CBS Daytime staple and attribute her crazy behavior to a brain tumor, which only Patrick can remove! (See CBS gals Aunt Pam on the Bold and the Beautiful, or Jana on the Young and the Restless.)

To make it extra soapy, Lisa should also need some kind of convoluted drug treatment that only Robin is familiar with so Robin has to actively be involved in her therapy. Then, Lisa can be a seemingly normal person for a few years until the tumor grows back and she can go crazy again!

Speaking of crazy, Brook Lynn is crazy if she thinks she can get away with her $50,000 scam. Michael is already wise to her and although she's denying it six ways from Sunday, the truth is out there and resident Carly expert Michael will get it out of her one way or the other.

And as I mentioned last week, we're going to see two lost souls collide shortly -- Brook Lynn, outed and shunned, will run into Nikolas, who's been abandoned in his giant castle alone. Do the math. I just hope baby Aiden doesn't end up with a sibling before he even turns one.

On to other sultry brunette beauties... I love me some Brenda Barrett and, although I am very impatient waiting for her to connect with Sonny, just seeing her on the canvas again makes my heart happy. Some of you wrote very disparaging things to me about Vanessa Marcil's appearance and all I can imagine is that you're very, very jealous because I think she's truly stunning.

Brenda agreed to marry Murphy, but I have a very strong hunch this will add to Brenda's list of weddings that never materialized. After all, her life-long obsession, Sonny, is headed to Rome, and so is she. This is a soap, which means one thing -- they will most assuredly run into one another.

I'm very ready for that reunion. I think on some level, the powers that be know what we want, although they're slow in giving it to us. Long-time viewers such as me have characters we've connected with in the past and love stories we've invested in. When the networks parade them out from time to time, throwing us a bone, we respond. I can't tell you how my mailbox lit up with happy letters the week ABC showed the "classic" Brenda episodes. If SoapNet had aired classic episodes of old soaps instead of crappy made for TV movies and other random programming, they wouldn't be going off the air, IMHO.

Where am I going with this? As reported on Soap Central, Leslie Charleson has been taken off contract. Okay, I get it; Monica doesn't have much to do these days. But the reason she doesn't have much to do is because they killed off Alan, AJ, Emily, and most of the whole Q clan. That was a mistake in my humble opinion. You take a core family the show was centered around that's rich in history and tradition and do away with it and then scratch your head when viewers leave in droves.

I stand by my theory that the reason the Young and the Restless is always first in the ratings is because they respect their viewers and the show's history. The Abbotts, the Chancellors, and the Newmans have been around since I was a kid. If I turn on the Young and the Restless, I see characters I've been watching since I was twelve. I value that.

As sad as I am to see Monica Quartermaine pushed out of the show she helped build (rightfully, she, not Steven Weber, should be chief of staff and we all know it.) I understand Daytime budgets are tight, she probably makes a hefty salary after 33 years -- so, just like the rest of America, the experienced workers lose their jobs in place of newcomers who can be paid less. Sad.

On the up side, we still have Diane. I thought her head was going to explode this week when she heard Claire's tape of Sonny and saw Sonny buddying up to Dante. The woman truly earns her money. My favorite thing about Diane is that she never succumbed to Sonny's charms once. She's perhaps the only woman in Port Charles who is immune to Sonny. Maybe she should sell her blood to science to make a vaccine to immunize other poor suckers.

Hopefully when Sonny flees the country, Dante will find Johnny's gun with Ronnie's fingerprints on it floating up to shore. Or we can hope that the nosy old broad who saw Michael with Johnny that day also saw Johnny pull a gun on Sonny, or at least saw Ronnie tossing a gun in the harbor.

What will happen tomorrow, dear readers? Will Sonny get an audience with the Pope since he's so faithful to Queen of Angels? Will Brenda toss three coins in a fountain? Will they have a Roman Holiday? Will Robin be on trial for Lisa's rundown the same day Jason and Sam are on trial for the Lopez brothers' murder, and Diane is in the courtroom trying to explain why Sonny's not at his attempted murder trial? Will Judge Carroll retire when he sees them coming? Will Sam realize thin wooden tables aren't really bulletproof? Will anyone explain why no one was guarding the back door of the cabin Sam and Jason were hiding in when apparently a dozen or so men were shooting the front of the cabin? Will Dante move since Brook won't go away? Will Lulu and Maxie give up on men altogether and go celibate?