Glazing the strudel

Liesl wants to glaze Griffin's strudel. Valentin wants turn the one-night stand into a two-night stand with Nina. Charlotte wants to know how many daddies she actually has.

"If I ever had the chance to glaze his strudel, oh my!" When Dr. Obrecht uttered those words while looking at Griffin, my week was made. I rewound and listened again. I laughed about that line multiple times this week. I kept saying it out loud. My husband, who pretends he doesn't watch GH, rolled his eyes. But he was laughing on the inside, too, I could tell.

Kathleen Gati is the most wonderful comic relief on GH. I love that she is now multidimensional and not a cardboard cutout of a villain anymore, but please, please let her keep saying those one-line zingers that make my heart so light. Liesl has evolved, and her soft squishy parts are more visible, but there is still a lot of steel in her blood.

Now that Liesl is a bit softer, we have a new treacherous villain in town to share the spotlight, Valentin Cassadine. Is it wrong that I find him so appealing? In real life, I like nice guys, the real Boy Scout type, but on soaps, I prefer the scruffy antiheroes, mobsters, and downright villains.

Why? Because it's safe. On GH, Maxie accidentally slept with serial killer Franco. No harm, no foul. She didn't know he was a serial killer at the time. Nina had a one-night stand with a handsome charmer named Theo, only to find out he was the much-feared Valentin Cassadine. We believe that Valentin killed Nikolas in cold blood, but there is a part of me that thinks Nikolas faked his death again with Valentin's help and that he will show up again when ABC has the good sense to rehire Tyler Christopher. Come on, GH writers -- write me a resurrection. We enjoy watching women on film make bad choices with men and play with bad boys so we don't have to do it in real life. Then we see the consequences they face, and it reminds us to keep picking good boys.

But I digress. All we really know right now is that Valentin is so evil that Helena feared him. Yes, you heard that right, Helena, the ber villain of the show for nearly 40 years, was afraid of Valentin! So clearly he's a bad dude, right? Even so, I was delighted when he waltzed into Wyndemere this week with gasps of shock and awe. How did he get out of jail? Who does he know? I have no idea. He is presumably bad news, but he's also quite handsome and charming, and if Nina slips and goes back on her vow to never see him again, I won't hold it against her. He's so fun to watch.

It's beginning to look like Charlotte could be the daughter of Lulu and Stavros. A) Nathan is not the father. B) Griffin is not the father. C) I doubt that Valentin is the father, though he may have been raising her -- Claudette could have carried the embryo and then run off with the baby. D) Daphne was paid by Helena to be a surrogate, so clearly the embryo survived the last mayhem at Cassadine Island. James Patrick Stewart has chemistry with nearly everyone with whom he has interacted. He and Nancy Lee Grahn are splendid together; too bad they are siblings.

I am halfway rooting for Alexis to drink that whole case of wine and take Valentin up on his offer to work with her half-brother to claim the Cassadine fortune. (Which Nikolas seemed to think was all gone...?) I like the idea of seeing Alexis pushed to the brink and exploring the dark side of her Cassadine nature, just a little.

Rumor has it that Valentin has either offed Claudette, and we will not be seeing her ever again, or that he has her holed up somewhere, and we will not see her for a very long time.

Also, Nina with her book of names, may get to choose a baby name, as another swirling rumor is that the doctors are wrong and that Nina is indeed able to get pregnant and that her fling with Valentin might produce a baby. If Charlotte ends up being Lulu's baby, perhaps a new baby with Nina will keep Valentin occupied and out of trouble.

It seems that nothing can keep Sonny out of trouble, not even a visit from St. Robin. It appears that Sonny is determined to take his life and that he continues to plan his own end. Nelle overheard him planning, and Sonny convinced her he was just planning to "go away" after Morgan's funeral but failed to mention that he was going away to his eternal destiny. Despite the fact he's always given a lot of money to Queen of Angels church, I am not convinced his soul will end up in the good place.

I was surprised that Halloween was so low-key this year. In previous years, GH has had Halloween all the way to Thanksgiving, like the year of the masquerade ball. But this year, we saw Franco as a mime, Dillon as Elvis, and not much else.

The most compelling Halloween scenes came from Sonny, who hallucinated that a trick-or-treater was Morgan and then threatened him when he realized he wasn't Morgan. Sonny is off the rails right now and we've clearly seen he's contemplating ending his life.

Sonny was at the footbridge with a gun and was clearly contemplating suicide just as his old friend Robin showed up and talked him off the bridge. Robin has never been my favorite character, but I found myself liking her in every scene this week. I loved her scenes with Sonny, and I loved her scenes with Anna. I found her moving and compelling. My eyes teared up, and I realized something...

I have to confess; I feel like a big part of my aversion to Robin came from the fact that I met Kimberly at some meet and greet thing many years ago. I was so excited to meet her, and I felt like she didn't want to be there. There was eye rolling and heavy sighing, and it hurt my feelings. My expectations of meeting her just didn't turn out the way I'd envisioned, and I walked away with a bad attitude about her.

But that was 20 years ago, and I am older and wiser, and she is older and wiser, and I'm over it. I think of all the times I have been rude to people over the course of my life and realize how unfair it is to judge a person by one isolated incident. See, I'm maturing now that I am an AARP-aged grandma. Ha. I have read several of her blog posts lately and heard some of the things she has gone through in life, and I am sorry I judged her so harshly and for so long. And there is my sinful confession.

Anyway, her scenes with Sonny, reminding him of their history and compelling him to stay alive for everyone who loved him, was very moving. I genuinely believe she had gotten through to him until I heard Sonny making end-of-life arrangements, "make sure my family is taken care of," with whoever was on the other end of that phone call.

Meanwhile, across town, Nelle found Morgan's journal and delivered it to Carly. The words inside showed a man who was committed to recovery, following his plan, taking his pills, and sounding healthy -- until September, when the entries became erratic and disjointed. Oh, dear readers, I want Ava to go down for this so hard. While I feel sorry for the guilt she is feeling, it's not punishment enough. I want Sonny to find out that Ava switched Morgan's meds. He would drop the suicide idea just to kill Ava.

What do you think is up with Nelle? She had a note in her purse signed "Dad" -- who is her dad? Is he still alive? What exactly did he do for her? Is this an old note or a new note? I'm dying to find out. I wonder if Morgan wrote in his journal about him kissing Nelle? If so, I don't think Carly would take too kindly to that news.

Lucy had news for Laura about the fact that Valentin owned Wyndemere, so Laura was not able to sell it. Okay, puzzle me this... What exactly is Lucy Coe's occupation? Librarian? Cosmetics mogul? Wedding planner? Emcee for large events? Realtor? I've seen her try her hand at all of those things. I think she was in the hotel business once, too -- but too many decades, and I can't remember them all.

Lucy has had many careers, and Valerie just one: rookie cop. But, according to Jordan, Valerie's career may be over for leaving sensitive documents out for Curtis to photograph. When Jordan said that, I got a little happy, because I've never felt that Valerie was a good candidate for a police officer. I'd rather see her go to work for Maxie and Nina at Crimson or work the counter at Kelly's -- or move back to wherever she lived before her mom died. No slam on the actress, it's just that the character hasn't really wowed me since that initial time she was first introduced to us. Valerie Spencer had promise, she was connected to an entire family, and she was fierce! But then the writers turned her into a home wrecker for Dante and Lulu, and all that promise faded.

Maybe if Valerie gets a new career path and starts interacting with new people, she can find her fire again. I'm pretty sure she only went to the police academy in the first place because she was hot for Dante.

As to her boss, Jordan, I think we should take bets on how long it is before she and Curtis finally get it on, because you know they are going to get it on. Those smoldering "I hate you so much I want you" looks can only mean they are able to rip each other's clothes off. This is a soap, after all.

I'm feeling a little sorry for the Jerome siblings right now. I know I swore I never would, but I was wrong. They are the victims of their own bad impulses, yet I feel bad for them. Ava is wrestling with guilt for her part in Morgan's death. Julian realizes he was an idiot and wants to find his way back to Alexis.

I see Julian's path as clear as day. Alexis is going to become an alcoholic, and Julian will be the only one who can save her. Hopefully he will do it before she becomes a raging street corner wino, but you just never know. I was happy that Valentin hired her to do a job just to get her mind off that case of wine. I see hope of redemption for Julian in saving the woman he tried to kill. I'm ready for that reconciliation. Please let Alexis get drunk and sober again by New Year's Eve, please.

But Ava? I don't see a path to redemption for her right now. If either Carly or Sonny puts together the pieces that Ava was switching Morgan's meds for placebos, she better resurrect Denise Demucchio and hightail it back to Delia Reed Ryan Ryan Coleridge Crane's bar.

Serial killer turned art therapist Franco has a jealous streak, and to be honest, I despise this storyline. Seeing him follow Liz around like a lunatic and drape himself over her every time she talks to another man is not entertaining to me. Is this lawsuit with Prospect Park over yet? Can he just be Todd Manning again? I like Liz and Franco together, but the jealous angle is tedious to watch. In my life, I have immediately broken up with any jealous boyfriend I ever had because 90% of my close friends are men, and if they can't handle me talking to other men, then they can't handle me. Liz has her fair share of men friends, too, so Franco needs to bring this issue up in his next therapy session.

Next up, Sam and her baby. Sam had better carry this baby to term. She had better deliver a healthy baby. If she loses this baby, if the baby gets kidnapped, if Jason disappears right before the baby is born, if the writers do anything but let this couple have a few months of happiness and deliver a healthy baby, I will be sorely disappointed.

What will happen tomorrow, dear readers? Will the church rescind Griffin's call to quit the priesthood, since he isn't really a baby daddy? Will Anna start a new branch of the WSB called WSB lite for people who just want to be part-time floater seasonal secret agents? Will Hayden get her diamonds back, since she isn't really Raymond Berlin's daughter, and use them to pay off the hospital's debt? Will Gram come to visit the reopened GH and see the portrait of her beloved Steve? Will Maxie invite the tripping puppy to her New Year's Eve wedding? Will Spinelli come back to Port Charles now that Ellie got a job on another TV show? Will Spencer come home from boarding school to live with Uncle Valentin? Will Emma really emerge from the other room at Anna's, or are they just toying with us? Will Fr. Griffin get to read the Christmas story at the annual GH Christmas party this year?

Only tomorrow knows, dear readers, and I will tune in tomorrow as long as there are tomorrows.Tamilu

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