The Ladies in Your Box: Oh God, Angelina, Why?

Welcome to The Ladies in Your Box, where we explore the meaning of women you see every day on TV. Today, we look at one of the stars of everyone’s favorite reality show…

Let me start by saying this — I wouldn’t last a day in the Jersey Shore house. One night of drinking with those crazy motherfuckers, and I would be hungover for the entire rest of filming. Which is why I’m not on the show (that’s actually the only reason).

But I’m not the only one who couldn’t hang with Snooki et al — Angelina Pivarnick lasted only three episodes last season. Which is why it was both shocking and horrifying that she apparently took it upon herself (well…she and the producers) to come back this season, despite the fact that she claimed to know that everyone there hated her.

They should have just started called her Cringe-elina after that. Angelina is every friend that you’ve ever had that refused to acknowledge when she wasn’t welcome, or acted like she didn’t care when she wasn’t welcome only to go and pout and cry about it later. Awk-ward!

So after arriving at the house, Angelina was immediately threatened with a beatdown by JWoww, who, I must say, is really letting her white trash freak flag fly this season. Anyway, instead of trying to understand what she did that made Schnookers, JWoww and Sammi so mad at her, Angelina did that whole thing where you pretend that you totally don’t care that everyone hates you, only viewers know that if you were alone in your room without cameras on, you’d be crying. I believe the word they use for that is “delusional.”

Anyway, after being shunned by the girls, Angelina glommed on to The Situation and Pauly. The two dudes were totally nice to her. They were all, no one else likes her, let’s let her hang out with us. You could tell they had their doubts, but their overall good-guyness won out in the end and they gave her a chance.

UNTIL — she went out with them and got wasted, and upon returning to the crib, she followed Pauly around the house, yelled at him, acted like she was his naggy, horrible girlfriend, and then slapped him in the face three times.

To Pauly’s extreme credit, he let the yelling slide and was all, Angelina, you are towing the line here, I am about to really get pissed. But once she slapped him, all bets were off, with him AND Situation. Pauly even told her: “you just lost your only two friends in the house.”

*Sigh.* If you could see me right now, I’d be lifting my glasses to rub the bridge of my nose and shake my head in exasperation. Angelina, why?? At that point, I can’t even call her behavior not taking a hint. That’s like, hearing a hint, ignoring it, hearing the hint repeated as another hint, fighting the hint, hearing the second hint repeated as a bold, loud statement, and turning your back on the statement, crossing your arms and refusing to believe any of it. Another word for all this? Denial.

Which is why the whole thing is so painful to watch — Angelina is in such deep, deep denial about the whole situation at the house, one wonders if she has even snapped out of it now that she’s had to watch it all play out, again, on national TV. Somehow, I doubt it.

In case you care, Angelina did actually make up with the girls when Snooki — always giving people a second chance! — went up to her at the club and told her that all she had to do was admit that she talked shit about the girls, and everyone would be totally cool with her.

Of course, this was a highly curious moment in and of itself. Facing JWoww and Schnickers, who had been waffling between ignoring Angelina, threatening her, and insisting upon their neverending hatred for her, Angelina said, “OK, fine. I did talk shit abut you.” And literally — as promised — Snooki and JWoww suddenly were like, “OK, that’s all we wanted! Cool, we’re friends now!”

What WORLD is this? That doesn’t even make sense! It’s like the Jersery Shore code of conduct that no one understands besides them, but they live by it as if it were tattooed across their eyelids. And why did she take them back as friends? Is nothing (like, your dignity) sacred?

Anyway, as far as Cringe-elina goes, I both feel sorry for her and can’t stand her; both dislike her and…well, I just dislike her. Mostly because she’s disingenuous, but also because she wouldn’t be able to be genuine even if she tripped over herself, since she has no idea who she is. And not in an adorable, I’m-22-and-I’m-still-learning kind of way, but in a heels dug in, refuse to face reality kind of way. All I can hope for is that in ten years or so, she’ll look back on all of this and laugh (…knowingly, not defensively). In the meantime, I’m sorry to report that I could do without her in my box.

The Ladies in Your Box will be back next week. Stay tuned.