The second season of The Real Housewives of NYC premiered Monday night on Arena, and it is still as good as I remember it. There were the season one cast of Ramona, Jill, Bethenny, LuAnn, and Alex and Simon, plus newcomer Kelly Bensimmon.

Here are just a few thoughts on the episode:

• The only person who appeared to have had no work done to them over the season break was Simon Van Kempen. Ramona’s face looked tight, as did Luann’s. And Bethany’s boobs just speak for themselves;
• The picking on Alex and Simon continued from last season, with all sorts of put down from all the cast mates, even Ramona’s husband called Simon gay. Not that Simon does anything to help those rumours by wearing lime green jackets, and pleading with his wife to go shopping.
• The Van Kempens don’t help themselves by being so obviously upwardly mobile, including how they raise their children by teaching them to speak french. I would have thought spanish would be a more practical language if living in the USA.  Those kids seem very serious, however I do agree with Alex’s no TV in the bedrooms rule.
• Here is the article in the NY Mag that created the drama between Jill and Simon. I thought it ironic Jill called Simon out on his drinking when all the housewives appear to drink like fishes.
• I am continually surprised by the level of vacuousness from all the Housewives, including the new one Kelly Bensimmon.
• Speaking of Kelly what is the tandoori leather looking face skin like? Was it an acid peel gone wrong?
• Alex and Simon after panning the Hamptons in a previous season were out there this year. I guess the producers of the show set this up. They rented a two bed room place which just highlighted the difference between the rest of the cast and the Brooklyn couple.
• Bethenny who is not wealthy either seems to escape the social climbing tag from the other housewives, in fact she appears to be the most popular of them all;
• Bethenny who has maintained her wit, I love the term she used in describing the people Kelly hung out with – the fabulosity crowd.
• I note the Countess Lu Ann husband was with her in the Hamptons, so they must not have seperated at that point of filming. For those who don’t know he has run off with an Ethiopian princess – yes a much younger one.
• My fave housewives last night Bethenny and Jill, at least Jill can admit she is neurotic, something Ramona has no insight of.

The Australian housewife Simon Van Kempen now blogs for Bravo on the series and gives a bit of insight into the episode here.

Alex and Simon (the Australian connection)

After reading on Twitter that there was a caption of Jill’s Gay Husband under her real husband I was really looking forward to watching the show. Which was not so secretly one of my favourite reality TV shows of last year.

However my Fox IQ had an epic fail in recording it. So now I have to wait until tomorrow to record and watch it and blog on it NOT happy.

Also not happy about that Foxtel does not seem to have the signal for the new GO channel as yet, and Survivor Gabon starts on it tomorrow night, and I have only been waiting all year to watch the series.  I think I will have to ring Foxtel tomorrow to see if the problem is my end or their end.

You have got to love a TV show that mixes New York and Bravo TV. If you have never watched  any of the”Real Housewives” series the New York one is a pretty good one to dip your toe into the water with. It is a reality TV show which follows six New York “socialites” around the city, recording their bitchiness and interactions, oh and supposedly their day to day lives.

The cast is:

• Alex who lives with her Australian husband in Brooklyn, they are voracious social climber for themselves and their toddler kids;
• Bethany who has a healthy food business has snappy one liners and his hilarious when she is a) drinking and b) moaning about her love life, which she does a lot;
• Ramona is 45 going on 25, and dresses that way, she is opinionated, loud and slightly crazy, and an embarrassment to her tween daughter;
• Jill whose husband is in textiles is probably the most normal one, and the one who links most of the group, she does have a weird obsession with her dog, and sent her teenage daughter to a fat farm in season 1;
• The Countess LuAnn, is currently going through a divorce in real life. He must be loaded as he always manages to get much younger models. She thinks she is an etiquette tutor; and
• New girl this season is Kelly, apparently she is nutty and has lots of fights with Bethany because they once shared a boyfriend.

Alex and Simon were one of the more intriguing characters of season one and they talked to TV Week about what the viewer can expect in Season 2.

Many viewers doubt the sincerity of your relationship. do you put on any artifice for the cameras?

Simon: No. In season two we were more relaxed. One day they asked us to do Pilates on the beach in the Hamptons, and we said no because that’s not real for us. We’ll go for a jog, then a swim, and Alex will do her Bo Derek impression while I do my Dudley Moore flailing in the sea.

Alex: The last thing we wanted to try to do was be on our best behaviour, because that’s not good TV, but we did want to do things that were authentic.

How much do the Housewives talk to each other when you’re not shooting?

Alex: For the most part, we save it for the cameras. We’re in constant phone and email contact with each other because we’re all members of this show and we have a shared experience. But at the same time, yes, we’ll go and spend a day at Jill and Bobby’s house if we’re all out in the Hamptons, but that’s really it. We don’t meet any of the rest of them for dinner.

Out of the girls, who are you closest to?

Simon: Probably Jill…. although we do have a bust-up in episode one!

Simon, you and Jill pair up this season to make Ramona mad…

Alex: That was the best!

Simon: She pretended that it didn’t upset her. It did – steam was coming out of her ears. It was comical.

Is Ramona really that crazy and intense?

Simon:  Yes. There’s no other answer to that question:yes!

What’s your take on Bethenny?

Alex:  In some respects, Bethenny and I are more similar than either one of us would care to admit, but in others…..Look, she’s had a lot of pain in her life, and you her sometimes in a moment where she’s unguarded. But the moment she feels as if she’s getting vulnerable, her defences go straight back up and she hides behind all this nonsensical banter. Her one-liners are funny and very cutting but, at hte same time, they’re a suit of armour she wears to protect herself.

Simon: Bethenny does make fun of Alex and me but, deep down, would she like to be happily married like we are and have two young kids like we have? Absolutely.

What was your gut feeling when you first met new Housewife Kelly?

Alex: My instinct was to tell her to watch out!

Simon: And when she puts her mouth in gear, to put her brain in gear at the same time. She’ll have a thought and sometimes between transmitting from her brain to her mouth, it gets completely confused.

Kelly was arrested for beating up her boyfriend. Did that come as a surprise?

Alex:  That was a crazy week, because her arrest happened in teh same week the new broke of me getting laid off from my job. It was suddenly a  Housewives  bonanza in the New York papers. Because we’re on the show and it’s such a big hit, out life is up for grabs. We’ve all got used to having things that wouldn’t  normally be reportable being reported. Whether it’s Kelly’s arrest, or Bethenny breaking up with her boyfriend, or me losing my job. All three are things that may not happen to every person, but they happen to a lot of people. I think it makes us relatable.

It’s also been revealed that LuAnn – the countess – is getting a divorce. Did you have any idea that was going on?

Simon:  We were surprised it hadn’t happened earlier, honestly. Her husband Alex, was never really around very much. She was living in New York all the time – he would come back and forth to the States. So the relationship wasn’t one of “Mum and Dad at home with the kid’s anyway.

Alex:  When it happened, we all thought, “Why is it happening  now as opposed to a year ago?”I’m surprised it took as long as it did for Lu Ann’s situation to become public.”

The Real Housewives of NYC commences on Monday at 7.30pm

Political parties love star recruits be it former rock stars, football players or actors. Will reality TV stars be the next ones political parties will try and tempt into public life?

Tim Brunero who was on Big Brother could be a potential reality TV candidate for the Labor Party.

However the Liberal Party may also have a potential candidate in Simon van Kempen, the husband of The Real Housewives of New York City Alex McCord. Simon an Australian was a member of the Young Liberals, and still keeps an eye on Australian politics as can be seen in this post on an opinion forum here.

The Real Housewives of New York City is a show on Arena which shows New York so called ‘socialites’ going about their daily lives – with some set up situations of course.

Alex and Simon are the co-dependent couple who do everything together and could be described as social climbers.

Personally I find them a little bit creepy.

There are somethings I just don’t get about them this includes:

• Why would you wear a his and hers matching g string swimmers when you are over thirty?
• Why you would spend so much money on clothes when you house needs a lot of renovations, also new furniture would not hurt one of the sofas looked like it was from Fantastic Furniture?
• When she said I couldn’t live in the suburbs and pulled a face didn’t she think it was ironic she lived in Brooklyn (I know it is not suburban but it is not Manhatten)?
• Why would you invite your husband along on a girl’s night out, and why would you want to go if you are her husband?
• Why the big deal about speaking French, I would have thought Spanish to be the more practical language to learn in the US?

Regarding the thong swimmers apparently we were lucky they were wearing any at all. Gawker reported Alex and Simon had been spotted on St Barts in all their naked glory. Obviously he has not got the Australian paranoia of the sun and does not slip, slop, slap.

NY Mag has a article on their assessment on how far up the social scale these New York housewives really are.

I must confess I am loving the show, and I am disappointed the final episode of Season 1 will be shown this Monday at 9.30pm on Arena. Though apparently there is now a series called The Real Housewives of Atlanta.