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In_need_of_TAR_withdraw
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Article On Susan & Patrick
« on: Mar 23^rd, 2005, 6:15pm »

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not much-
'Amazing Race' mom says she's still close with son

By John Kiesewetter
Enquirer staff writer

Susan Vaughn says she's still tight with her son Patrick, who complained about her nagging before they were eliminated from "The Amazing Race" show Tuesday.

"I knew when Patrick and I were cast on the show that the bond we had would not be tarnished by the experience," says Susan, 54, of Hamilton.

On the show, the pessimistic Patrick, 26, a Hollywood writer, constantly brushed off his mom's optimism as they were last to reach an Argentina polo club.

"I expected there would be moments like you saw (Tuesday) night. The editing doesn't show all of the positive things that Patrick said to me, and things he said about our experience," says Susan, judicial affairs director at Miami University in Oxford.

"He and I are a great team and best friends. I am so proud of him, and proud to represent my hometown area on national TV," says Susan, who has lived in Butler County her entire life. Patrick is a 1997 Hamilton High School graduate.

Susan calls traveling eight days through South America on the show "a once in a lifetime experience and I wouldn't trade a moment of it -- except perhaps the moment when (host) Phil Keoghan said, 'Sorry, Susan and Patrick, you have both been eliminated from the race.' "

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Syd a.k.a Hayden
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Re: Article On Susan & Patrick
« Reply #1 on: Mar 23^rd, 2005, 8:57pm »

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Thanks for the interview, interesting one Cool

pretty short though, they are the one team who are still left shocked i guess, especially susan, she looked really bummed out, i think they both thought they were gonna go real far in the show, bummers

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ilovemymariners
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Re: Article On Susan & Patrick
« Reply #2 on: Mar 23^rd, 2005, 11:03pm »

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Good for them! I like them..Kinda

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Survivor: Bobby, Jeff, Jenifer

The Amazing Race 6: ROCK ON FREDDY AND KENDRA! I KNEW I COULD COUNT ON YOU!

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GO LYNN AND ALEX AND UCHENNA AND JOYCE TOO! YOU GUYS ROCK ALSO!

BrYce_BrIan
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Re: Article On Susan & Patrick
« Reply #3 on: Mar 24^th, 2005, 12:44pm »

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I made it through the caption in CBS!!! Yahoo... ive been sending there like season 1 and i f

Kendra
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Re: Article On Susan & Patrick
« Reply #4 on: Mar 24^th, 2005, 3:58pm »

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Why is their interview so short? Did Patrick not have any input to what he thought about the race and his mom? LOL Guess he was too mad??.. Shocked

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Amber
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Re: Article On Susan & Patrick
« Reply #5 on: Mar 24^th, 2005, 5:56pm »

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I guess they couldn't make an appointment with Patrick....

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Syd a.k.a Hayden
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Re: Article On Susan & Patrick
« Reply #6 on: Mar 24^th, 2005, 6:03pm »

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I thought Susan was more angrier than patrick? Angry

I didn't really like this team, they were ok Grin

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banzai
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Re: Article On Susan & Patrick
« Reply #7 on: Mar 29^th, 2005, 6:32pm »

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http://www.advocate.com/html/stories/936/936_amazing_race.asp

Patricks Amazing Race secrets

The openly gay half of the first mother-son team on CBSs hit around-the-world reality show shares his dislike of fellow contestants Rob and Amber, his passion for musical theater, and his doubts about ever getting married
By Bruce C. Steele

An Advocate.com exclusive posted March 28, 2005

Its been a couple seasons since CBSs Amazing Race served up any gay contestants, but theyre making up for lost time with the current and seventh run, which began in February with two gay-inclusive teams: Life partners Lynn and Alex from West Hollywood, Calif., and mother-son team Patrick and Susan, from Ohio. (In fact, Patrick, 26, has been on his own in New York and Los Angeles for several years.)
Susan and Patrick started the game brilliantly, finishing near the lead in the first leg of the racewhich took them to South Americabut they fell behind when they couldnt find their way to the main north-south highway in Chile. Then, having driven across the Andes to Argentina, they dropped farther back when one of the contests periodic challenges forced lean Patrick to consume four pounds of grilled meata task that wound up taking many hours.

Other teams simply skipped the meat challenge and accepted a time penalty of four hours delay insteada strategy launched by Survivor: All-Stars winners Amber and Rob, an engaged couple in their third reality-TV contest (their first as a formal two-person team). Rob has played the ruthless schemer on two stints on CBSs Survivor; the network knows how effectively he polarizes both audiences and other contestants. People either admire his bold blue-collar Boston brashness or hate his pomposity, his bragging, and his endless conniving.

Patrick fell immediately and passionately into the second category, and some viewers wondered whether the amount of time he spent talking about how much he disliked Rob and Amber might have been better spent attending to his and Susans position in the pack. Its a concern Patrick says is overblown, even if by the time he and his mother were eliminated (at the end of the fourth round) he was sick of the Rob and Amber show.

Advocate.com spoke with Patrick, who was in Los Angeles near his Hollywood home the afternoon after the airing of the episode in which he and his mother were done in by a tiny motorboat in Argentina. The motor simply quit in the middle of a challenge, an unlucky break that left them hours behind the other teams. Patrick talked about how he was portrayed on the showas pessimistic Patrickwhat hes up to these days, and why hes still single. It was his third or fourth interview of the day.

So if youve already done three or four other interviews, are there any embarrassing questions that youve been asked that I should avoid?
No, I dont think so. I dont think theres anything too embarrassing. Well, I guess there is No, why am I going to freely give that away?

Well, now youve brought it up
No, Im just kidding. My mom was just talking [in an earlier interview] about how we had to sleep on the beach one time and share a sleeping bag. I didnt want anybody to know about it, but thats cool. [Laughs]

How do you feel about being called pessimistic Patrick?
[Laughs] Its something my friends have called me for a while. Not that [exact phrase] actually, but just that Im an eternal pessimist. They all know that. It was just so funny because last night during the show my friends were just turning to me and being like, Oh, my God, you really did just go out there and just act like yourself. You didnt put on something else for the camera, to not be pessimistic. And I was like, No, thats the point! You just be yourself and try to get through it. So, yeah, I guess my pessimism showed through.

How do you feel about watching that every week?
I actually thought it was sort of funny. I didnt realize that I was so obsessive and eternally pessimistic. I guess I am, though. I liked the very last line of last nights show--Maybe I need to lighten up--because thats what people tell me.

So have you been trying to lighten up?
Um, I guess so. Since coming back from the race people tell me Ive been a much nicer personmore lightened up. [Laughs] It might have been that kind of experience.

I do want to talk about some particulars of the race, but since this is The Advocate, I wanted to start by asking some things about your life that our readers might want to know. Like, what brought you to Hollywood from Ohio?
OK. When I was living in Ohio I went to Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. That was cool and all, but I just was not an organized-education type of person. I wanted to write for musical theater, so I dropped out of college and worked for a year and saved up and moved to New York. I lived in Brooklyn for a year, but I wasnt getting anything done because of the hectic pace of the city. So I was like, Ive always said I wanted to live on the West Coast too, so I just drove across country and moved to the West Coast. Now Ive been out here for two years, and I get a lot more done. So I like it.

So youre writing for musical theater. What else are you up to?
For my day job I work at an accounting office. But Im trying to break through: I write the book and lyrics for musical theater, and my writing partner, Sean Flowers, lives in New York and he composes. He gets things put together like workshops and things, and I dont even have to be there, so thats nice.

Do you ever want to finish your college degree?
No, I dont. I think that for some people its really meant to be and for some people its not, and I cant ever picture a time [when Id want to go back]. I cant imagine going back into a classroom and studying. I just like the real-life experience of everything.

Speaking of real-life experience, tell me about coming out to your parents and sister. Who did you tell first?
I guess I was 20, maybe? No, I had to be 21, because we went out for margaritas, so maybe I was a sophomore in college. So I went out for margaritas with my mom and we were sitting there just talking about random stuff, and after like two [drinks] I was like, Oh, you know what, now is a good time to get this off my chest. And I said that I had something to talk about, and she sort of nodded, like I think she knew what we were going to talk about. And I said, Well, we dont even have to really get into it, but just so that you know, there arent going to be any girlfriends. And she was like, I know that, Patrick. Ive known that. And I was like, OK. So then we went home and told my dad and then my sister like two days later. But everybody was just like, Oh, we hoped that you didnt think that you couldnt have told us this. Thats our only regret. Theres nothing you cant tell us. It was all good, and there was never any stress whatsoever, which was nice because a lot of my friends got kicked out of their houses and stuff for being gay in the Midwest.

Which reminds mewhose house is that pictured behind you and your mother in the opening credits of The Amazing Race?
Thats actually Miami University. Everybody asks that, though: Do you live in a castle? No, I swear. Thats a church on the ground of the university. Its actually the church where my cousin got married. Its just really scenic. Thats not our house.

So back in Ohio, were you out to anybody in high school at all?
I think thats interesting. I was completely asexual all through high school, because I just was focused on performing, and so I was in a lot of shows. I never dated girls. Never dated girls, never dated guys. [Theater] was pretty much it. All my gay friends, though, were always dating girls, and that was just really embarrassing, because I was like, Come on! One of you two open your eyes and realize it! So it wasnt until I was like, probably, in my senior year of high school, I guess. And I did a show away from my hometown, so it was just sort of like meeting a bunch of strange people, so when I met them all for the first time I just started saying, Yeah, Im gay. Then I just set up my own little identity there. And then eventually I was like, OK, now I need to work this back into my real life and tell everybody back there.

Is being gay really a big part of your life, or is it just sort of incidental?
Yes, see, thats the thing: Its just sort of incidental for me because I dont even date anybody. I have never dated anybody for more than, like, three months in my entire life. [Laughs] Ive never been in love, I dont think I believe in love. So I just dont even date. I cant remember the last time Ive been on a date.

You write musical theater and you dont believe in love?
Exactly! I believe in kitschy musical-theater kind of love, but thats like sugar and saccharine. Thats not [Laughs] I dont know. Its a good idea, though, and it sells seats in theaters.

No wonder your mother worries about you!
I know, exactly. So in answer to that, I would definitely say that being gay is just sort of like incidental. It definitely does not really impact my life. I guess it impacts my friends. And Im really aware of all the issues, and I care a lot about it, but personally, Im not rushing off to get married or anything, you know?

Well, did you mind being the gay son on the show, since every contestant has to have a sort of three-word identity?
No, you know what, I didnt mind it. I always like to see gay people represented well on television, and there had never been a mother-son [team on The Amazing Race], there had never been a mom and gay son, you know? Thered been a gay son [and father] before on the show, but you know Lynn and Alex were there, so I was like, OK, I dont think Im going to be [portrayed as] this flaming [stereotype]. So I sort of felt like the gay part didnt have as much to do with us, Mom and I, getting on the show. They had the gay thing covered.

It was more about the dynamic between the two of you.
Yeah, I think it was. I think it probably helped, though, that Im gay, because Im cattier, maybe. [Laughs]

Well, were you happy with the way you were portrayed?
Yeah, I was happy with it. I felt like it was accurate. It was all ammunition that I gave, so [laughs]. That all happened! Sometimes there are little editing things that [are] spliced together, when you would say something here and then they would show you saying it [somewhere else]. But basically, its accurate.

When your friends found out you were going to be on The Amazing Race, did any of them talk to you about how important it would be for gay visibility for you to be on the show? Did you go through any of that?
Actually, you know, I didnt tell anybody I was going on it. None of them even knew.

Really?
Yeah. All my friends are basically in New York, [from] when I moved there. I came out here not knowing anybody, so theres only like four friends, three or four friends that I see on a daily basis that would think it was weird if I disappeared. So I just made up a story and said I was going to Ohio to do a show and that I wasnt going to be able to be in touch with people over the holidays. I just sort of disappeared, and nobody thought it was weird. I came back and I only had 14 messages from people who were just like, Hey, I havent heard from you in a long time, where are you? I was just like, Im just going to see what happens if I just shut off the phone and go on the race. So, yeah, nobody actually really knew, and the people that did know werent gay.

So did you think about it yourself?
Myself? Well, it went through my mind that I didnt want to be portrayed badly, but I didnt think that I would be. More than like the gay thing, I was just afraid of being like a little villain, because I knew that that was the tendency that could happen with me.

Little realizing that Rob and Amber would take care of that role for this season.
I know. Rob and Amber show up, and they turn into the villains. But a lot of people really love them, which I just cannot understand. Ill read onlineeven though I shouldntthe crap, you know, that people are saying and how much they hate Mom and I because we hate Rob and Amber. And Im like, You people need to figure this out. These are like media whores, like, fake Oh, I dont know, theyre just embarrassing. I dont know why people can root for them.

This is the third reality show that my partner and I have had to suffer through watching Rob.
Exactly! Me too. When I saw them walk into that room [before the race started], I was like, Im just going to be nasty to them from the start, and of course [the producers] pieced together every single little nasty thing you say about Rob and Amber. But you just knew that thats how hes going to play the game. You knew hes just going to come in talking ***** about everybody.

Did the teams break down into the teams that liked Rob and Amber and the teams that didnt like Rob and Amber?
Well, all the teams out in front [early in the race] acted like they didnt like Rob and Amber That was the basic consensus, and everybody, every team agreed that they were going to yield them if they could get to the yield first, so [Laughs] [A yield is the opportunity for just one team to delay one other team thats following them for a set period of time. Yields appear a few times during the race. Ed.] We all had that agreement, but then when I watched the show you could see whos sort of buddy-buddying up with them. Like Ray. We used to call Ray Velcro because he was so stuck to Robs ass. That was actually something Meredith [the male half of the oldest couple in the competition] and I called him: There goes Velcro, stuck to Robs ass.

Its interesting you should bring up Ray, because on last nights episode, when the three last-place teams were competing not to be eliminated, Ray made some comment about Im not losing to these two teams, which really sounded like I dont want to lose to the old people and the fag.
Yeah, exactly. Thats exactly what it sounded like. He never would have said that word [fag], Im sure, but Im sure that was going through his mind. Heres the thing: I think Ray is, like, a nice guy, and I think he means well, but in the game he is a snake, you know? He is out to play. Thats what Lynn and Alex call him, the snake, because theyre just like...he is out to be vicious and vindictive, and you could just tell that the whole time. But hed come up and hed be very social and friendly, but then you know that hes making comments like that [behind your back]. I especially knew it, because last night before the show he calls and hes talking about how, you know, great it is to talk again, and then this morning I had an e-mail that said, I didnt sleep at all last night. I feel so bad. The two teams that I respected the most in the entire race I insulted the worst last night, and I feel really bad. So

Wow.
That was nice of him, I thought. But its really easy to make amends once you say ***** like that on national TV. [Laughs] I like the whole Patrick is weak comment [he made]. But in the end, I do like Ray and [his partner in the race] Deana, and its just a game and I can accept that. If Rob and Amber had been saying that, I wouldnt be able to let it just roll off my back, though.

You and Debbie and Bianca had an early alliance. What happened to that?
Well, that alliance would have kept going, probably, if it hadnt come down to our two teams [for elimination]. On that third episode, when we were driving through the Andes, that was when we were trying to find the [highway called] El Norte, or Cinco Norte, and we couldnt find it. We were with Debbie and Bianca searching, and finally we were just like, OK, neither of us can find this. Lets just branch off. And so that was the end of it. [Debbie and Bianca wound up driving two hours out of their way and being eliminated. Ed.]

Tell me about this: You and your mom seemed to get lost a couple of times.
[Laughs] Yeah, we did.

Is this something youve experienced before? Is navigation not your strong suit?
I guess I would say that maybe navigation isnt our strong suit. I dont know. I think we did OK. We made it through the entire Andes mountains without a map, so that was pretty goodjust stopping on the side of the road and asking people. Not bad. But we could have done better with the navigation, probably. That was why I sat in the backseat, because Mom hates my driving and she cant read a map, so my job was to sit in the back and try to navigate. Uh-oh! [Laughs] Maybe I didnt do that well.

A couple of the challenges you had to do, you got really upset when you thought your mom was nagging you. Do you think that affected your performance?
No, I dont think so. Mom and I, when we got done with the whole race, we said to each other, Im really proud of us. We are such a good representation of a mom and gay son because we didnt have a fight the entire time, but then Im watching it and Im like, Well, maybe we did fight, but thats more just like attitude we were throwing at each other, because its so stressful. But I dont think it hurt my performance--I think that Im one of those people that just needs to clear my head and concentrate, and sometimes what I perceived as nagging she really just meant as support, and I wasnt seeing that in that moment. But she understood where I was coming from, and I understood her too.

Well, from the point of view of watching the show on the couch, it seemed the tension was kind of growing between the two of you as the race went on. But it could have been just exhaustion.
I think it was exhaustion. Its similar to something like Survivor, because you dont have any food except for what you eat on airplanes, and you dont have any sleep except for what you get on airplanes. Its just running and carrying and talking andugh! Yeah. So I think that it did eventually wear us down. And diarrhea all the time. And that [final] day I was really just still sick to my stomach from the food [the four pounds of grilled meat]. Yeah, it sort of sucks.

Finally, watching the videos posted on CBS.com, we could figure out what you had tried to do as a strategy for the meat challenge and how that didnt really work out. You were hoping to be able to not eat the meat, take the four-hour penalty, and still be ahead of the last-place team, Debbie and Bianca. So you stopped eating. But even though they got there very late, it was clear the girls were going to complete the challenge. So you had to hurry and eat all that meat after all.
No, that didnt really work out. Yeah, that was sort of complicated. I wondered if [the shows producers] were going to be able to translate that.

Well, they didnt, because it didnt come across on the episode. On the episode it looked like you just sort of slept on it until you realized that Debbie and Bianca might have finished first, and then you buckled down.
I know, because they used a bunch of shots when I was acting [upset at having to eat all the meat]. I wasnt really as terrified. I even started to cry one time while we were sitting there. I was like, Im going to turn on the tears now because Ive got to really freak out Debbie and make her think that its that awful and that Ive been sitting here forever. And so I was like, I cant do it, Mom! I cant do it! And they were like cutting to that and showing that like that really happened. But whateverit did happen.

What was your favorite memory of the race?
Well, one my favorite things would be Meredith and [his wife] Gretchen. I just love them so much. They have so be some of my favorite people from the [show]: Meredith and Gretchen and Lynn and Alex. Im just so excited that we got to meet through this whole experience. There was one day on the second leg when we had this huge layover for like 13 hours, or something, in Peru, and so Mom and I and Meredith and Gretchen, we all teamed up and got a hotel and got our reservations and had ice cream and sightsaw, you know. It was just really nicewe had a great day together and really bonded. But of course all of that was cut out because its not fast-paced. [Laughs] That was just a nice little break from the race, and it was great to get to know them.

So were there other fun things that happened that we didnt see? Im just wondering if when youre watching the episodes on the air, you sometimes go, Wait! They skippedWell, now and then theyll skip a route marker, but it will just tell you where to go next. Theyll skip those sometimes.

Other than sharing a sleeping bag with your mom, was there anything that you were glad they didnt show?
I guess on this last episode I was really glad that they didnt show everything that happened to Mom and me after the boat died. [On the air] it just sort of looked like our boat died and then we got out and ran up [the bank of the river] and got into a cab a left. And there was really hours more stuff that happened. We knew we were last because we were sitting in our boat and it was dead and the other teams all passed us. They were on the ground headed for the pit stop and we still hadnt gotten a replacement boat yet. Once we got up onto land it took another two, 2 1/2 hours because we were trying to get a cab and nobody would drive us out [to the pit stop, outside of town] that late. We eventually just ended up sitting in a train station, and Moms crying, and I was telling her, Mom, this is it, its over, and shes saying, Were just going to stay at a hostel tonight and well make it to the pit stop in the morning, and I was like, And arrive six hours after the other teams depart for the next leg of the race? [Laughs] Yeah, that was pretty sad. Im glad we didnt see all that.

Yeah, we sit home watching the show and we call that fake editing at the end, when theyre trying to convince the viewers that theres a footrace between the two last teamseven though it looked like dusk in the shots of Meredith and Gretchen heading to the pit stop, and it looked like the middle of the night in shots of you and your Mom. Were like, No, this is not a real footrace.
Which is true. I think they got there at like 8:30 or 9 and we got there at about midnight. And yeah, it was [made to look like it was] all close, like, Whos going to come running up?

I know something that they didnt show: how you got the bandage over your eye in, I think, the second episode.
Oh, yeah, that was when we were on the second leg of the race. We were on the bus and Rob totally dragged me out of the bus and kicked my ass. [Pauses] No, Im just kidding. No, we were on this bus and I got off and was getting PowerBars out from [our luggage] underneath the bus, and I swung the door [to the luggage compartment] open and it cracked me in the eyeball. So I was just bleeding. But then they found out I didnt even need a stitch, so they just put a bandage on it. I didnt even want it, so I took it off that night. But yeah, watching the show, it was pretty mysterious [how that bandage got there]. It was nothing bad. No harm.

You told Phil at the end and in some of the videos on CBSs Amazing Race Web site that you dont think youre as devious and mean as you thought you were.
Yeah, I think that thats true, probably. Seeing Rob and Amber on the showI remember there was a moment in a train station [early on], and everyone was fighting with Rob and Amber and saying Its a good thing you cant be voted off and all that stuff

Yeah, I remember that. Rob had bribed one of the guys working at the train station not to tell anyone else which train got to the destination faster. But everyone found out anyway, and also found out that Rob had bribed the guy to withhold information. And everyone was pissed.
I was standing off to the side during all of that, thinking, This is so ugly. Im glad all of that stuff isnt directed at me, and thats not how Im going to play the game, the way Robs doing it. And I know I came into it saying, Im going to screw all these people, then I think you realize what kind of a person you are sometimes. And like, No, you know what? Im not going to be that nasty. Im still going to keep my morals. Ive got to live with myself once this is over with. Rob is just so nasty, so I realized that thats what it is to be devious and nasty in this game, and I dont want to be that way. Plus, at the beginning I had totally made up so many stories for everybody, and [decided] who I was going to like and who I was going to dislike, and I was just completely shocked [that most of the assumptions were incorrect]. So I was like, Wow, Patrick, you really arent as nasty as you thought.

So some of the people you thought you wouldnt like, it turned out that you did?
Yeah. I really didnt know if I would like [West Hollywood gay couple] Lynn and Alex. I couldnt tell, because I just thought that they would really rub me the wrong way, just from [seeing] all of the auditions and just seeing them at the walk-through [before the race commenced]. We nicknamed them Prancer and Dancer through everything, because they would just flit into the room and you would always be able to tell they were looking at you and whispering or something. But then we met them and we realized that theyre not nasty or mean at all, theyre just funny. Theyre really funny and they have a good time together. I guess Im just paranoid.

How do you think people misperceived you?
I think people misperceived me as being crazy. I think that Im not crazy, but I think that people think that I really am like psycho-obsessed with Rob and Amber. They really didnt have much to do with my game at all. Everybody says, Patrick, if you just stopped wasting all of your time thinking about Rob and Amber and its like, seriously, I thought about them when I would see them and we would be commenting Lets beat them, you know? But I guess it really makes it look like Im crazy and obsessed with them. I would think that might be the only way, though, that Ive been misperceived. I dont think that theres anything really bad.

How did you feel about the portion of the exit interview that they showed on television? Because among exit interviews, yours was sort of the least affectionate between teammates. Usually theres hugging and expressions of affection andI know.

Yours came across as You just have to understand that we dont think the same way.
Well, thats not really the case. I feel like the editors were trying to send me some sort of message last night with that exit interview, how it was all just about how I need to lighten up and Im too pessimistic and all that stuff. We said a bunch of stuff [during the exit interview] about how much we love each other and how this has been great and were best friends and all of that stuff, but none of that got on [television]just the negative stuff. I was hoping maybe online they would have shown some of that stuff.

They have posted some of the more positive stuff from your exit interview online.
Well, thats nice.

They also have video of the two of you in the cab on the way to your final pit stop.
Is that really nasty? Because Im pretty negative, I think, in that.

Your mom says, Its really not all about the money, and you say, No, its not really about the money; its how you play the game. But I was not buying it.
Oh, really? I said Its how you play the game?

Yeah. But I dont think you were all that happy to be
No, I was not happy. I will tell youOK, heres the thing: I was sort of happy to be eliminated because I was sick of this Rob and Amber show. Thats the deal. [Laughs] I had watched how it was going, and I was sick of it. And everybody in that race knows exactly what that means. I was sick of it. It wasnt the race I had auditioned for. I was just like, You know, if this is how its going to be the rest of the time, then Ive had my fun. We had our good time. We did The Amazing Race, but this wasnt like the other seasons weve watched. This was The Rob and Amber Amazing Race show. Yeah, I was really pissed.

So you made good friends with Gretchen and Meredith and Lynn and Alex. Are there any contestants from past Amazing Races that youve met?
Yeah. Brian and Greg [contestants from this season] have had these parties, so at some of those I got to meet Rebecca from last season, and shes pretty cute. And Jonathan [from last season], surprisingly, has been there, and hes a big supporter of Mom and me. But I was like, OK, do I want that support? [Laughs] [Jonathan was widely criticized as being abusive toward his wife and teammate during the show. Ed.]

My partner and I met Jonathan at a party too. We had a long conversation with him. He seemed nice in person.
Yeah, hes interesting, I guess, and hes interesting to talk to.

He seemed a bit one-note in the editing. Im sure theres a lot more to him than
Oh, yeah, Im sure too. And then Hayden and Aaron [also from last season] weve met too. And, oh, my gosh, Aaron is so hot. I cannot even deal, you know? That guy is so hot. Oh, but waitnow he might read that, and that would be weird. But hes so hot. Im so glad that I got to meet him and [his fiancée] Hayden. [Laughs]

The Amazing Race is such a small community, Im sure someone will point this interview out to Aaron.
Oh, they probably will, but thats OK, I dont care. I was so excited because they gave me their phone number, and I was like, Oh, I might just have to go call Aaron and Hayden and have them to dinnerbecause I just want to sit there and look at his beautiful face. [Laughs] Im just kidding.

So now youve got just a few more of your 15 minutes of fame. Is there anything you want to do with them?
No, it was more about the game show to me, the whole game aspect of it, and just getting this reality thing out of my system because Ive been so addicted to these shows. And I see that nobody really does anything once they get done with their 15 minutes of fame. I guess in a perfect worldand this sounds far-fetchedI would be a villain on Days of Our Lives, and I would throw my goblet into the fireplace and say Damn you! I want to have one of those partsmelodrama. But Im not an actor, so

Well, you acted in high school.
Yeah, I acted then. But really, now a dream job would be to write for Days of Our Lives. I dont know what it is [about soap operas]. I just love all that stuff. But Im not pursuing that or anything like that. I just think thats funny. Other than that? At the end of this Ive got a workshop of a show that were trying to put together in New York, and thats about all.

So youve just moved back into the life that you already have.
Yeah, exactly. Just went back into it.

With a few more friends than you had before.
Yeah, a few more friends and some really crazy experiences. And the most well-documented vacation ever. Later on in life Im sure Ill look back on this and think like, Oh, thats funny. And you know, it will never get old. You know, some people are going to be divorced from their husband or whatever, and theyre going to be like, Oh, I dont want to watch that old episode of The Amazing Race. But Im like, Hey, Moms always going to be my mom, so its always going to be fun to watch when were old.

You can e-mail Patrick at [email protected]. At the request of CBS, the magazine will hold your e-mails and forward them to Patrick after the finale of this season of The Amazing Race.

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