Confessionals Round 9: "Merge Smerge"

[Natalie Anderson]

So here I am!


I feel like I was on a train going a million miles an hour and now I am with 9 other people who haven't had to play the game in weeks, or even at all really.  It is a very strange feeling and I kind of don't know what to do.

I have talked to everyone at this point which is good.  I still don't have a lot of information.  Every must feel comfortable since only one person has come to me to ask to work together and that is Jaclyn.  No one else has even tried. People are being friendly and trying to get to know me, but that is it so far.

My assessment from Dorothy seems pretty accurate so far.  Except Jaclyn and Carrie don't seem as abrasive as I might have interpreted from what Dorothy said, however they are the only 2 to talk game with me, so I gues that actually does fit.

Let's chat about each person now:


Tim

I wasn't sure how my interaction with Tim would go, and lo and behold the first thing he asks me is why I voted for him at the last tribal council we were at together.  A part of me wanted to be honest about my alliances and how he was the only person that round that I wasn't aligned with, but with Dustin in the game I didn't want to risk Tim selling me out to Dustin.  I told Tim that I got nervous that he and Holly may be working together to vote me out and wasn't sure if either had an idol.  Then he confirmed something to me which I had been suspecting for a while, he said "Well Cody told me that you were voting me to get my supposed idol out of the game."  Fucking Cody.  I knew something was going on with Dustin/Cody/Tim.  This hurts me a little bit since Cody and I got so close so it is hard to hear that from Tim, and not only that but Cody still didn't even come clean with me about things, which means at this moment he is probably still more on team Dustin than team Natalie which makes me sad .  I guess I just have to make sure Dustin doesn't make it far .  Anyway Tim said its in the past now and wants to move forward.  I appreciate how straightforward and seemingly honest Tim is, but it is hard for me to think that he would forget that I voted him, and not sure if he really believes my story.

Dustin

I thought Dustin would be very happy to see me and tell me he needed to me join an alliance or tell me who he is close to so i could get o the same page or something.  But nope.  Literally nothing.  If I didn't IM him, I'm pretty sure he wouldn't have even talked to me.  He seemed disappointed it was me instead of Cody.  He asked me to fill him in on what happened on my tribe, so I gave him a brief rundown.  I then asked him how what I should be doing now and he basically told me to talk to the active people like Dorothy, Burnie, Ian, and Julia and just hope I make it through a few rounds...Cool, thanks Dustin so happy you care.  It's sad since he was the first person in this game I aligned with and liked and he seems to be very luke warm towards us being together again.

Dorothy

She continues to make an effort to message me when I'm online which is very nice.  She is trying hard to get to know me, whether or not that is for personal, strategically, or a mix of both I am not sure.  I'm pretty sure she has some pull so I have been hinting to her that I don't know what to do now and no one has come to me about anything game related so I feel like a sitting duck.  I am playing up the "I have no one" card and feeling insecure.  Hopefully that is enough to make her want to use me for a vote.

Julia

Julia and I get along very well and I like her a lot.  She mentioned to me a side comment of like "oh hahaha isn't dorothy so mean, lol" like she was being sarcastic and bringing up the fact of how nice Dorothy is.  From what Dorothy said about Julia  and that comment by Julia, I can pretty much confirm that Julia and Dorothy are close.  Julia also told me that that tribe bet on who on my tribe would be the last one standing, and she said almost everyone thought it would be Cody.  Go figures...My time to prove everyone wrong.

Ian

Ian def is an interesting character, but we also get along well.  I think I am a chameleon in a way and can adapt to others personalities, so I am matching his weird quirkiness and serving it back to him.  I think he likes it...It is hard to tell but hey I'm having fun messing with him.  Something he did say was that Burnie and I messaged him at the same time.  This was within like a minute of Burnie even being online, so if they are chatting with each other that quickly upon being online to me that means they are close.

Burnie

We have been talking a lot of TV and conversation seems to go well.  He gave nothing away interms of his relationships with anyone else.

Kathy

People said she was never online, so the fact that I got to talk to her is a plus in my opinion.  We apparently live a few miles from each other so there is that!  Again nothing really substantial and got nothing from her that can help me in this game.

Jaclyn

Jaclyn kind of cut right to the chase and was like "I'm worried about how this game is going to go since I haven't been strategizing since we have been winning."  She told me Tim was bitter about me voting him, so that is good to know.  She also said she would help me in anyway.  I told her I would watch her back as well.  She said she was worried about old Bruxelles being close and she was hoping I would be close with Dustin and Tim to get us together.  I'm not too sure on that though.  I'm kind of over Tim and Dustin and want to start over fresh.  She said she has connections with Dorothy and Burnie so that if something happens she would hear from them.  So good, at least someone finally who is willing to talk game with me.  That is a start.  She also asked me about Jasmine's idol.  She mentioned her and Ian were trying to figure out if it was exile or Luxemburg idol.  I told her I thought it was Luxemburgs idol since it matched 1/3rd of the puzzle I did, so I assume those 3 images in the puzzle were the 3 idols for our camps.  The screenshot probably said if it was a camp idol but I forgot what it said.  If she was talking to Ian about it, they potentially have something as well.

Carrie

Carrie is someone else who immediately talked game with me.  I was doing the same with her as I was doing with Dorothy, basically saying I'm all alone and not sure what to do (which actually is true, even though I am playing that up) and she told me that if it was up to her, I would not be the first to go and that she would look out for me.  She said she didn't want to promise anything but would keep me updated.  I asked her if there was anyone else I should talk game with and she said she thinks Julia would also give me a shot.  So there is something else going for me and another avenue to pursue.

Here are the connections as I see them

Dorothy:Julia

Julia:Carrie

Jaclyn:Dorothy

Jaclyn:Burnie

Jaclyn:Ian

Ian:Burnie

Dustin:Tim

So it seems that original yellow is really playing the game.  If that is the case I don't know why Tim or Dustin aren't trying harder with me.  I also find it weird that no one has said that "OMG I love Dustin and he loves you let's connect".  Like there seems to have been no mention of me from Dustin or Tim whatsoever aside from Tim bitching about me voting him.

Only a few people have even brought their names up to me, and it was mostly just like "you know them right?".

Maybe everyone really was just sitting on their asses not playing and once tribal is posted we will get a little more action.  All I know is that I have no allies and no idol, so people should want to work with me as I am not threating in anyway.  I'm pretty sure there are 3 idols in the game yet to be played, and if you do the math and take me out of it (no one should expect me to have and idol if they were smart) that leaves 9 people and 3 idols.  That means a third of the people in the game have an idol (If we consider 3 different people have each idol).  That is not good odds for someone if they do not have an idol, so they should want to work with me for that reason alone to try to flush the idols.

If I had to guess, I would say Dustin has the Amsterdam idol, Tim has the Exile idol and Carrie has the Bruxelles Idol.  Outside shot of Burnie having either the exile, or Bruxelles idol over the others.

[Natalie Anderson]

So the challenge was great *sarcasm*. I was obviously not going to win and even though Kathy killed it, they were not going to vote for her to win, and those were my only 2 options to at least force people to make a move earlier than they wanted.

Originally everyone was telling me that there have been no strategy talks really since they haven't had to, but as soon as the challenge hit you could tell that was not the case.

However that didn't end up happening. I have had a few people come to me about "just vote Kathy now I think you are good, then we will talk next round". Ian seems to be working hard to keep me. He told me him and Dustin were pretty solid on voting Kathy out, and that Jaclyn, Burnie, Carrie were most likely voting Kathy as well. He told me to work on Julia and Tim since they were weary of keeping me. He told me Dorothy was the biggest push for me to go so I was lucky she was on exile.

However, Jaclyn had already approached me my first day about feeling on the bottom and wanting to work together so I feel she will keep me. Carrie also approached me about not wanting to vote me either and that if I voted Kathy everything should be fine. Dustin also told me that he had never talked to Kathy and was voting her and that I would be fine.

I had to go talk to Tim and Julia and as soon as I told Tim, I heard people were voting Kathy he said "Im too tired to think, I need to go to bed". Well good for fucking you betch. So that didn't go over well. I talked to Julia and she was being very sweet and said it would be douchey for people to vote me out over Kathy and that she was 100% not voting for me. That is good, however you don't play survivor to be nice. I feel like I am good, but I am still hella nervous.

I did not do well in the challenge yesterday, which may work to my benefit since Kathy did the complete opposite and crushed it. She won 6 comps which shows she is more of a challenge threat than I am and hopefully people want her out more than me for not being as social and for being a bigger challenge threat.

I have heard that people are threatened by my "story" and that if I make the end I win. I will make sure to try to dull my story down so people don't think that. I do feel proud to be the last one standing, but my tribe was weak and a bunch of inactive idiots. I could flop all merge and be dragged to the end as a goat and be killed. Right now my strategy is just to sit back and hopefully be used by someone to keep me longer, then strike when I can. I already have a target on me so I can't do anything to make it bigger at the moment.

I of course will be at another wedding so can't compete at the challenge (if I am still here) so fml.

Ian and I had a great strategy talk. I really trust him and he is my number 1 at this point. He was giving me a lot of info so I don't think he was using me and think he actually needs/wants me. That is a good sign as I need someone I can rely on in this game.

He seems to think that the 4 Bruxelles are tight and that they have have 2 idols, which is very dangerous. I tried to tell him that we should strike now while they won't expect it but he doesn't trust Kathy to not sell him out.

I am not sure if they are planning on splitting the votes between Kathy and I but if not then I may talk with Ian about potentially blindsiding Carrie.

If Carrie/Julia/Burnie vote Kathy out

Kathy votes me (or random person)

Then Me/Ian/Dustin/Tim/Jaclyn can vote Carrie and she leaves. I know it is risky, but I obviously don't have anything to lose, so it is more that I don't think anyone else wants to ruffle feathers so soon, but this is merge baby so I can at least bring this idea to the table.

[Natalie Anderson]

Right now I am sitting in the airport powerless. I do feel good about surviving this round however I am nervous about next round. I'll be gone until Monday so will miss the challenge and most likely Tc which is not good since my butt is on the line.

I talked to Isn about trying to blindside Carrie but even though he thought it wasn't a bad idea, no one else was online to really solidify so we just decided to stick with the Kathy vote.

He said he had a plan next round to tell people to split the votes between me and someone else but then we plus a few others switch and vote someone else and blindside them. This is very risky since it all depends on who wins immunity and who they send to exile, plus if Ian is telling the truth and Tim is weary of me then he may not want to keep me another round. Ugh I feel like Ian is the only one thinking ahead but it is hard to do anything without an idol or other reliable people...

I hate everyone