Blogging The Bach: How Did We Get Here?

First, a confession: In my first Blogging The Bach post I pointed out that People used the exact same language on their Half Their Size covers two years in a row. I also described The Bachelor as "such a silly show on so many levels."  Then, as preparation for this post, I went back and re-read all of my early writing about the show back in 2009, and there it was, in a May 13, 2009 post about the upcoming season of The Bachelorette: "It's such a silly show, on so many levels." Now here I am almost six years later and you could say that I'm not even trying to come up with new language. Guilty.

Anyway, the new season of The Bachelor starts in 6 days and somewhat to my own surprise, I find myself deep in thought pondering all things Bachelor. I've blogged about show off and on since 2009, and this time around I'm thinking I might be a little more intentional about it, i.e., live-tweeting with hashtags during the show and writing a post after the show each week. Note that I probably won't do a scene-by-scene recap, there are plenty of those online already, but I'm sure I can come up with something to snark about on a weekly basis.



So who could have imagined, back on March 25, 2002, when Alex Michel hit the airwaves as the first bachelor, that 13 years later this weird little reality show would be a phenomenon, including not just The Bachelor, but 10 seasons of The Bachelorette, a couple of Bachelor Pads and this summer's Bachelor In Paradise. Yikes. Farmer Chris Soules is the 18th bachelor; can you name all 17 who came before? Me neither but according to Wikipedia, this is the list:

1. Alex Michel
2. Aaron Buerge
3. Andrew Firestone
4. Bob Guiney
5. Jesse Palmer
6. Byron Velvick
7. Charlie O'Connell
8. Travis Stork
9. Lorenzo Borghese
10. Andrew Baldwin
11. Brad Womack (the first time around)
12. Matt Grant
13. Jason Mesnick
14. Jake Pavelka
15. Brad Womack (second try) 
16. Ben Flajnik
17. Sean Lowe
18. Juan Pablo Galavais
19. Chris Soules 

My history with the show is a little spotty. I had heard about ABC's strange-sounding new dating show in the winter of 2002 but for whatever reason at the time I wasn't interested in watching. In those "olden" days the show was only an hour long, running from 8.00 to 9.00 here in the central time zone, and one night about halfway through the season I was planning to watch the show that came on right after The Bachelor. I turned the TV on a few minutes early, just in time to catch my very first rose ceremony, followed by some strange goings-on that were featured in the "Next week on The Bachelor" tease, and the rest is history. I was hooked, at least for a while. 

I watched a few seasons, including Aaron, Andrew F and first Bachelorette Trista, parts of a few more seasons, including Bob G and Byron the fisherman, then I lost interest. My personal Bachelor Dark Ages include the seasons of Jesse, Charlie, Travis, Lorenzo, Andy B and the first Brad Womack. I came back with Matt Grant's season (London Calling...) then I really entered into the whole new world of watching The Bach with Jason M's season in 2009, which I see as the starting point for Bachelor 2.0, which now includes blogs, websites and forums dedicated to following every twitch of the show, spoiler sites that claim to have advance info about what's going to happen, and an active community of tweeters on Twitter that make watching the show a truly interactive experience.

So come along for the ride, it's going to be a doozy, with Bachelor Chris Soules, aka Prince Farming, 30 crazy women, some bloggers, some tweeters and me. I'll meet you on Twitter, (#TheBachelor,) in six nights.