Hey every body—it’s good to be back for another General Hospital muse column. The muse has definitely worked her magic on me this morning because as I was watching today’s episode, suddenly I was rushed with a flood of questions/frustrations that I definitely need the answers to—or at least I need to know if everyone out there in internet land was wondering the same thing. If you’ll excuse me, I’m just gonna jump right in. 

Question 1: Is Kelly’s the ONLY damn place to get a job in Port Charles? I’ll ignore the fact that it’s already been established that it’s the only place in the whole town to rent a room. Off the top of your head, can you think of all the people that have rented the THREE rooms on top of Kelly’s? Ric, Brenda, Liz, Jason, Carly, Lucky, Tammy (where is she?), are the only ones I can think of in two seconds. Oh wait, I forgot about the ROOM above Jake’s or is it BEHIND Jake’s? I’ll bet Dillon is on his way to that room once he and Georgie get done playing “romance on the run”. 

Question 2: Is Alexis TRYING to get caught? She’s dealing all her dirt right there in the foyer of the Q mansion with folks running hot and cold through there. She’s kissing and hugging all up on Cameron right there for the world to see. Skye apparently hasn’t figured out that all she has to do is move her cameras from the living room to the hall way and she’ll have Alexis dead to rights. 

Question 3: Are Jason and Sonny TRYING to be stupid? Any fool would have figured out by now—if they’d just put surveillance on Ric’s front door from the start they’d have figured out that Ric has Carly somewhere in that house. Remember when he dragged her out of there to the hospital? If they’d put one car down the block from Ric’s Carly would be at home by now and we could all be sleeping through something else at 2:00pm. I have to say it’s a shame when instead of looking forward to General Hospital like I used to, instead I hold my breath waiting for Judge Judy to come on! 

Question 4: Is Ned suffering from selective memory? I understand, fundamentally for storyline purposes, Ned needs an ally, a female one, someone to combat Alexis for custody of Kristina. Skye is the perfect choice because of her own insecurities, her general hate for Alexis for going to bat for Jax and Brenda so many times, and the fact that there aren’t enough women to go around on GH, but when this all began, Ned promptly forgot or ignored (take your pick) the fact that Brenda, who happens to be his best friend and god mother to his REAL daughter, was played by Skye, who let her think she was going to DIE. Is he forgetting what a viper he’s really dealing with and how far Skye will go to get what she wants? I think so. If Brenda were still on the show, I wonder what kind of conversations he’d be having with her or Lois for that matter. I think it’s awfully convenient that Lois would take their daughter to follow a band around Europe, just so Ned wouldn’t have to step up and be responsible daddy. Why is it so important for him to fight for a child that isn’t even his, and he can’t be bothered to insist upon visitation given to him by a court of law for a child whose memory and identity is already fully in place?  

Question 5: Where are all my strong females? Oh, Guza and Pratt like to pretend that they’re writing enlightened stories about females who take charge of their professional and personal lives but that isn’t true at all. There are strong women on General Hospital but they aren’t the ones you’d automatically think. The strong ones are Audrey Hardy, Monica Quartermaine, Dara Jensen, Lois Cerullo-Ashton, Laura Spencer, Leslie Webber, and Bobbie Spencer—Hmm? What’s that you say? All these women have either disappeared from the canvas without legitimate explanation or are wasting away in mental wards, the black hole of soaps that is Europe or the Outback restaurant? You don’t say. I wonder why that is? Could it be because the females that could be strong and should be strong, like Brenda, Alexis, Carly, Courtney, Elizabeth and Emily have traded their smarts to be taken in by the only men on General Hospital who are actually “important” Jason, Sonny, Ric and Alcazar.

            Courtney keeps chirping about all she’s been through, how she was on her own for so long because Mike and Janine couldn’t be bothered to stop arguing and drinking to pay attention to her.  I’ll admit that when she first came on the show she was gutsy but now she’s been reduced to what all women are reduced to when dealing with Sonny and Jason—you have your pick of the kitchen, the upstairs bedroom or the island in Puerto Rico because that’s the first thing women do when their men are in trouble in the real world—they retreat to the kitchen, bedroom or whatever tropical island their husbands happen to own. I’m not even going to talk about that pathetic scene with Courtney and Carly when they were “boxing” to get out their frustrations and Carly claimed she couldn’t hit the bag because she’s five minutes pregnant. Please.

            Elizabeth Webber oh my GOD! What happened to the girl who used to smoke and drink and had Lucky Spencer wrapped around her finger? You have to be a gutsy girl to hang out with the Spencer men. Has she just fallen off the proverbial turnip truck? How many times does she have to be poisoned, pushed, kidnapped and lied to before she figures out that all is not well in newlywed-ville? How many times does Ric have to dismiss her to the bedroom, kitchen or the damned PARK before she figures out that when she leaves the room something bad or sneaky happens? I can’t believe she hasn’t ever pretended to go the 20 feet it must be into the next room but instead stand just out of frame so that she can witness it when Ric opens a WALL in your frickin’ living room!

And please tell me why it is that Carly, who has a camera in her room and can always tell when someone is about to come in, doesn’t just get a running start and tackle them and run the hell out of there every time Ric or Alcazar comes traipsing through there? The writers have been using selective memory themselves—sometimes Carly’s tied to the bed other times she’s free to walk, rant, rave and run all around that little cell of hers. Oh people I just don’t get it. I’m not going to get into the fact that when Carly first came on General Hospital she played everyone on the show like a master but now she’s no longer smart enough and all her “plans” go up in smoke. She had the best plan of ALL when she first came on the show; she dismantled an entire family and could have destroyed an entire community. This is a girl who became a physical therapist (but no longer has any skills mind you) and went through nursing school just to prove a damned point! Do the writers REALLY expect us to believe that all of a sudden she’s REALLY interested in decorating that damned penthouse? What was cute for one scene has now become an over the top and over used excuse to get rid of Carly whenever she starts harping to Sonny.

Brenda only gets honorable mention in this column because she’s not on the show anymore but she should really be the poster girl for this column. She had her own business, she was a model for two of the most “powerful and high profile” cosmetics companies in the country but she could never get it together long enough to have her own house—the cottage doesn’t count because Jax had to buy it like three or four times for her—she was once the OWNER of a record label that only had two real artists to put out a CD but most of her time spent on the show was being passed between three significant men who, whenever they had her, had a choice of sleeping with her, sending her to the kitchen or flying her to a different country so they could “protect” her and fight her battles for her. Moving on now before my frustration gets the better of me.

Alexis. Oh my goodness, the one female with the most potential on the show. Remember when she first came on because Stefan NEEDED her? She was running her shit left and right—still the best attorney on daytime but when she went to bat to keep her child with Sonny Corinthos she had to be “punished” by losing custody of her because a storyline with a capable career woman raising a daughter on her own and having a successful law practice isn’t as interesting as watching Alexis degrade herself rather stupidly in a butler outfit every week. Why did Alexis ever fall for Sonny in the first place? Could it be because it’s a right of passage for every female on the show other than the two or three that are related to him by blood?

Emily I will go easiest on because she’s new to this ball game but she is already starting to get on my nerves. Please don’t write to me about being insensitive about breast cancer—my mother survived a lumpectomy and my best friend’s mother survived a lumpectomy, chemo therapy and losing her hair. I’ve seen this disease do its worst and I would like for Emily to have one scene where she doesn’t cry, and she feels strong enough to handle this for herself. If Zander could have figured out that all he’d have to do was kiss Gia and Emily would come to him and tell him the truth then we could have been spared this storyline several weeks ago. And why does Emily need another man to be a barrier between herself and Zander? She’s not strong enough to just say no and be done with it? She has to have another man “protect” her from the man she truly loves? Come on, people, can’t we see Emily fight her disease with the help of the people around her and really dig deep in this story, lose those locks for real or at least stop and take stock of her illness because it is SO much more important than her love life at this point.

Lastly I must say, please do not write me about the acting prowess of the ladies I mentioned. Everyone has to be aware of the fact that I adore Sarah Brown, Tamara Braun, Vanessa Marcil and Nancy Lee Grahn. All of their characters respectively inspire something in me to even write about them, so they must be doing something right and I think all of them deserve every accolade they’ve been given. Their characters, on the other hand, have often left a sour taste in my mouth but I’d say that’s more to do with the writers than anything else.

Okay, I really feel better—honestly I do. Thanks for putting up with me. I hope that this feeling will last—I know it will, at least until 2:00!