Ugh.  Most confusing Gossip Girl ever.  I don’t even know if I’ll be able to recap this one.

So I suppose the biggest deal of the evening was Blair Waldorf and Vanessa Abrams duking it out over who’d get to deliver the freshman toast at the NYU parents dinner.  Vanessa was all set to deliver the speech, and seemingly no effort from Blair begging and pleading with Josh Ellis, Head of Freshman Affairs, could stop her.

Unfortunately, across town, Dan Humphrey was busy inviting new celebrity gf Olivia Burke to the parents dinner so she could meet his parentals, Rufus Humphrey and Lily van der Woodsen.  Olivia decided to call up Mr. Ellis and accept his invitation to give the freshman toast so she could impress the fam, unknowingly bumping Vanessa from the position.  Looks like Olivia will be delivering the toast!

Nate Archibald is busy working hard on cousin Tripp Vanderbilt’s congressional campaign.  He’s also keen to help Serena van der Woodsen with the whole Carter Basin situation, and tells her the Buckley’s have shipped Carter off to Texas to pay off his debts to the family at an oil rig. 

Nate thinks only way to pay off the debt is to play a high-stakes game of poker with P.J. Buckley (didn’t she spend time playing poker with her step-father in Monaco, after all?) - and Serena agrees, for some insane reason.

Blair finds out about Olivia’s new role as toastmaster and throws it in Vanessa’s face, then uses her primo powers of manipulation to convince Vanessa to trick roomie Olivia into backing out of the toast.  Vanessa tells Dan that Olivia is freaked out over meeting the ‘rents and convinces him to disinvite her to the parents dinner and make her chicken dinner instead.  As a result, Olivia gets all freaked out that Dan’s cooling on her, so Vanessa tells her that Lily and Rufus are really judgmental when it comes to “Hollywood types.”  OMG VANESSA IS SO BAD AT LYING!

But!  Back to Blair!  The girl still hasn’t secured her position as freshman toaster.  She concocts a little plan: she and bf Chuck Bass will resume their cheating man/scorned woman act in order to embarrass Mr. Ellis.  Chuck will flirt it up with the administrator and Blair will catch him in the act. Chuck is all for it, obviously, and does a bang up job - Ellis ends up planting a big ole smooch on the Bassface.

But no!  Embarrassing Mr. Ellis wasn’t Blair’s actual plan - she was, in truth, selling Chuck out!  Apparently, Blair had struck a deal with Mr. Ellis to check #27 off the TriBeca Scavenger Hunt List: Kiss Chuck Bass.  With that exchange, Blair got her speech.

In the meantime, Serena is all set to play poker and totally blows it, losing all of Nate’s money.  However, the guy’s got faith in her and raises the stakes with a photo of cousin Tripp with a bong - an image that could ruin his political career.  Serena, of course, loses again.  The money and Tripp’s campaign are lost.

But are they?  It turns out Nate actually wagered a doctored photo.  He wanted the image to be released so that it looked like the Buckleys were gross enough to sink as low as all that and victimize the poor Vanderbilts.  Serena, pissed that she’d been used, calls up P.J. and tells him to truth, and pays off Carter’s debt herself.  Unfortunately, when she tells Carter he’s in the clear, he isn’t happy.  He wants to do things his own way, now that he’s a good man.  Carter doesn’t need her charity, he wants her respect.  He leaves; Serena is left heartbroken.

At the parents dinner, Blair is all prepped to speak, but unfortunately, Vanessa isn’t done fighting yet.  She’s keen to deliver the speech herself, as her super self-righteous, condescending mother Gabriella will be there, and Vanessa wants to convince mom that NYU is the place for her (Gabriella Abram’s opinion on private education: “Knowledge should not be for sale”).  Vanessa confronts Blair, but not without a hidden microphone.  Blair confesses, unknowingly mic’d in front of everyone, that she had stolen the toast, that she had been willing to do anything to get it, including lying to Chuck, “the one person who trusts me more than anyone.”  BUMMER!  Chuck is noooot happy.

Meanwhile, Olivia is busy acting like a super stuck-up Hollywood type in front of Lily and Rufus, on account of she’s pissed that they’ve pre-judged her as exactly that.  Dan eventually figures out what’s going on and he and Olivia confront Vanessa - who’s been acting very un-Vanessa this episode, am I right?  Vanessa confesses all that has gone down and apologizes, telling them how important it was to prove herself to her mother with this speech. “I wish Rufus and Lily were my parents,” she tells them - and mama Gabriella overhears!

Lily gives Blair a mini-lecture about how important trust is in a relationship and the girl seems to take it to heart.  However, when Blair goes to ask Chuck’s forgiveness the next day, he won’t have any of it.  Chuck knows how little respect she has for the people she manipulates, and he won’t be one of them.

The episode ends with Blair sitting down at a cafe with Vanessa, who’s just been stood up by her mother for breakfast.  The two bitches left in the dust!

What did you think of Vanessa’s new manipulative streak?  Is she falling into a life of private school games?  Does anyone care?  How does the real NYU feel about all this publicity?

And seriously, could I get a litte more Gossip Girl narrative up in this mix?  xoxo!

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