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Worth the Wait podcast and Just Like That recap, but I want to preface this by saying, well, we're definitely going to recap the episode of And Just Like That. This episode calls back one of the most influential Sex and the City episodes, titled A Woman's Right to Shoes. It does, right? It's true.
Episode where Carrie goes to the party and is asked to take her shoes off and when she goes to get her shoes on before she leaves she finds out that the shoes are gone and so she has to go. The the, the friend, the woman who owns the, owns the place and who was having the party and said, oh, you know, hey, my shoes were stolen and my shoes are gone and, you know, she needs them replaced. And so she says OK, and the woman goes to get her checkbook. She's how much? How much are they?
Well, doesn't she say like I'll give you 250? I'll. Give you $200 and she said, you know, we're not responsible for your exorbitant lifestyle. Yeah. OK, which is true? Which is true, but not of the people that you invite to your wedding or your baby showers or your Bachelorette parties or all this stuff. But in any case, which is the point? That's the point of the episode. Exactly. And that's why it was so influential. So we will talk about that.
But before we do, let's just recap the episode because in the event that people thought that the great writing would continue, it did not. It did not. It did not. I was disappointed. They have Carrie. No. I thought she owned this place, this building, that's where she lives, but apparently there's a basement apartment that looks like it hasn't been updated since the 70s. Right that that was. That seemed odd to me as well.
Right. That she didn't seem to know that there was somebody going to be living below her, but then does sort of tracks because Carrie and Details don't have a really strong relationship. Right. I guess I just, I don't know. You would have, yeah. You would have thought like the realtor would have said something and that and that Carrie would have remembered. And that the realtor is one of her friends. So you really think the realtor would have said something?
Oh, did Zima sell her the place? I didn't remember. Yes. So he's a famous author from London. So of course we have a London, we have a Samantha tie in and the author moves in underneath Carrie and Carrie walks back and forth and back and forth and back and forth on her hardwood floors with no rugs in her high heel shoes. And you know. That's. That's something that clocked in the very first episode of this season because that's when the
season opens, right? And I first of all, was like, who the fuck is wearing shoes in their house? Much less who's wearing heels in their house. Right right now, I think that's part of the call back of she goes to this person's party and she's horrified that she's asked to take her shoes off. I feel like he, his approach wasn't great, you know, showing up and being angry about it. But her response where she was basically like, Nah, I'm not going to, I'm not going to take my shoes off.
Girl, listen, you, you've lived here a long time. You know what it's like. And it's just, it's rude.
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It's just rude. Right. It also it it asks absolutely nothing of her. Right, right. You know, and typical Carrie, who is just so in her own world, is thinking, well, if it doesn't bother me, then who cares? You know, I what I found so fascinating and illogical and also like infuriating about, about this storyline. She she's never able to explain why she is so resistant to the idea of removing her shoes in her apartment. But don't you think it has to come down to character syndrome? Yes.
Like she's she's walking around all the time as though she's being perceived, when in fact, hopefully in your own apartment, especially that palatial empty apartment she now has. No one's looking at you. You know, one, no one's looking you. But also she doesn't even have rugs down. And it just occurred she bought this whole building. So I could see her sort of feeling like I literally own the place. I could do what I want, you know?
And again, it's strange to me that Carrie didn't know that she was going to have a downstairs neighbor. So he kind of sucks, and she kind of sucks. And she goes down to him and she brings him this basket, this welcome basket. And he gives her his oh, I bought you something too. And he bought her these old sort of. And she calls them nursing home slippers. And she's just so resistant. Which they're not. They're not. They were cute. Right you I'm swearing those.
Are like what you bought me for Christmas, right? Right. I love them. I love them. So Carrie's standing there in this apartment and what does this guy do? He starts smoking a. Pipe, yeah. Sir, we don't do that here anymore. We don't smoke in our apartments. And that's when I went. So he wants to be able to smoke a pipe in his apartment, but he wants, but he wants her to take her shoes off. You both suck. Well, I mean, not only that, but like I said, who the fuck is
wearing shoes in their house? Who the fuck goes to New York for quiet? Right. Sir, you have the rest of the world. Right, right. And also like, yeah, like the whole, like both of them are so illogical and require such a such a suspension of disbelief in this episode that it frustrates me. Very much so, very much so. I didn't care about either of them. Hopefully they fell madly madly in love because they're so they're exactly the same. 2 incredibly selfish people.
We'll see. It's interesting that you say that, because I liked Duncan for Seema, actually. I could see that. She's, you know, she's strong enough to put him in his place. He's not around all the time, which I think is perfect. For her. Right for her, Yeah. And yeah, he's, he's an adult man. Right. So they end up having, I guess she's out with the with the garden and he's very upset that she's doing something with the garden. She owns the building.
Right, well, he's only upset about it because it's making noise during the day, which is when he sleeps. Which again, like Sir. Whose fault is that? Right, right, right. That's the thing too, when people have these work schedules and listen, it's not my fault that you work a night shift. However, I'll do what I can to accommodate. It's just easier. It's just easier. And if this is like, listen, especially if somebody's, you know, they're a doctor or whatever, OK, I'll do what I can.
You know, that's got to be a brutal schedule. I will. I'll do what I can. I don't care who they are. I don't care what they do for work. I'll try to help because it's just easier. And reason you're not going to stop living. No, I'm not going to stop living, but. But you would take your shoes off. Right, so Carrie is out in the garden talking to the hot hot hot Tom Hardy looking gardener, but I really wish they would start giving him more of a
storyline. Except there's nothing for him to do because he's not age appropriate for any of our main characters. But here's the thing though, he's like late 40s, early 50s in real life. I would say late 40s. OK. So but. Aren't aren't our main characters like late 50s? I think they're early to mid 50s. OK. Duncan gets very upset at them because they're making noise and existing and all of a sudden Carrie, hers hears the the the smoke alarm going off in his apartment.
So she runs into Duncan's apartment because the smoke alarm is going off and going off going off, and she has to wake him up and he has to take whatever the kettle off the stove and the cloth that he uses to get the kettle catches fire and he drops on the ground. And of course, Carrie stomps it out with her heels on. Which she wouldn't do. Right, right. Because immediately prior to
that she's absolutely useless. Like instead of turning the stove off, she yells at him to do it when she is also standing right there. So she stomps out the the mini fire on the on the cloth and she goes, boy, you're really noisy. And all of a sudden the tension disperses. It's broken. And I was like, perfect, fall in love, go somewhere, I don't care, right? You're both terrible. So that's the end of that.
Now let's talk about the fact that it took us 30 years to find out that Carrie and Miranda used to live together. This is so dumb and again, required such a suspension of disbelief. I'm overall pretty disheartened with what the writers are doing with Miranda's character. You're undoing everything we've ever known about Miranda, right? Like, she's a totally different person, right? And I guess maybe getting sober and getting divorced would do that to you? Maybe?
I don't know. It just feels like they're changing who she is fundamentally. Yes, exactly. And here's what I mean. Ain't no way Miranda is taking your last banana and not calling DoorDash like at the same time. It's not that she wouldn't take your last whatever in the fridge, right? But she sure as hell is replacing it. Listen, Miranda is that roommate that puts her name on all of their food. Well, that too.
Right. That's who Miranda is, and that's OK. The idea that Miranda was going to move in with Carrie and suddenly become this incredibly thoughtless person. And not just thoughtless, but but almost. But right, bumbling, right? Just like, and they're trying to make it physical comedy for some reason, right? So there's the scene. Of course, Carrie gets up. I don't have to go to the bathroom. Maybe it's a middle of the
night. Miranda is walking out the hallway to the bathroom, I guess one of the many bathrooms Carrie has, and she's completely naked now. Number one, I love the idea of a woman over 40, a real body showing it. I'm all for it. And yay for Cynthia Nixon for doing it. So I liked that aspect of that scene. What I didn't like was you live with someone. It is just common courtesy. If you were a fucking man, what would we be saying? Yeah, right, that he's creep. That he's a creep. Yeah.
And that sort of what's it? That's a bit it's a a hypocrisy of listen, if this were a dude, we would be telling Carrie, get him out of that house. Well, not only that, but we've, you know, we've spent so much time with Miranda and we've seen her in various stages of undress, right? And we have no reason to believe that Miranda is a naked sleeper. We've never seen it. She's always been in pajamas, whether it's AT shirt, whatever it is.
Even when she was like had a man over, she was always in like like a like a nightie, a nice slip nightie. Always, always. When did this happen? When did the movie happen? But I will also say Carrie sees her naked, has this just gasp. And I will ask again, how did this woman, how was she a sex columnist? It it reminded me of walking in on Samantha giving the UPS guy a blowjob. Yes, yes, she carries such a prude. I But here's the thing. I don't know how I would react to that.
I would probably immediately turn away just because that's how I was raised. But I don't know if I'd be like, yeah. Right. Make the person run into the wall in your in your urgency to avert your eyes. To the boobs that you have, like
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have what she has, what is, what is, what's happening here? Ridiculous. It was. It was stupid. Finally, the other thing that pissed me off. Miranda sits at the table that Carrie bought because Aiden bought her that stupid, hideous looking table. And what does Miranda do? Spread all her work out on it and her laptop on this table, covering underneath? Nothing. No concern for scratching it. Nothing.
Well, that actually didn't bother me, because you know your work papers aren't going to scratch the table, right? Your laptop might. Probably not. Probably not. And and even when she spilled the coke, I was like, well, all right, like yeah, that's irritating. But like if your if your table can't withstand a coke like. OK, but how about when they're trying to wipe it up with the papers and the scarf? Right. Are you new to New York City? Are you new to everything? Are you new to life?
Go in and get a cloth we. Could say the same of Carrie though. Why don't you have kitchen towels? Paper towels. Anything right? Has this never happened to you before? Right, right. What is a strange and mystical world like that caveman lawyer she really is? It's if the two of them have woken up from a 30 year sleep. Yeah, so Miranda moves out. Goodbye now. Why did it take so long? This is another thing about this episode that pissed me off.
Why did it take so long to get Seema involved in the real estate situation for Miranda? Carrie's excuse here is is very flimsy. Basically says like oh I don't, I don't want to. I don't want to mix business with friendship. First of all, I thought Seema was everybody's friend. Is she not? Really doesn't seem that way. It really seems she's just Carrie's friend. That's fucking weird too. Right, right. Yeah, I understand. More so why Lisa Todd Wexler is only Charlotte's friend because
they're mom friends, right? That makes more sense to me. It doesn't make any sense at all why Seema has not been more integrated into the group dynamic. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know about that. It's almost as if they're afraid to integrate her because they might get rid of her, right? Which I hope that it. Also Carrie saying like, oh, I don't, I don't want to mix friendship with business. Like you're, you're talking to Miranda, Like Miranda's not going to fuck around with
business. Right money. No, she's not. Going to do anything embarrassing, right? Yeah, it's a flimsy excuse, and I also think that Seema is way out of Miranda's tax bracket. Well, at this point, and that's, that's fucking weird too. Oh, sorry. Like you got no money saved. Miranda, what happened to your money? I'm sure she does. I'm sure she does. Why aren't we using it then to get a place? I don't know. Don't know. That's never made sense. Why are you Airbnb ING it?
Why don't you have an apartment? In the restaurant, when the I think Carrie initiates it, she's talking, yeah, she's talking about the downstairs neighbor being a problem, right? Miranda says. Oh, in my Airbnb, the guy across or the person across from me is always blasting heavy metal. And Carrie says, what's that got to do with me? Right. Wasn't that great? Amazing writing that was like the only moment of incredible writing and. What's that got to do with me now? Charlotte?
Charlotte finally gets a storyline and. Through Harry. Through. Harry and we we both kind of commented how last week when he was having trouble in bed, we were like, OK, you know, that's he peed himself the week before all right, so we're seeing it's age. No, it's not age. It's prostate cancer, and it's very early. And there's the the he. Said it was like a 90. 8% survival rate. And of course, Charlotte's beside herself. But what does he do? He says. I don't want anybody to know,
not even our kids. Now, this happened to me when my mother was sick and she was diagnosed stage 4. The doctor told my father that my mother was stage 4, that she was dying. My mother never knew. Right. Isn't that crazy? Insane. Yeah, insane. But not only did my mother not know, we didn't know. Yeah. We didn't know until probably the end I guess. Until it was, yeah. Until it was obvious. And I can't tell you how resentful I am. Not resentful. I understand why my father did it.
But I've said this before. My mother hated having her picture taken. I don't have any pictures of my mother. I have the oil painting. That is it. And that bothers me. So give your kids the opportunity to just do, you know what I mean? Tell them. Tell them so that they can, I don't know, spend more time with you have more. Conversation. They could behave differently, right? I mean, just there's no question that Lily would be less of a twat in this episode if she knew.
Right. And it's such an unfair burden to put on Charlotte, you know? And I really thought they would have Charlotte tell people, and I was really impressed that they didn't do that. Because it really shows you how much Charlotte loves Harry, right? Like this is what he asked me to do. And I kept, I would have been first of all, if they said you can't tell anybody, I'd be like, sorry, that's not going to
happen. It's just, it's not going to happen like because it is when you are when you're in a situation like that and it's it your partner's sick. It is a very, I don't know how to describe this. You're both going through something, right? There's a reason why they have groups for parents of kids who are addicts or spouses of people who are addicts, because those people need that support, especially if they need to be
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there for their partner. Burdening somebody with something like this is not just selfish, it's counterintuitive because. But this is like the only thing in the episode that didn't require suspension of disbelief, because this is what men do. Right. They don't, they don't want anybody to know, right? I mean, I think in a lot of cases they don't even tell their wives. And I think it, it comes from a place of like, oh, I don't, I don't want my wife to worry.
I don't want things to be different. I don't want her to act any different, you know? But like, it's, yeah, really not really not fair and very counterintuitive. I'm sure they're eventually going to tell their kids and to tell people, but I just, I felt really bad for Charlotte because you could see how worried she was. Of course, even. Though I believe Harry, I believe that it's 98% survival and blah blah blah blah, she's still terrified.
I did appreciate in this episode, though, that they they made Lisa Todd Wexley the almost confidant because I feel like if Charlotte had been, like, out at, you know, the restaurant with the girls, the usual crew, right? I feel like Carrie would begin browbeating her like, oh, come on, tell us. Oh, you're really not going to tell us how long we've been friends, right? I don't know what Miranda would do at this point because she's a
totally different person. And I feel like Charlotte having this conversation with another woman who's married makes a lot of sense because Lisa doesn't push the issue. Yeah. She just uses the door. I love Lisa, I love her husband. I wish they would give her more to do. They're trying. Right. They're trying. And I think they do a lot with the little. I think they do a lot with the little that they give her. Yeah. She's got a male editor.
I don't know. I don't know where that's going to go, but please, I I love the guy. I love Marion. I don't. Know who say I? I hope he sticks around because I enjoy his character as well. I think they don't give him any lines, but they all count. Right. And the lines he had he was great with. It's a man's name, too. Right, right. I did. I liked him. I like to see them. I mean, obviously I don't want her cheating on her husband, but you know, OK.
But you know what it did remind me of again, this is funny because now we can sort of move into the So we have the introduction of this character Marian in this episode where Carrie's having the struggle with her shoes, right? A woman's right to shoes. But when you go back, I went back and I watched a woman's right to shoes. And what episode is that? The episode where they introduced Doctor Robert Leeds Blair Underwood. And so I was like, oh, that's, that's interesting.
Like that's the. Opportunity too. Right, right. Sounds so good for Brad. My God, he was so good. He's so Blair Underwood, I think is an underrated actor. Oh really? I just, I love everything he does. Like we we value him but. Not as much as we should. I'd like to see him in more stuff, but I loved him in this role for Doctor Robert Leeds. I loved him. But this episode, what I loved about it is, you know, Carrie goes to the party, the shoes get stolen.
The woman is all offended that she has to replace Carrie's $500 shoes. And she's Carrie's. She's shoe shamed to me, right? Like she shamed this choice that I made, that I made. And of course, Samantha's like, fuck her, right? You know, we're supposed to be putting up with people's kids, which I totally agree with. I can't tell you when I'm walking the dogs and there'll be someone behind me and their kid is screaming. I'm just like, you know, you can't say anything.
But at the same time, like, listen, we all have to coexist here. Maybe try to do something about that. I get that you want to do your gentle parenting thing, but this is that we're outside. Well, I think that's the excuse for it usually, right? Yeah. You're outside like New York. You're going. To make noise. I mean, that same argument. So Carrie's talking to Charlotte and she's saying, you know, I did the math on this.
Between Kara's wedding present, shower, present, baby shower, this that, I have spent almost $2500 on her at the destination wedding. Really. You're going to have a destination wedding and you expect people to spend what, 1015 hundred?
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Stupid wedding, right? And then if they can't go, are you going to get offended? You know, why should we be expected to pay for your exorbitant lifestyle? I don't know if this is a hot take or if this is just a 2025 take, but a strong belief about destination weddings in 2025 is that the unspoken expectation is, yeah, don't come. That's why it's a destination wedding. They want it to be like 10 people.
Oh, maybe, maybe, I don't know. But the point Carrie was making was we spent all this money for all of these sort of milestone events, right? But what does single? What did single people have? Nothing. Birthdays, I think, Charlotte points out. Right. She's like, no, no, what does she say? Like because that everybody gets that or something. Yeah, I think she says. Everybody has one of those. So she what does she do?
She calls Kira and she's like, hey Kira, I just want you to know I'm getting married to myself and this is where I'm registered. And Kira was like, OK, let me go buy those shoes, girl. What? I just don't understand. First of all, if someone called me and said I'm getting married to myself and this is my registry, I would say go fuck yourself. I'm not buying anything from your registry. Maybe that makes me a bad person, but I'm not doing this because you want to go marry yourself.
That's cool. I am I wrong? Am I the drama? Well, if every other preceding event had happened, then yes, you'd be wrong. But my take on that was the reason Kira Acme s s is because she gets the point Carrie is making. She's like, oh, OK, you're right. Yeah, you have spent lots of money on me, right? Celebrating my milestones. Point taken. I'll replace your shoes. Do. We really think. That's probably the end of the friendship regardless. Right, right.
Whether you replace the shoes or not like that's this is probably the end of that friendship. So I guess you might as well not replace the shoes. I, I just, I just, I just from the way she acted, where she was so very much like, you know, your choices aren't as, aren't as important as mine. I don't see her changing her mind that quickly. Well, Irli think you're you're probably right, which is why I said like, well, you know, it's probably the end of the
friendship regardless. But truly these people probably wouldn't have still been in touch, right? Like by the time Kira's kids walking around like past the toddler stage, like you've lost touch with your single friends. Yes, yes, have right, right. So she buys the shoes and you know she gets the card. We hope you and you are very happy. I don't know. I don't know. I just didn't buy that. I didn't think that Kira would would acquiesce that.
Quickly, but neither would Big. Big never would have married Kara either. But we, you know, we wanted our happy endings, Kristen, and we got them on occasion with the original series. Yes, but it did raise that point of wait a minute, why aren't our single women's graduating Business School getting a promotion? Why aren't those things celebrated? And it's, it was, it's a reflection of how our society views marriage and how it's really put on women that marriage is above all else. Yeah.
Right. So I thought that that episode really started a conversation I feel like. It did. And I feel like the conversation now has evolved into, have you seen this, this genre of TikTok video that's like my parents reaction to me graduating with my MBA? And it's like a photo of a person with like a totally neutral face. And then the video goes, my parents reaction to my brother making his bed. And they're like ecstatic. Have you seen those? Oh God, I but what? What do you? How do you?
What's the I feel? Like, the connection is, you know, we keep talking about the male failure epidemic, right? When men are lagging behind. And all is related to how, like, we don't celebrate women's achievements because we believe it's their obligation to achieve in the first place. Well, you don't think we have that expectation of men? I mean, I do. Right. Yeah, I do, right. Society at large maybe also does, but men don't seem to be holding themselves to the same
standard. True. Well, I mean, there's got to be a reason they are failing and flailing. OK, so this is a a recap for Just Like That. We do it every week. Make sure to subscribe to our Patreon at patreon.com/worth the Wait show so you can get all the bonus content and the bonus, the essays and the posts and the advice letters that people write in. And if you have a question, send them to hello@dataologycoach.com or submit them through my
website, dataologycoach.com. Make sure to follow us on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube at Worth the Wait Show. All right, fog witches, warlocks days value your time. Decenter men, center yourself. Goodbye.