For better or for worse, 'Jersey Shore' is back

Last week, I watched all nine 40-minute episodes of "The Jersey Shore's" first season (all episodes are free on MTV's website). Season 2 starts up tonight, and Season 3 has already been ordered.

Yikes.

The MTV reality TV show set on the Jersey Shore debuted last winter and has become really well-known (well-liked, I can't say for certain).

If you haven't been watching, you've missed bar fights, bar hopping, insults, hair gel, (the standard) drama, and some questionable decisions.

The show is a lot like the 20-plus seasons of "The Real World": Eight strangers are thrown into a big house and they party, fight, hang out, and work (for about 5 minutes of the entire show).

Their lives are taped, but you quickly realize that they either forgot or don't care that their parents/boyfriends/first-grade teachers will likely end up seeing their ... adventures.

The cast are self-proclaimed guidos and guidettes. Guido is slang for macho, hair-gelled, working-class guys from New York or New Jersey and often Italian-American, according to Webster's Dictionary.

The show and MTV were criticized last winter for being derogatory toward Italian-Americans. So last month, MTV agreed to "tone down" Italian references and the word Guido in its second season.

FYI: Six of the eight Jersey Shore cast members are from New York, one's from Jersey and the other from Rhode Island. At least three aren't Italian.

But the cast, oh the cast.

There's Mike, who calls himself "the Situation" and is very certain that every girl likes him.

Nicole, or "Snooki," has my favorite nickname and every episode it seems as if her hair poof is trying to defy gravity.

Pauly D, a DJ with the Italian flag tattooed on his back, seems like a Mike-Lite.

And then there's Ronnie, Vinny, Angelina, Sammi and J-Woww.

In my search for finding some form of redemption for the six hours I spent watching Season 1, the best and most entertaining part of the show has to be the random, laugh-out-loud quotes that are spread throughout the show.

For example, in one episode, Snooki, who walks in on the group preparing to have lobster for dinner, proclaims, "That's why I don't eat lobster or anything like that 'cause they're alive when you kill it."

Why, I had no idea.

Another gem came from Mike "The Situation," who educated the masses on GTL (gym, tanning, laundry), the best way to make sure you're "staying fresh and mint," according to UrbanDictionary.com.

Ahh, the things "The Jersey Shore" teaches me about.

If you missed the first season, you aren't missing much.

There's not a lot I can say (in print) about "The Jersey Shore," so I'll leave it to a cast member. The show's first season opened with Ronnie saying, "Get ready to party. Get out there. Get filthy, creepy and weird."

That might be the best way to describe "The Jersey Shore" and what the next couple of seasons might offer.