Celebrity Big Brother 2009 / Dan Fitch / 22 January 2009 / Leave a comment

The housemates indulge a little Americana as Tommy excels at baseball, Coolio goes round in circles and Terry and Ulrika fail to eat a pie in half-an-hour without using their hands... Dan Fitch has the latest from the Big Brother house.

It was the day of Barack Obama's inauguration and the American housemates were excited. Coolio confided to Terry that he would have liked to have performed at the ceremony. If it's any consolation, I imagine that it was a very tight decision between him and Aretha Franklin.

The housemates were given a task celebrating all things American. They had to pass three of the four tasks to win the luxury shopping budget.

Coolio and Verne undertook the American biker challenge. They were both dressed up like Hell's Angels, given little motorbikes and had to do 500 laps of a track laid out in the garden.

Before long Verne was struggling. He was just too small to retain complete control of the bike and his attitude soon changed from 'Yes we can', to 'No I can't'. Verne was allowed to retire from the challenge, while Coolio continued.

Scottish blokes wielding baseball bats are a regular sight in some of the seedier areas of Glasgow, so perhaps it was no surprise that Tommy excelled at the baseball challenge.

Every time Big Brother played a little burst of music, Tommy had to run into the garden with his baseball bat, where a machine would pitch three balls at him. To pass the task he just had to hit one of the three, each time.

If he managed to hit a home run, by knocking a ball over the garden wall, the housemates would win a special prize. Possibly imagining that each ball pitched at him had Ulrika's face on it, Tommy managed to smash two home runs and easily passed the task.

Ben and La Toya were given a rodeo task and had to collectively manage to stay on a bucking bronco for two minutes. At first it didn't seem as if La Toya would master the bronco, as she screamed hysterically, while it was still moving at the pace of a Stannah stair lift.

But when it came to the task, La Toya pulled through. She rode the bronco in a manner that I'm sure would have elicited a suggestive comment from Coolio, if it were not for the fact that he was still riding around the garden on his motorbike, while his fellow housemates watched the task. Ben proved even better on the bronco and the task was passed. The A1 pretty boy is now the rank outsider at [34.0].

Not so successful were Terry and Ulrika in the pie-eating contest. Dreamed up no doubt, to celebrate America's continued dedication to obesity, Ulrika and Terry had to eat a cherry pie each, in half an hour, without using their hands. You sensed that if the pie was meat and potato, then northerner Terry would have polished it off easily. Instead the pair failed the task. Terry is [5.4] to win.

Eventually Coolio finished off his 500 laps, giving the housemates the three passes they needed. For Tommy's home runs, they won a burger meal and some American beer.

American beer? The lengths they'll go to, to make sure that Verne doesn't get drunk again.

The housemates were treated to a broadcast of Obama's inauguration. They were convinced that Channel 4 would use one of the most significant moments in American history as a smokescreen, before Davina appeared and announced an eviction. Luckily Channel 4 hasn't got that far downhill just yet and the housemates were allowed uninterrupted coverage.

Coolio was very moved and let a few tears out during the inauguration. When it was over, he went to the bedroom on his own and had a real good sob. Showing his sensitive side will have done Coolio no harm at all and he has dropped to [17.0] in the betting.

Meanwhile, Verne and La Toya were annoyed at comments made by Terry and Tommy, which they deemed to be disrespectful towards America. Terry actually just made the point that Obama's speech didn't really outline what he planned to do, while Tommy criticism was in reference to the Bush administration.

Perhaps if those in America listened to some criticism from time to time, rather than lazily soaking up what they're told by Fox News, then they (and therefore the world) wouldn't be in such a mess at the moment. But anyway, this is meant to be Celebrity Big Brother, not Newsnight. Verne remains the [1.49] favourite.

The double eviction saw moaning La Toya go first and Tommy second, proving that Scottish people will always vote for their own on reality shows, even if they don't really like them.

Which leaves Ulrika at [17.0], trapped in the house with four blokes. Though this might have made her day a few years ago, it's now her worst nightmare.