The theme this week on Desperate Housewives was guilt and making connections and just about everyone on Wisteria Lane is neck deep in it, and as the wise Mary Alice tells us that guilt could destroy them. Is it wrong that sometimes I hear Mary Alice narrating my own life? Is that strange? Please tell me I’m not the only one. Oh, what are we going to do on Sunday nights without the ladies of Wisteria Lane and their delicious fresh baked Drama Pies?

Carlos (Ricardo Antonio Chavira) is letting the guilt affect his nether regions much to his wife’s chagrin. Lynette (Felicity Huffman) is dealing with it by being generally crabby and manipulative so not much new there. And Susan (Teri Hatcher), Lord grant me patience with Susan, is coping by rushing around town trying to get into as much trouble as she can so she will feel adequately punished for the crime she dare not speak of. At least she has her clothes on. Gabby (Eva Longoria) and Bree (Marcia Cross) seem to the be the only ones who aren’t letting the guilt get to them, but Bree is teetering on the edge of crazy now that the creepy note has appeared in her mailbox. More about the note later.

I know we are only on episode two but the end already seems too close for comfort which makes Susan’s recent batch of foolishness even harder to bear. Maybe I just need to accept that she is who she is and she may never rise above it, but I can’t help but want something great for her character before the show takes its final bow next spring. The only good thing about her ill-advised misdemeanor crime spree is that she found common ground with Carlos and their friendship evolved to a deeper level, one level above where they inevitably fall into the sack together. A Carlos/Susan pairing is not one I ever even contemplated in all these past seven years so I’m actually a bit excited about the possibilities.

Gabby meanwhile is focused on the lack of sex in her life and hires a stripper to teach her some moves. When that ends badly (come on you knew it would) she pays the girl to give her husband a lap dance in hopes it would reawaken the beast below. Instead it pisses Carlos off. Gabby is definitely consistent, I will give her that. Maybe she should drag out her dolls again.

As if poor Mike (James Denton) wasn’t already reduced to window dressing I’m sure this new friendship with Carlos won’t help any. Maybe the job opportunity that the hot Aussie neighbor Ben offered him will help. Does anyone else get a creepy vibe from Ben Faulkner? Sure he looks great in jeans and his accent could melt butter but something just isn’t right about that guy. We got a peek into his past during a convo with Renee (Vanessa Williams) but as Truvy Jones once said; “I think there’s a story there.”

Down at the Scavo’s place their marriage continues to disintegrate as they play good parent/bad parent. No new ground was covered here because Lynette and Tom (Doug Savant) have been at this for seven years. I have no doubt they’ll find their way back to each other before the sun sets on this little slice of suburbia but for now I’m ready to move on from their fighting. I’m also ready to move on from Renee’s criminally vapid plotline. Team Wisteria has been wasting Vanessa Williams since she arrived on the street. I had hoped they’d do more with her than simply fill Edie’s shoes as the neighborhood vamp. We get hints of a deeper story there but they never explore it. At this point is it even worth it? I love you ‘Nessa but you deserve better. Let’s hope they do right by you this season.

This week did see the return, ever so briefly, of Creepy Paul Young (Mark Moses) who is rotting in the Fairview jail for a myriad of crimes against good taste. Bree high tails it over there to confront him about the very Mary Alice-esque note she found in her mailbox and rightly assumed that Paul was the one who sent it. No one else alive knew about that note right besides the girls and Paul right? WRONG! Paul tells her that he told the police about it…more specifically a certain hunky detective that is presently assaulting Bree with his baton on a nightly basis. Bree was about to break up with Detective Chuck Vance until this little nugget of info was uncovered and now she’s holding on tight. What’s that saying about keeping your enemies closer? It remains to be seen if Chuck is behind the mysterious note. I lean towards him not being the one but you never know. He seems awfully obtuse for a detective. I think there’s a story there.

Desperate Housewives returns next Sunday at 9pm on ABC.