This is going to be funny!

This lady who lives about 35 minutes from me (I don't know her) is going to be on that show where they trade mom's. True cajun woman..fights with snakes and gators...Here is the article from our local newspaper, The Courier.

Locals to appear on 'Trading Spouses’ Monday night
By LAURA McKNIGHT
The Courier

A local family becomes one of the latest families featured on a Fox reality show Monday night, after the show’s casting crew decided it wanted see what happens when a snake-wrangling Cajun woman from Bayou Boeuf switches places with a vegan animal-rights activist from California.

The Fox reality series "Trading Spouses: Meet your New Mommy" lets two mothers trade families for a week, switching polar opposite moms to create "real" fish-out-of-water-style entertainment. The twist comes in the $50,000 check given each family -- the swapped spouses tell their new families how to spend the money.

"Right now they’re calling us their most famous family," said Dianalynn Tregle, the mom who got swapped.

The Loupe family of Bayou Boeuf, a community north of Thibodaux, will see its first glimpse of the show when it first airs at 7 p.m. Monday night.

"I’m apprehensive, excited, nervous, scared, happy all at the same time," said Tregle, who has kept her maiden name. "I saw the preview, and it was funny as could be."

Fox even got airbrushed Zam’s Swamp Tours T-shirts for the show’s cast and crew to wear to the in-house premiere of Monday’s show, she said.

Tregle, 45, is a snake-wrangler and co-owner of Zam’s Swamp Tours, and holds bachelor’s degrees in criminal justice and political science. Her husband, Lloyd "Diego" Loupe, 40, co-owns the tour company and works as a boat captain, a job he took to counter the dent in international tourism from 9-11.

The couple’s son, Zamariah "ZZ" Loupe, 8, is a third-grader at Bayou Boeuf Elementary School.

The California family includes Barbara Gates, an animal-rights activist, and husband Jim, a freelance deep-sea diver and their children Jack, 10, and Lucy, 8.

Tregle said the Bayou Boeuf family did not go looking for the reality show.

"They called us. They found us," Tregle said.

Fox was in the New Orleans French Quarter conducting a casting call for families to appear on the reality show.

"They kept hearing our name around the French Quarter," Tregle said. "We’re pretty famous around the French Quarter."

The family is well-known around New Orleans and in French-speaking countries as the owners of Zam’s Swamp Tours in Bayou Boeuf, which has been open for nearly 30 years as a family-run business. New Orleans locals often advise tourists to head to Zam’s for "the real thing," said Tregle.

Family members are no newcomers to the big or small screens, said Tregle, as they are known in the film industry for their alligator- and snake-wrangling skills. Tregle said the family has worked as animal wranglers on numerous films, commercials, documentaries and productions featuring Cajun themes or requiring alligators or snakes. Diego and ZZ Loupe wrangle alligators, while Tregle specializes in snakes.

In fact, Diego Loupe recently performed a one-line part in "Skeleton Key," asking Kate Hudson’s character, "Can I help you, cher?"

The trio has fulfilled offbeat requests, even escorting an alligator to the second-floor balcony of a local plantation home for a Neiman Marcus spring catalog shoot, and helping Uncle Kracker place a gold-toothed gator on the cover of his "No Stranger to Shame" CD.

However, until now, the family has mainly kept to the background working with animals, said Tregle, not entertaining in front of the cameras.

"We work behind the scenes with production," she said.

When the Fox crew called the family for an interview, Tregle said she thought it was for the usual Cajun-, alligator- or snake-related request.

"I just said, 'OK.’ You’ve got to understand how many TV shows we have done," Tregle said. "It didn’t matter because we do everything they ask us to do."

Tregle said a couple days later, a Fox worker told the family the crew had returned to California, but Fox would send people back to film the family and its home, because she "had a gut feeling that we were the people they were really looking for."

When the worker mentioned the interview was for Trading Spouses,’ Tregle said she thought, "Oh, no."

"I was never into reality shows. That was never my thing," she said. "I didn’t want to be on the screen at this part of my life…I’m an old lady now."

However, Tregle said she became more interested when the worker mentioned the $50,000 bucks given each participating family.

After a cameraman filmed the family and its home, Fox invited the family to Hollywood for an audition.

Tregle said the all-expense-paid trip included a stay in "the best hotel," limousine service and plenty of sight-seeing. Tregle said her son even stood barefoot on Hollywood Boulevard in his camouflage shorts, flanked by the stars of Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley and "looking like a frog out of water."

"We went all over Hollywood. We took advantage of being there," she said.

The trip an FBI profile and background check, and a battery of tests -- psychological, medical, drug and blood tests.

"You got to be squeaky clean," said Tregle.

Tregle said the family had "pretty good suspicions" they would be picked for the show, as Fox workers were "beside themselves" with the Louisiana family during auditions.

"They said, ëYou don’t understand how excited we are,’ " Tregle said.

While Barbara Gates experienced Cajun culture, Tregle spent a week of October in a small town near San Diego with a vegan family.

Tregle said her time in California was fun, but full of the mishaps one would expect from swapping a homegrown Cajun with a health-conscious Californian.

Tregle said her new family ate no meat or eggs, drank no milk, and would not kill mosquitoes. She said the California family eats organic food and uses "organic" make-up, toothpaste and dishwashing liquid, even stocking recycled toilet paper.

"And we have animals. And we wrestle them. And they didn’t like that," she said.

When she arrived, Tregle said she attended a party planned for her by Barbara Gates. Moments before handing out alligator heads to the guests as gifts, Tregle discovered the guests were all animal-rights activists. However, the awkward moment turned to tears and friendship when Tregle told them she appreciated their vegan lifestyles as healthy eating had saved her life.

"They loved me … and I loved them," she said. "I really enjoyed California. I was in a beautiful state. I met some beautiful people."

The South Louisiana native said she cooked the family gumbo with soy chicken and soy sausage, and brought the children to a pet store to handle snakes.

Back in Cajun country, Barbara contended with a family that not only handles animals, but eats them. Tregle said the California woman cried as she tasted alligator for the first time.

"I told my family to treat the lady like she was on vacation," Tregle said.

Tregle said her new family’s home was the only one spared from a wildfire, which she interpreted as a sign from God.

"There were a lot of signs from God during the whole thing," she said. "It was almost like I was supposed to be there."

Tregle said she believes the show was God’s way of saving her life.

In recent years, the Bayou Boeuf family lost seven loved ones in six months, then took beatings from a tornado, floods and hurricanes. Tregle said exhaustion from the series of events weakened her immune system, which resulted in her receiving blood poisoning from mosquito spray. Treatments for blood poisoning led to yeast in her blood, Tregle said, which made her sick, almost sick enough to lose her life.

"I asked God to let me live and show me how to detox," she said.

Tregle said God placed her in the vegan family in answer to prayers for more information on how to detoxify her body. Tregle said the experience helped her teach her family to eat healthier.

"I was on the right track, but I didn’t have no resources," she said. "I was glad to hear they were vegetarian. I learned a lot from them people… That is what it was about to me. To me, this was God’s way of saving my life and my family."

The story has a happy ending, said Tregle, with the California family planning a Mardi Gras trip to the Tregle family’s bed and breakfast.


This message was edited Nov 21, 2004 6:51 PM

Cool!

How cool is THAT?

Bet Ron Guidry wishes it was him. ;)
http://www.cajunman.com/

How very cool..I especially will enjoy watching this show tomorrow night..

Somebody bump this thread right before it comes on - I want to see it, too!

wowsa...doesnt this sound fun? you guys will have to post reviews of this show....seeing as how, I cant see it.
it sounds like it is going to be a hoot.

How cool is that.

I hope we can get it. We only have the big C band dish and some individually subscribed to channels. We do get both Discovery channels, TLC, and the Travel channel if it happens to be on any of those.

It's on Fox
http://www.fox.com/tradingspouses/home.htm

It's on at 8:00pm EST, so go from there. :)

Ohhhh, Lisa,Beb! I'm watching it now! I'm so lonely for you, Jesse and Sally now! They sound just like you guys. **sniffle** And I'd eat the oysters, alligator, shrimp and crayfish with y'all.
http://davesgarden.com/forums/fp.php?pid=420592

Jesse, if that woman had switched with Lisa, you'd have gone without Dr. Pepper for days!! :P

This message was edited Nov 22, 2004 8:38 PM

oh kimberly, we were all cracking up over here!

do I *really* talk like dat? ;0)

Coooh, you pushin' my leg? Dat coo-yôn vegan woman shoulda said "Poo-yee! Dem gator heads!"

dat po' po cajun woman had to eat nutin' but duh veggies. My Jesse says he would not pass a good time havin' to eat juss veggies...heck, he ate a bbq po'ke chop tonight with no veggie *AND* a Dr. Pepper. Me, on duh udder hand, I waz a good sha, I ate my veggies.

Darnt darnt darnt! What did you say Lisa? LOL

darnt darnt darnt yo-cef'...

I bet day made dat po cajun woman put 'tators in a gumbo...

LOL! Oh, man, my November just isn't the same not going to see you guys! I had absolutely *no* qualms about slapping mosquitoes, either. Miss you!

http://davesgarden.com/forums/fp.php?pid=43644

remember when howie?

If they can make pie out of tators than I think there is room for tators in a gumbo. I never did put them in mine just for the record. The recipe said that you could add them if you like. We love our tators up north here.

Lisa--So good to "hear" your musical voice again! I wish I would have seen this thread earlier. I'd be rootin' for the good cooking cajun Mom.

Quote of the episode...

Barbara, "You'll probably die when you're 40, you keep eating like that."

ZZ (8 years old): "When the good Lord want to take me, He take me."

ROTF!

Sounds like it was real fun....

It just goes to show you the kind of people you have down south. They were kind and generous. They just wanted to try and make the people comfortable. Execept for the 8 year old that is. I'm sure next week they will come to there boiling point but at least they did not start out that way.

I watched it on tape last night and they do sound a little like you lisa. Your cajun speak is not quite as thick except when your trying to be that way. LOL All though some of the slang words were the same. It did make me miss you guys. Oh and sweet Sally could never be as rotten as that boy. So other than the kind and generous part and living in the same area the likeness ends.

And how much of it is exaggerated by the editing? I think it depends which Mom has the sympathy of the camera crew. Lord knows I wouldn't want my words taken out of context or my life edited. They'd probably show all my worst sides--and I have LOTS of them!

I'm not a vegan, but I wouldn't want to be compared to Lisa as a Mom. She's young & delightful, home schools and can cook rings around me. Besides, I would do ANYTHING for one of Lisa's pralines. No comparison!

Did some one say PRAW-leans??? LOL Lisa herself dun tolt me that dey was called dat. Jo

no, no, no jo! not PRAW-leans....PRAH-leans...the "AH" part sounds like a short "o" as in ostrich. ;-)

And I thought you spelled it "incredible treat".

DANG...you'll just have to send me some so I can HEAR the correct sound!!

Lisa...they were SOOOO good. Love & Hugs

Jo

If you hold one up to your ear, you can hear the sea, err, calories...

Iv'e got to see that "Swapping Wivws" episode! Will it play again? I want to root for the cajun. my Dh is a hunter & We're MEAT eaters here.

Oh, that vegan woman brought some NASTY words from my mouth. She was awful...No amount of editing could have made her look good, either. Ugh...How condescending and snide could she be??

And I *love* the Cajun family (not biased or anything, y'all - honest).

Kimberly, I thought the same thing. She is coming down here again in the spring according to the news.
I couldn't believe how ungrateful she was. I bet the veggiegals husband had more conversation with the cajungal than he ever had in his whole married life with his real wife!

I about fell off the sofa when she was preaching of the evils of meat, then turned around and lit up a ciggy...

Oh I know I did too on the ciggy. And then to preach about eating animals and to cry over a video but then eat gator. "This is pretty good" LOL. What a piece of work. Her poor husband. I about died when he said "Your in charge honey" as if we did not already know that. She was so hot when he got 10,000 for his orchard and the kid asked for a hot tub. LOL Those poor kids. She just turned my stomach.

Dagnabbit...that show never came on here. I'm missed out! Last weeks was definitely not a Cajun and a Californy swap. This week it appears to be the husbands take a turn.

Maybe the Cajun one will come on at a later date. (Ya'll must have cable? Satelite?)

best quote of the night:

veggiemom to cajun kid:
"How can you eat a frog, but not eat a dog"

Cajun kid to veggiemom:
short pause: "A frog is a frog, but a dog is man's best friend"

LOL!

Shoe, we almost don't have cable and don't have satelite, we only pay 7.95 for our so called "cable" services.

Howie taped over the old one last night...We only have the second one. I was going to offer the video for SASE, LOL.

Vegan woman added credence to the statement, California is the home of fruits and nuts :)

She was in a bad mood all the time because she was hungry.....LOL!

edited to say....she was hungry before she left CA...she just didn't know it.

This message was edited Nov 30, 2004 5:55 PM

Howie says he sensed a divorce coming in the vegan household.