So tonight it came down to Haley and Chris S as the bottom two. Phil was in the bottom three, but Ryan Secrest sent him right back up to sit down.

Given the choice between a pretty hot chick and a fat guy, I’m relieved to report that America made the correct choice and kept Haley “Legs” Scarnato around for another week. Perhaps next week she’ll just shuck wearing any kind of pants or skirt altogether. The question is whether or not Simon Cowell or Ryan Seacrest would care.

Actually, I’m a bit bummed- I thought Haley should have been voted off prior to Chris S. But I had them pretty closely ranked, and there’s far more-deserving-of-being-bumped, like Sanjaya, Chris R, and Phil.

I did get a kick out of how Randy and Paula punted when Ryan asked them who they thought was going home. Simon, of course, stepped right up and said he thought it was “goodbye Curly”, which of course meant Chris- and he was right. Like I said about Chris, he could only ride his sense of humor and smarts for so long. Thing was, he was better singing “Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic” tonight than he was last night- better beat, moved around.

Gwen Stefani performed. Man, she’s got real talent. She looks a bit too thin to me, though- I noticed it in last night’s show as well. Hopefully she’s just trying to be uber-buff and not dealing with a drug or weight management problem.

On to next week. One bright spot- since roughly 30 million people vote each time, you have to figure that those who were voting for Chris (in other words, who really thought he did a good job) will now move to someone else. Sooner or later, the group of people who’re screwing up the shows and blighting them with Sanjaya’s continued presence won’t have the numbers to keep up, and he’ll get booted.

I think we’ll see Haley and Phil and/or maybe Chris R, and then Sanjaya will finally meet his end to his run.

So here’s Papa Lima’s review of American Idol last night:

(I’m Papa Lima… at work, air traffic controllers end phone calls with their “operating initials” and they have to be distinct, and PC was taken when I reported to Seattle Center, so I’m PL, or Papa Lima in ICAO-talk.)

Tonight’s theme (do they have a theme every night? I’m not experienced enough with Idol to know) was Gwen Stefani, the lead singer of No Doubt who also has a big solo career. I like her a lot; she’s just one of those people that you can take your eyes off of when she is performing. She also seems like a girl who’s just having a really good time at what she is doing, which is very attractive in an international superstar.

Lakisha led off with a Donna Summer song. It was a great song choice for her, up-tempo but with enough big notes that she could still show off her tremendous voice. I wrote down my notes that she was kicking it in the boots and one of the first things that Randy mentioned was indeed her boots she did a good job, and I give her a 7.

Chris S was up next and he did a Police song, “Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic”. It should have been a good song for his voice but it was definitely not his best job- he gets a 5. He was just a bit off note and offbeat, also he seemed a bit too schmaltzy/Muzak to me. They showed his wife in the crowd and she is still hot. all three judges agreed that he was offbeat and off tempo.

Gina was third and she was all teary when she met Gwen. She had a great beginning, and then responded very well when the audience cheered as they were grooving with her. You could see her realize they were liking it and she cranked it up a notch. I thought she did an excellent job of just standing and delivering the song. It was her best performance in weeks and the judges liked it a lot too; she gets an 8 from me.

Sanjaya… well… he wasn’t TOTALLY horrible last night. But he was still pretty damn bad! I found myself wondering what happens to his voice- he actually does have a nice, if somewhat quiet, voice. When he’s singing, though, I think he’s so nervous that he gets all tight, and then he’s got to really fight to be in tune and on pitch, so he just shrinks down and winds up stinking the joint up. I have to say this, though- he’s one classy, tough kid to keep going out there and giving it a shot. Simon said it best- it doesn’t matter what the judges say, somehow Sanjaya keeps going through week to week. He gets a 1.

Haley was next, and unfortunately for her I spent most of her performance thinking about what a great set of legs she has and how she needs to pick stuff that shows off her (ex-gymnast) body. The problem with this is that it’s not a fashion show; while what they’re wearing and how they look is part of the performance, ultimately it’s a competition for SINGING. (As Simon, who I really like, keeps pointing out.)

So Haley is pretty hot, but her voice… forgettable. I think Simon hits it right on the head when he says that; she’s just not really standing out for her voice. This week, though, I liked her better than the judges did, and give her a 7 for her song and a 9 for her legs. Gwen told her to not put a lot of extra stuff into the song (the Cyndi Lauper song “True Colors”, a great choice for Haley) and Haley listened to her.

Phil came next, and doing “Every Breath You Take” should have been a great song choice for him. Actually, it was- right in his vocal range- but he just didn’t really nail it like he could/should have. Gwen gave him the same advice as she gave Haley- don’t screw around too much with the little runs and stuff, just sing the song. He was actually pretty good and I was thinking he’d get a higher score… until right before the end when he barfed up a note or three. He recovered, so he gets a 6.

The Queen of the competition, Melinda, was after Phil. It’s got to suck for the contestants to see their names either right before, or right after, Melinda- they have to know they’re going to look like Ugly Betty next to Cindy Crawford. Melinda kicked butt as usual; her voice is just so luscious. Hard to believe she’s a backup singer in her “real” life and not in the lead. The only criticism she got from any of the judges was Simon saying he hated the outfit. He was right, it was bad, but when you can sing like her as long as it’s not taking your attention away from the voice, who cares? She gets a 9, mostly only because the length of the show means that she didn’t sing long enough.

Blake was up and did a Cure song, “Love Song”. Actually a good choice for him, but the tempo was just a tad bit slow, or his phrasing was a tad off/slow or something. I thought he was a tiny bit pitchy but the judges all liked it, and Simon thought he is the front-runner for the guys. The guys all suck so much compared with the Big Three that it doesn’t really matter who the “best guy” is, in my opinion. I give him a 7.

Jordin gets a 6, but only because I didn’t like the song for her. Just not a good song. Of course, since it’s a No Doubt song, it was a hit with others. Also, I thought she was a tad weak/quiet in the lower notes of the song. Somehow, Jordin always looks older when she’s performing- the makeup artists do a great job with her- and she was sassy. I just thought this version, with this band, sounded kind of… like Muzak or something.

Chris R was last. I was pretty surprised when he was in the bottom two with Stephanie last week, but I realized last night what it is that really bugs me about him singing (and apparently the voters, too): He tries to do TOO much, too many runs, too many flourishes, too many whatever. And I’m starting to think he does it because he can’t consistently sing a longer note on pitch; he does the runs because he’s actually searching for the notes. Anyway, he was weak, and gets a 5.

So as things stand now, Sanjaya is (yet again) by far the weakest, suckiest on the show. Hopefully, sooner or later, people will quit the whole “vote for the worst” bit and they’ll boot him.

Here’s the order I’d kick people off, based on the overall competition (weighted towards the later shows of course):

Sanjaya- ’nuff said
Chris R- just doesn’t do anything for me
Phil- only ahead of Haley because she’s got awesome pins
Haley- love to date her, but I’m not inspired to pay to hear her sing
Chris S- fading, I think his sense of humor and personality have gotten him this far but now he’s got to SING
Blake- his stock has gone way up in my eyes but he’s just not good enough compared with…

The Big Three are Jordin, Lakisha, and Melinda. As it stands right now, Melinda is the best, and the other two are neck-and-neck. (I’d say that they’re all three neck-and-neck-and-neck, except for two things: One, Melinda is just better than them, and two, she has no apparent neck.)

If I had to vote, I’d rank them:
The Best: Melinda
#2: Jordin
#3: Lakisha

And this is only because I’d rather pay to see Jordin perform… but it’s really close. I just think that her voice is a tad more distinctive than Lakisha, who’s really great BUT… just a tad generic. Lakisha needs to come blow the doors off of a song in the next week or two.

It’s really something, though, that there’s a lot more discussion of who’s #2 than who’s #1. Melinda is just that much better than everyone else.

Discuss.

I am still trying to voice recognition software from time to time. I have had a few problems with it; every so often when I am entering a post, it will jump for some reason to Google’s home page or select a hyperlink on the page I’m using. It is also hard to remember to speak the word “comma” or the word “period” instead of just pausing at the appropriate places while speaking.

I can see how it would be very useful for someone who has to enter a lot of text. I type reasonably fast, though, and typing out a post actually gives me a little bit of time to think about just what it is that I want to say- and how I want to phrase it.

So… the jury is out on the whole speech recognition thing. For example, I started using it to do this post, and switched to typing- considering that it is supposed to get better and train itself to my voice as I use it, if it stinks too much at the beginning and I never use it… it’ll never get better. Hmmm… little catch-22 here.

I’ve upgraded to a new version of the plugin (that works with WordPress) that puts my running stats on this blog. A guy named Mark wrote it and it’s pretty dang cool- it takes the information from your Nike+ and iPod Nano kit and puts it right up here.

I had some trouble with it at first and posted a comment on Mark’s site asking for help. He took a little time to get into my web site and discovered the problem and fixed it. Super-nice guy, and creative. If you’ve got a Nike+ kit, and blog with WordPress, I strongly urge you to give his plugin a try.

Speaking of the Nike+ thing, I cut my foot today and am now behind in my running. It was so stupid- I was putting together a little medicine cabinet thing from Ikea this morning, and it had a little piece of metal bent at 90 degrees, so part of it was sticking up about 1.5 inches… I was barefoot and stepped over it but didn’t lift my foot up enough, and slash- a cut about 4 inches long, with about 1 inch of that deep enough to draw blood and break through the tougher layer of skin, right on the padding part of my foot below my third and fourth toes.

It didn’t even hurt that bad but was one of those cuts that is open for a few seconds, and you can kind of look down into it, and then the blood starts welling out and it bled pretty good. I hope it doesn’t get infected, stuck some neosporin in there. At least it’s not too sore and in a spot of my foot where it doesn’t hurt too bad when I walk.

I’ve been posting on another web site occasionally about FAA/NATCA stuff, but I’m not sure if I’m going to continue. The guy who started the site (I gave him some help) and one of the other authors are pretty ticked off about stuff in the FAA. Me, I’m angry, but I’m more saddened. So the tone of the site is a bit harsh for me- I’m not sure if I am going to keep writing for it.