The girls are lined up on the staircase, and I can’t help but notice Amanda’s hair. EW!

For both the boys and girls, the one who went last last week is going first this week. Hmm! Seacrest chats with the judges a bit, then it’s time to tackle the 70s again.

Carly Smithson: She works at an Irish bar around the corner from her tattoo shop. What a shocking dirty secret! What about the secret that she was once given a million-dollar recording contract? I guess that’s not for us to know. Anyhoo, she Hearts it up with “Crazy on You”, and it’s true what the judges say about song selection. She’s picked better this week than last, that’s for sure. And hey, they use the same wireless Sennheiser microphones that we have at work. Randy calls it “a’ight”, Paula loves it, and Simon calls it “better than last week”, but doesn’t think she’s chosen the right song yet. When she does, he says, she’ll be the girl to beat.

Syesha Mercado: Seacrest teased her before the break, saying that she’s putting a new spin on a Billy Paul classic. My fingers leapt for the fast-foward, because I can’t wait — it’s sure to be “Me and Mrs. Jones”. She tells us in her package that her big secret is that she’s done commercials back in Miami. She makes a baby crying noise that’s spooky weird. And OH YES, it’s “Me and MISTER Jones”. It starts too slow and soft for me, but her title lines are awesome. There are a few flat notes, but overall it’s an all right performance. Randy doesn’t think it was a great song choice … but I think she could totally have belted this song. Simon gives her grief for doing a man’s song, which he finds “silly”. Snaps!

Brooke White: Supersecret: beauty school! She likes doing hair because it’s art. But she didn’t finish school, and does the classic “beauty school drop-out” joke. For her performance, she does “You’re So Vain” and starts out accompanied by nothing but her guitar. They show a 3/4 profile shot, and she actually looks a little like Carly Simon. It’s a song with great range, but she gets a little off on the lowest notes. During her applause, we can hear Simon comment on how Brooke was looking at him while singing. Randy likes the song choice, but she didn’t do anything original with it. Paula digs on it, and Simon absolutely loved it. I like this girl, and it pleases me to see that she’s probably moving on again this week. When the finalists are named, she’ll most likely be one of my choices to win it all.

Ramiele Malubay: Aw, it’s time for the littlest Idol! Her secret is that she used to Polynesian-dance. Just like Robbie and the drag racing, this isn’t too surprising a secret. Her song is “Don’t Leave Me This Way”, which always makes me think of the elephant love song medley in Moulin Rouge. It’s all right, but I don’t know if this girl should have chosen disco. And it’s a little boring. Randy harps on her wrong song choice, Paula makes occasional sense and agrees, and Simon agrees with Paula … but then he labels her as one of the top three singers in the competition. she originally picked a couple of ballads, she says, but then people started to call her “lullaby” instead of “Malubay”. Whoa, DIS!

Kristy Lee Cook: She lives on a farm … and thinks we’d be surprised that she’s a tomboy. She sings “You’re No Good”, and it’s … not good. She looks fantastic, long and lean. But her singing isn’t that great — off notes both high and low, and it feels like she’s putting on an act, trying to appear rougher and tougher than she is. Oh, and the very last “good” she sings is awful. Randy says it’s an improvement over last week, and I guess he’s right. Paula and Simon agree, but Simon goes on to say that he doesn’t know what kind of singer she really is, and that perhaps she should go down the country path. Yeah, I can see that.

Amanda Overmyer: She wears a bandanna in her interview, and it’s 100% more convincing than Robbie. Her secret is that she’s a big reader. I can’t wait to see if Simon takes issue with that the same way he did with crossword David yesterday. She sings “Carry on My Wayward Son”, and as it starts, Scott says, “Feels like I’m playing Guitar Hero.” Heh. Amanda’s hair is godawful terrible, and sadly, her performance isn’t much better. She’s hitting notes both sharp and flat all over the place, and she looks uncomfortable as hell, like she’d rather be anywhere but on that stage. Has she given up hope, after being in the so-called bottom two last week? Randy complains that it isn’t a singer’s song, and that it was pitchy. Paula compliments the dance moves. Simon says that she seemed cool in her package, but that the song and her hair were terrible. The black hair sparkles in a telltale way — she’s either wearing synthetic extensions or a synthetic fall wig behind the blonde front. Ugh.

Alaina Whitaker: This is one of the two honey-blonde girls with big scary teeth and a big blockish face. so I’ll call her Blondezilla I. Her secret is that she doesn’t like her foods to mix — can she say OCD? She sings “Hopelessly Devoted to You” from the movie version of Grease, and it’s just as mediocre as every other rendition of that song. She stands with her feet planted really wide apart, which looks awkward. She tries for the really high note, and mangles it. Randy likes the song, but not for her. Paula asks if she loves the song, and of course the kid loves it. Otherwise she would have realized what a mistake it would be to sing it. Simon says he likes the girl, but it feels like grandma put the performance together.

Alexandrea Lushington: As Seacrest introduces her film, I realize what a massive watch he’s wearing. Compensating for something? Her big secret is that she was a poster child … for the fire department. We see a clip of her as a child, oversinging the national anthem. She goes for Chicago’s “If You Leave Me Now”, which is a surprising choice. She’s wearing a hoodie/puffyvest, men’s cargo shorts, and high-heeled ankle boots. I have to look away to judge her singing, her outfit is so absurd. The song is very meh — the high notes aren’t as pretty as Peter Cetera’s. Randy (whose watch is bigger than Seacrest’s) accuses her of making a safe, boring choice. Paula liked her. Simon thinks she’s struggling in the competition. She has a glare/sneer on her face as she listens to Simon, and nothing in this performance makes me like her any better as a person. Seacrest pronounces her name as “Alex and Dray-uh”, which I guess is correct, since he doesn’t get corrected.

Kady Malloy: It’s Blondezilla II! At least her hair is straight, and BZ I is curly tonight — it’s easier to tell them apart this week. Her big secret is that she also sings opera. Her song is “Magic Man”, and it starts out with some of the most off-key notes of the entire night. It’s just terrible, this performance, plus she changes the line “he’s a magic man” to “I’m a magic man”. In what universe does that make sense? At least half of the notes are off, she does it too slow, and it’s overall awful. Randy says she never settled on a pitch. Paula says that the notes where she “powered” were good, but the lower stuff wasn’t good. Simon accuses her of imitating Christina (I’m guessing he means Aguilera) and lets us all know that he’s never heard the song before.

Asia’h Epperson: She was a cheerleader in middle school and high school. Yeah, not that shocking a secret, but it’s cute. She closes the night with “All By Myself” and some icky hair extensions. Like so many of the girls, she has trouble with the low notes. I expect her to kick the ass of the belting stuff, though. OH, but she doesn’t — she catches her voice on the word “by” the first time, and the rest is just uneven. Randy lets us know that Asia’h is currently suffering from the Idol illness, but gives her kudos for the level of difficulty. Paula things she brought it home in the ending. Simon doesn’t think she pulled it off, because she’s not good enough for the song.

Recap time! Carly was great. Syesha was a little boring. Brooke was great. Ramiele was all right, but could have done so much better. Kristy reeked of fake. Amanda stunk up the joint. Alaina was the word “wuss” personified. Alexandrea was meh. Kady was flat in her recap. Asia’h did all right.

I hate to say it, but I have a sneaking feeling that Amanda is on her way out. If she was truly in the bottom two last week, then this performance isn’t going to get her many more votes. I’ll combine her this week with Kady, who chose the wrong song and performed it terribly. I hope she goes, because there isn’t room in the finals for two Blondezillas.

An interesting note — I didn’t have to Google any of the song titles for the girls. Whereas I had to look up maybe half of the boys’ choices.

I ignored most of Seacrest’s preamble, instead spending that precious time getting a snack and booting up the laptop. It’s 70s music this week (Does this mean we’ll get the 80s next week?), so off we go!

Michael Johns: In his pre-sing interview, he tells us he’s a jock, that he likes to play tennis. I don’t know about you guys, but I don’t really think of tennis players as “jocks” per se. As for his song, it’s not very jocky either — a little Fleetwood Mac. He does “Go Your Own Way”, and it’s surprisingly mediocre. It’s just limp and boring, and there’s nothing catchy in it. Randy and Paula liked it, and praised his consistency, but Simon agrees with me that it’s his weakest performance yet.

Jason Castro: Once again, this boy would be beautiful without the dreads. He plays the guitar again, and he does a weirdly good job of modernizing “I Just Want to Be Your Everything”. It sounds nothing like Andy Gibb. The judges are varied in opinion, and Paula wants to see him without the guitar next week.

Luke Menard: His hidden secret is that he’s in an a cappella group. Um … ugh. They play us a snippet of Luke doing “Bohemian Rhapsody”, and it’s just blah. He follows up with more Queen for his performance this week, but his version of “Killer Queen” sounds like he’s spent his entire life doing musical theater. His falsetto isn’t pleasant, and he just can’t hold a candle to Freddie. I predict that Simon will call this performance “karaoke”. Hmm, Randy and Paula liked it, which I don’t get. Come on, Simon! YEAH! GO SIMON! He lacks personality, and his performance was theatrical, and verging on whiny. Darned tooting.

Robbie Carrico: Pre-package interview: he’s just being him! Package: we’d be surprised to know that he drag races cars! No, that’s actually not surprising at all. He’s a redneck from the south; it fits perfectly. What kind of “authentic” rock will he sing this week? Why, it’s Foreigner’s “Hot Blooded”! He starts out at what feels at least an octave lower than the original, and continues to try too hard throughout the whole thing. Dude, you used to be in a boy band. Wake up and smell the coffee — you’re just not a convincing rocker. HA! Randy says he’s not sure that rock is really Robbie’s thing. Paula gets all clueless about how on earth people can say he’s not “authentic”. Earth to Paula: HE’S NOT AUTHENTIC.

Danny Noriega: His secret is that he was in a 9th grade punk band. That played one show. He’s still in the 9th grade, isn’t he? I guess when you’re that young, you don’t really have any good secrets. He starts singing “Superstar” off-key and too low. The performance is slow and boring, and there’s just no passion in it. He slides gently to the bottom of the list for the night, taking residence in the worst-performance slot. The judges think he was trying too hard (not as hard as Robbie was trying, in my opinion).

David Hernandez: This guy went first last week, right? SO forgettable. His dirty secret is that he did gymnastics when he was younger. His set starts with some awesome wokka-wokka guitar, and he heads into “Poppa Was a Rolling Stone”. It’s actually not too bad — he’s giving it some emotion. I only wish the song had more variety. He does some nice stuff at the end, and overall it’s much better than last week. The judges like it, and Simon gives it the coveted “best vocal of the night so far” award.

Before giving David’s number, Seacrest asks Paula, “Why was it [the 70s] such a great time for music?” Her response: “Because there were some great songs that came out of the 70s! Great songs.” Um … what? The songs were great because … they were great. Paula Abdul, ladies and gentlemen. She has a hit song!

Jason Yeager: We all picked him to get the boot last week. We may not know that he plays multiple instruments! His choice for the 70s is the Doobie Brothers’ “Long Train Runnin’”. The entire first verse is incomprehensible — his diction sucks the big one. I take it back about Luke Menard — THIS is the performance that’s straight out of musical theater (except in musical theater, we enunciate our words). I find him corny and cheesy, but not in a good way. Randy starts out with a heaving sigh, then calls it pitchy and karaoke. And he’s right, it’s not a “singer’s song”. It’s way too easy, and shows virtually no range.

Chikezie: His big secret is the source of his name — Nigeria. Why does it not surprise me that he’s from the same place that gives us bank scams? I don’t know the song he sings, so I had to look it up — it’s “I Believe to My Soul”, done by Donny Hathaway and Ray Charles. He’s all right, but I find his double-polo-shirt look almost as awful as his orange suit from last week. The judges think he did much better than last week. I guess it was all right, but there’s just nothing about this guy that interests me.

David Cook: His big secret is that he’s a “word nerd”, and does crosswords and such. That makes me like him more, but I still hate his hair. He accompanies himself with an electric guitar for his performance of “All Right Now”. I can’t think of this song the same way I used to — we do a very upbeat, peppy version as a closing song in the show I do. He does a good job with it, and it’s way better than last week. Randy calls him the “real rocker” for the season, and it makes me laugh at Robbie inside my cold, Grinchy heart. Simon slams on the crossword puzzle love, which is the first thing in, what, 3 years that we’ve disagreed on.

David Archuleta: The very mention of this boy’s name makes the girls in the audience squeal. His secret is that when he was 11, he got to meet the American Idol finalists in the hotel lobby. They show a blurry camera shot of Kelly Clarkson watching the kid sing, and she’s gape-mouthed when she hears him. Hee! As soon as Seacrest mentioned that the song is by John Lennon, I knew it’d be “Imagine”. It’s a little too slow for me, but it’s better than Blake did last year. Though it’s not quite as good for me as Jordis Unga did on Rock Star: INXS. Even if the judges hate him, he’s safe as houses. Randy loves on him, Paula wants to mutilate him with her love, and Simon calls him “the one to beat”. Both Paula and David’s dad have tearstained cheeks.

Recap time! Luke was sucky, Danny was creepy, Yeager blew goats again. I’m definitely picking Yeager for my first pick. The second is harder, as they’re unlikeable in different ways. But I guess I’ll go with Danny — since Archuleta’s going to hog all of the cute-young votes.

Tomorrow night: 10 ladies, 10 more songs from the 70s. Hopefully, no repeats. And if someone sings Pink Floyd’s “Great Gig in the Sky”, I’ll eat my hat.

And it’s girl time! Another two hours, and another bunch of contestants I don’t recognize.

Ryan starts by criticizing Randy’s “dawg”-heavy comments from last night, and then he asks Paula to give the girls some girl-to-girl advice. Then we find out that Simon actually likes it when the contestants give him backtalk. Um … OK?

The girls will be saddled with the heavy weight of the 60s tonight. Now, let’s see a little edited piece that shows who the heck some of them are! I recognize more of the girls than I do the boys, but I don’t know who Kady, Amy and Alexandrea are, among others. I can’t wait to find out if they suck or not.

Kristy Lee Cook: I recall this girl from auditions. She’s always seemed incredibly bland to me — just cute enough that she hasn’t had to develop a personality. Her initial audition of “Amazing Grace” just felt really soulless. She sings “Rescue Me”, and it feels a little too slow. Her jeans have weird bleach marks and rips all over them, which I find ugly as hell. The performance is repetitive and mundane — I don’t remember the original being this boring. Apparently she’s sick, so that explains some of it. Paula warns her not to let that get in the way of how she “emotes”, but I don’t really think this kid could emote much even if she were in tip-top shape.

Joanne Borgella: Ah yes, the plus-size model. She’s correct in her package interview — we’re trained to expect a deep, belting voice from a larger black girl. Her lighter style is an interesting change-up. She sings “I Say a Little Prayer for You”, and it’s … just all right. Her voice is a little bit thin, and she gets weirdly screechy on a few notes. The last quarter of the song sounds like some weird bridge from another song, and the performance totally falls off the rails. Simon agrees with me, that the second half was worse than the first half. Damn, Simon, why do you have to agree with me all the time?

Alaina Whitaker: The pre-sing interview brings out that she’s the youngest girl. But … she looks at least mid-20s. Maybe she’s just lived a rough life, but girl sure don’t look 16. I don’t really remember her from the first auditions, but the country-singers don’t generally stick with me. She starts “More Today than Yesterday” really slow and soft, then it picks up to a really pop-ish beat. Her voice still sounds fairly country. She does all right, not too awful. She may be the best so far, but she’ll be surpassed by the end of the show. She’s safe this round, to be sure. There’s something about her teeth that creeps me out — like she’s going to take a bite out of my neckmeat. Hmm.

Amanda Overmyer: I liked this girl as soon as I saw her. Although I fear that her voice is a bit too stylized to make it all the way. Then again, Taylor Hicks had a very distinctive style to his voice. I’ll be very interested to see what songs she chooses throughout the season, because even before she sings tonight, I’m telling you she’ll make the finals.
She comes out with “Baby Please Don’t Go”, singing along with the guitar riff. Nice. I don’t know if this is the best song for her — it’s repetitive, and highlights the guitarist more than it highlights her. It feels like something I’d hear in Guitar Hero. But she’s still safe, safe, safe.

Amy Davis: Who? She’s very much a cute everygirl — we’ve had her kind every single season. She sings “Where the Boys Are”, which kills me a little bit — I love that terrible movie. Amy is certainly no Connie Francis — she’s hitting dud notes all over the place. Sad that my favorite song of the night is the worst performance of the night so far. Simon is right once again — she’s going to struggle after that. So far she’s one of my choices for elimination (but I’ll always keep the door open for something more bland and uninspiring).

Brooke White: I totally remember liking this girl in auditions — didn’t she play the keyboards for her first song of Hollywood week? She starts “Happy Together” with some really awful notes. It gets better, but she still has lots of weird catches in her voice (although not as many as I expect to hear from Asia’h later). I wonder if she’s one of the girls with the flu this week. I agree with Paula — she’s different from the other pretty white girls, though I can’t explain why. Simon compares her to a spokesperson for “washing-up liquid”, and everyone acts like that’s the weirdest thing ever. Really? You people can’t figure it out? Sheesh.

Alexandrea Lushington: I’m not putting the accent aigu over the second e. Deal with it. She seems very meh in her package. She starts into “Spinning Wheel” at the top of the stairs, and rocks her way down every step. This girl is pretty good, except she goes falsetto for some of the higher stuff — my ear wants her to belt more. She has some decent moves, and all in all it’s a good performance. I can admit that, and still not necessarily like her. Don’t know why. Paula and Randy argue that she’s “relevant”, but Simon just doesn’t get it. As Ryan goes into her phone number, she repeatedly corrects Ryan’s pronunciation of her name. Ooh, losing points. And she mouths Ryan’s teleprompter lines. Aah, I’m starting to figure out why I don’t like her.

Kady Malloy: Wait, didn’t she already sing? An average blonde with scary big teeth? She’s the same person as Alaina! She sings “A Groovy Kind of Love” slowly, while sitting on a stool. The phony emotion she’s pumping into the song doesn’t work — it’s still dull as dishwater. Or the washing-up liquid used in the dishwater. She gets up off the stool, but apparently the stool was helping her tone — now she’s throwing out all sorts of bum notes. Blah, meh, blah! She’s white bread with American cheese — boring.

Asia’h Epperson: Through the audition process, I’ve yet to hear the judges say a single word about her weird bubble-in-throat, full-of-catches method of singing. I don’t care for it myself, but I think she’s an all right kid. She sings “Piece of My Heart” because Amanda won’t. She does a good job performance-wise; I just don’t like the things she does with her voice. I can appreciate her talent without liking the music. But I think I like her as a person. She’s the Bizarro universe version of Alexandrea, so I’ll put the apostrophe in her name. The judges love it, and I’m thinking she’ll be around for quite a while this season. Maybe she’ll work out some of the weirdness in her voice and win me over to her sound.

Ramiele Malubay: I remember her voice from the initial audition — a great sound coming out of a little gidget. She gives me someone from Florida (other than Robbie) to root for. She starts out very slow and mellow on “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me”. She speeds it up a little bit, and puts more power to it in the end, but it’s still a bit slow and plodding for me. It was a decent performance, but I much prefer upbeat stuff on this show (which is weird, because I seem to much prefer slower stuff in my MP3 collection). The judges love her up, and she’s totally safe this week. She’s a full head shorter than Seacrest, so she must be absolutely teensy.

Syesha Mercado: Ah, more Florida representin’. I remember her lost voice during Hollywood week, but she really overcame and rocked it then. Tonight she sings “Tobacco Road” she does all right, but I don’t really like the song itself. The guitarist plays the hell out of it, and he has a really gorgeous guitar. The judges call her “consistent”, and I’ll agree with that — but unlike some of the other girls who are consistently a 7 on the ten-scale, this girl is a consistent eight. But I’d rather hear a ten, and it’s just not happening with this group. Seems like a good kid, though, and hopefully she’ll stay around.

Carly Smithson: The unforgettable Irish lass. I hope they curl her hair at some point, because I hate it straight — it always looks limp and greasy, like the hair of a 12-year-old. But enough of that harsh assessment — she seems like a nice girl. She sings “The Shadow of Your Smile” (my parents had this record). She sings well, but it’s not her best. She also needs a tutorial on how far to pull off the microphone when she’s belting — she pulls it too far away from her mouth too frequently. Randy calls her the best of the top 24. I’m not sure I can agree with that, but knowing that she has the crappy flu/bronchitis that’s going around makes me more impressed with her performance. The illness has been sweeping Disney World as well, and it’s knocked out almost everyone’s voice at one point. Simon points out her microphone technique, so once more we’re on the same page.

Watching the recaps, my bottom-dwellers are Kristy (boring), Amy (off-key and boring) and Kady (sleepy, off-key and boring). Since Kristy was only boring, and not off, I’m choosing Amy and Kady for my bottom two.

TWO HOURS? Really? All righty then, guess I’ll get set up with a beer and a snack. This week has a theme already — the 60s. Ugh.

We start the evening with an introduction to the boys, the girls, the judges, and the performance space. We get a shockingly brief recap of the boys’ journey so far (we’ll probably hear more about each of them before they sing) and some inane banter between Simon and Ryan.

Cut to commercials — that one with the dad who goes on the business trip with the little girl’s stuffed animal just guts me. He takes a picture of the house when he gets home!

David Hernandez: I have little memory of this kid from the auditions. He starts into “In the Midnight Hour” with a breathy style that I don’t really like. He sounds … all right, I guess, though not amazing. He hits a couple of awkward higher notes at the end. I hope his mediocrity is due to nerves, being the first guy and all. But overall, I give him a “meh”.

Chikezie: Decision to go with only one name: BAD. Especially when that name sounds like a cheesy poultry dish. Or cheap bubble gum. I do recall this kid from auditions, but he didn’t blow me away. First off, the red suit and red shoes are a bit much. To quote Michael Kors, “A little too matchy-matchy.”

I don’t know the name of this song, so I’m Googling the lyrics. But a Google of “all I know is that I fell in love with you” gets me Spinal Tap’s “Tonight I’m Going to Rock You Tonight”. OH, it’s not until the chorus that I realize it’s “More Today than Yesterday” … but it doesn’t sound right at ALL. What a freaky slow rendition. Chikezie needs to be wary of notes too low; like a lot of chicks, he gets really out of tune at the bottom of his range. Overall, he’s less impressive than David, so he’s in the number two of two position right now. Although I LOVE that Simon accidentally calls him “Jacuzzi”. OH, and his backtalk to Simon fills me with hate.

David Cook: This guy drove me nuts all through auditions and Hollywood, because of his hairline. The stringy comb-forward isn’t a good look for anyone. He launches into a slow, emo version of “Happy Together”. It gets un-emo quick, but then he’s just trying too hard to make it all rocklicious. And what’s with the kids wearing bracelets with keys on them? I’ve seen that a LOT this season already. He’s keeping up the streak of meh and mediocre … maybe it’s the songs from the 60s that are doing it? Randy loves this guy’s “rock edge”, but it just seems forced to me.

Jason Yeager: Who? I have zero recollection of this guy. He tears into “Moon River” wearing a preppie-like blazer and sitting on a stool. Most of it is boring, with a couple of dud notes thrown in for good measure. He’s so bland, I’m going to give him a nickname we bandy around in our house: Blando Calrissian. Simon calls the performance “very cruise ship”, and he’s totally right as usual.

Robbie Carrico: Due to the bandanna on his head, I’m calling him Bo Bice II. He says in his interview that he was in a “boy girl group” that opened for Britney Spears. I want to cut his hair SO BAD. But his rendition of “One” is decent, and it’s a good song choice for him. It is, for me, the best performance of the night so far. But the bandanna and chain wallet need to go. Paula calls him “authentic”, but I question that … whoa, and Simon questions it as well.

David Archuleta: I paused the playback to let Scott know that I find this kid adorable, and genuinely talented, and he’s only 16. Scott said, “So he’s like Graham Downing?” Hee. The audience gets to its feet immediately, and I get the feeling he’s a crowd favorite too. He sings “Shop Around” quite well, and I think he’s only going to get better with time. He tops Robby, certainly. He’ll go far in this competition, that’s for sure … as long as he doesn’t go Kelly Pickler-grade overboard with the youthful exuberance and innocence.

Danny Noriega: He reminds me, for some reason, of a lot of the kids who come here to work for the College Program. Young and fun and superduper adorable. He sings “Jailhouse Rock” adequately, but his skinny jeans and skinny tie are really distracting. These kids get fashion advice once they hit the finals, right? He’s good, but he’s no David A. Safe for the week.

Luke Menard: Another guy who we haven’t seen much of yet. He kind of looks a little bit like Hugh Jackman. He sings “Everybody’s Talkin’” up in his higher register, which makes sense — the one low note sounds wonky coming out of him. He hits some really odd pitches in places, especially at the ends of various lines. Simon calls it “forgettable”, and I’m afraid he’s right — it was average, and slow in tempo, and wasn’t saved by a fun performance.

Colton Berry: From auditions, I know him mostly as the kid who beat out the other geek boy, Kyle. I fully expected Kyle to make it to the top 24, and I fear that people might hold it against the kid. He sings “Suspicious Minds” and seems very comfortable — he looks like he’s having a good time on stage. It wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t awesome. But he’s memorable.

Garrett Haley: Whoa, this kid has a higher voice than half the women I know. And he has beautiful girl hair. I get the Frampton and Leif Garrett references, but it’s only because of his hair. He sings a soft and slow “Breaking Up Is Hard to Do” and shows us his amazing cheekbones, and that he desperately needs to shave his scraggly boy-whiskers. I find him roughly as forgettable as Luke, with the same problems — slow song, a few pitch issues, and no real personality.

Jason Castro: This guy is cute, to me. He does “Daydream” while strumming his guitar, which earns him points. He sounds good, looks like he’s having a good time, and is mostly in tune. I move him up to the 2nd place slot, right behind little David. Randy wasn’t that blown away. Paula agrees with me, and Simon once again echoes my own thoughts — Jason is in his top two for the night. Now THIS kid is the “real thing”, not that pseudo-rocker Robbie.

Commercials — the FOX news tonight is going to have a piece on “hometown” boy Robbie. The tease? “From a small-town rocker to a household name overnight.” I don’t think that’s entirely truthful.

Michael Johns: I’ve been looking forward to the last performance, because this guy was one of my top picks going into the top 24. Good looking, foreign, great voice — what’s not to like? He’s doing “Light My Fire”, which is a great choice. His voice kind of reminds me of another Aussie, the late great Michael Hutchence. He rocks the poop out of the song, and it’s a great end to the night. HA, Randy mentions Hutchence too! After I wrote it! Anyhoo, he seems like a good guy in addition to being a good singer. I’d keep an eye on this guy to make it to the end.

Watching the recaps, my bottom four are Chikezie, Garrett, Luke and Jason Yeager (curse this season for its three Davids and two Jasons). But I don’t think Chikezie will be eliminated just yet, since he has the market cornered on non-white dudes. Of the other three, Garrett is the most cute and pitiful (and bound to get the Kevin Covais-grade pity vote), so I’ll spare him too. So my two choices for elimination are Luke and Jason Yeager.

Today is our last Sunday off together! Next week I start my new schedule, which will be Tuesdays and Wednesdays off. Such is the luck of the draw when you’re low man on the totem pole.

Since this will be our last full day off together for a couple of months (I think Scott re-draws for days off in April) we’re hitting the parks for a day of fun. At the very least we’ll be going to Disney’s Hollywood Studios (future home of the new American Idol attraction!) and the Magic Kingdom.

In other news, the bad press that Bright House cable has been getting because it’s shutting us CableCARD users off from several HD channels is piling up. They’ve agreed to let us use an HD DVR for free until the USB dongle that’s in development is released. Maybe they think we’ll leave TiVo for their DVR, but there’s not much chance of that happening — their DVR already crashed once yesterday, and it has a fairly ugly interface. And the remote is effing huge.

Yesterday, I was presented with the “Quarterly Spotlight” award for Downtown Disney. The award is “in recognition of outstanding job performance, service, quality and dedication to the philosophy and tradtion of Walt Disney World Resort.”

This means that more than one person in my area (managers, other cast members) nominated me for this thing. Pretty darned cool! Scott won the quarterly award for his area a couple of quarters ago (I think he got 2Q 2007; mine is 4Q 2007), so now I guess we’ll have to be double-dorks and frame the certificates.

Oh, and it came with the gift of 30 “Disney dollars”. Hee!