Idol Wednesday

Welcome to Day Two of my American Idol fanaticism. Hello, I love pop culture.

Seacrest opens by wondering if the girls can match the guys’ throw-down last night. It was more of a toss-down, so I’m betting they’ll manage.

Gina’s “Alone”, and never really cared until she met us. She brings her big rock voice, but sounds screamy at times. R says she got it together. P says, man, excellent job. S says the vocals felt forced and, hey, isn’t she supposed to be edgier? In an embarrassing moment that probably shouldn’t be happening, Seacrest admonishes her boyfriend to propose. I don’t even think she told him to say that! I say: the girl’s got spirit.

Alaina is not ready to make nice. She hits a few bad notes and doesn’t quite pull off the bold, angry thing like a true Chick, but maybe that’s better for her – I fear a lot of voters are going to HATE the fact that she’s singing this song. R says it was not good. P says it was a hard song to sing. S says he’ll put it into plain English: this performance was like R taking part in a 100-meter sprint. P says she looks beautiful, which in P-speak means she sucks. I say: I’m ready to let her go.

LaKisha sings “Midnight Train to Georgia." She’s flawless; I’ve got nothin’. R says she’s got some vibe. P says she loves it, and her. S says she’s a phenomenally good singer, but she should act like more of a star. (Um, don’t go advising normal people to become insufferable divas right before they make it big. 'Kay? Thanks.) Then he criticizes her outfit, which is uncalled for. I say: major contender.

Melinda, who is by far the most likable candidate, personality-wise, ever to appear on this show, sings “Funny Valentine”. At first, I think she’s headed for disaster (AI history: slow and old can be baaad), but she does the best version I’ve EVER heard. R says we’ve got a competition going. P is astounded. S says it was incredible and that she’s a breath of fresh air. I say: perfect.

Antonella sings a Celine song, which nobody should ever attempt. (Say what you want about Celine – that woman can sing.) She hits, like, three notes, total. R says she’s drop-dead gorgeous…but pitchy. P says less than 1 % of the population can sing like Celine. S says it was worse than last week. Antonella fights back, comparing herself to Jennifer Hudson, whom S also dissed back in the day. I say: just go home.

Jordin, who is by far the most impressive human being, everything-wise, ever to appear on this show, sings a song from Mulan. She’s incredibly articulate, insanely talented, and, oh, seventeen. She’s confident and gorgeous and charismatic. I may be slightly in love with her. R says it wasn’t her best, but is so, so impressed with where she is at this point in her life. P tells her she’s a brilliant talent. S stresses her massive potential. I say: top three.

Stephanie sings “Dangerously in Love” just like Beyonce. Which is great, except that it makes her – just like Beyonce. R says she has proven she deserves to be up here, but needs to find her own sound. P says fantastic, brilliant, more adjectives, and everyone will be in love with her. S agrees with P. Let’s say it again. He AGREES that it was terrific. I say: another one to watch.

Leslie is feelin’ good. She’s got that smoky, deep, soulful thing going on. I’m a BIG fan of the voice, but she’s too jazzy-cool for the voters, probably. I’m thinking basement club, gritty city. R likes that she’s returned to her trademark style, but it was just aiight. P says she’s in her element. S says a bunch of whack shit that we’ll skip over, because P jumps in to compare her to a “different” flavor of ice cream. The judges spiritedly discuss what flavor of ice cream Leslie is, while she kind of rides the wave. I say: keep this one around.

Haley’s got the stuff that we want, the stuff that we need. Girl has WAY more fun than she did last week and is entertaining to watch. Still, I sense reviews will not go well, because you just can’t sing “The Queen of the Night” and get away with it. R says everyone has had a good time, but the song was not great for him. P says leaps and bounds better than last week. S says she gave it a go, but advises that contestants not take on Whitney songs unless they have Whitney voices. I say: yeah, forgettable.

Sabrina sings “He Fills Me Up”, another Whitney song. She’s powerful, and actually does have the voice for it, but – meh. Except for her hair, which is itself incredibly charismatic, she just doesn’t command attention. R says nice overall. P says she’s a big contender. S says she almost confused power with shouting, but predicts she’ll be back next week. I say: works for me, I guess.

And we’re done. I’ll spare you commentary on the eliminations tomorrow, as I’ll be watching Grey’s Anatomy and, you know, reading some tremendously important literary masterpiece during the commercial breaks. Because I’m cultured, oh yes I am.

Idol Tuesday

Don't worry, I won't do it every week. This week, I can't resist.

Seacrest opens with a short tribute to “Jen” Hudson, “our” first Oscar winner. Our first Oscar winner who opted not to thank AI in her jubilant acceptance speech, though God did get a shout-out. Hmm!

The top ten boys are singing tonight. Contestants will be dedicating their performances to people who inspire them, thus ensuring that we're in for a snarkable evening. I smell lots of sappy salutes to grandmothers, girlfriends, and our troops.

Phil ain’t missing us at all, since we been gone. I appreciate the revival of a fun ‘80’s tune. He makes it pretty boring, although he hits one mildly impressive note before the end. R says it was hot. P likes his tone and can hear him on the radio. S is not jumping out of his chair. R gives him the three-yeah salute. I say: meh.

Jared dedicates his performance to Mom and Dad, and then, creepily, sings “Let’s Get It On." I’m sure I don't need to tell you that this is a bad choice. Boy also should not be wearing white sneakers with a suit, or crawling on the floor. R loves his “face-move." P tells him he’s good-looking. S is reminded of the Love Boat. I say: word.

A.J. takes forever to get going, but ends well. R tells him to shake it out, dawg, and then says he has skills. P says he has a real, real, real, real, real voice. S says it was nearly very good. I say: OK, but I’m still not fanning myself over here.

Sanjaya, the gorgeous-hair kid, is stepping out, with his baby. But he does go wrong - by covering up that fab hair with a hat. The worst part is the song choice, though. Kid’s only seventeen, so I’m thinking he’s never really stepped out. R says aww, gawd, it was like a bad talent show. P tells him he was in pitch! S says it was like a ghastly lunch where the parents make the kids sing to guests. I say: oh, honey. Sigh.

Chris S. sings “Trouble”, by Ray Lamontagne, which is an AMAZING SONG that I LOVE. He’s not as good as Ray, but he’s definitely got some soul. R calls it “skills." P says he’s real awesome. S says he used to think Chris was a very good singer and tonight he is indeed still a very good singer. (Yikes, S.) I say: high point, yep.

Nick sings “Fever”, which contains the craptastic lyric “what a lovely way to burn." I get over it though, because his voice is smooth and cool like a [I wanted to have a really good comparison here, but all I can come up with is] stone. R says it was smoky and kinda nice, dude. P praises his tone. S says he looks like he just came from the office and now he’s singing this song. I say: alrighty then.

Blake's future is made of virtual insanity. He wins instant points with me for choosing Jamiroquai, but mucks it up with mediocre vocals. His beatboxing rocks, though. Not gonna win, but I like him. R gives something like a three-dawg salute, he's crazy in love with this one. P says way to go. S separates the performance into three parts and says the beginning was copycat, the middle was great, the ending was a loss. I say: S is right.

Brandon sings “Time After Time", another revival I approve of, but he doesn't pull it off. He's almost surely the most talented in this group, but his performance is dull. R says he likes the dedication to Grams, but he's not showing what he’s got. P says she understands he’s keeping his emotions inside. S tells him to put it out there and make us believe. They get into a debate about feelings. To show or not to show? I say: duh. S is right again, babe. Put it out there.

Chris R., who favors Jason Mraz in almost every possible way, sings “Geek in the Pink." I’m split on this one: the boy can sing, but he’s got a weird quality to his voice. Bzzzz, it kind of sounds like a bee is stuck in his nose. R says it was hotter than the original. P raves. S says it was the best by a mile. I say: really?

Sundance thinks you better slow your mustang down. He's sucked it up big-time for the last three weeks, but he finally busts out the voice we heard in auditions. R gives him the three-wow salute, welcomes him back, and says he dropped the bomb. P says to BRING IT like this every week. S praises, but warns not to get too excited. He can still do better, but it was great. I say: about time, Mr. Head. I knew I wasn’t delusional.

And that’s it for tonight. Tomorrow: the top ten girls, almost all of whom are more interesting than pretty much any of the guys. As usual.

Sahara

Africa’s a terrible place, dangerous, screwed up. You should never go there. I already knew she thought that. My mom’s the type of person whose opinions you know. She thinks people who run red lights should be shot. She enjoys British sitcoms and thinks American ones contain too much sex. She still favors tapered jeans and says wide-leg make you look like a ragamuffin. She believes it’s lazy not to speak at least one foreign language. And she hates Africa. The good thing about people with strong opinions is that you always know where you stand with them. The bad thing is that they shut out too many interesting voices. They may speak the truth, but less frequently do they hear it from anyone else.

I’d like to go to Africa. That’s one of the truths about me. I probably shouldn’t tell her that. If I did go, I’d have to delay telling her until I’d been back for a week. Or I might just say I’d gone to Nice or Mykonos, destinations she could get behind. I’m not all that happy about this. It would be great if I could call her and say, “Hey, did you hear that piece on NPR the other day? The interview with one of the runners who crossed the Sahara? Isn’t that amazing?”

But she wouldn’t get my fascination, wouldn’t be tempted out of a comfortable lifestyle by the idea of a 4,000-mile run – 100 days, 6 countries. Wouldn’t want to hear about how this sounds to me like one of the best ideas I’ve ever heard (disregarding practicality, of course). Sounds bloody miserable, is what she would say. And dangerous. I bet none of those runners’ mothers wanted to see them cross the Sahara. That they went anyway probably wasn’t a direct defiance, it was simply a choice between voices.

Limbs: An Appreciation

Four is such a good number. The Four Seasons, the Fab Four, the Fantastic Four, the Four Tops. Four food groups. Petit fours. Four walls. Four sided-pyramids. The Schick Quattro. Where would humanity be without that? But my absolute favorite four is the Four Limbs. Arm, leg, leg, arm. Excellence in design, right there.

A woman at my gym this afternoon was telling a group of us about a friend who had an ice-related accident. The friend broke both wrists AND twisted an ankle. Can you imagine? Oh, my goodness, can you even imagine? I hope she has damn good insurance. I hope she has a damn good husband! She can't even go to the bathroom on her own, God, she'll need therapy after this! We all shook our heads and lamented the poor woman's condition. Having broken a foot last summer, I've come to think that functional loss of a limb is one of the most frustrating afflictions there is. Not the worst, just the most frustrating. You feel okay, but you can't do squat. I used to have to put on sweatpants and shimmy across the hardwood floor with a Lean Cuisine on my lap, because it's not possible to use crutches and carry frozen chicken piccata at the same time. Believe me, this is even more depressing in person.

So, to be down three outta four is pretty much my nightmare. I spent the rest of my workout feeling thankful for all of my limbs, hoping that my only ever complaint about them will be that they're paler than average and kind of short.

Pretty Good Spam

I've been paying attention to my spam lately. You know, it's entertaining. I choose to know very little of how spam comes about; I prefer to imagine that it's written and sent independently by small, frail aspiring lyricists who make their homes under the stairs of Manhattan high-rises. Lines from today's most excellent sample:

Now Japan will withdraw,
From this venture so flawed,
While Bush clings to his pricey, failed mission.

He mocks liars on cue,
And he loves kangaroos.

My media humor is here,
and my Ann Coulter humor is here.
My New York humor is here,
and my travel humor is here.
With laughter my mood he transforms.

Ne monkey pas avec les babouins!

Like, wow.

Year of the Pig

I love a new year. If what you do on the first day signifies what you'll do throughout the year, then in the year of the pig I'll be sleeping in, writing, eating Italian sandwiches, spending time with friends, and reading my stories in front of gathered crowds.

Sounds perfect.

Anniversary of a Snow Day

[I wrote this post before I had a blog, back when it was just called a journal, on another snow day exactly one year ago. It's mildly angsty, fits in with my theme of late, so here it is.]

From my living room window this morning, I could see that a man across the street had strapped on a pair of skis. He was all suited up - snow pants, parka, goggles, hat, gloves, ski poles. I watched him for nearly an hour. He would start in his backyard and get himself going with the poles. He would shoot across the twenty-foot stretch of midland between houses and into his neighbor’s backyard. He’d disappear for a few minutes, I assume to take advantage of a slightly more substantial slope on the other side. And then he’d do it in reverse, shooting back between the yards and stopping to turn around again. Back and forth on these baby slopes, on this baby snow.

It occurred to me that, had he seen me, he'd have found my actions just as strange: I was dressed in my pajamas and spinning a three-pound hula hoop around my waist. My laptop was perched precariously on the arm of a chair, pointed towards me, streaming an episode of This American Life from the year 2000. Half-read books were scattered, open, on every surface in the room. Every few minutes, I'd laugh at something on the radio show, causing me to lose my rhythm and the hoop to wobble and fall down around my ankles.

Of all the things we do when (we think) no one is watching, the most interesting is that we open ourselves up to our own truth. Here in my living room, I'm able to admit that I prefer not to get dressed before noon. I keep after the almost hopeless cause of achieving abdominal svelteness, while studying my media, my handbooks, my tomes. My neighbor, too, seems to have made an admission: he's in the wrong place. He fancies himself atop an Alp instead of in the twenty feet that separates his small home from the one next to it. Maybe today is his first time on the skis he bought five years ago with grand intentions, and now, inspired by Torino, now that the kids have trudged off to school and the wife has gone to work, he’s free to pursue Olympic gold. It will take years of practice and a lot of equipment he doesn’t yet have, but he’s spent his whole life learning to be patient. In the absence of a mountain, he makes do.

Ack! Ack! Ack!

I've been given a surprise afternoon off work - thank you, God of Precip - which of course means that I'm dressed in pajamas, drinking a latte, and considering chilling some mini-bottles of Pinot Grigio leftover from a barbeque we had in September. Free time. I really make it count!

What I should be doing today is freaking out productively (i.e. getting some work done in preparation for a very looming deadline) as opposed to freaking out counterproductively, which is what I was doing for much of the morning. The mania du jour: grad school. I have no idea what brought this on, but here's what happened:

Tracy [on the phone to Friend, immediately after Friend picks up]: Don't I seem like someone who should have an advanced degree?
Friend: Um...hi?
Tracy: Hi. Sorry. Don't I seem like a person who should have, like, a Master's?
Friend: Yeah, er, what? I mean, I'm sure you can get one.
Tracy: Getting one is not the same as having one. I should have one.
Friend: Is this about...? What is this about?

I didn't know what it was about. We talked in circles until she made me hang up and take deep breaths. Oh my god, oh my god/calm down, calm down. That's all we accomplished. I've been stewing ever since.

In my original life plan, Plan A1, I didn't need a graduate education. That was because I was going to be a movie star. The money thing was therefore implicit, and the respect thing I would get simply by being less drugged out than my Hollywood peers. Plan A1 was amended to Plan A2 when I realized I was too pale and bookish ever to take Los Angeles by storm. Plan A2: become an Olympian. The A-plans were generally pretty bold.

As I matured, I learned more about my own strengths and weaknesses, the pitfalls of money and fame, and the gleaming promise of the Stafford Loan. The B-plans were centered around involving myself in art, theater, and writing in an Ivy League setting. I would stay for as many degrees as it would take to become an authentically frizzy-haired, glasses-wearing NPR listener. Unfortunately, I got scared and ditched the arts in favor of the more practical and parent-friendly C-plans.

C1-5: Architecture, psychology, architecture, psychology, architecture. Graduation. Work. Major freak-out. Then, D1: pouring/fetching. Not terribly practical, or parent-friendly. Look how that worked out. Telling the whole story would exhaust me.

So, now I'm in the early E-plans, having left both the design and restaurant industries behind. I'm happy enough, and probably better off than I've been on any of the plans that came before. BUT - nothing I ever wanted I actually got, and that, I think, is why I'm freaking out. What if I'd stuck with it, any of it? Disregarding A1 and 2 (did I mention I was five and twelve when I came up with those?), I bet I could've made some dreams come true. Any combination of publication, gallery shows, applause, rolled up sheets of heavy paper, funny hats, and big-name universities (oh, the respect!) would have been quite satisfying. I know it's irrational even to be thinking the words "too late" at twenty-five, but then, being irrational is the essence of freaking out, isn't it?

Yep, I'm definitely gonna chill that wine.

She Reminds Me

When Felicity (yes, the television program) premiered, it was 1998. I was a senior in high school, an insane person on the edge of everything, who was at that time juggling seven college applications, two art classes, physics, a handful of other (comparatively less demanding) classes, daily play rehearsals, and all the soap-operatic drama that comes with being seventeen. Most of the drama was imagined, but that has never in the history of humanity made any of it less serious, because, as they say, or maybe nobody says – maybe I say – the mind is everything. Everything.

I watched Felicity with fierce devotion, and related to the characters in a way that I’d never related to any others the WB had produced. There was nothing about that show that didn’t strike me as meaningful and straight-outta-life, even and especially the stark camera shots, the above-average vocabulary, the saddish music that kicked in to let the viewer know that someone was having a Moment. In my head, this was also how I lived. My emotions were black-and-white photography, my progress set to guitar music. The conversations I imagined having were good in the sense that a writer might have written them. And I was going to follow my heart, and I was going to live in the city, and I couldn’t grow that great, curly, I-am-what-I-am hair, but I’d find something to do about that, too. I cried throughout the first season.

The show was about making decisions, particularly the ones that come fast and furious as you’re in college, trying simultaneously to grow up and not to. Felicity was a year ahead of me, and so I used her as a role model and a preview of what was to come, which was slightly dangerous and somewhat stupid, but everyone did it. Does it. I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s rare to the point of being almost impossible not to base your life, at least some part of it, on someone you know, or think you know, or know of. This person is the one who informs your choices, is the voice in the back of your head, or whose work and/or life has inspired you to reach for something. I think most people have someone like that. I have a few people.

I’m not saying that Felicity, the fictional New York student, is one of those people for me – anymore. But I’ve spent the weekend watching the first season on DVD, which I haven’t seen since it aired originally, and I’m surprised by how thoroughly I still can relate. It’s been eight years since I was a freshman in college, but I’m no more sure of my direction now than I was then. I still wonder what I’m doing here, “here” being anywhere I happen to be. I still wonder what I’m ever going to do about men, having made mistakes enough in that department to fill my own – albeit extremely short-lived – prime time soap opera. I still wonder whether the decisions I’ve made, basically since I’ve been making decisions, were the right ones. And you know how people always say, with their chins in the air, that they have no regrets? Yeah, I don’t think that way. I’m certain that if I could go back in time, I’d do many things very differently.

Of course, I’m saying to myself, as I sit here in the yoga pants that have done no yoga, the mind is everything. I could choose to look at my decisions and see them as solid, in that, like 99% of all decisions ever made, they could’ve turned out worse – and they could’ve turned out better. Or I could choose not to see them at all, but to take my current reality and only move forward with it, and never think back. But then again, I know what I have in the mind I’ve got. It travels in time. It loves to watch television and cry with people it doesn’t really know. It can keep me busy all weekend, just flashing pictures and playing songs, squeaking what if, what if, what if? Actually, it’s the best show around.

The Walking Hour

I leave the office, south of Baltimore, at four-thirty. I’m slightly ahead of the rush, so it’s a commute with options. I could take the beltway, or MLK Boulevard – either of which would be shorter, at least mileage-wise – but instead I like to quick-turn through the city, passing the familiar people and buildings that pop up like Outlook reminders, letting me know what it is I’m about to see.

Every day, I hit Charles Street a few minutes either side of five o’clock. Today, despite the cold, my people are out and walking. All of them, it seems. The teenagers who eat chips and drink sodas in front of the Subway. The girl who carries a portfolio across Mulberry Street. The guy who walks his scarily tiny dog up the hill past the Walters Art Gallery. There are dozens of dog-walkers out; a group gathers on the grass at Mount Vernon Place, people talking, dogs sniffing, but I don’t have time to recognize them as the light turns green. I’m jealous of the walking hour here on Charles Street. There’s no better hour for walking than this one, when everyone has just left work, changed shoes, and is facing the best choice of the day: what to do with the wide-open rest of it. I’m only sorry I’m in a car headed north, speeding past it all, having already made my choice.

Back

It almost sounded like a call to action. Give me your money. I’d heard it before, from the Red Cross, Amnesty International, Habitat for Humanity. But tone – tone is important. This was no call. It was a gloved and hooded 250-pound demand. Spat up from history’s throat, these words were old and experienced; they had begun in the early wars, passed through the golden age of motion pictures, made euphemistic appearances on behalf of the underfunded, and were back – here, now – on the modern, lamp-lit streets of Baltimore. Just those words, numerous potholes, a thuggish fellow, and me.

And then I woke up. But that’s not important to the story.

The story is: you lose. You walk along, and for no discernable reason, people take your stuff, or it falls out of your pocket, and you lose. This is not my favorite piece of life. I also dislike the waking up sweaty and scared when I only dream that I lose. Which has been happening more or less continuously since I was introduced to the concept of theft.

This story has no ending. It's not a good story. I’m only writing it to say that you should be careful, and you should hang on.