mamadrama

So I've watched this episode, like, five times because I keep falling asleep during it. She gets worse with each viewing. The petulance and entitlement are staggering, but Dr. Now seems to have her number at least.

I forget that Bumbly and Raquel are even in the lineup because I swear I'd never heard either one of them until this episode. I'd seen them in the group, but I have no recollection of hearing them sing. I guess they didn't have big enough sob stories. I continue to question what the judges see in Evelyn. Her rendition of "Leaving on a Jet Plane" sounded, as Luke said a few nights ago, very "coffeeshop" to me. She had a fairly significant fan base before the show started, however, so even if she gets kicked off next week she'll still be able to use this experience to her advantage. On the 'other" show, she refused to move away from her small,New Hampshire town because she didn't want to leave the family band. At some point, if she wants to have a bigger career, she'll need to. None of this concerns me, though, as I don't care for her voice. I FF through Eddie's part when this aired because I didn't care to see it. When I read that he sang "Hey Ho", though, I went back and watched it last night. I enjoyed it, but probably because I like the song a lot, not because Eddie was singing it. I don't "get" him. I can see where Laci's mouth would bother people, but my mouth looks exactly the same way. Not much I can do about having big teeth and huge, exposed gums. I've been bullied about it my whole life and it's one of the reasons I gave up singing. If she ever finds a fix for it, I hope she shares it.

Riley is pretty and has a pleasing voice, but her song sounded like karaoke Dolly Parton. I love Dolly, but if you're going to take on one of her songs, you need to find some way to make it sound like you're not just parroting the original. I kept thinking of Mindy Smith's version of "Jolene" and how good THAT arrangement is. Mindy's showed a kind of Appalachian gothic take on the song; prancing around the stage with a wide smile and bouncy voice does little to connect with the subject matter of the lyrics. Part of it is age, but Tanya Tucker was singing cheating songs at 14 and it was totally believable. I enjoy watching Uche. I love Laine's voice and he's a pretty boy. Like others, though, I feel like he's taken some kind of AI guru course and now he's putting everything into practice. Laci is my favorite at the moment. Her voice is beautiful and I've loved all her song choices. When the episodes go off, I normally forget everything I just heard. I've never bought an album from an American Idol participant, though I've downloaded some singles here and there. I would actually buy something of Laci's. Raquel, Kate, Bumbly, Madison, Ryan...they're all perfectly adequate singers and I've even enjoyed some of their performances, but I forget about ever one of them by the next morning.

When Dr. Now asked her how and why she got in that condition, she had her victim abuse story read to fire. It was almost like it was rehearsed because she knew exactly which words to use and how to place the blame. It's one of the few times that I've heard someone talking about abuse and I wasn't automatically overcome with sympathy. She took no responsibility for her weight.

Yeah, I've seen those posts as well as the tweets about it that his dad made. I was talking about within the context of the show, which doesn't always mirror reality. I guess I remain "whelmed" by her. Neither under nor over. FWIW, I didn't say that she didn't deserve her spot.

Mama won't wipe my pretty poopy butt Mama won't bring me food but my red rosy lips will taste pizza once again When I find another fool.

Riley is cute and she can sing in a technical sense, but I am not seeing anything particularly special about her voice. I'm from a state that has produced more famous country singers than any other state in the country and girls like Riley are a dime a dozen here. They have power, can carry a tune, have somewhat of a range, and have a nice demeanor but ultimately forgettable within half an hour of listening to them. On her own she's okay; paired alongside Laci or Ashley or many of the others, there's no real competition. Still, I don't dislike her.

His whole storyline right now is about his parents not accepting him, how he's had to leave his family and job, but at least he has his boyfriend to support him. IF his parents come around, my guess is that it will be on the night of the finale if he makes final 3. Or, you know, it's "songs that remind you of home" night or something and right before Jeremiah goes out on stage, he sees his parents down on the front row. He goes out, sings, cries, and hugs them as his song finishes. The show will want to milk that angle with all they've got. I'm not saying that as a diss to Jeremiah or to anyone else whose parents have had trouble with their child's sexuality. I know this happens and it's incredibly sad. I live in a very religious and politically conservative (socially anyway) area and I've had many friends who were disowned by their church or parents for being gay. It's incredibly sad. As greedy as shows like these are, though, I can see them thinking that the whole forgiveness storyline is too good to pass up. They'll somehow want their fingers in that. I guess if it helps him and his parents move forward together, though, then it doesn't matter.

Yeah, the doctors never explained it to my mom. I did my own research and had to explain it to her. I mean, it sounds like it should make sense. Some of the patients on this show seem to have cognitive issues while others have been flat-out stupid. I think a lot of people need the surgery explained to them as simply as possible. "It only works if you do the work" is true, but also vague. "You still have to follow an eating plan and increase your physical activity because the stomach can still expand even after the surgery" may be more helpful to others who just need it spelled out to them. I love Dr. Now, though. He's a better man than me. I don't think I could put up with half the stuff he does. And you KNOW that during filming he probably has cast members calling him and demanding stuff at all hours of the night. Some of these patients have surgeries within a few days of each other and are in the hospital together. Could you imagine having Jeanne down one corridor, Steven Assanti down another, and James parked in a wheelchair by the nurse's station screaming, "My leg"? Yikes.

Yeah, she definitely thought surgery was going to make her magically thin. This is one of those times, however, when I wanted Dr. Now to word it in a different way to her. He kept saying that it wouldn't fix the problem, that she had to do the work, etc. and it was clear his words were going over her head like a lead balloon. I wanted him to stop and say, "Okay. You changed your eating habit for one month and only lost 8 pound. You show that you cannot follow the plan. If I do your surgery tomorrow then what is your plan for losing weight after?" To which she'd have undoubtedly replied, "The surgery will make me lose weight because I won't be able to eat as much." To which Dr. Now could've said, "Yes. For maybe one month. When you fail to follow the diet plan, however, and you resume your normal eating habit the stomach will expand and you will gain all your weight back. I am trying to give you the tools now so that once you have surgery the surgery will have a bigger chance to work." Mom had GBS and like many she thought that her responsibility was finished once she'd had the surgery. She thought that the surgery would shrink her stomach and then, for the remainder of her life, she could eat whatever she wanted and not gain weight because her small stomach would cut her off when it was full. She didn't realize that it didn't work that way. I think a lot of them do. It's another way of having someone else fix their problems. They think that with the surgery they won't have to watch their diet or exercise ever again.

My kids and I were trying to describe her voice to my mom the other day so I did a few lines of "Wicked Games" in the style of a yodeling goat braying in the style of the Cranberries. I asked my kids, "Did that sound kind of like her?" "No," they said, "yours is much better." Ha. I mean, we all have different tastes. Nothing wrong if people like her voice. I'm sure I like people that others don't. (I could listen to Emmylou Harris and Dwight Yoakam on repeat.) I only snark on stuff like that on here amongst my people. My kids: "He only had 5 lines to remember and 2 of them were the title of the song." It was slightly more than that, but they weren't wrong.

So I finally got Philo on my Roku and can watch this again... Good dog in heaven, this was a complete clusterfuck. Jeanne bothered me in ways that even the other obnoxious ones did. I hate her victim mentality. She wanted to take zero responsibility for anything. Nothing. And dang. that house...I bet Dr. Now's nurses wanted to wear nose plugs around her. I don't normally like making fun of a person in that way, but her hygiene was such a problem that even HE was commenting on it. And she really could've done something about it. I bet she didn't want to, though. Like everything else she wanted someone else to do that for her as well.

That annoys me SO much. As though Europe doesn't have more than one country and those countries don't have their own diverse regions. When I was a travel writer working abroad, people would always ask me about America "what's America like?" or make general statements about the country. There are very few generalizations that you can make about a place. I mean, my state has more than 100 different counties and each county has its own unique culture, albeit sometimes a subtle one. Even within the counties you can often see a difference in between the towns.

I actually really like his voice, but he himself is starting to get on my nerves and that's affecting my listening enjoyment. Like Evelyn's singing voice, I feel like Wade's is really affected. My kids say that both are channeling "characters" when they sing, rather than using their natural singing voices.

And the weird thing is that I've lived in some of those deep recesses of Appalachia for almost 40 years now, even have family in some of those places the American "gypsies" came from, and I'd NEVER heard of a strong Romany subgroup until this show. After talking to friends and family who knew some of the key players in that series, it appears that while the heritage itself is real, they're playing up almost everything and many of them didn't even identify as gypsy until the show.

I refuse to believe that Wade's ignorance is real. I think it's part of his schtick. There have been too many things that he "hasn't heard of." He needs to drop it and soon. I want to bring Jeremiah home with me. We can watch "Designing Women" marathons and eat Nutella out of the jar in bed. My kids have always wanted an older brother. Out of all the seasons I've seen, Laci is one of the few people whose album I'd buy. Alejandro is another one that I just like to sit back and listen to. I've really liked other people in the past, but only for as long as the season is airing. Once is ends, I tend to forget about all the contestants but the really big ones (Kelly, Carrie, JHud, Adam, etc.). I continue thinking that Evelyn sounds like a cross between Delores O'Riordan, Sinead O' Conner, and a braying goat. She is so affected that I almost can't even listen to her. Laci *could* sound affected, but she missed the mark and that's in her favor. IMO she's one of those who naturally has a unique and different voice, whereas Evelyn's sounds like she's trying to have one. I've been lukewarm on Laine, but I actually liked this performance. It was past Nate's time to go.

I can't watch it until Hulu puts it on at 5am. Someone care to spoil me with the highlights?

So I just started this season and I'm very far behind... I like Hazel. I can see her being the kind of woman who, while not feeling romantic love for her partner, will still be a good wife. I've seen marriages like that work. They don't feel that "spark" between them like the movies talk about, but they have mutual respect for each other, they support one another, they make good partners, and even manage to have a good sex life. I can't judge women like Hazel too harshly because I've never been in that situation. Here in the US, even if you're born into poverty you can still theoretically work hard in school, earn scholarships for a trade school or college, and improve your life. It's not like that everywhere. In many countries, women's physical qualities, as well as their temperaments, are their meal tickets for getting out. Jesse scars me, no shit. Not a fan of Pole, either. Oh, and I don't know what Jon's problem is with Rachel's looks. I think she's as cute as a button. I'd date her. (If I weren't married and straight.)

*sigh* I loved the men's dance. It was cute and it looked like they were having fun. The girls'dance, though, basically consisted of everyone doing something different all while Whitney wore her "Ah am a dahncer darling" (or her "I just smelled a fart") expression while barely moving. I'm not a huge fan of Heather, but she could do better than this sorry bunch. You know the episode's bad when you have to use HOARDERS as brain bleach to erase the nastiness of what you just watched.

IMO it's a little unfair to say that those of us who aren't fans of her voice only dislike it because of what we saw on 90DF. And, as a matter of fact, it was the opposite for me: I watched the other show but it was her singing and voice that turned me off of her, not her personality. On that other board we've had MANY conversations about her voice and why those of us who are not fans don't like it, and it's all for musical taste reasons. Personally, I can appreciate the occasional power of her voice and even the whispery part, but after 2 or 3 songs she starts sounding the same to me and the slight yodeling sounds like howling. It is just not pleasing to my ears. It doesn't sound "ethereal and angelic" to me, it sounds a lot like my cats in heat. That's no comment on her personality. I'm sure she's a lovely person in real life. I have no doubt, however, that she'll make it to the end. The ones that I take a dislike to usually do.

From what I've seen and read, it sounds like she had better luck with getting men to support her than women. The majority of the people they've focused on have been older men. I don't have any commentary on that, I just think it's interesting. I see what you're saying and I agree. I think that in the future we'll have some kind of version of this. I hope she doesn't feel vindicated when that happens.

Erica's hairstyle might be a bit cultural, too. When you guys point out movies that had actresses with similar styles then I can see how it's period acceptable. In real life, though, I didn't know anyone in MY life who didn't at least tease their bangs. People around here didn't start growing out their hair until around 1993. Before then, even with straight hair you always had those bangs teased to high heaven. But then, where I am from, we're always a little behind the times.

I like Dimitry but his models looked like they had erections on top of their heads. Once I got that thought in my mind, I couldn't see anything else.

I've been binge watching the All Star seasons and the time limit has fluxated. The regular seasons get several months in between so that their final show can coincide with Fashion Week, but the All Star seasons have always gotten significantly less time. A week or less is pretty standard.

Shay made it through. I'm surprised that Wade made it through. They seemed to be put off by him.