Summer Breeze

American Idol: What's Randy's Deal?!

Why does he love lil David so much and hate Syesha? I mean, in Randy's eyes D can do no wrong, and Syesha can rarely do right. Syesha sang that song! And while David A.'s got a great voice, it's always the same and that's boring - in a Ruben Studdard kinda way. I already know how the song's gonna sound before he says the first note.

I hope Randy felt guilty when she started crying. That was cool of Simon to show some humanity and not dump on her as well. Instead, he actually took up for her.

Is Jason Castro phoning it in, or what? Geez, forgetting the lyrics? Well, at least he didn't have to start over to get back on track. (Ahem, Brooke.) But, still.... I think his eyes and locks may have come to the end of the road.

David Cook for the win. Syesha runner-up. That's my vote.

Snapshot: Summer Breeze

What I'm doing right now? Jammin to Keyshia Cole's cd, at this exact moment, "Sent from Heaven." When love won't let you walk away... I love how her "pitch" changes in this song, her upper register is on point.

What did I just finished doing? Clearing off some of the books and papers to expose the wood on my dining table. School is winding down for the academic year. The end (and the tabletop) is in sight. [Keyshia's is my cleaning up cd.)

What am I gonna do next? Depends. If this girl finally emailed her paper for peer editing, I have to work on that. Otherwise, I'll check a few blogs and head to bed. Man, I hope it's the latter.

What was I doing an hour ago? Not surprisingly (see pitch comments above), watching American Idol on DVR. Somewhat surprisingly, though, I was getting weepy-eyed watching Brooke get sent home. I didn't even really like her, but her sincerity was infectious, and doggone it, she got to me trying to sing her last song. Either that, or I'm hormonal like a mugg.

Notice Anything Similar??

Painter's 8-year effort at Dallas Orthodox church nearly done

hmm.... Think he might've taken the "in man's image" thing too far....

Wow, It's Been a Minute!

It's been so long, I temporarily forgot my login to my blog. Yikes.

End of the semester. Just busy, ya know. And blogging requires thinking, whereas MySpace, FaceBook, checking emails and other blogs do not.

I love FaceBook by the way. Scrab.u.lous is the bomb. Challenge me, please!! *Warning* I play slow games. One word every couple of days.

What else, what else?

Hmm. My little boy's best friend is moving away in June, but I haven't told him yet. No sense in torturing us both. He has almost no concept of weeks/months and everyday will wonder (and ask me) when. No, thanks. I'll wait till like a week before, I guess.

I'm very glad that The Office and Grey's are back. The Office was really good last Thursday. I can tell that an episode is good when I don't want it to end. I love it when Michael and Dwight take road trips.

ANTM? I'm still watching. My final 3 prediction: Anya, Fatima, Whitney. Winner? Fatima.

ANTM Questions: Why did that Italian dude at the designer's shop look like Mr. Jay's metallic older brother? Why was Tyra hating on Fatima so bad in her commercial? Hers was GREAT. (And I haven't been a Fatima fan.) Why have the director on there if you're going to disregard his opinion?? And is it just me, or does it seem like the only point to having the girls do commercials in foreign languages is for the judges' amusement?

I'm so over this school thing. As my brother would say, laffin but serious. I can't WAIT til the summer!! I need a vacay, for real!!

Stock Check at Babies R Us?

This blog post that I found via C, reminded me of a recent conversation with my soon-to-be-four year old.

After spending most of Saturday with a friend and her baby, my son was in love with the baby. The little guy was both big enough and small enough for him to hold, ya know. So while in the car, he says:

"Mommy?"

"Yes, Zee." I can tell he's been thinking, because he's using his thinking voice "mommy" which he always pauses after

Z: "I really like that baby."

M: "I know Z, I could tell. I'm glad you had fun."

Z: "Mommy?"

M: "Yes, Zee?"

Z: "We should get us one of those babies."

M: Oh lawd.... "Uhm, where would we get one." Stalling.

Z: "Um, I don't know. Maybe the baby store?" I can only guess that this reasoning was based on a car lot that I had explained as a car store.

M: "The baby store, huh? Well, we can check, but I'm not sure they have any more."

I know I'm wrong, but that's as far as I felt like going with that conversation!

Hmm, that was refreshing...

Some sort of way, Finesse (of SNL "fame") has finagled his way into advice columnist for the lay-deeees. He's got a recurring column in Essence, and today I saw him pop up on msn.

Surprisingly, it's actually pretty good advice. Check it out here.

Some of my faves:

4) When a man loves a woman, he’ll do whatever she wants. Really.

5) If you want to keep a good man, match his affections—and don’t take them for granted.
Sometimes she gets too comfortable with the fact that he’s being good to her and stops returning the kindness. She’ll get to a place where she thinks sex or things like that should become a treat for him.

8) Playing hard to get isn’t a good way to keep a good man. The key to keeping him is matching his efforts. If he calls you, call him back, and expect the same. If he doesn’t call, stop calling, and really pull back until he starts matching your efforts.

Jason Whitlock Gets on My Last Nerves

I hope that when he wrote this latest article for msn/foxsports, he was playing Devil's Advocate. Otherwise.... side-eye

Excerpt:

Would someone please write a handbook? "What Will and Won't Piss Black Folk Smooth the **** Off"; would be an international bestseller.

I'm black, and I'm pissed off most of the time, but I wouldn't leave home without the handbook. Not in these racist-ly confusing times. I can barely keep up with when I'm supposed to be disappointed as opposed to offended as opposed to being pissed smooth the **** off.

He is making reference to the controversy over the LeBron-Gisele cover on Vogue. His opinion on the photograph is not clear, i.e., I'm not sure if he thinks that LeBron is not imitating King Kong and black people are overreacting, or if he thinks that he is portrayed as the beast, but that LeBron (and other athletes) also perpetuate stereotypes, so why are black people mad now. I'm pretty sure it's the latter, but that's beside the point of this post. My issue is with Whitlock's line of reasoning.

One of the ways he thinks LeBron is making himself a beastly stereotype is via tattoos. Apparently, and this was news to me, black people get inked up to look like prisoners. Betcha didn't know that. Here I was thinking that we all had different minds and motivations. Silly me. No, no.

According to Whitlock, when LeBron "covered his body in tatts years ago, mimicking a death-row inmate, [he] invited people to jump to the conclusion that he's dangerous." Did LeBron say that he got tatted because he was "mimicking a death-row inmate?" Or is that just what Whitlock sees when he looks at him? You know, "we" can be prejudiced, too. Couldn't be imitating rock stars or skaters or being alternative, or hell, just plain liking tattoos? Nope. Not according to Whitlock. Per him, "Half the black players in the NBA take the court each night in front of white audiences tatted from neck to toe like they're shooting a scene for Prison (Fast)Break."

Thankfully, we have Jason to voice what is apparently our one collective mind as black people, which he does in an article replete with "us" and "we" in reference to black folks. We all get tats to look like prisoners, we all get mad about the same thing, and we all love Tyler Perry's movies.

Not.

But hey, Jason, folks gotta make money some way, I guess, and if coddling white people who feel troubled and who like to chalk black people up to being overly sensitive is how you get down, more power. But one request:

Please stop speaking for the rest of "us". "We" are not all of one mind. YOU are perpetuating the idea that "we" are, which makes "you" worse than "them", because "you" should know better.

Hmm, I wonder why msn.com is highlighting this article as one of their headlining stories?