Goodbye, Mushmouth (I mean, Bucky)

Well, tonight we said goodbye to the American Idol's resident Mushmouth, Bucky. Why do I call him Mushmouth. In case you couldn't figure it out, I can't understand a single thing he says. Ever.

As AI opens, we are treated to a Queen medley sung by the final eight. Why didn't they sing the songs last night that they sung tonight? Whoever picked who sang what tonight should be picking the contestants songs for future shows. Most of sounded much better during the medley than they did last night. Especially Ace.

I was wondering why tonight's show was an hour instead of the regular 1/2 hour. Now I know. We are going to be treated with hearing how proud everyone's family is of the singers. Well, duh. Let's just get on with it. Although I have to say that Taylor's bandmates seem to be just as much fun as Taylor. It would be a kick to hang out with all of them.

I have to admit that in the beginning I was a Kellie fan, but as the show continues on, she is starting to wear thin. And she is too confident on these elimination nights. She needs to be in the bottom three just to shake her up a little.

So the bottom three are Elliot, Ace and Bucky. I would love to see Ace go, too. He is so cheesy. Especially that "smouldering" look. Whenever he does that I want to kick the TV. It's like nails on a chalk board for me.

And Bucky is leaving. I'm just glad that I won't be seeing his "cool" microphone moves. You know, that microphone hand switch thing. I drove me nuts. Well, that and his footwork.

Next week: Rod Stewart. This should be interesting. There is a lot to choose from.

That reminds me of a story about my grandma. As we were sitting around the kitchen table one morning a couple of years ago, my grandma says, "I saw this new guy on Good Morning, America. I really liked him. I think his name was Rob something. He sings big band. Do you know him?" It took a while before I realized she was talking about Rod Stewart.

I never thought, in a million years, that I would say, "My 82 year old grandma is a big fan of Rod Stewart. She has all of his new stuff." I'll have to make sure she tunes in to hear the new guy next Wednesday.

If you want to read more about tonight elimination, head over to Dummocrats to see what Kris has to say.

Welcome to married life, Chad and Catie

My cousin Chad and his new wife, Catie, are back from their wedding and honeymoon in Hawaii. Congratulations!
I can't wait to hear all about it. Well, on second thought... You know what I mean.

Thought for the day...

All of these protests around the country being attended by illegal aliens made me think. I don't remember hearing about any businesses or industries shutting down. According to many, these illegals should be welcomed here because they are working jobs that "Americans don't want." If this is true, with the amount of them protesting yesterday, wouldn't we have heard about the lack of workers. I mean, if, for example, hotel housekeeping is performed only by these people, then wouldn't we have heard about no one showing up to clean hotel rooms. Wouldn't the MSM have jumped on this. Basically, it would have be a walk-out by thousands upon thousands of workers, in all menial jobs, across the country. And yet, I don't remember hearing about that. Maybe, just maybe, there are enough Americans and legal-non-Americans working these jobs so that large and small businesses across the country did not have to close shop while these illegals were protesting our immigration laws.

My heart is heavy

I must admit that I don't pay much attention to the crop of current movies, especially when I know that they are written, produced and/or directed by people that I philosophically disagree with. That being said, tonight, while surfing Blog Explosion, I came across a post about George Clooney's Good Night and Good Luck. While I knew that it was about McCarthy, that was about the extent of my knowledge of the movie. The post that I read explained the plot further and mentioned Edward R. Murrow. That caught my attention.

While I worked at Disney, I was a VIP hostess. My most memorable experience (not just at Disney, but most memorable life experience) included Fred Friendly. I was extremely fortunate to be able to spend a week with Mr. Fred and his family. He was being inducted into the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Hall of Fame and decided to make it a family event. He and his wife Ruth planned a family reunion. They opened their arms to me and, for the week, I became a member of their family. They were wonderful and I must admit that I learned one of life's most important lessons from him.

He and I were sitting on a bench at the end of a long day in the parks. As we sat there waiting for the boat that would take us from their hotel to EPCOT for fireworks, we watched his wife, children and grandchildren in the distance. I looked at Mr. Fred and you are a very lucky man. He turned to me, looked me in the eyes and said, "Dana, luck has nothing to do with it." I have never forgotten that and I credit that advice with the family life I have now.

I say all of this because, when I saw that Good Luck and Good Night was also about Edward R. Murrow, I had to see if Mr. Fred was also included since they worked together. He was. And he is played by George Clooney.

This makes me feel better

I think that I'm going to save this and replay it every time I catch a glimpse of Ben Affleck. Now excuse me while I go run to my local Chevy dealer.

Thanks for the hattip, Kitty.

Start the funeral dirge. Death is imminent

The final nail is about to be driven into the coffin of the republican (small r) United States of America. And who holds the hammer? Every politician who sees the number of illegal aliens and immediately starts to drool over them as an untapped voting bloc. They give absolutely no thought to the damage this will have on our country. Of course, to expect anything else from these politicians would be madness on my part.

The most frustrating thing is that no one seems to want to stop this. No one has the courage to stand up and call this what it is - madness, insanity and just plain stupid! Everyday our country is being hijacked by socialists. Control is being wrested away from hard working, TAX PAYING Americans. More and more, we, who invest the most of our hard-earned dollars into this country, are having less and less representation. Of course, the evil of it all is that the left have succeeded in convincing the lower class, the poor, and the "unlucky" that they are victims of the wealthy. And they are there to help.

Well, thank you Ted Kennedy. You and your ilk have managed to destroy what so many have given their lives to protect. And you have destroyed it for your own evil gain. You may have inadvertently helped some, but that was NEVER your intent. You know it was always to advance your career, position and power. And yes, that is the definition of evil.

Looking for a good book?

Recently I was strolling through the library looking for, what else, some books (imagine that). At my library, they showcase newly-arrived books. One was The Big Over Easy. The title immediately caught my attention. I picked it up thinking that it was a new book about New Orleans, maybe even about the city in the aftermath of Katrina. I was pleasantly wrong.

The full title was The Big Over Easy: A Nursery Crime by Jasper Fforde.

It’s Easter in Reading—a bad time for eggs—and no one can remember the last sunny day. Ovoid D-class nursery celebrity Humpty Stuyvesant Van Dumpty III, minor baronet, ex-convict, and former millionaire philanthropist, is found shattered to death beneath a wall in a shabby area of town. All the evidence points to his ex-wife, who has conveniently shot herself.

But Detective Inspector Jack Spratt and his assistant Mary Mary remain unconvinced, a sentiment not shared with their superiors at the Reading Police Department, who are still smarting over their failure to convict the Three Pigs of murdering Mr. Wolff. Before long Jack and Mary find themselves grappling with a sinister plot involving cross-border money laundering, bullion smuggling, problems with beanstalks, titans seeking asylum, and the cut and thrust world of international chiropody.

And on top of all that, the JellyMan is coming to town . . .

After I read the inside flap, I was intrigued. And a couple of chapters later, I was hooked. After finishing The Big Over Easy, I read the only other Fforde novel my library had at the time, The Well of Lost Plots (the third in the Thursday Next series). Last night I finished his first book, The Eyre Affair.

Welcome to a surreal version of Great Britain, circa 1985, where time travel is routine, cloning is a reality (dodos are the resurrected pet of choice), and literature is taken very, very seriously. England is a virtual police state where an aunt can get lost (literally) in a Wordsworth poem, militant Baconians heckle performances of Hamlet, and forging Byronic verse is a punishable offense. All this is business as usual for Thursday Next, renowned Special Operative in literary detection, until someone begins kidnapping charactersfrom works of literature. When Jane Eyre is plucked from the pages of Bronte's novel, Thursday must track down the villain and enter the novel herself to avert a heinous act of literary homicide.

Needless to say, I am an addicted fan. I am going to buy all of his books so that I can read them again and again. If you are an avid reader, you, too, will love these books. They are so much fun to read.

The NOPD needs to be changed immediately

I'm not sure if this is getting national airtime, but there has been another allegation of police brutality here in New Orleans (registration required).

The Pratts refused to discuss the matter, but [Dulcie] Pratt's mother-in-law Scott [Pratt's mother-in-law] said [Jonie] Pratt was returning from visiting her sick father in Baton Rouge early Tuesday when police said she ran a stop sign about two blocks from her house. The woman drove to her house in a middle-class area of the city before pulling over.

"I saw an officer pull Jonie out of the car by her hair," said Scott, who was baby-sitting her grandchildren at the couple's house. "He was swearing at her and pounding her into the car. I said, `Stop that, that's Officer Pratt's wife."'

Scott said the officer twisted Pratt's arms behind her and sprayed Mace in her face. She said two more white officers arrived and the three shoved the 5-foot-2 Pratt to the ground and knelt on her back, and an officer kicked her in the head.

I have no doubt that this happened; however, I don't believe that this is a racial issue. New Orleans police officers don't restrict themselves to beating up people of one particular race. They will intimidate, bully and brutalize anyone they want - white, black, male or female. And it happens more often than is reported.

How do I know this for fact? Because it happened to two members of my family last year (I'll call them Betty and Bob). Her offense? Asking a cop for his badge number.

Betty was picking up Bob from work since he had just had surgery to fix a torn rotator cuff in his shoulder. Since he worked at a hospital, she was going to pick him up at the emergency entrance drive-up (just as she had numerous times before). This particular day, there was a cop blocking traffic at the entrance. She explained that she was picking up her husband and he told her rudely, "I don't care. Move your car. No one can come this way." Since she worked at a hospital, too, she knew that the cop couldn't block all of the traffic and said, "You can't cut-off all traffic to the emergency entrance." He said something like, "I'm a cop. I said move. I don't have to explain anything to you." According to Betty, he was unbelievably rude, so she asked for his badge number. To this he replied, "I don't have to give you anything." She parked her car and again went to the cop to ask for his badge number. Again he refused and told her to go back to her car and get out of here. She went back to her car to wait for Bob to come out of the hospital and the next thing she knows, this cop is banging on her window telling her to get out of the car. She rolled down the window to tell the cop that she was waiting for her husband. He starts to open her car door and pull her out, demanding to see her driver's license and registration. She starts to argue that she has done nothing wrong and refuses to give him this unless he give her his badge number. At this, he pulls her out of the car and throws her on the ground and tells her she is under arrest. Meanwhile, her daughter is in the backseat watching this happen.

The cop calls for back-up and more cops start coming. Betty was thrown up against the car and handcuffed. While this is happening, Bob, who had had shoulder surgery just two weeks before and whose arm is still in a sling, comes out of the hospital and sees his wife being roughed up by a bunch of police officers. He immediately starts demanding to know what is going on. I guess they see Bob and a threat and a police officer throws him against a wall and pull his arms behind his back and handcuff him, too.

Bob and Betty were arrested for resisting arrest. Obviously, they are fighting this. When it happened, I told them to go to the press, but Betty was so upset and embarrassed that she just wanted it all over with.

Ever since this happened, I have heard more and more stories like it. I would love to see the NOPD purged of this egotistical, power-hungry officers, but I'm afraid New Orleans wouldn't have any more cops.

We teach our children that the police are the good guys fighting the bad, but what happens when the police are the bad guys fighting the good? Who is going to protect us for the police?

I just can't believe this happened

OK, I know that there are more important things going on besides who leaves American Idol, but when Mandisa garners the least amount of votes, I just have to comment. I think that she had arguably the best female singing voice this season. So, what happened? How can she be leaving while Bucky, Ace and Kellie are still around to sing another week?

I think I figured it out. I really believe that what put the nail in Mandisa's coffin was her choice of outfits. Let me say that I LOVE Mandisa. I have been a fan of hers since the night AI first showed her audition. Her size was never an issue. I think that she is absolutely beautiful. BUT, last night, I didn't hear what she was singing because her clothes were so loud. I'm not exaggerating. When I heard her sing her song tonight after hearing the results, I realized that I didn't pay attention to a single note she sang last night. If I felt this way (and she is my favorite second only to Taylor), I can only imagine how others reacted to her. Of course, I guess now I don't have to imagine. We all know.

Goodbye, Mandisa. American Idol won't be the same without you. The only consultation is that there is no way this the last we have heard from Mandisa. With her talent, she is guaranteed a recording contract. And I will definitely buy her first CD.

Katie leaves NBC

When I heard the news about Katie Couric leaving the Today show, I started to reminisce about the couple of days that I spent with her 11 years ago. I was a VIP hostess for Disney World and was assigned to Katie while she and the Today show taped at Walt Disney World. It was actually a lot of fun. I found her generous,kind and down to earth with a great sense of humor. She actually encouraged me to go back to school and finish earning my degree. I wish her the best.

Florida Wins! I can't wait to go back to Winn-Dixie

On Saturday, my dad and I went to the grocery store to prepare for a family get-together later that day. While waiting in line, I over heard the lady in front of me talking to one of the workers. They were predicting a match-up between LSU and Florida with LSU winning. Well, since I am probably the only one in Louisiana that can't stand LSU and since I am married to a Gators fan, I, of course, had to tell them that they were wrong. (Hey, I haven't blogged in a while and I had to get my controversy fix somewhere!)

All of a sudden, all conversation stopped. I swear you could hear a pin drop and I think, out of the corner of my eye, I saw my dad try to dig through the tile in the floor. The lady says, "Honey, you are in the wrong part of the world." To which I wanted to reply, "Duh!" What I did say was that I think LSU is too cocky and would love to see them lose. When the woman was leaving she said, "Sorry that your weekend is going to be rotten 'cause LSU is going to win." Well, as it turned out, not only did I have a good weekend, but I just had a really good Monday evening. Ha! Ha! Ha!

I can't wait to go back to Winn Dixie now. I love to see LSU fans sad.

Slowly, slowly I awaken

Hello again. *yawn* It's been way, way too long since I have written. Life down here is starting to return to a new normal. My cousin, Shannon, got her carpet Saturday and is finally moving her family back into their house. Her house is looking great.

It also looks like my aunt and grandmother are going to be buying a new house in a couple of weeks. Right now they are living in a FEMA trailer on my side yard. Of course, it only took 7 months for them to get into it. It sat on my property for 6 weeks while we waited for electricity.

I think part of the reason that I didn't want to blog for a while is that everywhere I looked there was nothing but frustration. Of course, it just strengthened my resolve to never, ever, ever depend on the federal government for any timely help and assistance. It is the most ineffectual entity in existence and I challenge anyone to dispute that! Anyone who thinks that the government can do anything better than the private sector should come down and wait for a FEMA trailer (the military is the only exception that I can think of now).

Much of these last 7 months have been like beating my head against a brick wall. Nothing down here has changed and I seriously doubt that it ever will. The political culture of Louisiana is just that - a culture. And I don't think the majority of people here want it to change. It is almost like they are proud of the corruption and status quo. The sad thing is that the people who are really hurt by this are the ones who truly want change. See - beating my head against a wall.

So, instead of focusing on things that I wish would change, I am going to keep my blood pressure down and write about the positive things that are going on or funny news items - anything to keep blogging.

New Orleans in New York

Well, sort of.

The Krewe of Orpheus will show the world that the Spirit of New Orleans is alive and well this Thanksgiving.
Members of Orpheus have agreed to wear authentic Mardi Gras Krewe costumes in the legendary Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. They will ride on the Big Apple float while other costumed members in costume walk alongside the float followed by Orpheus lieutenants on horseback, leading the way for the LSU Marching Band.

Orpheus participating in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade is such sign of hope that New Orleans needs right now. It is a sign not only to the rest of the country, but to native New Orleanians that New Orleans and the Gulf Coast WILL survive and come back stronger and better. I can't wait to see it and I'm sure I won't be the only one shedding a few tears. (Of course, those tears come really easily these days.)

Update: For all of my friends outside of New Orleans, here is a brief explanation. Orpheus is a Mardi Gras krewe. Each parade during the Mardi Gras season is actually organized by different "krewes", or social organizations. Each "krewe" has officers or lieutenants as well as its royal court that presides over that parade that year. Members of the "krewe" ride on the floats during the parade. Over the last few years, Orpheus' membership has grown substantially making it one of the largest krewes in the city.

All I want for Christmas...

Last night we had our first visit from the tooth fairy. Jacob lost his two bottom teeth. One of them was literally lost! Jim noticed it was gone while giving Jacob a bath last night. Since we didn't want to risk losing the other one, Jim pulled the other tooth out. Jacob was so excited. He has been waiting for this ever since he first heard about the tooth fairy.

So, what did the tooth fairy bring? A Canadian quarter and a Swiss Franc. We have an international tooth fairy. With the money that some tooth fairies bring, ours just couldn't and didn't want to compete. Now we get to avoid those nasty, "I have a cheap tooth fairy!" moments.

Awesome Hurricane Katrina video

A fellow New Orleans blogger, Laura from Pursuing Holiness and who also writes for Dummocrats has a great and powerful video of the damage from Hurricane Katrina. It is a must see even if you have never been to New Orleans. Thanks for sharing it Laura.

What cards!

A few weeks ago, I posted about the advertisers "stealing" October after Katrina "stole" September. Well, I had to laugh when I opened my mailbox and found this card from my cousin Amy. Inside she wrote:

Dear Dana,
Just wanted to wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas and a Happy Holiday Season!

P.S. Where has the time gone? I barely remember Halloween or Thanksgiving!!

Then yesterday, I found another Christmas card in my mailbox. This one was from my Aunt Adrienne. Now I know where Amy and Chad get their sense of humor!

I feel so loved.

Happy Halloween!

The power of blogs

I am still amazed at the power of this simple, grassroots tool to shape this country.

Miers withdraws nomination

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush's nominee for the
U.S. Supreme Court, White House counsel Harriet Miers, abruptly withdrew from consideration on Thursday after fierce criticism from the right and the left about her credentials for the lifetime job.

If you have spent any amount of time navigating around the political blogs lately, you can't have ignored the uproar about Miers' nomination. I'll admit that I know very little about her, but because many bloggers whose opinions I respect have voiced their opposition, I am happy with her decision to withdraw. This has definitely been an interesting process to watch.

As if we need another reason to hate Blanco

Pardon the harshness of my language, but Blanco is an @#$# idiot. Everyday, I lose more and more respect for the woman. She has no place in any leadership role. We are so in trouble.


Hattip: Louisiana Libertarian

Three years ago today

My husband and I welcomed our little girl into the world. I can't believe that it has been three years already. It seems like only yesterday that I still mourning my miscarriages and feeling like I would never have a second child. Sometimes I look at her and think, "Where did you come from?" I am truly blessed with both of my children. And as we celebrate Georgie's birth today, I can't help but stop and tell God Thank you.