What's the matter -- nobody but Steven Tyler celebrates St. Patrick's day? Jennifer must have some sort of green outfit she could wear.

But no: Other than Steven's little green necklace, it's as if there's no holiday. And that's not the only thing that went wrong.

First the good news: the Born to Be Wild/ Baby I Was Born This Way medley could have been awful, but it was really cool. The "field trip" to the Ford music video studio was shameless. The "something about you" clips were funny,a nd I'm glad to hear that Paul has a 14-year-old wiener dog that smells bad.Read more »

I was out at the SPJ FOI Awards event early in the evening, so I missed the first few performances, but no worries: Vivian and Michael were taking excellent notes and filled me in. And the best stuff came at the end anyway.

First: What was UP with J-Lo's hair? I can't find any pix on the web (Idol is insanely protective of its imagery) but trust me: She looked like something out of the Lion King. And the leopard-print dress didn't help much. It's a jungle out there, Jennifer. Grrr.Read more »

How long does it take to tell 10 contestants that they're in and 14 that they might have to go home? Particularly when there are no real surprises and pretty much everyone knows what's going to happen? Wait! I just did it! About 11 seconds!Read more »

Not as great a night for the women, I have to say. The guys pretty much blew everyone away, but I only saw one Idol-class performance from the women, and I saw a lot of pretty weak stuff. The good news: Pia Toscano. The last one on stage, after the final commercial, just when I was trying to hustle the kids off to bed, and we just had to sit down and shut up and listen. Read more »

I'm not taking it all back (yet) cuz I still think all the tears and drama are stupid, but Ihave to say: the guys brought it last night. Not a single contestant truly sucked (except Jordan, who almost truly sucked, but he's a jerk anyway). Some were absolutely spectacular. Doing Screamin' Jay Hawkins on Idol is nuts, so much could go wrong -- but Casey Abrams pulled of "I Put A Spell On You" in a way that seemed almost impossibly brilliant. Read more »

Ok, American Idol. I sat through four hours this week. And yeah, Randy is Randy and Steven Tyler is a rock god and J-Lo is so pretty it makes my teeth hurt, but:

I miss Simon. Because everytime somebody really mangled a song, he'd remind them that "this is a singing contest."Read more »