A Very Special AI Audition Recap

Yes it's true, I still think the auditions are asinine. That hasn't changed. But last night's episode was in San Diego. I can't resist.

To make this experience complete, start playing Buck-O-Nine's "My Town" on repeat while you're reading this.

Okay, so we start off the San Diego episode. San Diego, city of beaches, sun, bikinis, and palm trees. America's finest city! How does AI start it off? With a couple of old white guys who can't even complete a sentence. Maybe my impression of San Diego is all wrong. My friend Maja says San Diego is the most breast-obsessed city in the world. See Maja? Not breasts. Old white guys. Crazy Kiwi.

Oh, and there HAS to be a Sea World shot in every San Diego montage. Let me assure you, Sea World is BORING. It costs like five hundred dollars and there's hardly anything to do or see. Sure, there's "Shamu," but even that show sucks now. (Pssst, Shamu is long dead, those whales you see are impostors). We went on a couple free tickets last summer and, yup, it still stinks. If you're ever coming here for a visit, save your money. Go to the zoo instead. It's not worth shelling out that much money just to watch a big whale splash shit. Seriously.

The big ol' cattle call auditions are at Qualcomm stadium (AKA "The Q"), which was more fun when it was called "The Murph." It used to be the home of the Chargers and the Padres, until the Pads conned the city into building a big-ass, expensive stadium just for them downtown. Downtown? Where the traffic and parking were already hellish? Yes, that downtown. Now the Chargers are pouting because they want their own over-priced, inconvenient stadium. Man, to beat the Padres' stadium it'd have to be, like, suspended three feet above the water in the bay or something. Or in Arizona. A side note: my husband and I were at the new stadium and, from our seats, we were able to count no fewer than one hundred and eighty-two ads visible without standing up or turning around. Good lord!

ANYWAY, so the actual auditions are clearly not at the Q. There is nothing luxe about the Q. It's a gigantic concrete bowl in a swampy river valley. It's like they're not even pretending that the cattle call auditions have anything to do with who gets through. Yes, I'm joining in on the ringer suspicions.

So the auditions start out with Paris Hilton, who actually gets through. Didn't we have some sort of national referendum on Paris Hilton? Aren't we done with her? We all like Nicole Ritchie now, right? She has a baby. A baby beats a wonky eye and tons of STD's.

Then we get Perrie. Perrie's a single dad who lost his kid's mom to, what sounds like, gang violence. Sad. :-( What's even sadder? He's going to "make his life better" by leaving him and pursuing his dream in Hollywood. I think he'd rather have his only parent with him, but what do I know? I'm just a kid who grew up with a single parent and I would have been devastated if my mom would have gone off and left me for weeks to do her own thing.

*edited to change the daughter to a son. Go figure, that was the prettiest, highest-voiced little boy I've seen in a long time*

So Perrie gets through because he's a hot single dad who can kind of sing. On the plus side, he has the cutest kid in the entire world.

Hey! There are still people who are fans of Mariah? Wow, good for her.

So, they just said that the judges are at the Rancho Bernardo Inn. Well, that's at least thirty minutes from the Q, and more than 45 minutes from the beaches they keep showing you. Actually, they keep showing you beaches in Coronado, which is not really San Diego -- almost AI! The Rancho Bernardo Inn is just down the street from my kid's pediatrician, in case you were wondering.

I LOVE Monique and her main gay, whatshisname. They'd been through "so much" to get there. You're telling me, they had to come up through traffic on I-15 to get there. *shudder*

Let's not forget weird Samantha and her weirder sister. Sam is totally a ringer, but I am eternally grateful for them being dumb brunettes. It gives us blonds a break. Sam has a weird botox look, but she still can move her eyebrows and stuff. You have to see it to believe it. It's like she goes through life surprised, but someone told her moving her face gives her totally un-awesome wrinkles, so she tries not to show it.

Freaky mama's-boy Blake does not get through, again. Raise your hand if you got a Bates Motel feeling from mom. The good news is girls, I bet he's single!

Finally, I have to mention faux-hippie Alberto Hurtado. I SWEAR I went to high school with this guy. He was a total smart ass attention whore, and he was totally awesome. Not the best actor ever, but fun to have around. Armando? Is that you? Remind me to get my husband to look at the tape and see what he thinks. If it's not him, he has a doppelganger here in San Diego. Awesome.

So a bunch of people get through, including a kid with a paralyzed vocal chord. (Yikes). I think AI is making a valiant effort to cut off the VFTW vote, but their baser motives will come through. Some dumb idiot no-talents will make it through to the top 24, they won't be able to resist. Mark my words. My God, Taylor Hicks WON! Do you need any more evidence than that?

I'll leave you with this: if you haven't yet seen pictures of Clay Aiken in Spamalot, I command you to Google that shit right now. Comedy!