over it

Well, my initial sadness over Amanda's departure has subsided a bit.

Sure, she had great stage presence, but the truth is she would have been another Taylor Hicks had she won. Great at cover songs within a specific genre, but lousy on her own.

Still, I liked her, namely because she had that no-prior-experience, big-break feel that's becoming a thing of the past on AI. She literally was someone with a real job and a dream...hoping to use this show to make it happen.

I mean, even Kristy Lee had a recording contract...and look at what she's given us so far. Shudder.

I never saw Amanda winning the whole thing, but I did expect her to go on the AI tour. I really do think her spot as the first singer Tuesday aided in a perhaps premature departure. Curse of the first...thanks, anonymous commenter, for pointing out my earlier error.

Amanda spoke to reporters today, and seemed pretty grounded and realistic about her future chances of stardom. Here's something she said in this interview:

"Hopefully I created enough attention that somebody wants to pick me up and let me do something with music. But chances are they won't and I might end up right back where I started. I'll probably give it a good six months or so and beat the pavement. If this ends up being my 15 minutes of fame I will gracefully bow out and move on to do something different. This will not be the unicorn I will chase for the rest of my life."

Good answer, right?