Alexis Cohen (a.k.a. "Glitter Girl") twice appeared on American Idol. In season 7, Alexis first appeared. Outside the audition room, Alexis ranted for a while, spewing a string of profanities combined with multiple confused cliches and mixed metaphors. In season 8, Alexis reappeared with a new attitude, promising that she would behave. After her audition, she ended up giving the judges the double-finger before leaving.

Alexis was a great Idle Idol. Even while ranting and raving, she seemed to be upbeat about the whole thing. She was working on stand-up comedy and had even posted a MySpace video just the day before her death. If you are not allergic to adult language, you can watch the Alexis Cohen MySpace video.

Thanks, Alexis, for the fun times in both seasons.

During her audition, Paula mentioned that she was a huge fan of Paula Abdul's. People.com reports that Goodspeed had changed her name from Sandra to Paula. Paula had drawn life-size pictures of Paula Abdul. Media outlets have been painting Goodspeed as a stalker, noting that Goodspeed had sent dozens and dozens of letters to Paula, shown up unexpectedly, and sent flowers to Abdul the week before under Abdul's boyfriend's name. Family members have insisted that she was just a big fan and not much more.

Idle Idols appreciates Paula's audition and wishes she had stuck around to share more of herself with the world. Our hearts and prayers go out to Paula's family.

American Idol will return for its eighth season on January 13 and 14 from 8:00 – 10:00 pm EST each night on Fox, of course.

Fox made this announcement last week:

Get ready for the most anticipated season premiere of the year! AMERICAN IDOL, television’s No. 1 show, returns for Season Eight with a two-night, four-hour premiere event Tuesday and Wednesday, January 13 and 14 at 8/7c, only on FOX.

Can't wait? Get a glimpse of what's to come by looking at funny American Idol Season 8 pictures!

Mark your calendars for January 15, 2008. The 2-night American Idol premiere beings at 8:00 EST and continues the following night at the same time. The two episodes combine for four hours of Idol fun!

Idle Idols is helping you keep track with a countdown of how many days are left until the American Idol premiere. In the meantime, check out the American Idol 7 wacky audition pictures.

Your chance is coming to your region soon! American Idol's official website has posted the audition venues and schedule:

1. July 30, 2007 – San Diego, CA
2. August 6, 2007 – Dallas, TX
3. August 10, 2007 – Omaha, NE
4. August 14, 2007 – Atlanta, GA
5. August 18, 2007 – Charleston, SC
6. August 22, 2007 – Miami, FL
7. August 27, 2007 – Philadelphia, PA

So get your most eye-catching outfit and get ready to sing your heart (or appendix) out in front of the judges!

Civil litigator Danielle Caminiti-Aidala feels that American Idol could sue Stern and VFTW for trying to subvert the Idol voting process. She claims that American Idol Productions has a case because "the Howard Sterns of the world and the Vote for the Worst dot coms of the world are intentionally interfering with malicious intent to sabotage American Idol."

Bill O'Reilly doesn't like the whole idea behind Howard Stern's campaign, but he debates that Caminiti-Aidala's entire argument crumbles because American Idol continues to bring in millions of viewers and enjoys plenty of success. Danielle Aidala counters, "That's not the will of the people because a lot of the people are under Howard Stern's spell, so to speak."

Howard Stern truly does have malicious reasons for asking his listeners to vote for the worst — He thinks that this will cause the show to be canceled if a lousy singer wins the contest.

Vote for the Worst, on the other hand, realizes that American Idol is a show that claims to look for original acts while only passing through the same old cookie-cutter singers that we've seen in all the other seasons, with a few exceptions. VFTW also knows that what makes entertaining television is watching a lousy singer struggle time and time again, week after week . . . and watching the judges' reactions as these horrible acts are kept in the contest. Howard Stern wants the show to be canceled, but VFTW wants American Idol to continue strong in its ratings.

Watch Bill O'Reilly discuss the issue with Danielle Caminiti-Aidala:

In this author's opinion, any lawsuits here are simply ridiculous and should immediately be thrown out as frivolous. American Idol has chosen to allow telephone voting by viewers, and nowhere does it say that you have to vote for the best performer. You simply have to vote for the contestant you want to stay. It is also difficult to quantify the effect that Howard Stern and VFTW have on the voting, both collectively and (especially) individually. If American Idol Productions doesn't like the public maliciously voting for Sanjaya, that's too bad — they are the ones who selected him and placed him in the finals for the public to vote on in the first place. The public has no say on which contestants initially make it through to the voting stage of American Idol. With the huge response to American Idol audition calls, is it really true that none of the other contestants were as good as Sanjaya?

Furthermore, it seems obvious that American Idol is benefiting from this entire movement. Howard Stern listeners and VFTW visitors who would never watch American Idol now have a reason to watch and passionately root for a contestant. Previously apathetic Idol viewers now watch more passionately as they gasp when Sanjaya stays in for yet another week. And, in the end, Sanjaya will not win the ultimate prize. It's very difficult to alter a vote for just two or three contestants when millions of votes are placed each week. Even if American Idol draws any attention to this issue, it will be purely for the media attention. Remember, any media is good media.

Not only has Sanjaya made it as an American Idol finalist, but as of this posting, Bodog has Sanjaya with the third-best odds (5/2) of the remaining nine contestants. Who knows — maybe in two years, Sanjaya will be winning an Academy Award, just like Jennifer Hudson!

As if Arrested Development weren't a great enough show already, there's just one more reason to tune in!

PS: If you're thinking about watching the Olympics opening ceremonies, make sure you record Arrested Development, as they are on at the same time. Thanks a lot, Fox!