Pia Toscano: Fifth Girl in a Row Voted Off American Idol

Pia Toscano was the fifth straight female singer sent home, by American Idol voters in Season 10. The females outnumbered the male singers 7-6, when the field was pared down to 13 contestants.

Now the males outnumber the females 6-2, as they go into the Final 8 competition next week.  It looks like Naimi Adedapo and Thia Meghia were right, when they said that the younger girls watching the show are voting for the male singers, giving them an advantage this season.

America definitely voted wrong on Wednesday night, as they sent home the wrong singer. I thought it was time for Paul McDonald or Stefano Langone to go home. It isn’t that they didn’t sing well. It is just that someone had to go home and they were the most likely to go home.

It may be time to give the judges a say, in who gets voted as the American Idol. There needs to be a combination of fan voting and judge voting, to make sure the best singer is more likely to be voted in.

The way it is now, it is more of a popularity contest than a singing contest. Nobody can tell me that Pia Toscano was the ninth best singer in this year’s competition.

It wouldn’t surprise me to see Haley Reinhart or Lauren Alaina Suddeth sent home next week, since it seems like the female voters are mostly voting for the male singers.

This is just my opinion, but I believe Scotty McCreery is the leading vote getter. The fact that Jacob Lusk was in the bottom three tells me, that unless he makes a strong comeback, he won’t be in the final two on Finale Night next month.

America got it wrong during the Wednesday night vote. We can only hope America does better next week or we may continue to send the wrong singers home week after week.

The following poll lists the remaining eight contestants giving voters a chance to vote for the best singer remaining:

(Voters can vote more than once for the best singer)

Extreme Couponing: Couponer Pays $8.27 on $684.56 Grocery Bill

This grocery bill receipt added up to $676.29 before subtracting coupons. After coupons were subtracted the couponer paid a total of $8.27.

 

Extreme Couponing debuted on TLC last night and will be seen on Wednesdays, at 9PM EDT and 8PMCDT.

The show follows the couponer being featured in the episode, from clipping out the coupons, then follows them as they shop and then to the checkout register.

Some of the couponers actually pay websites, to send them coupons in bulk. One couponer last night was shown going from door to door of neighbors and businesses, to pick up coupons friends had saved for them.

Another coupon takes her family dumpster diving to find coupons. The couponers featured on the show are also hoarders.

One man had 1,000 bottles of body wash stocked in his garage. The same man bought 300 toothbrushes, while shown shopping in the episode last night. He also almost filled up a shopping cart with deodorant.

When he went to the grocery store, he had $4,000 of cereal he had pre-ordered waiting for him. The cereal only cost him $150. To his credit, he did give some of the cereal to a local food bank.

The clerks at the checkout line have to dread seeing a couponer headed toward their lane. One lady couponer was shown checking out, when a serious problem arose. She had exceeded the 1,000 items allowed on one ticket.

The clerk had her break up her order, which freaked out the couponer. She seemed to lose track of which coupons, went with which product, but it ended well for her.

When shopping, the couponers have notebooks telling them which products, they have coupons for. It tickled me when one kid picked up a box of cereal, with Spiderman on it but the couponing mom told him, that she didn’t have a coupon for that item.

The most exciting part of the shopping trip for couponers, is totaling up the damage, then watch the computer screen, as the coupons are subtracted, from the original price. Even the couponers, start to worry when seeing the total price of the groceries. If they paid attention to details, they still walk away with huge savings.

By then a crowd of people, including store employees and customers, have gathered to see how much money the couponer has saved.

I am not sure this much attention, being paid to the extreme couponers, is good for them and other couponers.

The coupons don’t hurt the grocery stores since they are reimbursed for the coupons, but the manufacturers could cut way back on coupons being offered if too many customers start using coupons.

However, the couponers are a disruption to the routine at a grocery store, with one cashier tied up for an extremely long time, while checking a couponer with between 500 and 1,000 separate items. In one scene from the show several grocery store employees were shown pushing shopping carts toward the checkout lane.

An average shopper, doesn’t have the storage space to be an extreme couponer, but they still could use coupons to save money on a much smaller scale. For instance they could buy $200 for less than $10 if they have enough coupons.

The key is to have enough coupons, go on double or triple coupon days which results in receiving many products free.

To watch some of the extreme couponers in action (video will start automatically):

http://tlc.howstuffworks.com/tv/extreme-couponing