李宇春

I have now spent until 4am Shanghai time reading about the Chinese "American Idol" winner 李宇春. She's fascinating!

Chinese Idol

China held its own "American Idol" recently, but only for women. The winner is a very tomboy-ish girl with a low voice. Her singing skills are so-so, but she is very cool on stage and dances well.



It's odd that in China, a relatively conservative culture, a girl who has a so-so voice and looks like a man would win. The third-place is a beautiful girl with an absolutely phenomenal voice:





Consensus is that 李宇春 won because many teenybopper girls treat her as a boy and have crushes on her, so they voted for her.

I like her stage presence and confidence. I read an interview with her. She has a natural performer ability, and onstage she becomes a different person -- outgoing, basically a rock star personality. This caused her to become an idol in her middle school. When she got to college, she fell behind her peers due to lack of musical training. After a pivotal conversation with a teacher, so she decided "Screw it" and began participating in tons of contests even though she didn't place.

Through interviews, you can tell that she has an attitude of "I'll do what I please". It's the same as J. Lo had about her ass, and Angelina Jolie has about everything. It's very winning. I like it.

Murder mystery weekend

Last night, billionaire Brighton Standish was discovered murdered in his estate. Police officer Columbo quarantined twelve members of the Standish estate for questioning. Whodunnit?



Was the murder committed by the shoe closet maid, Monique, whose modeling dreams were crushed when Standish blackmailed her with a few nude poolside photos?



Standish just fired his personal trainer Tyne last week for designing a faulty exercise program -- was she out for revenge? He forced his cowboy business partner to sell out half of the Beef-Ka-Balls restaurant chain -- did he resent it enough to kill?



His butler is 99 years old but wields a hefty silver tray! His wife was just back from a gala, driven by the large-assed chauffeur. And there's always the pool boy... They all wore smiles when they found that Standish was out of the picture.



After learning about each other and discovering the motives ...



clues were uncovered...



dinner was served...



and love was in the air.



Three teams raced against each other to find the culprit.


After a restful night's sleep, the teams discussed their suspicions over waffles and fruit.



and the guilty party was taken away in handcuffs, restoring peace and justice to the land.



(Compliments to Madison Street Inn.)

facial

Today I got a facial from Destino Spa.



Getting a facial has some similarities to going to the dentist. They examine your face under a bright light. They poke you with sharp metallic objects in a painful process. They ask about your daily treatment, and then talk about the terrible things that will befall you (teeth falling out, wrinkles) if you don't go through a particular maintaineance routine every day (brush and floss, cleanse and moisturize).

With a facial, there's also the lavendar / eucalyptus aromas, the hydrating face masks, and the neck massage.

Destino is voted best spa in the South Bay, with good cause. Julie the facialist added in steps as necessary, and didn't push products on me.

My face is smooth now and porcelain!

Next Saturday I am going back to get my eyelashes curled. It's my first time! Apparently it's like getting a perm, but for your eyelashes.