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While this just-discovered video of American Idol judge and serial technical difficulty victim Paula Abdul giving an interview to a Fox Dallas affiliate's morning show is decidedly lighter on the slurry, incoherent, and fidgety delights that made her recent Seattle and San Francisco appearances instant classics of the "What the hell is she on?" genre, it does have a special moment in which Abdul closes her eyes for a full six seconds, prompting her concerned inquisitor to ask the subject if she's a little "sleepy." At the conclusion of the interview, the nodding-off footage is replayed and the matter is turned over for consideration by the local morning show tribunal, who after being informed that "the producers" cleared the interview with the explanation that Abdul was "tired," offer their opinions in between fits of uncomfortable laughter, ranging from "Wow...I've never been that tired! The last time I was that tired I was asleep!" to "Obviously, she was a little [finger quotes] 'out of it'" to "Did she have the flu or something maybe?" We commend "the producers" for authorizing the clip to air, allowing audiences to decide on their own if Abdul's unexpected power-nap was merely the product of junket exhaustion, or the sudden metabolizing of the Klonopin-and-wheatgrass smoothie with which the Idol judge begins each grueling day of publicity obligations.

You can watch the video here, at least until someone at Fox gets nervous and yanks it.