Well shiver me timbers! After a month and a half of people squealing in rage, sadness, and delight, of Simon being a jerk and Randy hooting and braying and Kara saying nonsense nothings, we are done with Idol auditions.

Congratulations, everyone. It's been a long and terrible road. There were fires on the ridges and deranged chanting. Every year we slog through this bitter, belching morass of awfulness and just as we can see a light, a clearing at the other end of the swap, we always think "This is it, it's too much, it's too much." We won't do this again, we won't tread this way again. But then that light, that tantalizing glow. Of having gone through the muck, of having weathered the pain and thus reaping an even greater reward. Of course the clearing out there, the one we've already placed one doomed foot in, comes freighted with its own perils and miseries. But nothing is as bad as what lays behind us, dead and buried. Long gone, long gone.

Last night was basically just picking the remaining Top 24. Which means there was much crying and, in the end, horrible awkward hobo dancing (see video below). Who got through? Did your favorites go through? Did you have favorites? Be honest. You had favorites. You did. You liked someone. You were sitting in a tree and you were eff you see kay eye en gee ing someone, weren't you? That's OK. Everyone does it. It's perfectly natural. That's the whole point. I had favorites. Was there a Melinda Dandy Doolittle this year to fill my heart with manic joy? No. But there are people in the Top 24 that I enjoy. And others I do not.

Ashley Rodriguez is from Boston, so theah ya go, kid. Plus she can sing like a pack of songbirds in the rafters of the Mormon Tabernacle. (Is the Tabernacle a place? Is that where the Choir lives? Or do they live in space with Joseph Smith?)

Crystal Bowersox has the best name since Amethyst Boomerknickers and has a nice sorta folksy wail that ought to provide nice, shivery slow moments. Yes, she has a bad case of Brown Toof, but as we discussed yesterday, that's curable. Hopefully she's working on it right now. Go, Blunderstockings, go!

I've a funny feeling about Alex Lambert and Tim Urban, because they have the last names of other famous singerz (one of whom was on Idol — circles!), and because they'll likely be the beat-beat heartthrobs for the enormous and undeniable Tweengirl voting bloc. Though they could cancel each other out. Sister will fight against sister to elect their favorite shag-haired moppet to the office of President of Being Famous For a Few Weeks In May, and thus neither will win.

Shirtless Casey James could become a slightly-less-awful Ace Young, all cheesy attractiveness and diminishing star presence. He might also be something of a Michael Johns, a bit too grown-uppedly rugged and Handsome for, again, that all-powerful Screamcreature teen voting bloc. Perhaps the Pinot-Slurping Horny Mom bloc will keep him in the game, though.

John Park, Shania Twain's magnificent magic Asian, and Andrew Garcia, our growly Egghead Latino and heir to the bespectacled Danny Gokey throne (though farrrrr less annoying than the Gokes), will be the real Singers of the boys, I suspect. Whether John Park can transcend the Anoop collegeboy a cappella nerd ghetto will be his big story arc. And I've said it a million times before, but I really think Garcia will be on this show until May.

Holy God is Haeley Vaughn going to get annoying. Remember Paris Bennett? Remember how annoying she was? Well, imagine Paris Bennett singing country music. Like pop-y, Swiftian country music. It's terribly grating already, and we really haven't even begun. I feel like Vaughn had a strange sort of momentum early on, but maybe lost it after we saw her unbearably wretched final performance at Hollywood Week? But who knows. The whole nation is just going fucking nuts making out with Taylor Swift under the high school bleachers of their minds, so maybe Vaughn will sell like hotcakes. Really warbly, cloying hotcakes.

Katie Stevens is that kiddie powervoice from Connecticut who is, yes, a terrifically good singer, but... I don't see much personality there. What I do see I find a bit unpleasant. There's something sort of unexpectedly sharp about her. She's not the gooey, bubbly teen girl you usually see on this show. I know this sounds horrible to say about a teenage girl, but... she seems a little too confident! She acts like a pro or something, and that's, well, it's kind of not endearing. Not endearing in the way that kids need to be to advance the iron wheels of their vocal Wehrmacht across these Idollic fields.

Other than that? I don't know. There's a bunch of random pretty girls, as always. There's that one weird chick who died her hair gray, of all colors. This Paige Miles is intriguing, mostly because we saw the judges going a bit apeshit over her, but didn't really hear her sing. So! She could be a pleasant surprise. Or just another random nobody. That weird Tyler Grady character, the one who everyone calls '70s-esque because he wears boot-cut jeans and has shaggy hair I guess, is probably going to flame out in the vocals department early on, but the fans could rally around him like a Sanjaya or John Stevens before him. He's got pizazz on camera or something, so it could play well.

Oh, hey. Let's talk about something. Angela Martin. She's the nice lady who's got a daughter with some kind of developmental problem and a mother who's gone missing (though they didn't mention that sad fact on the show... maybe she wasn't missing yet?) Well everyone loved her and felt bad for her and this was her third time on the show (and her last opportunity to do so because of the age cut-off), but... she didn't make it through. In a prime example of Kara DioGuardiablo being the most annoying fart-faced idiot on the planet, she was all "Angela, I'm gonna come sit next to you." And then she walked over there and made Angela sit on the arm rest while Kara sat fully in the chair. It was just... Kara, stop. Just stop it. Don't treat the woman like a child and just tell her the hard truth. Everyone was all "You're so good, keep pursuing this," etc. etc. Hopefully some go-getting record exec will see her and hear her sing and decide to give her a call, but... Who knows. Who really knows. Kara said "I'll remember you... forever." Oh you'll remember her? Forever?? How nice! How about you maybe call her once this season has wrapped and actually help her do something, Kara? Instead of mugging to the camera to show America how warm and kind you are, in a sad attempt to make America love you. Because America doesn't like you, Kara. You're an awful interloper. "Get out of the chair sweetie. You're talking to a celebrity now." BAH. Awful.

OMG, that's it. I'm done with this recap. No more. NO MORE AUDITIONS, guys. It's all over. Many people are sad, some people are probably happy.

Last night, after the last person had received word of their fate, Ryan started cleaning up. Throwing out water bottles, putting chairs back in storage closets, turning off lights. But before he trudged up to the booth to turn off the still-buzzing spot, he stood at the lip of the stage, basking in that warm, warm glow. Here we go, he thought. Another year. The room was quiet. No more tears or shrieks of joys. Just the HVAC whirring high up in the flys, and the sound of his own weary breath. He almost turned to leave, but then stopped himself. He looked at that pool of light, still and hot on the floor, waiting. He laughed to himself. He stepped back into it. He took a deep breath. He thought about all the voices, all the tears and croaks and worry and wonder that had sputtered and died and lived on this stage. Just in the last week, even. He thought about the weight of all of it and, with a strange swell in his heart, just for the hell of it, he began to dance.