That I'm even bothering to try to accommodate a schedule change in "Idol's" Season 10, years after having kicked a serious "Survivor" addiction, suggests there's something more than habit at work here.
Not just for me: The ratings may have declined, the audience may have aged - advertisers can't be happy, but for the rest of us, it beats dying - and recent winners may be utterly forgettable, but it's 2011 and "American Idol" is somehow still No. 1.
So maybe it's time to stop asking if this show can be saved and ask instead: What's it going to take to kill the sucker?
And while we're at it, some other "Idol" questions:
Simon Who? I've heard from some of you who still mourn the loss of Simon Cowell - are those promos for "The X Factor" not enough? - but I'm wondering which Simon you miss.
Is it the fearless and funny bloke from the show's earlier seasons who tried to teach America's pampered princes and princesses that self-esteem wasn't the same as talent?
Or is it the increasingly moody guy of the past few, who was recycling his put-downs and seemed less interested in deflating contestants' egos than in cutting Ryan's down to size? (Not that that couldn't be a full-time job in itself.)
Who let the Dawg out? Guess it's only natural that sole survivor judge Randy Jackson would be trying to fill Simon's shoes (though, blessedly, not his T-shirts). But when I heard him say last week, "If I'm being honest . . . " I thought he'd taken the transformation as far as he could.
Throw in a couple of Magic Mountain references and a Madonna-like British accent, and he might as well hire himself out as a Simon impersonator. Perhaps on a cruise ship to nowhere.
Could "Idol" production values be peaking too soon? Before Adam Lambert came along, I'm not even sure the show had a budget for dry ice, but now if it's not fog, it's gospel choirs accompanying singers whose voices - and names - we're still getting to know.
