Hello,

With news coming out about new music by Adam Lambert (yawn!), Kris Allen (double yawn!) and threatened music by Danny Gokey there is a ray of sunshine. Allison Iraheta has the first 2:20 available of her new song to listen to. Check it out here: http://www.popeater.com/2009/10/05/exclusive-allison-irahetas-friday-ill-be-over-u-premiere/ "Friday I'll Be Over You" is a pretty cool song. It's mostly a rock song, but it does have a bit of that modern pop sheen on it. Allison I wish for you a long and a fantastic career. Alexis Grace and Megan Joy (or whatever you are going by this week) I'd like to hear some new music from you as well.

Fireflight's second CD "Unbreakable" is now playing on my Rhapsody account. This is a pretty good CD, definitely worth your hard earned money. The first song is the best song. That song "Unbreakable"" rawks! The other songs continue the kick butt theme. They remind me a lot of Paramore but aren't as good as Paramore. Not to take anything away from Fireflight, they are a good band as well. Their first CD, "The Healing of Harms" reminds me of Lacuna Coil. They also have an acoustic CD available, it's titled "Unbroken and Unplugged".

MLB playoffs start today with Detroit going into Minnesota to play the Twins for the right to play New York in the ALDS. Today's game is officially not a playoff game. However who wins advances and whoever loses goes home. (I realized again that's why March Madness is great, you lose once and your out. In MLB's extended series you can have up to 3 bad games and still win the series.) I'm cheering for three teams: LA, Boston and whoever plays New York. I wouldn't be surprised if LA gets swept right out of the playoffs. I anticipate Boston getting past the Angels. Boston has won 10 straight playoff games against the Angels. Colorado battling Philadelphia should be a good series. Although it's the last thing I want to see I think the Yankees might win the whole thing this season. In fact I'm going to curse the Yankees by predicting they win the World Series.

Speaking of sports: tonight ESPN starts 30 for 30, they gave free reign to 30 directors to make films about 30 classic sports events. Here's a preview:

The first 30 for 30 episode is about the Edmonton Oilers trading away perhaps the greatest player in hockey, Wayne Gretzky, to the Los Angeles Kings. That show premieres tonight. I'm not a big hockey fan but the preview makes the show look interesting.

I continue reading through the excellent "Where Men Win Glory: The Odyssey of Pat Tillman". I just read the part where Pat Tillman was killed by friendly fire. This is a person who turned down a $3.6 million contract with the Arizona Cardinals to fight for his country following 9/11. Pat Tillman was killed fighting for the country he loved while not necessarily agreeing with the President at the time. He was killed in a friendly fire incident, one of many in the Irag/Afghnistan wars. (The Defense Secretary at the time, Donald Rumsfield, insisted on the military accomplishing "metrics". This corporate America approach caused bad decisions to be made. That put these American soldiers in even more dangerous situations so that the troops on the ground could reach arbitrary goals. When we have the lives of people on the line, shouldn't we be more concerned about their safety than hitting metrics?)

Quoting from Jon Krakauer's excellent book about the death of Tillman, "Concurrent with the muzzle flash, three .223 caliber bullets pierced the right side of his forehead just below the rim of his helmet, killing him instantly". Thus the death of an American hero! Thanks Pat Tillman for all your sacrifices for this country, it's people like you that make my life so great. Thanks also to his parents for raising such an outstanding man and for his wife Marie for letting him follow his conscience. I'm just overwhelmed by the death and sacrifice of Tillman and his family.

Here's a great article from espn.com about this incident: http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://espn.go.com/i/eticket/20060719/photo/eticket_22_712.jpg&imgrefurl=http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/eticket/story%3Fpage%3Dtillmanpart1&usg=__JPAN_8CdKV-q8cFjjA45PPKY54I=&h=482&w=712&sz=53&hl=en&start=13&um=1&tbnid=lcGKppawNb69aM:&tbnh=95&tbnw=140&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dmarie%2Btillman%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DX%26um%3D1

As always thank a veteran, themusicaddict