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American Idol’s most recently eliminated contestants, Lil Rounds and Anoop Desai, have been talking a lot about what their life is like now that their journey on the show is over. 
“It’s easier to go through it with someone else,” Desai said of the double elimination. “We can joke to each other. Neither of us is really wallowing all that much.”
Both Anoop and Lil talked about the harsh criticism they faced from the judges, particularly Simon Cowell.
“I didn’t think it was my worst performance,” said Anoop. “But you know, that’s the Simon Cowell that America expects. He’s very superlative driven. I wasn’t offended at all.”
“I kind of got to the point where I was like, ‘Okay, I don’t know if I can win with them,’” Lil said. “I can honestly say I went up there and gave it everything I had each time my foot touched that stage.” And what about all the talking back that Lil did? “I would not take that back,” she said. “It wasn’t to go toe-to-toe with the judges or get into a heated argument. I just wanted them to understand that I was being an artist. They kept saying, ‘Give me you,’ and I’m like, ‘But I am!’ It was kind of weird.”
Lil talked about how her stint on the show has changed her life with her husband and three children: “It really does blow my mind. I was displaced from my home when I first got to the show and now we’ve actually gotten a three-bedroom townhouse. American Idol has done what I knew it could do for me and my family, and that was really bring us back together and get us back in a home.”
Throughout the competition, I had always wondered if Anoop would go back to the University of North Carolina to finish his graduate degree if he got eliminated from the show (Carrie Underwood won the competition and still went back to finish her schooling). I was disappointed to learn that he has other plans in mind (although, I completely understand): “I plan on pursuing any record deal I can get. Right now that’s my no. 1 priority. My only priority. My wildest dream was that I would be a pop star. And thanks to this show, that dream is going to become a reality. I have faith in my own ambition.”
image © 2009 FOX BROADCASTING CR: Ray Mickshaw / FOX