Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Set your TiVo!


On Tuesday afternoon I went to a taping of the Martha Stewart show which will air tomorrow, Friday March 30. As many of you know, I LOVE to watch this show and I TiVo it every day. I will say I was a little disappointed because Martha starved us. I was asked to arrive by 12:30pm for a 2:00pm taping. I was thinking there would be some sustenance since we were going to be there for a LONG time. Well...not really...there was bottled water and plates of chocolate chip cookies. That was all the food we saw from 12:30pm to 3:15pm. So, I was hungry.

I must say that the crowd control was handled well though I did feel like I was being herded like cattle. At least they didn't brand us. So we were herded into a waiting room where they had the water and cookies and a few plasmas playing old episodes of Martha. We waited there for about 45 minutes where we had to fill out waivers and we were given our instructions by the warm up guy. We were told to turn off all electronics and we were also given instructions about how to clap...yes...we had to know the different hand signals for a standing ovation, medium applause, huge applause, an appropriate ooooooooooooh when necessary and finally an mmmmmmmmm for when there was something yummy being made.

After being in the waiting room, we were called to go to the studio. Each ticket had a different marking on it and this was how we were called. I was lucky enough to be blue highlighter which meant I was the second to be called. We got into the studio and it was freezing and really bright of course but it was perfect as it should be since it IS Martha. We got to listen to the warm up guy for another half hour or so. Whatever...nothing too exciting. Then we were ready for the show to start.

Zac Posen was on the show and he had a little spring fashion show which was nice. He's adorable but he's on fire. Then he baked a cheesecake with Martha....that I could smell and because I was STARVING....I was salivating like mad. The other 2 guests were some Iranian chick who went into space as a tourist. She went to the International Space Station to visit. She spoke about the experience that she paid a paltry sum of $20 million to enjoy. Finally, we had Chef Andre something or other...he was the chef at Lutece (used to be a very nice and famous french restaurant in NYC very often compared to Le Cirque) for 35 years. He and Martha made a lamb stew....yeah....with the aroma of this my stomach began to digest itself.

After the taping, the chef took some questions so I asked a question about making stew since my meat always seems to be tough...never gets really tender. He gave me a few tips. Said to make sure I always keep it in the gravy and don't allow it to dry out. He also said to always use shoulder meat. We'll see.

Georgia and I were seated in the 3rd row on the aisle. We are behind the seating on the floor and we are in the middle section. I'm wearing a green t and Georgia is wearing a grey blazer. I think we were caught cracking up on camera during the Zac Posen segment. This is the funny thing. I had just said something about one of the crew being pregnant to Georgia. There were a lot of pregnant women. So, after I said something, Georgia looked at her and looked at me and said, "Um, that's not pregnant....she's just really fat." Well, oops on my part...she really did look pregnant. So, that's why we were laughing.

Many times Martha gives out some really good stuff. I've seen her give away digital cameras, gift cards to various stores, books, etc. Well, we were told in the beginning that there were no giveaways at this show. Well, as we left the building, they were handing stuff out. I couldn't see what it was until I got up to the front. It was actually two things. One was a little bag of toiletries and samples of shampoos and other fun stuff. Not bad. Well, the other giveaway just left me baffled. We were each given a box of Barilla linguine. Yup, I got a $1 box of pasta. Wonderful.

Today on the show....the audience got 2 tickets to the circus, giant ziploc bags (they were a good thing) and the book 1000 Places to See Before You Die. I got pasta. YAY!