I went into NYC today to see the Martha Stewart Show. I’ve never been in the audience of a TV show, so when my friend Anna had a spare ticket I jumped at the chance. I’m not a big Martha fan, but it was fun to get a behind-the-scenes look at how a live TV show is produced.

I got up before dawn and caught a 6:30 train with all the groggy commuters – boy am I glad that I don’t have to do that every day. It really made me appreciate my scenic drive to work. There is entirely too much hustle-bustle and general crankiness happening in the city for me. Never mind that I felt like a lost little duckling following Anna and her mom around – Penn Station and the city streets are like a maze to me.

The show taped lived today and as an audience member my job was to clap a lot and be energetic – not easy on 4 hours sleep. The show set had a kitchen and a craft area and a small greenhouse. There is a small army of staff people that attends to Martha during the commercial breaks and cleans up any spills or crumbs and has everything ready and *just so* for when the show goes on the air. On today’s show, there was some soap opera actor who I never heard of (Ricky Paull Goldin)and Wolfgang Puck, the chef.

Martha made coconut macaroons and a veggie pizza with the chef. We were looking forward to the audience giveaways – we’d heard that Martha gives really good gifts – but there were only gifts for a few people. Everyone in the audience got a macaroon (sans the chocolate coating she recommended in the recipe) – so I guess that made it worth the trip. 😉 We roamed the city for a bit afterwards and had chinese dumplings for lunch before catching the train back home. Here’s Anna and her mom, Flor, looking dazzled in the audience. The taped show re-runs at 6 pm here in the East on TLC – I’m off to go see if I can find myself clapping my fool head off in the audience.