Yum-O!

Oh. My. Gravy.  I am back from NYC and my stint as an audience member on the Rachel Ray show!  Front row seats in fact! 

 

Rachel Ray is my guru.  Everything she does I think is just super cool!  So after almost a year of waiting I finally got an email from her audience department saying I was selected for tickets!  You don't gotta tell me twice!  I booked some vacation days, a plane ticket, a hotel and was off.  With my friends Sherry & Dawn of course.  I wasn't about to do this without some friends to join me in my excitement!  Dawn lives in Stamford so she was only a 45 mins drive away from NYC.  But Sherry - ever the fun friend - joined me for the road trip to Buffalo and a flight into the Big Apple late Tuesday night!

 

Here's where the story gets a bit dicey.  We arrived at the studio bright and early, just a little after 9am.  The email said we should be there for 10:30 but that tickets were first come first served so we knew we should get there early.  There were only about 30 or 40 people in line ahead of us...so I wasn't too concerned.  However...when the time came to hand out tickets...she stopped after she handed tickets to the girls in front of us and asked us to sit tight...hmm...I was beginning to get a little nervous...but trying not to show it.  In the back of my mind this whole time I had been thinking this entire thing was too good to be true and felt something had to go wrong.  And so it did. 

 

She sent everyone behind us away, and let everyone in front of us in and there we stood at the velvet rope.  She told us that they were at capacity, however, if someone wasn't dressed appropriately or couldn't stay for the whole taping then we could get in.  If not. Sorry, tough luck, she could give us a form for guaranteed tickets starting in January 2008.  I was stunned...especially since I knew the chances of someone actually not being dressed appropriately or not wanting to stay was slim.  And then it came "Sorry Girls...but thanks for coming..."

 

All I could hear was Karen's voice ringing in my ears..."get there for at least 8:30...or earlier Alexis!"  We told her we came all the way from Canada.  But all we got was a "Sorry girls - it says in the email that you may not get in."  At that point I must've blanked out.  'Cuz, Sherry and Dawn had to relay to me the rest of what happened.  It may have been the tears that sprang into my eyes.  Or the the fact that we didn't move, just stood there in shock.  But after what felt like an eternity. She said.  "Ok fine, here's what I'll do...she grabbed the sheet of paper she had just handed us explaining how we could get tickets for the new year and scribbled 'VIP 2:15' on it and instructed us to come back for the afternoon show.  We didn't have to stand in line.  Just show them our paper and we would get in.  Because I was in such shock, this didn't really register to me at the time and I thought it was just a 'try again this afternoon'  but as we sat in a coffee shop right after, Dawn and Sher explained to me that we were in for the afternoon show..for sure this time. 

 

We showed up at the studio at 1:45ish, stood at the audience door (eyeing the huge line up of people) and in no time a staff member came out the door and before we could even show her our paper, she waved us in, saying 'Yep, she told me you would be here, come in.'  We were given 3 tickets numbered 1, 2 and 3 and ushered inside!  There is a lot of waiting around after that...but also lots of food...and fun and once we got on to the set, the girl that tried to turn us away in the morning showed us to front row seats!

 

As a fan of the show for almost a year.  And watching it everyday (I PVR it).  Sitting there in real life was almost surreal.  Rachel is just as awesome in person as she is on tv.  She doesn't even use a teleprompter.  She just speaks right off the cuff which I think is amazing!  When she first came out I was beyond excited and trying desperately to look cool.  At one point a camera guy that chatted with Sherry and Dawn and I throughout the commercial breaks had the camera inches from our faces.  It was impossible to concentrate and relax and I can only imagine what we will look like if that footage makes it to the final edit. 

 

She taped parts of two shows - so we got two 'snacks of the day'.  And one of the guests was my favourite of her regulars - Greta, who always talks about fashion!  It was the most fun and amazing experience for me since the Sex and the City tour.  In fact I think this tops that by a hundred!

 

We realized that everything happens for a reason...and if it wasn't for the Starbucks screwing up my order in the morning we would have been in line 5 mins earlier and we would have been the last ones they let in.  But if that had happened...we wouldn't have had front row.  We also realized that there are so many people on the 'VIP' list (people that couldn't get into past shows) that they really only can take a handful of people from the current day's line - which we figure is essentially why even though we were only 30 or 40 ahead of us in line...they hit capacity (just over a hundred) before they even got to us!  The girl explained to us that they have to overbook as if it happens to rain, no one shows up in line...she has actually gone over to the Regis and Kelly line-up and had to try and steal people away. Because without an audience, there is no show.

 

And one last thing - as we stood in line I told Sherry and Dawn that if we got the opportunity, I wanted the aisle seat 'cuz at the end of the show she does high fives and shakes hands down the centre aisle.  In the excitement of the actual moment we forgot and Dawn got the aisle seat.  Sure enough, at the end of the second show, Rachel came down the aisle and Dawn got to give her a high five (of course it took a few seconds for Dawn to realize what she was doing...I wonder if you will be able to catch her moment of hesitation on tv).

 

As soon as I find out when the shows air...probably next week sometime I'll post it here!

 

me.