Gracie Awards 2011

[This post is several days late because I couldn't upload pics for some reason! So, just pretend it's Wednesday afternoon...]

Hello from Hollywood! This is Slim (sans Stretch! Boo hoo!)

I got up at 2:50 AM Austin time today. This was partially nerves and partially just needing to get out of the house to catch my flight at 6:30!

All went swimmingly. The flight lasted just under 3 hours (which feels really short after sitting through a trans-Atlantic flight the same week!)

Arrived just after 8 AM, took a long and expensive taxi ride to Beverly Hills and found the Beverly Wilshire Hotel where the Gracie Awards luncheon would be held!

Remember this place from "Pretty Woman"?

Once I had oriented myself, I took a walk around the environs, including Rodeo Drive! I ended up having a nice cup of tea at a place on Santa Monica Blvd called 'Panini' something. It was very pleasant in the sunshine! The weather is great: low 70's and breezy.

The area where the hotel is located can best be described as the world's largest and most expensive open-air shopping mall. So I enjoyed window shopping at places like Ralph Lauren, Coach, Fendi, Michael Kors, and dozens of other places where I can't even afford to breathe the air inside the store.

It was amusing to me to reflect on how different LA is from the places I inhabited for the past 2 weeks. Lübeck and LA- could two places be more different! Underlining this odd juxtaposition was the fact that I read 2 more short stories by Thomas Mann on my Kindle while I was there, one of which took place entirely in Lübeck, though he never names the place outright.

But I digress.

After my tea I walked back to the hotel to change into my glad rags for the ceremony! The dress managed not to be too wrinkled, despite having been wrested into a garment bag and smushed into an overhead bin on a small airplane this morning!

They opened the doors at around 11:45. The ceremony was held in the ballroom. The first person I met was the very talented and glamorous Bridgette Lateice, who won her 5th Gracie for a documentary about students studying abroad in Africa.

Soon after that, the other half of the Austin contingent arrived: Khotan Shahbazi-Harmon, who won her 2nd Gracie for her show on KOOP called 'Idea Lounge'. She does long-form interviews on her program. She used to be a relief announcer on KMFA, and frequently uses our studio to conduct her interviews. She is a lovely person, and I really enjoyed getting to know her at the luncheon!

They soon let us into the ballroom for the luncheon portion of the festivities:

We had a nice salad, followed by roast chicken (for the majority of the folks!) Luckily, there was a vegetarian option: roasted veggies Wellington accompanied by haricots verts and pesto sauce. Quite tasty! For dessert, chocolate layer cake with fresh berries.

After lunch, the ceremony began: the keynote speaker was the CEO of PBS, Paula Kerger. She gave a very inspiring talk on the role of women in the media landscape.

She spoke of growing up watching PBS, and specifically mentioned one of my favorite shows from Masterpiece Theater: Elizabeth R, starring Glenda Jackson! She also referred to an initiative by actress Geena Davis, which you can read about here.

I actually read about this just a few weeks ago. Geena was watching children's TV with her young daughter, and it occurred to her how few female characters there were, how little they had to say and do (compared to the male characters) and how sexualized they were in their dress and conduct. This caused her to found the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media to study this phenomenon, and to hopefully enact change.

I was very impressed with what I read about her work. Little kids internalize the messages they receive from watching TV, even the unspoken ones, and I believe that it is vital to show kids of both genders taking part in the action equally, solving problems equally, and not reduce the female characters to wall-flower status.

Anyway, here I am digressing again... :-)

After Ms. Kerger finished her talk, we met the host of the award ceremony: Nancy Giles.

She is an actress, and TV journalist (CBS News Sunday Morning). She was a very smart, witty and amusing host! And I got to shake her hand after I accepted my Gracie!

None of the 'action shots' of me accepting the award turned out, but they had a professional photographer on the scene, and they say those pictures should be available in mid-June.

My program was the sixth one they announced (it was in alphabetical order) and of course it was all a blur. I was concentrating on not toppling over, unused as I am to wearing heels! Sadly, they did not permit us to make any remarks. Personally, I would have been glad to sit there for another hour so that everyone could say a few words. I wanted to thank Michael Nyman, after all!

The four award-winners at our table: me, Khotan, Michael Martinez from WAMU in Washington, DC, and Cheryl Jennings from KGO-TV in San Francisco!

Austin's got talent!

After the ceremony, I took a cab to my hotel, which, though fine in itself, looked a little shabby after the Beverly Wilshire! HA! There I took some pictures of Gracie:

After that it was time to think about dinner. I figured LA would offer a rich assortment of vegetarian restaurants, so I did a google search (say what you will about my shabby motel- it had free Wi-Fi!) and found Real Food Daily. It was on a bus line, so I decided to give my pocketbook a break and take the bus rather than a cab.  That turned out to be not one of my wiser decisions, as I waited for over a half hour for a northbound bus (watching 3 southbound buses of that number go sailing by while I waited...)

Anyway, it all worked out and I eventually made it to the restaurant. What an amazing array of choices on the menu! Omnivores may not realize what a special feeling that is, when one is used to having 2-3 things to choose from on an ordinary restaurant menu (maybe more if you eat fish, like I do). I eventually selected a very tasty BLT wrap. The "B" in this case being made of tempeh. It was sliced very thin, so it was crispy like bacon, and it also had a smoky flavor. They did very well, in my opinion! I also had a glass of organic California Cabernet, and a cup of chai tea for 'dessert'.

By then I was totally beat, and took a cab back to the motel, and was out like a light by 9 PM (LA time- 2 hours earlier than Austin.) So there was no heavy sightseeing or boisterous partying for me that day!

Oh, I wanted to mention these gorgeous trees I kept seeing:

Had no idea what I was seeing, so when I got back I asked a friend who grew up in that part of LA, and she knew. They are called jacaranda, and they are just gorgeous!

So to finish this saga, the next morning I got up, had a jog on the treadmill, ate breakfast at the motel, and was on the road to the airport by 8 AM. My flight left at 11:20, but I was living in fear of LA traffic. Turned out, there was none! So, I spent 2 hours at the gate.

I was also worried about getting Gracie through security (wasn't about to put her in my checked baggage!). That also was no problem at all. Had a smooth flight back to Austin, and was met very punctually at baggage claim by my wonderful husband, who I was very glad to see! Then we went home and I cooked my first meal in about 3 weeks. Welcome back to reality! :-) Honestly, I'm glad to be home and to be staying put for awhile!