"If you’ve never actually attended the Oscars (and I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that a few of you haven’t), there are some things that might surprise you about them — at least, as a first-time attendee, there were things that surprised me. For one, the Kodak Theatre is inside of a mall, so when you’re walking down that last stretch of red carpet towards that glamorous staircase, you’re actually walking past a sunglasses shop, shoe store, coffee place, fudge shop, etc. (They cover the store fronts with red drapes to hide the mall-ness.) Also, on your way to the venue, you have to run a gauntlet of anti-Hollywood protesters holding signs bearing slogans like “Ask Me Why You Deserve Hell” and “The Wages of Sin is Death.” Festive! And while it looks on TV like the Oscar audience is wall-to-wall celebrities, in fact, the vast majority of people who attend the Oscars are random and decidedly un-famous people, trying to act blase in their fancy duds even though they’re actually just as excited to get a glimpse of the movie stars as everyone else. People like … well, me."