February 10, 2018

The One with the Jimmy Fallon Tickets

Friday, January 12th, 11:59 AM
Lydia: I'm on the waitlist for jimmy tickets
Lydia: If I get them, will you fly up and go with me?
Glory: DUH

Thursday, January 18th, 1:53 PM

My caps button wasn't stuck. I was just that excited. 
One look at my schedule and a Delta roundtrip purchase, and it was settled! I was going to do something I'd been wanting to do for years. I was going to see Jimmy Fallon LIVE!
I became a Jimmy Fallon fan when I was introduced to the SNL skit "Debby Downer." He isn't even the main character in this skit, but oh my goodness was he funny! (the other actors are really great too) So I continued watching him every now an then on SNL, and on to the late show, but when he got the Tonight Show I became a dedicated viewer. I would DVR the show at my older sister's house when I was her nanny. Then I would watch it every single day with her son who has now known Jimmy by name since he began to speak. I have watched Jimmy Fallon through his having two daughters, the making of his crooked finger, his friendship with JT, and many other interviews and hilarious times. He has made me laugh through many different times in my life, and I wonder if he ever thinks about the way that he influences other's lives by adding happiness and laughter. If I could speak to him, I would thank him for making me laugh during the hardest things I have ever been through. If laughter is the best medicine, Jimmy is a doctor.
I got a lot of questions about how I got Jimmy Fallon tickets. As I scored them through my sister, here she is to explain to you the process and her experience of getting Jimmy Fallon tickets. Over to you Lydia!
Just to preface how much of a miracle it is that I won these tickets, I feel like y'all should know that basically every person in NYC's goal is to go to Jimmy Fallon. I have a conversation at least once a week where someone tells me that he/she "has been trying to win Jimmy Fallon tickets FORRREVERRR." Everyone tells me it's impossible to win them, and if you win them, people act like puppy dogs to try to get you to invite them with you. Well people, it's not impossible! Pretty much, I just want to let you know that prayer works, and God rewards patience and persistence. Maybe this is the reason why He wanted me to move to NYC? Whoa... Just had a revelation. 

Anyways, now that you know that, I got the tickets off a website called 1iota.com. How the website works is that you create a profile and then look through the calendar to see what shows they are offering free tickets to. I've scored tickets to Good Morning America, Seth Meyers Late Night Show, and obviously Jimmy Fallon. Jimmy and Seth are the hardest to get tickets for because they're in such high demand. The tickets are released once every few months and are gone in about 2 minutes or less. You enter by choosing the show, date, time, and amount of tickets you want. They also ask you to explain why 1iota should choose you to go to the show. Sometimes they ask you questions that only a true fan of the show would know (you can just Google the question if you're not a raving fan). What I wrote was that me and Glory are obsessed with Jimmy. We've been watching him for years, we are HUGE fans, and we have even been on his ride in Universal. I actually went to Universal the day his ride opened and saw him live, so I mentioned that as well. Then I topped it off by saying winning tickets would be a dream come true, and we will be the best/hottest audience members ever. 

I actually didn't know the tickets were being released the day that they were, but my lovely coworker Becca graciously let me know the day of. Becca, my other coworker Nicole, and I all entered at the same time. I figured if I entered as many times as possible, I would have a higher chance of getting the tickets, so I entered into every available date and time possible (they have the monologue and two time slots for the show for every day). All three of us were put on wait lists, so we didn't have much hope of winning tickets. On January 18th at 1:44pm, my world was changed! I got an email from 1iota telling me that my ticket request status changed from waitlist to AVAILABLE! I immediately confirmed my ticket and put it on my snapchat story, because that's what us millennials do. I also texted Glory and told her to buy a flight because her wildest dreams JUST came true (cue Taylor Swift). We were going to Jimmy! 
Thank you Lydia for sharing that with us. Now let us tell everyone about the experience we had at the show! (Lydia's comments are in italics)
My flight got into LaGuardia around 12. I Lyfted close to Lydia's apartment and stopped at Roast for what is now my favorite salad: a buffalo Caesar. It's exactly what it sounds like, and I'll probably eat this for every other meal from now until I die, or at least until I throw it up. Just before 2pm, and in between meetings, Lydia so sweetly ran, yes literally, over to where I was in order to hand off her keys so that I could dump off my bookbag and change before we were to meet at Rockefeller Plaza, which made me late for a meeting with the owner of my company btw #priorites. For reference, the window of time to get in line in order to make it into the show is 3:15-3:45pm. We had planned to make it there as early as possible, because the earlier you are in line, the closer to the front you get to sit. I took an UberPool, where you carpool in an Uber, so that the cost would be lower. Of course the one time that this would matter during my 24 hour stay in NYC, my driver made 4 extra stops picking up and dropping off other UberPool riders. For this reason, my original arrival of 3:15 became 3:40. STRESSFUL. Lydia got out of her last meeting around 3, grabbed a normal Uber, and had an ETA of 3:30.  As we stressfully texted each other from Ubers about every minute that our ETAs would change, I began to prepare myself mentally for the possibility that I may arrive too late to make it into the show. I told myself, at least I got to see Lydia and have fun with her, but honestly, I would have been super upset and probably would've made Lydia help me attempt to stalk Jimmy Fallon after his show. 
Lydia arrived around 3:30 and wearily awaited my arrival. At 3:40, I saw the Rock and told my driver, who was stuck in traffic, that I would get out. After running through the streets, I entered and found that this place was basically a maze! I called Lydia, we talked simultaneously, me asking WHERE DO I GO, her giving directions that made no sense to me as I had apparently entered through a different door than she had. This was the longest three minutes of my life. 

At 3:43 I saw her! We yelled! I ran up, and the man at the bottom of the stairs just smiled and said, "Well, there she is!" He had just told me if she didn't show up in 1 minute that we couldn't get into the show, and Glory's flight to NYC would have been for nothing. It's fine. Thank you, kind sir, for not judging our frazzled attitudes and spastic behavior. Also sorry that Lydia screamed in your ear. We went up the stairs (there are no photos allowed after this point), already drenched in sweat from the stress of getting to this point. We stood in a short line, showed our IDs, then went through a quick TSAish checkpoint, and were then ushered into the peacock lounge. They are very serious about the no photo rule starting here and ending never. I managed to take one photo without getting caught hehe. Lydia witnessed a page ask a woman to delete a photo that she took of her daughter. But honestly I'm not sure why. This room isn't all that special. It's just a bunch of couches in a room with walls that are decorated with large slideshows of Jimmy moments. I mean this is basically my dream living room, but still not sure why photos aren't allowed. This is the last chance to use the bathroom or drink water (from the water fountain, there's also no food or drink allowed). 
Around 4:30, they began lining people up to head toward the studio. Here's how it works: first, single letters line up from A to Z, then double letters AA to ZZ, then standby tickets. We were KK, which we were kind of bummed about at first, but we actually ended up in the perfect seats. After we were ushered into Studio 6B, we waited for the remainder of the studio to fill up with people who had gotten standby tickets. Then Seth Herzog came out as somewhat of a hype man.  He interacted with the audience while also explaining what we should expect during the show. This was when the Roots entered and warmed up. There was a dance competition, and you could feel that everyone in the audience was getting more comfortable, which is of course the point of this whole thing as they told us they don't add any noise to the show. What you hear is the real audience, and that's all they've got.

Around 5:15 Jimmy Fallon made his entrance and performed his monologue gold. As soon as Jimmy was on stage, time moved so quickly. He introduced Sarah Jessica Parker, who was as fabulous as ever. I made a note to look for shoes like hers for my wedding. Her interview and the way that she talks about her husband made me like her more than anything else that I've seen her in. She was a dream! She's just like Carrie in Sex and City but level headed and married with kids. Jimmy and SJP performed a madlib skit, and we could just feel the fun that they were actually having together. There are short breaks when there would normally be commercial breaks. During this time, Jimmy's hair and makeup stylists come move his hair millimeters over and powder his forehead. The next guest was Jesse Tyler Ferguson from Modern Family. They wore wigs, which just made me think of this awesome interview with Bradley Cooper. Next, five members of the new SuperBowl champions, the Philadelphia Eagles, came out of the curtain:  Zach Ertz, Nelson Agholor, Chris Long, Alshon Jeffery and Jalen Mills along with the Vince Lombardi. Interviewing five people was a little odd for Jimmy and the flow of the show, but the players seemed really genuine in each of their answers. The musical guest for this episode was Diplo, but he had recorded earlier that day. So we pretended we were about to see Diplo and then pretended that we had just seen Diplo.  This was when Jimmy signed off and went through the audience giving high fives to anyone lucky enough to have long arms or a seat at the end of the row. Lydia had the outside seat of our row, but luckily I've got long arms and determination. So we both got to high five Jimmy Fallon! He had soft hands! And that was when I fainted.
Just kidding. But I was definitely excited enough to faint. I'm surprised that people don't faint more often at his shows. I never thought I would be a super star struck type of person, but when I got that high five, everything I knew about Jimmy sped through my brain. If I had the ability, I probably would've been like LET;S BE FRIENDS I'LL BE YOUR NANNY FOR FREE I SWEAR I'M NOT CRAZY. After we had a magical moment, Jimmy took photos and shot a promo with the Eagles players. The Roots then left their usual spots to meet the Eagles players. Watching a band of Philly natives meet the team that brought them their first Super Bowl trophy was absolutely adorable. I've never seen grown men that giddy before! When all photos had been taken and promos had been shot, the famous people made their exits, and Seth Herzog returned. He kept the audience entertained by answering questions while everyone was excused by row. 
As people exited, we all turned our phones back on to see that it was now 6:30pm. We were led down to the NBC store and given 10% off coupons. Lydia was financially smart enough not to make a purchase, I on the other hand got a shirt for myself and a souvenir for Caleb while Lydia talked me out of buying literally everything Jimmy Fallon and SNL. After my purchase, we walked around the bottom floor of the Rockefeller, probably longer than was necessary. That place is large, I'm pretty sure we were lost looking for the skating rink exit. I was walking around in heels, and my feet were killing me!! I only did it because I was inspired by Sarah Jessica! Once we found the exit though, our Jimmy Fallon experience officially ended, but we were still hyped from the experience and just as excited about our plans to eat Chickfila for dinner. After dinner, Lydia did a search for "cheap but good drinks in NYC," which ironically led us to a place named Jimmy's Corner. Though it wasn't a Jimmy Fallon themed bar, it was still pretty awesome and has cheap drinks. 2 out of 2 would recommend.
I flew to New York City for less than twenty four hours just to see Jimmy Fallon. Sad. And I have absolutely no regrets. We almost missed the entrance window and weren't allowed to eat, drink, sleep, or pee for two hours. But all of that and the money I spent were worth it. We did make it! And Lydia was smart enough to point out that the front row is blocked by the cameras for most of the time, so our seats on the same side as Jimmy's desk and with a view right over the cameras were absolutely perfect. We touched Jimmy Fallon, and nobody can ever take that away from me. This is one of those rare memories that I will always remember fondly and without any downers, even though my flight got cancelled and I spent the entire next day at JFK. I got to see snow in New York City, and I got to have a sleepover with my sister, and did I mention that I touched Jimmy Fallon?
PSA: I am fully aware that I sound like I'm overly obsessed with a celebrity in this post. Please take into account that this is all in light hearted humor, and I would never actually stalk anyone, including Jimmy Fallon even though he is very cool. I would... I've actually stood outside his house before and looked through the fence of the private garden he spends a lot of time in to see if he was there. It's normal. I'm sure she's joking, Jimmy. We are both totally normally functioning non-sociopaths. 
That's us! Photo cred: Meghan of I'm Fixin' To 

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