This time of year, the weather is just plain insulting. The only thing to do is to wait it out indoors with a mug of gin while peering at the gray world through milky 3M window plastic, our phasers set to stoic. It's times like these that make me so glad for the Academy Awards.

I get to sit in my comfy Barcalounger of Judgment, snug in my cat hair-covered bathrobe, contemplating people I will never meet having a fabulous party 2,000 miles away. Beautiful, fit, famous people gliding serenely across the red carpet in sumptuous suits, jewels and gowns. Then comes the polite applause and death-mask grins of those who thought they'd win. (I guess if they were better actors, we wouldn't be able to see what they are thinking.) Ditto the tearful deity-invoking acceptance speeches of those who can't believe they won.

How about these hothouse flowers who thank God? As in the Christian God. I've got news for them -- the God the actress at the podium grew up with, the God of Nebraska, South Dakota and lutefisk church-basement suppers, has nothing to do with award distribution. Plus, I don't believe that's who she's been worshiping since she relocated from Flyoverland. Hollywood is the world capital for false idols -- red wrist strings, secret handshakes, bottles upon bottles of niacin. They are all into something goony. Just once I would like to see the best-actress winner fall to her knees when her name is called, dig a lipstick out of her $10,000 Chloe evening bag, scrawl a crude pentagram onstage and bellow a celebratory chant to Xenu. That I would believe.

At the preshow, I love picking out the dutiful, long-suffering, less-attractive-than-famous-mate celebrity spouses. Also the escorts and beards, all spiffed up to put on a show for Tinseltown's toniest tin man.

One more Oscar date I love to pick out: the Heavyset Supportive Family Member, usually an indication of a recent or pending celebrity divorce. It must also be noted that the HSFM is not actually overweight, nor are his or her teeth corn-colored in real life. It is simply that those around them weigh 4 milligrams and have had their teeth replaced with peppermint Tic-Tacs. The HSFMs cannot stand too close to their famous loved ones for fear of "ruining" press photographs. (Hint: The HSFMs are usually wearing too many sequins, which also applies to whomever wins Best Foreign Short.)

I don't really care who hosts, that's all the same to me. The real kick of the show is watching directors, editors and glamourpusses who are usually protected by a script bark out their lines from a Teleprompter. It's like watching the dogs at Westminster run their paces. It's comforting to know that there's only so much that a good blow-dry can do for you.

As long as there are a few Debbie Allen dance numbers between speechifying and the Lifetime Achievement Award, it's a no-miss night of quality entertainment.

I don't know who is getting the Lifetime Achievement Oscar this year, but I got a taste of it last month during the Screen Actors Guild Awards. Apparently, Mickey Rooney has carried a SAG card for more than 75 years. He is the Hollywood version of the turtle at the Como Zoo, remarkable simply for still being around. The SAG producers threw him in a suit and trotted him onstage for a warm round of applause. I don't know what Rooney's life is like these days, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't involve an audience of that size giving him the love gloves. And the awesome thing was, you could tell he missed it. He raised his arms like Moses parting the sea and bathed in the tribute, standing in the keylight far longer than the crowd had energy to clap. He took it as his due, because he has the distinction of living longer than Jackie Coogan. If he had been any happier, he would have died on the spot and they could have cut straight to the 2007-'08 death montage.

No matter what happens tonight, the Oscars are a great way to spend three hours, warm, snug and smug.

Listen to Colleen Kruse on FM 107.1 from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. weekdays.