MTV News reporter Brian McFayden tried to chase down Aguilera. By the time he caught her, she was pulling off that celebrity trick of looking at once bored, tired and ridiculously skinny. Not that McFayden helped; he looked like the sixth member of 'N Sync. The gorgeous Romanian journalist next to me used to be a VJ on a music channel in Eastern Europe. She said they had a name for people like him: "Cookie."

Of course, all award shows are about fashion, and the look of the season seemed pretty punk -- albeit a sequined kind of punk. The Red Hots wore Mohawks. That silly pop star Pink looked like a bottle of Manic Panic magenta in a fur collar. R&B trio Destiny's Child, wearing silver-studded corsets, looked like bondage punks, or characters in a video game designed by a horny programmer.

Puffy and Jennifer Lopez both wore white. (After Labor Day!?!) Toni Braxton wore a long open coat. No, that's it: a long open coat. It must have been attached to her breasts with Velcro. Kid Rock went high class in a wife-beater and a vest. Rapper Lil' Kim wore some sort of orange plastic thing that made her look as if she'd been running naked and hit a temporary security fence at high speed.

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After everyone was off the carpet and in the building, the walkie-talkie people ushered us press people past the teenagers in their mall best back to our press tent. You see, we wouldn't even be let into the building. Press, like everyone at home, got to watch the broadcast on television.

Our perks were blacked-out commercials, enough candy to give Willy Wonka a sugar seizure and an occasional honest-to-God celebrity trotted out in front of us every 10 minutes or so. The only drawback was, of course, that whenever one of those celebrities was talking, all the sound went out on the TVs. That means, in a way, that if you watched last night, or if you see the reruns this weekend, you'll probably see more of the show than I did. All I can say is that I'm sorry for you.

The show was already running by the time we got back in the tent. Shawn and Marlon Wayans were halfway through a stand-up routine about the fight that broke out at the hip-hop award show sponsored by the Source earlier this week. The punch line was "black ass" and one of the interchangeable brothers illustrated it by showing off his ass cheeks.

Remember when Chris Rock used to host the Video Music Awards and insult everyone?

Next, Janet Jackson performed an elaborate dance routine to "Doesn't Really Matter." Like most of the songs on the radio, the beats were skittery and the melody subdued.

Blink 182, whom I hate because I saw them solicit blow jobs from the stage at a show a few years ago, won best group video for "All the Small Things," their parody of boy band videos. Sure, they looked kind of adorable in their little T-shirts, but by the end of the show, I'd have another reason to hate them.

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