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If nothing else, Oscars 2006 will go down as the year the media opted to have us choke on its coverage, with no tangential detail too small not to warrant an in-depth 1500 word feature accompanied by an array of infographic sidebars. Who needs to get bogged down in reading about the latest on the Iraq war when now, thanks to the AP, we can readily answer the far more pressing question of "Where is the Oscar red carpet woven?"

The carpet of dreams' long journey to Hollywood begins in Dalton, Ga., where it's woven together in a natural shade of white. It takes about five days to dye it the proprietary Oscar shade, which veteran carpet queen Joan Rivers describes as "Nancy Reagan red that wonderful red with a little blue in it."


With the rolls unloaded, the carpet guys start their work. Passers-by snap pictures as the crew workers unfurl the tradition-steeped rugs, first with their feet, then on hands and knees. Then they start the meticulous process of piecing the carpet together.

There is no more storied red weave in Hollywood history, with the possible exception of the time Tom Cruise insisted that Nicole Kidman shave her head to reduce the amount of hair-thetans interfering with his Born on the Fourth of July chances, necessitating an emergency wig. Not that the carpet hasn't been involved in a mishap or two most notably the year a dawdling Joan Rivers was accidentally rolled into it by workers and shipped back to Georgia for its annual industrial chemical cleaning, a happy accident Ms. Rivers now schedules regularly.