We know that we harbor absurdly high expectations for awards shows, and that anything short of witnessing a despondent Leonardo DiCaprio dousing himself in the alcohol that is so readily available at these events, taking the stage in the middle of Forest Whitaker's emotional victory speech, and spectacularly self-immolating to atone for his public failure to win the trophy despite comprising 40 percent of the Best Dramatic Actor field all by himself will leave us feeling empty and disappointed. Still, we wonder if even such a magnificent tableau as the one above would satisfy; deep in our hearts, we suspect that performers can never possibly be drunk enough, dispirited enough, or engulfed in the raging flames of nullification enough to please us, the jaded kudocast viewer. But still we watch, because settling in for three-plus hours of watching well-dressed famous people handing gilded trinkets to other famous people (who then go on to recite a list of names of still more people, some of them familiar to us) momentarily makes us feel better about the acute lack of attractive celebrities handing us shiny objects in our own, small, tragically un-televised lives.

Wait a minute, we just watched the Golden Globes, not the Oscars? Oh, forget all that nonsense we were nattering on about; with the Globes, we're more than happy if somebody's soused enough to slur their way through a nominations list (thanks, Tim Allen, for picking up the Harrison Ford slack) and Jack Nicholson flashes a couple dozen shit-eating grins while wearing sunglasses indoors. On those counts, the HFPA's latest, generously lubricated Tinseltown reacharound got the job done, without any of the troubling existential angst we've attached to the Academy Awards, the single most important human endeavor ever undertaken.

After the jump, our customary post-ceremony collection of notable awards show moments, forever frozen in time by the combination of a TiVo pause button and our trusty cameraphone. (Please write off all typos, factual errors, and general incomprehensibility to the Champagne and NyQuil cocktails that barely got us through the ordeal.)

E! Red Carpet Pre-Show Special:

Actual red carpet exchange between John Stamos and Ryan Seacrest:

Seacrest: "Did you come solo? John, did you come alone"
Stamos:"I came with a friend, yeah. Did I bring a girl?"
Seacrest: "Did you bring a date?"
Stamos: "No."
Seacrest: "And...do you want one."
Stamos: "Are you hitting on me again?"
Seacrest: "No, I want you to leave with a girl tonight."
Stamos: "That night at Hyde with your hand on my knee was too much."
Seacrest: [nervous laughter that barely conceals tender memories of that night at Hyde when his quivering, oh-so-naughty hand found its way to Stamos' briefly welcoming knee]

The Golden Globes Ceremony:

Dreamgirls' Jennifer Hudson, winner for Best Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture, thanks her director, then God, recognizing the accepted Hollywood order of who wields the most power on a movie set. Number of co-stars thanked by name: zero.

This year's Miss Golden Globe, Lorraine "Daughter of Jack and Some Actress" Nicholson is introduced, and with a shy wave, initially avoids the Petulant Celebrity Offspring syndrome that so visibly afflicted last year's honoree.

And the Globe goes to Jeremy...Irons, not Piven, for best supporting actor in a series, mini-series, or TV movie. As Piven released Irons' hand, he quickly turned to his mother and muttered, "I can't believe I dragged you here to lose to a guy who wore a pirate-dandy costume to the Golden Globes, Ma."

A waxy Renee Zellweger lifelessly leads the salute to the Hollywood Foreign Press, perhaps because now she can no longer receive a $70k gift bag in return for introducing the shadowy puppetmaster of the HFPA, Philip Berk, for his annual moment of Hollywood recognition. Upon fulfilling her duties, Zellweger quickly fled the stage, not wanting to spend the rest of her earning years locked away in Berk's starlet dungeon.

Jack Nicholson, barely in frame but sensing the camera's loving gaze, signals for attention as its hungry lens pans the audience following best TV drama actor Hugh Lurie's speech. In Nicholson's defense, it had been nearly three minutes since his last televised reaction shot.

Ageless Multimedia DespotWatch! Rupert Murdoch in the house! As Meryl Streep noted just moments earlier after winning for her Devil Wear Prada performance, he signs the checks of the guy who signs the checks.

Audience members (including Paramount emperor Brad Grey, center bottom, incriminatingly circled) are driven to the bar by Ben Stiller's weak joke about Night at the Museum being a "breakthrough" and "modern masterpiece" as he introduces a Borat clip...which he quickly redeems with a much better line about Rocky Balboa holding a bag full of his own poop.

One word for Helen Mirren in victory (for best actress in a miniseries or TV movie for Elizabeth I): classy. OK, two more words: unexpectedly doable.

Even during the rush of Golden Globes triumph for best actor in a TV comedy, Alec Baldwin remembers to name-check CAA twice. When his agents gather in their new office tomorrow to gobble a baby in their prized clients' honor, it will not be one of the snackable infants cloned from Baldwin's DNA.

While introducing a Dreamgirls clip, freelance distribution consultant Jamie Foxx offers a pointed critique of Paramount's release strategy for the film, decrying its appearance "in only 800 theaters. You do the math, you do the math!" (Shhh, no one tell him it played in 1,900 theaters this past weekend. He's on a roll!)

Drew Barrymore shows that she's learned her lesson from last year's fashion fiasco, and has the girls firmly under her control this time around.

Maria Menounos to Ugly Betty's America Ferrera as she walks off the stage following a moving speech for her best actress in a comedy series win: "Wow, you're much cuter in real life than you are on that TV show about the homely girl! I've just learned a valuable lesson about superficial appearances or something! You go, girl!"

Tom Hanks offers a stirring tribute to actor/writer/producer/director Warren Beatty (Most Promising Newcomer of 1962), whom, as far as we can tell, is being given a lifetime achievement award recognizing his enormous testicles. Later, Hanks would sheepishly admit to being one of Beatty's legendary sexual conquests.

Beatty refrains from showing the audience the unparalleled balls upon which much attention was just lavished, but does answer the upstart presenter: "Forget about Hanks. I've got bottles of moisturizer older than Tom Hanks."

Living Oscarless Legend™ Martin Scorsese takes the opportunity following his Globes best director win for The Departed to directly address the Academy, "Please, Oscar voters, don't fuck me this time. Enough is enough."

Finally, the moment we've all been waiting for: a Sacha Baron Cohen win. We dutifully transcribe a landmark moment in awards speech history: "I want to thank the Hollywood Foreign Press. And I just want to say this movie was a life-changing experience. I saw some amazing, beautiful, invigorating parts of America. But I saw some dark parts of America. An ugly side of America. A side of America that rarely sees the light of day. I refer, of course, to the anus and testicles of my co-star Ken Davitian. Ken, as I...when I was in that scene, and I stared down and saw your two wrinkled Golden Globes on my chin, I thought to myself, 'I'd better win a bloody award for this.' And then when my 300 pound co-star decided to sit on my face and squeeze the oxygen from my lungs, I was faced with a choice: death, or to breathe in the air that had been trapped in a small pocket between his buttocks for 30 years. Kenneth, if it was not for that rancid bubble, I would not be here today." We were easily more moved by these words than the ones Warren Beatty spoke about his love for Annette Bening; the bond between an actor and the partner who nearly asphyxiated him with his fetid taint in the name of Art is far more beautiful than the relatively uncomplicated one between man and wife.

With a second Helen Mirren acting win (this time for best actress in a drama), we are driven so wild with desire that we can scarcely type these words. We're off to find a DVD screener of The Queen to satisfy our burning lust.

Hobbled by a recent skiing accident, but utterly undeterred in his maniacal, ongoing mission to torture the populace with the action movie catch-phrases of two decades ago, California Governator Arnold Schwarzenegger actually declare the following as Babel's best drama award celebrants clear the stage: "Don't forget next year, we'll be back." Yes, really.

[Photos: Pitt/Jolie and Irons pics by Getty Images]

• Globes scorecard [The Envelope]