Digging daytime

In case you can't stop what you're doing to watch the live announcements for the 35th Annual Daytime Emmy Awards (and hey, why would you), we'll try to keep you updated this morning.

So far, a bunch of soap stars who no doubt display their interpretation of the Seven Deadly Sins on a weekly basis have gotten nods. One word: Luke!! Yes, Anthony Geary as Luke (that would be half of the "super couple" Luke and Laura) has been nominated again. He's no newbie, having won before, when his hair was much bigger than it is now.

Tyra and Dr. Phil will be duking it out with a PBS show for best talk show/informational, a new category this year. And on the entertainment side, it'll be Ellen vs. Rachael Ray vs. "The View."

As for talk show hosts, there's Ellen vs. Regis and Kelly vs. all five coffee klatch members from "The View."

The guy from People magazine on hand to comment on the nominations wasn't at all put on the spot (and could never have seen it coming) when Elisabeth Hasselbeck asked him to handicap the talk show race. His response: maybe this is the year that "The View" hosts stop becoming the Susan Lucci of the daytime awards.

Or maybe not.

The industry loves Ellen, prefers one-host shows, and well, maybe doesn't so much dig what Joy Behar just called the controversial nature of "The View" banter.

That was a couple seconds before they started chatting about educated women having fewer orgasms and Sherri Shepherd admitting that she's happy being dumb.