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This evening my wife and I went to the taping of NPR’s “Wait Wait … Don’t Tell Me!” radio show at the Straz Center in Tampa. The show is normally taped in Chicago, but it occasionally travels around the country. A few months ago when we heard it was coming to Tampa, we just had to get tickets.

I don’t typically listen to NPR but my wife got me listening to “Wait Wait” about a year ago. But whereas she listens on the radio, I download the podcast. Regardless, we were both excited to attend a real live taping of the show.

In addition to host Peter Sagal and judge/scorekeeper/announcer Carl Kasell, the panelists for the evening were Roy Blount, Jr., Adam Felber, and Faith Salie. Rumor had it that Bill Cosby would be the celebrity call in for the “Not My Job” segment but Peter told the audience that the Cos had cancelled at the last minute. Instead, comedian Mark Maron from the WTF podcast called in to answer Florida-related quiz questions.

As we expected, the show just as much fun to watch live as to listen to … maybe even a little more fun because a) you’re in a room with 2,500 other people laughing and appluading and b) the broadcast show is edited down for time and content so there’s a lot more riffing going on live than you hear on the radio. It was also interesting to see how the producers had Peter and others re-record some lines/sections at the end of the show. It will be interesting to see what’s changed and what did (and didn’t) make the cut when the show airs on Saturday (much like when I attended a TV taping of Good Eats Turns 10).

After the recording, they brought an audience member up to the stage to play a limerick challenge, which won everyone in the audience a Wait Wait! tote bag. Then Peter and Karl took some questions from the audience, which was cool. Overall, it was a fun, enjoyable evening.