By Producer, Tom Vitale

A few months ago when the first cold front hit New York, I was contentedly sunning on a beach in Greece.  I’ll admit it, I have a great job.  Whenever the topic comes up with new friends or acquaintances, without fail the first question asked is “Do you need an assistant?” The next is invariably “Do you have to eat all the gross stuff that Tony does?”

Contrary to popular belief the vast majority of the food we encounter is far from bizarre, it’s delicious. Still it’s true; occasionally I’m forced to eat something I find kind of nasty, like that steamed shark’s head in Singapore.  In the interest of not offending our proud and generous hosts, the crew knows when faced with this situation, to smile and politely choke it down. Not such a big deal. Refusing, as Tony says, would be to “bring shame upon the clan.”

By Producer, Diane Schutz

Tony: I love you like a brother – but after hearing you talk about the difficulty of our caving adventure in Jamaica, I needed to chime in here! I’m convinced you’ve become, as your British pals might say, a big girl’s blouse.

You wrote that this was “the hardest, most physically demanding, insanely foolhardy and irresponsible venture ever on NO RESERVATIONS”. Really? I know your memory is somewhat selective, but can I remind you of such shoots as Malaysia, where we hauled ass through the jungles of Sarawak for 6 hours, trying to keep up with our 80-something-year-old, amazingly fit Iban guide?  Or New Zealand, where we huffed and puffed up 45-degree-angle hills to hunt a 400-pound wild boar – an angry boar that could have turned on any of us at a given moment, carving us into carpaccio?

Hi. I’m Christopher Martinez, editor of some of your favorite No Reservations shows. And Sweden.

Yeah, Sweden.  I’d appreciate you not sharing with me any further insights on the
that show until after publication of my 3 volume critical analysis/after action report with
the working title,  “Sweden: An ABBA Joke Too Far”.

Moving on…

For no particularly good reason I’ve been allowed to accompany the ABNR crew on the
shoot for the upcoming Japan show which I’ll start editing when we return.

By Jared Andrukanis, Segment Producer

I am sitting in my office at Zero Point Zero trying to figure out exactly how we are going to get Queens of the Stone Age out to New York in the middle of their U.S. Tour when my phone rings.  It is Chris, the Executive Producer of the show, and when he tells me where I am going on my next shoot, I nearly drop the phone out of my hand.  
Chris says that Tony is going to New Orleans, and it is going to be a different kind of “No Reservations”…
I know it sounds strange that a statement like that could cause me enough shock to lose my grip on the handset of my office phone, but let me explain…