SEND IDOL INVITATIONS: Get guests pumped with your own version of a "golden ticket." Photocopy the details onto gold paper and include the title "You're Going to Hollywood!" and the date, time, and location of the event. Don't forget to give thanks to your sponsors.
HOST A COCA-COLA BAR: Go along with the show's shame-
less promotion by serving a cocktail made with the classic soda. Think Coke with vanilla vodka or rum, or the Birmingham Idol cocktail.
SERVE AN INSIDER'S MENU: Start with fried calamari and dual dips of cocktail sauce and tartar sauce as a tasty tribute to previous contestant culinary-challenged Kellie Pickler. Follow up with a perfect TV-night second course honoring Paula's famous slurfest of yesteryear: pizza and a salad. You can continue the marketing madness with a finale of Baked Sanjaya--Baked Alaska renamed and topped with a merangue mohawk.
TAKE A GAMBLE: Print out sheets of paper with the names of the 12 finalists and get each partygoer to rank them from one to 12, with one being the winner of this season's Idol and 12 being the first finalist to get voted off. Collect the sheet and $5 or more from each guest, and at the end of the season award the pot to the person with the most accurate ranking.
GIVE PARTING GIFTS: As people leave, offer them toy micro-
phones ($28 for 6, at PlumParty.com) for the road. Don't even think about handing them out during the evening, or the annoy-
ance of someone talking over your favorite Idol contestant's performance will seem as polite as a whisper.
