Today was a bit surreal. But it was also totally awesome.

Two fun things happened today. Read on, dear reader!

Thing one: My tour this morning was a sing-along tour. Yep, we sang. Well, not all of us sang. But me and some of the older women sang “Sisters” from “White Christmas.” Later on our tour, more people chimed in when we sang “Seventy-six Trombones” as we drove around Midwest (aka River City, Iowa from “The Music Man”).

I’ve always thought life should be a musical, so I’m always singing on tour (much to the amusement of my guests). It was so fun today to actually have people singing with me.

Thing two: The Chancellor of Germay came to Warner Bros. today.  She’s quite a remarkable woman, this Angela Merkel. In addition to being the first female Chancellor of Germany, she’s also the second woman to chair the G8 (after Margaret Thatcher from England).

Chancellor Merkel was in Washington for the Nuclear Security Summit. President Barak Obama invited over 40 heads of state and governments to consultations on guarding against unsecured nuclear material. So why exactly is she visiting Los Angeles?

According to the Los Angeles Times, Germany is the fourth-largest source of direct foreign investment in the Los Angeles area, with German-owned and affiliated companies employing nearly 3,000 people. That amounts to about $149 million in wages paid to employees, according to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s office.

Her visit to Warner Bros. is just one stop on her 5-day visit to the States. According to Wikipedia, health care reform and problems concerning future energy development have thus far been major issues of her tenure.

I personally have great health benefits, but that’s more a result of my union (yes, I’m union) than anything Warner Bros. is doing. But the environmental stuff? Ah, now there’s where we’re the leaders in the industry.

The Warner Bros. Studios Environmental Initiative is one of the leaders in the entertainment industry. We recycle and reuse EVERYTHING, we’ve installed a solar power system of more than 500 kilowatts (this helps us save about 900 kilowatt hours of energy and $1 million annually), and just last year we completed construction on the first environmentally-efficient soundstage in the industry. And, heck yeah, they gave me a reusable water bottle.

So I can see why Chancellor Merkel would want to visit Warner Bros. We’re the best, anyway. 🙂

Just a few more things about this remarkable woman:

Forbes magazine listed her as the most powerful woman in the world from 2006-2009. Chancellor Merkel has also been the chairwoman of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) since 10 April 2000, and Chairwoman of the CDU-CSU (Christian Social Union) parliamentary coalition from 2002 to 2005.

From 2005 to 2009 she led a grand coalition with the Christian Social Union (CSU), its Bavarian sister party, and the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), formed after the 2005 federal election on November 22, 2005. In the elections of 27 September 2009, her party, the CDU, obtained the largest share of the votes, and formed a coalition government with the CSU and the Free Democratic Party (FDP). Her government was sworn in on October 28, 2009.

Chancellor Merkel is also a member of the Council of Women World Leaders, an International network of current and former women presidents and prime ministers whose mission is to mobilize the highest-level women leaders globally for collective action on issues of critical importance to women and equitable development.

In 2008, Merkel received the Charlemagne Prize “for her work to reform the European Union”.

And she’s only 55.

Enjoy some pictures from today’s meet-and-greet with the always-dashing Simon Baker, one of the stars of Warner Bros.’s hottest drama The Mentalist.

German Chancellor Merkel meets Australian actor Simon Baker, left, on the back lot of Warner Bros. Studios during her tour of the studio in Los Angeles on Wednesday April 14, 2010. (AP Photo/Paul Buck, Pool)

Simon Baker showing Chancellor Merkel some of the Midwest set. (AP Photo/Paul Buck, Pool)

Chancellor Merkel and Simon Baker (AP Photo/Paul Buck, Pool)