<p>I once saw S.F. Mayor Willie Brown in a bar. After he made eye contact, I said, “I never forget a face. You’re an actor, right? Godfather Part 3?”</p>
<p>His reply: “Youare awful! You’re terrible!”</p>
<p>He later introduced the the two young women who were with him as his “bodyguards.”</p>
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<p>No, I’m an immunologist, but my world intersects with clinical chemistry in the realm of immunoassays, which is why I sometimes go to the clinical chemistry meetings.</p>
<p>Another famous person I met: Summer Sanders. She was nice.</p>
<p>Seeing Gerybeard’s comment reminds of the time when we were in a bar/resturant (Hawk and Dove, I think) on Capitol Hill, and my wife, who was a supervisor at the time in the DC government’s central budget office, and I ran into then mayor Marion Berry. Marion, of course was with a female, who was not his wife, sort of recognized my wife. They had travelled together in his limo a couple of times going to community meetings. She said that he sucks his teeth.</p>
<p>Had a nice conversation with Michael-J-Fox in an elevator. Admiring our two boys, he said, “Kids seem like so much fun! My friend Bruce has a new baby and he is having such a great time.”</p>
<p>That friend would have been Bruce Willis…</p>
<p>concerned dad - Just catching up on this thread. Nice Valentine’s Day touch (#65).</p>
<p>Mr. B’s Jim Kelly story reminds me of something I once read about Joe Montana: he had broken his hand in a play-off game against the Giants, then went to Hawaii a few weeks later for the Pro-Bowl (he was selected, but didn’t play due to his injury). He went out to eat one night, and was served by a waitress who didn’t recognize him, and who asked him how he hurt his hand. “I broke it playing football.” She looked at him askance, and said, “Aren’t we a little old to be playing football?” His glum response: “Maybe so.”</p>
<p>Gawd, my life is b-o-r-i-n-g. Okay, here goes. </p>
<p>Almost met…ELVIS! But, only if I can go back in a time machine to April 1956. My mom was a student at Las Vegas High School, and she and her best girlfriend ditched class one day to go see Elvis Presley sing in a parking lot on the back of a flatbed truck. She came home from school that day and raved to my aunt about seeing this hot, new singer named Elvis. He was appearing at the New Frontier Hotel, but his 2-week gig ended up being cancelled after the first week due to poor audience response. Elvis graduated from h/s in 1953, so he would have been around 21 at the time. </p>
<p>Almost met…JERRY VALE, the Vegas lounge singer. My H, who was my boyfriend at the time, and I were at the old MGM Hotel movie theater making out in one of the blue, velvet loveseats. At one point when we were sitting up, we noticed the very distinctive white head of hair in front of us and realized that it was the man himself, Jerry Vale. We straightened up and kept watching, Gone With the Wind.</p>
<p>Almost met…TONY FRANCIOSA. Remember him? Easily confused with James Franciscus? He was tanned and very blond in 1976. He was sprinting through the Las Vegas airport (the Twilight Zone of airports), and I was there waiting for my Hughes Airwest flight back to college. He was in the TV series stage of his career, probably still working on the action-detective show, Matt Helm, and it was cool to see him dashing through the airport just like his character. </p>
<p>Did meet…CATWOMAN, JULIE NEWMAR, at the height of the TV series, Batman. My dad was a cameraman for a local TV station in Omaha, and she showed up to sign autographs. Julie Newmar, right up there with Emma Peel on my chick Cool-O-Meter! </p>
<p>Did meet…PORTER WAGONER, the Grand Ole Opry Country Western star. He had a weekly TV show, and my dad was (again) doing the camera work for a local performance at the TV station where he worked in downtown Omaha.</p>
<p>Almost met…a bunch of BIG TIME WRESTLERS at the TV station where my dad worked. In 1969, I think it was popular at local TV stations around the country to have weekly Big Time wrestling matches. Seems like I met somebody named, “Mad Dog,” but I think they all went by that name at one time or another! </p>
<p>Did meet…FOSTER BROOKS in 1974. He was a Vegas act, and he used to occasionally appear on Johnny Carson. He was a comedian best known for burping through his monologue. I was introduced to him at a Democratic political party during the 1974 Nevada governor’s race. I was campaigning for the now Senate Minority Leader, Harry Reid.</p>
<p>Okay, maybe it was James Franciscus…I just looked up a photo of Tony Franciosa when he was shooting, Matt Helm, and he’s not even close to being blond. He was too fast for me to catch, so I guess I’ll never know for sure! :p</p>
<p>I nearly stepped on Meryl Streep’s hand.<br>
I sat diagonally in front of Angela Lansbury once. </p>
<p>They were in “private” mode and I gave no sign that I knew who they were, though I contrived to give one a photo of her niece.</p>
<p>I shook hands with Ricardo Montalban without knowing it was him.</p>
<p>OK, TD, I’ll bite, why was Meryl Streep’s hand in a position to be stepped on? I hope she wasn’t drunk, and passed out in the curb again!</p>
<p>This is so tacky 
What the heck…</p>
<p>I met Brian McKnight last summer in Philly…we were both behind the venue waiting for cars to pick us up after a show in which he peformed…he’s taller than I thought - and much more handsome in person. </p>
<p>I met Robin Givens on a beach in the Caribbean. Actually, she was more interested in my D, but said hi to me too. </p>
<p>I, unfortunately, met Charles Barkley while dining in a Philly restaurant before I got married. He came over to my table and said to my date “I just wanted to tell you that this is a very beautiful woman you are with - and I have NO idea why she’s with you”. No comment - UGH CB!</p>
<p>I met Alice Walker when she spent the night at the home of a friend when I was in HS my friend’s mom was a professor and Alice Walker was in town to speak at the college. We spent time talking on the sofa late that night - she was very nice. </p>
<p>Sometime in the 1990 timeframe I dated a pro-football player - Maurice Johnson (Mo Johnson). I’m sure there are plenty of other women who can make this same claim - for the same time period. I didn’t care. </p>
<p>I served as hostess for PA Governor Ed Rendell when he was still Mayor of Philly and was keynote speaker at a youth computer contest</p>
<p>It’s embarrassing how many of these people whose <em>names</em> I don’t recognize.
Oh, and politicos I’ve met by the dozen. Hubert Humphrey was the first voice I recognized in D.C. when I stepped into the Capitol to look for a job on staff there…on the other side of the aisle, I’ve met that Minion of Satan, John Ashcroft quite a few years before he became a minion.</p>
<p>CD, it was simple: Meryl Streep had some relation dancing in the local ballet studio’s summer school performance. Said performance was in the largest studio, five long rows of folding chairs for the audience, not enough fans to keep it from being hot and sticky anyway, etc. So after the lights have dimmed, late people keep skittering in…no seats to be seen…so they scooch down and sit on the floor in front of the first row of chairs. After the performance, TheMom says, “Nice going, dear…you nearly stepped on Meryl Streep’s hand!” “That was Meryl Streep?!” </p>
<p>I was a good lad when Angela Lansbury was sitting behind me: I did <em>not</em> turn around and say something along the lines of “It was murder, she hoped.”</p>
<p>But for drunk and passed out in the street, I did once encounter this guy passed out in front of the ballet studio. Short, bearded guy with canvases tucked under his arm. I opened his shirt, prepared to give CPR, and found the tattoo, “Born Toulouse.”</p>
<p>USC, Los Angeles, Disneyland enployee-ran into several. Only care about the Harry kiss. Once while waiting in a Beverly Hills waiting room for psychologists a known actress started looking for her keys. I immediately started pounding on the sofa. She looked at me like are you crazy? I told her “well my keys have a little bell so when if I pound I can hear them”. She said something like that’s a good idea maybe I’ll get a bell. I suddenly realized we were looking for her keys not mine and what an idiot I was. I can’t remember who got called in first. My sister, a therapist said that office had someone who saw the stars. I had the cheap guy-no views-can’t believe I paid $$$$$ to learn how to deal with success/some money.-crazy I guess</p>
<p>I’ve had the good fortune to have met several people along the way, but my favorite embarassing story happened a few years ago, when I was called up on stage with several other people at a David Copperfield show (the magician) to participate in the finale. At the end, he huddled with us backstage, asked us not to divulge the secret to the trick, and gave us some pointers on what to say if people asked. He started to say… “if anyone asks you how the illusion worked… say…” and I chimed in… “bite me!” Unfortunately, instead of it coming out as funny, he thought I told him to “bite me”. Oops. Not funny :o</p>
<p>Second embarassing story occurred when I was a teenager. We were vacationing at the newly opened Ceasar’s Palace. I was impressed that I recognized Louise Lasser (“Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman”) across the pool. My mother leaned over to me and whispered “don’t look now but there is Telly Savalas”. I rather indescreetly said, a bit too loudly. “who the h-e-l-l is Telly Savalas?” The bald guy in the loungechair next to me leaned over in my face, and in that deep, booming voice said “I am!”</p>
<p>On a teentour I met Glenn Campbell, Carol Burnett and Steve McQueen (he was a jerk).
Also met Troy Donahue at the Diplomat Hotel in Hollywood, Fla when I was a young teenager. Talk about meeting a young girls fantasies… I also used to live near Fran Tarkington, when he played for the Giants, and used to occasionally walk my dog with him. Robert Merrill (opera singer) sat behind us at religious services one year, during one of the big holidays… but he didn’t sing!! 
I guess he would have drowned everyone else out.</p>
<p>I was on a flight many years ago that had engine trouble and we had an emergency landing in Philly. We all spent several hours together in the airport while they got us another plane. In first class were James Brown (godfather of soul) and Earl Brown (then Sec’ty of Agriculture). Listening to them chat was pretty entertaining.</p>
<p>My older s. won an award last year and was photographed with Hank Aaron. He also met Warrick Dunn (Atlanta Falcon) last year. He was also supposed to have an award presented to him by Newt Gingrich. Problem is, no one told us he was being honored, and we showed up a bit late!! Oops. Actually, Newt used to live near us and I ran into him in the drugstore (he was taking his mother to the bathroom and she had a roll of cash in her hand-- never did figure that out) and at a local restaurant. Also live near Dkimbe Mutumbo, when he played for the Hawks, and used to run into him in the supermarket (he was HUGE). Doc Rivers (another Hawk), who I also met, wasn’t anywhere near as big and imposing.</p>
<p>And, for those of you who are REALLY old (prize to anyone who knows who she is), I took a drama class in college from Jean Arthur.</p>
<p>In first class were James Brown (godfather of soul) and Earl Brown (then Sec’ty of Agriculture). Listening to them chat was pretty entertaining.</p>
<p>That sounds hilarious.</p>
<p>Momsdream-
Yes- It was a hoot, and definitely got our minds off the fact that we’d just landed on a runway full of foam lined with fire trucks!!</p>
<p>Oh, I also got to shake Bobby Kennedy’s hand when he was campaigning in our town. Back in “those days” the political candidates just stood in the back of a big car in a shopping center parking lot.</p>
<p>Did you hear the “groan” all the way down South, TD?</p>
<p>The Dad-
I thought the “Born Tolouse” was funny!! It reminded me of a shirt that said “Baroque: When you are out of Monet”</p>
<p>Ok, forgot this one…but it goes with the “almost met” theme of this thread…</p>
<p>Janet Jackson ; on the dancefloor next to me (if you can call it a dance floor) at Johnno’s on Anguilla - dancing with her entourage/dancers…she is more petite than I expected - but had loooooong braids in her hair. Funny thing, the crowd at Johnno’s could have cared less - she was just another girator that night.</p>
<p>I have to admit I don’t recognize a lot of these names. Probably, therefore, don’t really know who I “almost” met! I would most likely be like one of those mentioned who says something stupid because I don’t know who the person is.</p>
<p>But I did meet Hubert Humphrey. I was 12, and my Italian class attended the Cleveland Opera to see La Traviata. He was in a box seat down below our nosebleed seats. Everyone in my row was too shy to approach him, so they talked me into it. (My older sister was there, and she always made me do everything she was too shy to do. Still does…) I approached his box with a handful of programs and my libretto. He was very nice, signed all of them, got to mine and said, “Wow. Somebody has a libretto.” I proudly told him it was mine. (My mother told me to get one, so I would have a clue what was going on. Good advice, since I was only a first year Italian student.)</p>
<p>And I admit I had no idea who HHH was at the time…</p>
<p>I was a freshman at Pitt when Tony Dorsett was a senior. Only he was Tony DORsett then, not Tony DorSETT. And Dan Marino was there around my time, too. But I didn’t meet either of them. That I know of…</p>
<p>My S ushered at Christopher Reeve’s funeral at Juilliard, and sent me a list of famous people he saw. He has the same problem I have in not knowing many folks (we don’t watch much TV) so had to have many of them pointed out to him. He did know Robin Williams, though, and a few others. Wonders how many folks he seated that he should have recognized but didn’t.</p>
<p>He has also met and spent time with many well known classical musicians, and we have met a few as well, through him. Although I wouldn’t know who they were if my S wasn’t a musician! </p>
<p>And Brett Butler (the ballplayer, not the comedian) attended our church for awhile. He and Jeff Foxworthy did some youth programs there, and pulled in a few Atlanta Braves, too.</p>
<p>My other S is friends with one of the Olympic gymnast’s brother… And I taught one of the swimmers in middle school.</p>
<p>And I had my picture taken with Maynard Jackson (former mayor of Atlanta) when we were both honored for something. Jimmy Carter was also honored, but he didn’t show up.</p>