Suki

Statia, do tell: what did you talk about (or do)that was so memorable that you ended up in his biography???

I just exchanged hello's with Condoleeza Rice in Washington two weeks ago. She looked great.

Yawn_boring

Wow, what a cast of scrubs! I don't know which is the worst of <b>that</b> lot! at least Tom Wolfe is famous for doing something, unlike &quot;Prince&quot; Charles and the other losers. Barbara Walters .... shivers!

I never met anyone famous in Europe. In the US, I've met a lot of famous tennis players, and Eddie Murphy .Oh, and at my college's reunion people kept saying &quot;there's katie couric&quot; but I had no idea who she was.

Statia

Ahhh...Suki. I guess you'd have to read &quot;Gimme Danger&quot; to find out.

JJBhoy

I suppose I'd be lying if I said I &quot;met&quot; him, but Bing Crosby sat in the seat right behind me at the British Open in Carnoustie in 1975.

Jim

P_M

As an All My Children fan I am quite impressed by the Josh Duhamel encounters. &lt;sigh&gt; He's quite the hottie.

Along those same lines I met Rebecca Budig (Greenlee) and Alicia Minshew (Kendall). I got Greenlee's autograph, as well as a picture of myself with her. If you are an All My Children fan you will know who they are. Those two look small on the show, but OMG, you should see them in person. They are REALLY tiny!! And Kendall is not nearly as tall as I expected.

BlueSwimmer

When I was doing study abroad in Paris in the late 80s, waiting for friends outside of the Pompidou Centre, a limo pulled to stop and out stepped Gorbachev to shake hands. No visible security anywhere. The French were going nuts for him.

My claim to fame is that I touched Gorbie on the sleeve and a nice tall man held my camera above the crowd and took a picture of the famed birth mark.

I also sat in a booth next to Sally Field and her lovely-looking family in the coffee shop at the San Juan airport during a layover. I was impressed with the fact that she ate fries and had her own rolling suitcase, just like the rest of us mortals.

PalQ

Yawn boring: who the hell is Katie Couric? I'm still so out of the loop i guess! Vaguely heard of the name.

Dayle

The highlight was going snow cat powder skiing with Bob Redford at Sundance, then being introduced to Paul Newman to boot.

Doesn't get any better than that.

P_M

Katie Couric is the star of the Today Show. It's a morning news/talk type of show on Monday through Friday from 7 to 9am. That's in the Central time zone, I don't know about the rest of the US.

cmt

All of the many very famous people I've chatted with on trains, stood behind on customs lines, brushed against in museums, greeted on hiking trails, squeezed by at outdoor markets, and bumped into while ogling ruins have been cleverly and effectively disguised as Florentine shopkeepers, Dutch tourists, Turkish semi-nomadic goatherds, Sicilian grandmothers, Greek fishermen, German graduate students, and French businessmen, so, unfortunately, I didn't recognize them as the famous people they were.

AAFrequentFlyer

~1987-88(?), my beatiful wife and I splurged on a total getaway to Mustique Island, Grenadines, Caribbean. It's a very secluded, upscale little paradise. There is (was, I think, remember) only one local bar on the island, Basil's Bar. We walked in, in mid afternoon and at the bar are the 2 biggest idols of mine, Mick Jagger and David Bowie, and nobody else in the place. I don't like to do the fan thing, but in this case I had no choice.

Anyway, they bought and did one round of shots with us and were just totally cool. After the shots and couple of pics we left.

Recently at the LAX AA Flagship (first class) lounge I had the pleasure to meet and talk to Christopher Walken. He had no entourage, no security, just him, flying to NY. We had a drink together, talked little bit about his &quot;psycho&quot; characters (one of my all time favorites) and I moved on. Totally cool guy. Unfortunately he was not looking very healthy looking that day. I hope it was just a long night, but I doubt it.

There were few others, but the memories of the meetings above will be with me for the rest of my life.

PalQ

cmt: you probably also passed by Rod Stewart as he was busking in the London Underground in the 60s without knowing it!

usbeauty

On my return flight from LHR to SFO last year at this time, I sat next to George Lucas the whole trip. He was in London to put the finishing touches on the last Star Wars film.

Nikki

AAFF, when you have no choice, you have no choice.

I read a profile of a rock and roll groupie somewhere about 35 years ago. She talked about how she traveled to rock shows all over and slept with the band members, always thinking, &quot;He's great but he's not Mick Jagger&quot;. Eventually, yes, it was Mick Jagger, and she kept thinking, &quot;He's great but he's not Mick Jagger&quot;.

I have ever since thought of this as a metaphor for life.

GreenEyedCatWoman

Not in Europe, but on my way there, in 1995.

My sister and I were flying Delta across the pond from St. Louis, so of course we had to connect in Atlanta. And what former U.S. president is from Georgia?

Yes, Jimmy Carter was on our flight to London! Of course, he was sitting waaaay up front and we were waaaay toward the back of the plane.

After the plane was loaded, Pres. Carter walked down one aisle and up the other of the L10-11 and shook hands with every single passenger! Secret Service guy with wire coming out of ear right on his heels, plus another guy in front of him running interference.

The flight attendant told us he flew with Delta several times a year at that time, and always shook hands with all of the other passengers. This was back when he was doing quite a bit of the good-will ambassadorial thing.

Nice guy!

Marilyn

usbeauty, I sat next to George at a sushi bar in San Rafael last year. He wasn't very talkative.

nikki, I heard that story years ago and still love it. I agree with you --it's a great metaphor for life.

alya

Nikki, LOL

I once saw Ken Livingstone on the tube, but that's nothing special he used to use it all the time, Does he still?

My mother saw Princess Diana at close quaters and said she had the most amazing eyes.

jules4je7

I met President Bill Clinton at a Democratic Party event in 1994. It was a pleasure to shake his hand and say a few words...my then-husband knew a Senator's daughter who got us in.

I found him to be very friendly -- like he connected with each person he met. But then I'm a brunette, and I know he prefers them.

I've met Governors, several U.S. Senators, and a couple of celebrities here and there in my work as a newspaper reporter, but meeting Clinton while he was President was by far the most memorable.

Jules

mari5

Charlton Heston...back in the 70's,,,we were having dinner at the same restaurant in the hills above Innsbruck, Austria. His group left the same time we did, and my husband took our two boys, ages 10 and 12, over to meet him when we were outside...and Mr. Heston graciously shook their hands.

abram

In 1964, in NYC, we were visiting the US Mission, and there was a limo out front. Never one to be shy, my mother asked the chauffuer whose it was. &quot;Adlai Stevenson&quot;, he replied, and encouraged us to wait. We chatted with AES, took a picture, and when my mother told him I had been born in Illinois while he was governor, he said, &quot;I'm glad to see you survived the experience so well.&quot;