Question of the day 16th December. Your claim to fame.

[bonnie1965]

Okay, I remembered one

I met Wilma Mankiller at a talk/booksigning here at Powells. I was toungetied trying to speak with her, managed to sputter out something about where I had lived in Oklahoma that was near her home. She is just an amazing woman. I did talk with her husband for about 10 minutes, wasn't bumfuddled at all then.

 

[norachelhere]

When I was young my grandparents and I would have breakfast almost every day at a little diner on the corner, and Randy Savage would too. He always sat alone in the corner, so I felt bad and would go sit with him.

I also know Nick Bollea (hogans son) very well. He is a popular person in the car scene here. I cant say I care much for the kid after many conversations with him, but I know him very well . . .

 

[butzie]

Back in the '70's I met Jim Jensen who was a prominent newscaster in NY at that time and maybe 3 persons on TCS know who he is . Our high school in the Bronx was selected to be on a perspective game show - a la history Jeopardy - against a team from a high school in NJ. Okay, the producer's son went to the HS in NJ, but why my HS in the Bronx? Anyway, we creamed them, so the show never aired. I did get Jensen's autograph.

I was in NYC on business with a co-worker and I saw Joan Rivers in a fur coat coming out of a Broadway show. No matter how hard I nudged him, he didn't see her.

Last night I dreamt that Johnny Depp came into my bedroom in his pirate's outfit and he closed his eyes and had those second eyes on the lids. I closed my eyes in the dream and then I woke up. Does this count?

 

[EnzoLeya]

no....... I hope that I will get lucky some day to meet someone famous. Knowing me it will be someone I barley knew, a D-lister. I met someone who said, yeah I was from that movie....... I didn't even know the movie, apparently it was one of those that went straight to DVD, no theater time. I can't remember his name

 

[ldg]

Politicians

President Bush & Governor Pitaki. La Cote Basque (which doesn't exist anymore

) was our regular for biz lunches. Gary called to cancel a lunch one day, and the Maitre d' said "I'm so sorry you weren't able to reach us earlier, but the Secret Service tied up the phone lines - of course we'll see you at 12:30." Gary got the hint and kept the lunch with the clients, so we've got witnesses: the Chef of the restaurant (the owner, Jean-Jacques Rachou) made a point of coming out to introduce Gary to President Bush, Laura Bush, Governor Pitaki and Libby Pitaki. They chatted, and asked Gary what he did - he had a package of our stuff. THAT morning (Jan 23, 2002) the headline on our morning notes was "Paul O'Neill and His Shameless Band of Hacks Take Their Weird Show to Tokyo." !!! Laura Bush says, "Oh! The O'Neills are very great friends of ours." ...to which Gary answers - "Isn't it a great thing that we live in a country where we have the liberty to write anything we want." (Or something to that effect). The whole restaurant tinked their glasses.

At nine, Gary played four holes of golf with Frank Sinatra, Spiro Agnew, Bebe Rebozo. (His grandfather lived in Palm Springs next to Frank Sinatra on some golf course).


Sports

He played an entire summer on the JPGA tour - he played numerous times with Doug Ford Jr. (two times Masters Champ), who used to hit him in the back of his knees with a clubwhen he wasn't standing right.

We both met Peter O'Malley - the owner of the Dodgers at the time. (Our boss was married to Terry O'Malley, Peter's sister). We met bunches of the Dodgers - we lived in FL, their training camp was in Vero Beach, and Rollie (our boss) used to make us met him there all the time. Rollie was great friends with Yogi Berra, and we always used to sit on the bench where Rollie hung out with him.

Gary used to hang out with many of the Black Hawks at a bar in Chicago, particularly from 1990 - 1993.

Here there are really just too many to list because Gary was a regional manager for Stone Container which had HQ in Chicago and he met so many people at various functions. One of them was Michael Jordan.


Music

Well, let's see. From 1977 to 1980 Gary was friends with all the members of AC/DC, and they used to hang out in his apartment in Chicago, and he toured around with them for a while.

In 1993 Gary managed Nine Inch Nails for a couple months - they were hanging out in Seattle at the time. He had Thanksgiving with Pearl Jam that year. He was totally plugged into the "Seattle scene" at the time, so he knew most of the bands back then...

He recognized Johnny Winter at a bar in Alabama, and hung out with and drank with him. Coaxed him into playing a few sets for the bar.

Gary knows George Clinton and Bootsie Collins (Parliament). When they played in NY in 2005, he took Naomi (our adopted daugher) to the concert. I didn't go because there was a HUGE snow storm coming. Their manager didn't show up to the concert, they didn't know where to park the bus, and Gary handled it all (knows the people who own BB King's in NY). ...turns out I-80 was closed that night because of the storm - Gary blew through the cones to get home though. I have to find them, but we actually have pictures of Naomi dancing on stage with the band, and George Clinton hugging her.

Gary was a massive fan of Thin Lizzy, and knew all the bouncers at most of the venues in Chicago. He got backstage the first time he saw Lizzy, and became friends with Phil Lynott. Got to meet and hang out with Gary Moore several times too. He hung out with Phil every time they were through Chicago in that mid-70s to early 80s time frame - must have hung out with him at least 20 times.

That same restaurant where Gary met the Bushes, we met (at dinner time) Berry Gordy and Diana Ross during dinner in NYC.

They were seated at Table One, which was usually held for us. We sat next to them and got to talking. (We had money back then and bought them a MUCH better bottle of wine than they were drinking

)

I'm missing a LOT - I'll ask Gary tomorrow for more.


Business

Because of work, we've met loads of famous business people: We met (I mean had one-on-one meetings with) Kevin McNeeley (CEO of Sun), Eric Schmidt - we met him at Novell after he left Sun Micro, but he's CEO of Google now. Don't know if you remember "Chainsaw" Al Dunlop (Sunbeam). Gary met him on an elevator too. They got into a big argument. Ended up with a crowd around them in the lobby of the hotel (the NY Palace). In the end, Al gave Gary the business card with his personal direct line on it. (Though we never did initiate coverage of Sunbeam - good thing, too.)

The biggest one: Gary played bridge (online) with Warren Buffet through someone we were doing consulting work with at the time. That was in 1999.

We're working now with the guy that used to head Citibank's M&A department - he's the one who did the Prudential and Bache merger.

Here I'm sure there's more - but it was stuff a decade ago, and my brain's not functioning so well right at the moment.


Actors

When we used to commute into NYC frequently (before and around the time we started rescuing kitties), we used to take our dry cleaning into the city to get it done rather than find the time to deal with it out here. Donald Sutherland used the same dry cleaner.

The first time we ran into him, Gary told him we're huge fans of his work. He asked which was our favorite movie, and of course we both agreed - Kelly's Heroes. He laughed - he said no one had ever picked that one for their favorite role of his. Gary did an imatation of him in part of it, and Donald Sutherland was in stitches. ("...and this is my other dog impression..." )

When we lived and worked in LA, we used to fly to NY (where all our customers were) and stay for weeks or up to a month at The Palace. We met Jackie Chan on the elavator. He had a really cool bag - so did Gary, and they got to talking about them, though Jackie's english was pretty broken.

Gary most likely has met others.


International

Gary was shipped off to boarding school for a while as a kid. He went to a small exclusive school, and ended up being in school with the nephew of the Oil Minister of Saudi Arabia. When he visited, Gary and his dad had dinner with him and the nephew. They were the first jews he'd ever eaten with.


Classic Music

Gary's dad's family was very involved in Chicago Opera stuff and made Gary attend some special kid's program thing. He was actually in La Boheme at 12. He met George Solti (who used to get pissed off at him and throw stuff at him) and Itzhak Perlman.


Art

Gary's dad's family is originally from the Ukraine. His great-grandfather was the one who emigrated to the US. Turns out Marc Chagall's family is from the same village. He spent a weekend at Gary's country house with the family, and drew Gary a charcoal (which his dad took possession of and we have no idea what happened to it).


Laurie

 

[eburgess]

I met Leslie Nielson when I was doing a parade in Elkins WV, Former PA Governor Tom Ridge when he was still Governor, current WV Governor Joe Manchin, and many WVU football players when I was a student. My sister met Clay Aiken a few weeks ago.

 

[u8myufo]

Tee! Hee! The names are mounting up now. I forgot to mention I bumped into, or should I say nearly stepped on Paul Daniels the magician whilst in town once. He was as arragent as anything. I also had in my class at school Roland Orzabal from the group Tears for Fears. I also met Peter Gabriel whilst helping my mate do some work at his recording studio.

Two of the funniest encounters were seing the comedian Tommy Cooper who tripped coming out of a shop doorway, he picked himself up and dusted himself off, and then just used his famous catchphrase, Just Like That!

Also I was driving my Father through town once when he said he spotted the comedian Windsor Davies from the old comedy show It Aint Half Hot Mum, he played the Sergeant Major, his catchphrase on the show was,
Nice Shoulders Son! Show Em Off!

We drove up the road and turned around, coming back down the street Windsor was now on my Dads side of the road. My Dad wound the window down and called out to him, Nice Shoulders Son Show Em Off!!
With tears of laughter running down my face I failed to notice that a car had stopped at a pedestrian crossing right outside the police station. On hearing the sound of the impact Windsor Davies turned to us and gave such a quirky grin, the two ends of that well known moustache of his just curled up both sides of his face

 

[samantha1979]

I met Cybil Shepard once. She is my best friend from grade-school's Aunt. We picked her up from the airport. She wasn't super friendly. I barely recognized her. I was able to hang out with her oldest daughter quite often at my friends house when we were teens. She was very nice and down to earth. And she was gorgeous! I remember being a couple of years older than her, and she looked way older than me.

 

[felicia's mom]

I got to see (and pet) First Landing, a race horse from the late 1950's. I did this in 1973.

I have seen onstage, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Loretta Lynn, Marty Robbins plus others.

 

[sibohan2005]

I have seen Kurt Russel and Goldie Hawn because they have a summer house in the area just off of one of the large lakes. My friend's parents live just about 3 houses down from them.
I have also met quite a few hockey players