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In no particular order, who are the five most famous people you've met?

Started by planxtymcgillicuddy, September 21, 2019, 01:16:52 PM

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planxtymcgillicuddy

For me, my five would be:

Bobby Allison (84-time winner in NASCAR, 1983 Cup series champion and 1988 Daytona 500 winner)
Joe Gibbs (We all know who he is!)
James Gregory (comedian)
Junior Miller (longtime NASCAR modified racer here in NC)
Richard Gilewitz (guitarist)
It's easy to be easy when you're easy...

Quote from: on_wisconsin on November 27, 2021, 02:39:12 PM
Whats a Limon, and does it go well with gin?


Max Rockatansky

Dale Earnhardt Sr. (NASCAR Driver)
Roddy Piper (Professional Wrestler)
Dave Marcis (NASCAR Driver)
Jane Seymour (Actress)
Ken Schrader (NASCAR Driver)

J3ebrules

Beyoncé - and the rest of Destiny's Child, circa 1999.
Whitney Houston
Stephen Jenkins (lead singer of Third Eye Blind)

That's about it, honestly.
Counting the cars on the New Jersey Turnpike - they’ve all come to look for America! (Simon & Garfunkel)

akotchi

Former Vice President Dan Quayle
Johnny Unitas
Bob Griese
Don Shula
James Garner
Opinions here attributed to me are mine alone and do not reflect those of my employer or the agencies for which I am contracted to do work.

1995hoo

HRH the Duke of York (Prince Andrew)
Alex Ovechkin
Raisa Gorbachev
Either Rod Rosenstein (long before his service as Deputy Attorney General) or Merrick Garland (likewise, long before his nomination to the Supreme Court)
Marion Barry
"You know, you never have a guaranteed spot until you have a spot guaranteed."
—Olaf Kolzig, as quoted in the Washington Times on March 28, 2003,
commenting on the Capitals clinching a playoff spot.

"That sounded stupid, didn't it?"
—Kolzig, to the same reporter a few seconds later.

GaryV

Gerald Ford (when he was in congress - but only in a student group, no talking directly or handshake)
Margaret Mead
Dean Kamen
Eminem (he was bowling at the place my daughter's team was holding a fundraiser - bodyguards kept everyone away - does that count as meeting?)
Sen. Debbie Stabenow

Throckmorton

Quote from: akotchi on September 21, 2019, 02:22:26 PMJames Garner

I always liked James Garner. It would have been cool to meet him.   
   
Quote from: 1995hoo on September 21, 2019, 05:51:34 PMRaisa Gorbachev

How in the world did you meet Raisa Gorbachev and not meet Mikhail?   
   
Proceed with caution

1995hoo

Quote from: Throckmorton on September 21, 2019, 06:57:20 PM
Quote from: 1995hoo on September 21, 2019, 05:51:34 PMRaisa Gorbachev

How in the world did you meet Raisa Gorbachev and not meet Mikhail?   
   

Mikhail Gorbachev came to Charlottesville to give a speech on the Lawn for Thomas Jefferson's 250th birthday. I got there super-early to snag an aisle seat. Mrs. Gorbachev was on my side of the aisle and her husband was on the other side. Oh well! I have some good pictures of him, but they're not digitized because 1993 was definitely the film camera era!
"You know, you never have a guaranteed spot until you have a spot guaranteed."
—Olaf Kolzig, as quoted in the Washington Times on March 28, 2003,
commenting on the Capitals clinching a playoff spot.

"That sounded stupid, didn't it?"
—Kolzig, to the same reporter a few seconds later.

hbelkins

Mitch McConnell (U.S. senator from Kentucky, now Senate majority leader)
Kyle Petty (former NASCAR driver)
Tubby Smith (former UK basketball coach)
Sam Bowie (former UK and NBA player)
Ernie Fletcher (former Kentucky governor and former congressman)

Honorable mention: Harry Gant and Steve Park, former NASCAR drivers, met them the same time I met Kyle Petty, but Kyle's better-known; and every Kentucky governor since 1975 except John Y. Brown Jr. and Steve Beshear, but I included Fletcher because he has held other high office and I like him the best of all the governors I've met.

Most famous non-person I ever met was Lil Bub. (Google her if you don't know who she is. My wife met both her and Grumpy Cat, and I'm insanely jealous over that.)


Government would be tolerable if not for politicians and bureaucrats.

index

Bernie Sanders, twice. (Senator from VT and 2020 presidential candidate) I also have a picture with him.
Pat McCrory (former Governor of North Carolina)
Nina Turner (former Ohio State Senator and Sanders campaign co-chair)
Some NFL player came to do a motivational speech at my school when I was younger, this was >years< ago and I have no idea who he was or who he played for. I did shake his hand though.

And that's about it...I haven't met much well known people. One of the staff at my old middle school was related to the one of Oklahoma City bombers, Timothy McVeigh, so there's that...
I love my 2010 Ford Explorer.



Counties traveled

ce929wax

The only one I can think of is Tyrus Thomas.  He was an NBA player, but when I knew him we were in the 8th grade together in Baton Rouge, LA.

corco

1. Hillary Clinton (during her 2008 primary run)
2. Dick Cheney
3. Andrew Luck (checked him into a hotel room while he was at Stanford)
4. Two Chainz
5. Steve Bullock

Beltway

Two sitting U.S. senators in Virginia --
John Warner
George Allen

L. Douglas Wilder -- served as the 66th Governor of Virginia, from 1990 to 1994.  He was the first elected African-American governor in the U.S.

Paul W. Tibbits, Jr. --  The pilot who flew the B-29 Superfortress known as the Enola Gay when it dropped  the first of two atomic bombs used in warfare, on the Japanese city of Hiroshima.   Commander of the 509th Composite Group, which would conduct the atomic bombings.

D. James Kennedy -- pastor, evangelist, Christian broadcaster, and author.  He served as senior pastor of Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, from 1960 until his death in 2007.
http://www.roadstothefuture.com
http://www.capital-beltway.com

Baloney is a reserved word on the Internet
    (Robert Coté, 2002)

Rothman

Meadowlark Lemon (Harlem Globetrotter)
Al Sharpton
John Calipari (when he coached UMass Basketball)
Mary Peters -- USDOT Secretary
Russell Nelson -- Pioneering heart surgeon and leader of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (a couple of times).
Al and Mimi Sparhawk -- of the band Low

Oh, and I ran into Joe Montana's mother while I was working in San Francisco...
Please note: All comments here represent my own personal opinion and do not reflect the official position(s) of NYSDOT.

dlsterner

Assuming "met" involves at least a handshake and/or a few words exchanged.  So no using sporting events nor concerts, unless the prior condition happened.

In no particular order:

Jimmy Carter (post-presidency, about 10-15 years ago)
William Donald Schaefer (former Mayor of Baltimore and former Governor of Maryland)
Larry Hogan (current Governor of Maryland)
Boog Powell (former 1B for the Baltimore Orioles, 1970 AL MVP)
Robert Packwood (former US Senator from Oregon)

hbelkins

I have pictures of me with Tubby Smith and Gov. Fletcher. (Also have pictures of me with current Gov. Matt Bevin and former Govs. Brereton Jones and Wallace Wilkinson). I also have a picture of me with John L. Smith when he was Louisville's football coach, but I didn't include him in my Top 5.

I have actually never met the most famous person I am related to, former MLB (Cincinnati and NY Mets) player Doug Flynn. Up until a few years ago, I would have enjoyed meeting him, but after he ignored a personal request from me a few years ago regarding something pretty important to me, I don't really care if I ever meet him.

I also worked for several years with Malcolm "Mac" Kilduff, the assistant presidential press secretary who made the announcement of JFK's death in 1963.


Government would be tolerable if not for politicians and bureaucrats.

formulanone

...having-a-Wikipedia-entry famous? I'll go in the order I've met them.

Quote from: dlsterner on September 22, 2019, 12:38:20 AM
Assuming "met" involves at least a handshake and/or a few words exchanged.

Derek Bell - Sports car and former F1 driver - Stepped out of the motor coach in the pit paddock and talked to my brother, father, and I in Miami for about 5 minutes. Nice guy!

A.J. Foyt - Indycar driver, et al - Was getting his haircut in the paddock in of the IMSA West Palm Beach GP. I had my little 110 camera at the time, and he said "If you don't take my picture right now, I'll give you an autograph!" I lowered the camera from my eye. He signed a few glossies for my brother and we shook hands before a few others arrived.

Cris Carter - wide receiver - used to bring his car in to me for work. Super-relaxed guy, only asked him once if he "knew" the football player. Gave me a wink and gave me a handshake with a mitt that was about three times the size of my own hand! He actually didn't mind waiting for his car to be worked on, and would just casually and quietly wait upstairs with the other customers. Literally had to assuage him to take a loaner car ("I don't want special treatment.") for a five-hour repair, after I'd explained we would give anyone a loaner who needed one (if we weren't out).

Jim Moran - president of Southeast Toyota Distributors - my boss, at one time - real nice guy and was a great springboard to my career.   

Akio Toyoda - president of Toyota Motor Corporation - Though, he wasn't yet president at the time I met him, he and Jim Moran had a random chit chat with me while I was at work. Shook hand, did a little head bow, and said "hajimemashite" and he gave a smile.

That's about it.

ErmineNotyours

In 1990 I took a creative writing course at Washington State University with future bestselling author Sherman Alexie as a fellow student.  In the first class we joked that only the student who had ambitions of being a technical writer stood a chance of being successful as an author.  In this class, the professor would photocopy the students' manuscripts and we would discuss them in the next class.  Sherman's work jumped fully formed off the page.  It was strange to read such good stuff off a typewritten manuscript.  I'm such a pack rat that I saved all these documents.  Later when I stood in line at an author signing event, the other fans were discussing the things they were having Sherman sign.  I brought a copy of Sherman's first short story, and that got the most attention of anything there.  He said he never saved copies of the manuscripts, so they took it off to an office to make another copy of it.  I sent him copies of the other stories.  Also during the class we would discuss other things.  This happened when Dances With Wolves came out, and Sherman said, "There will never be a sequel to Dances With WolvesLittle Big Man was the sequel to Dances With Wolves."  Later when Sherman co-hosted the podcast A Tiny Sense of Accomplishemt, it was just like being in class again, hearing him discuss pop culture phenomena.

When I was working at Microsoft Studios in Redmond, Washington, I met Bill Nye at the front door.  As a temp, I didn't have a key card, so I would have to wait in the lobby for someone to let me in.  One day Bill Nye came by with his wardrobe over his shoulder.  He tried the door and noticed the latch was taped over.  He said, "It's ajar.  When is a door not a door?  When it's ajar."  Wow, my very own Bill Nye joke.  He was there to record the Windows ME launch video.  I didn't have much to do that day (I usually transcribed interviews for Encarta) so I helped fill out the studio audience.  Throughout the video, I noticed a camera on a crane doing closeup cutaway views of audience members, and at one time the camera landed right in front of my face.  I tried to keep a view of the monitor out the corner of my eye and try to look natural when the scene cut to me.  After that, I tried looking for the video on Microsoft's intranet, and I've since kept looking for it online.  Not even the star power of Bill Nye can keep this video from surfacing above the embarrassment of Windows ME.

KEVIN_224

Randy Savage - Shook his hand outside of the Yale Bowl in West Haven, CT. He was part of Volvo's Love '91 charity softball game at Yale Field. Vince McMahon and Bobby "The Brain" Heenan were there as well. :)
Ric Flair - March 1992 at the Mystic Mall. I think it was Chelsea, MA. It was to help promote WrestleMania VIII.
Owen Hart - Met him at the Exhibition Hall section of the Hartford Civic Center before that night's house show. It was May 1993. (Owen passed away in 1999.)
Bret Hart - Met him at am auto dealership in Bristol, CT. There was a show in New Haven that evening (1996. I believe).
Brian Pillman - This was before a "WWF Monday Night RAW" TV taping at the Pepsi Arena in Albany, NY on Tuesday, September 23, 1997. Brian passed away only 12 days later.

Non-wrestlers? Tough one! I got Faye Dunaway's autograph once outside of "Late Show With David Letterman". Met some of Dave's neighbors, but not all at the same time: Mujibur, Sirjul and Rupert Jee of the Hello Deli. Baseball? Alfonso Soriano in 2001, then with the New York Yankees. Mariano Rivera at Yale Field one fall. I guess you can count actor Michael Vale in August of 1991. He was Fred the Baker in many commercials for Dunkin' Donuts. (He also did ads for Breakstone Sour Cream and the Sound Playground electronics chain of CT and MA.) Lastly, I shook hands with Jesse Jackson in 1991. He was on a People's Coalition march to Hartford. He and his people walked right past my house.   

I didn't meet them per se, but I've been 15 feet or less from Derek Jeter (Trenton, NJ in 2011) and Taylor Swift (Box office area of Mohegan Sun Arena in 2009).

ftballfan

Off the top of my head, I can only think of two people (and I have pictures with both of them):
Jim Leyland - former manager of the Detroit Tigers. Met him in Lakeland, FL during a Tigers spring training game in 2014 or 2015
Eddie Money - rock singer. Met him after a concert in Traverse City, MI in 2014

Scott5114

Lt. Gov. (and unsuccessful 2010 gubernatorial candidate) Jari Askins (D-OK) was in attendance at the state quiz bowl meet ("academic team" in Oklahoma) the one time we made it to state. She made some light small talk with me. She made the mistake of asking me if there had been any difficult questions, and I tried to relate a question I hadn't known the answer to but found particularly clever. I wasn't doing the best job of explaining it, though, and I could see her eyes glaze over in real time. She excused herself and found someone less awkward to talk to shortly thereafter.

My other two interactions with famous took place online, so count that if you want. One was on this forum–Jeopardy! champ Ken Jennings was doing research for his book Maphead and–you guessed it!–wanted to learn about roadgeeking. So he very politely contacted the admins and asked if we were cool with him asking some questions here. We told him to go right ahead, of course.

Another time I posted on another forum that I had appreciated game show announcer Randy West's work on Supermarket Sweep and was disappointed I'd never gotten to see his fill-in work for Rod Roddy on The Price Is Right. Somehow, Mr. West ran across my post and sent the admins of the forum an audio-only copy of some of his Price work to forward on to me. I thought that was very classy of him.
uncontrollable freak sardine salad chef

wphiii

Wiz Khalifa (went to high school with him, caught the same bus at the same stop every morning)
Mac Miller (same, though our time in school didn't coincide, there was enough overlap in our social circles that I interacted with him on a number of occasions)
Beto O'Rourke (fiancee worked on his Senate campaign)
Michael Roos (former Pro Bowl offensive lineman for the Titans, he was neighbors with my uncle in Nashville and we went to a Christmas party at his house)
Elroy Face (great Pirates relief pitcher of the 50s and 60s, his grandson was on my baseball team growing up)

Henry

These five people have a Chicago theme among them:

Ryne Sandberg
Mike Ditka
Phil Jackson
Michael Jordan
Scottie Pippen

I met the last three during the Bulls' first championship parade in 1991. Ditka was a speaker at my school from way back, and Sandberg was from my many Cubs games that I went to as a kid.
Go Cubs Go! Go Cubs Go! Hey Chicago, what do you say? The Cubs are gonna win today!

clong

Bob Riley - former AL Governor, his granddaughter was in my son's 2nd grade class and he invited the class to the Governor's Mansion for the annual pre-Thanksgiving tradition of pardoning the turkey
Jose Canseco - got his autograph before a exhibition game between the A's and their AA affiliate (in 1989) Huntsville Stars
Gary Palmer - current AL Congressman, met him at a reception for those nominated for service academies
Bill Hybels - pastor Willow Creek Community Church (Chicago suburbs) and author, sat with him at lunch at a Willow Creek promotional event
Steve Shaw - SEC Supervisor of Football Officials

Honorable mention to Will Muschamp, South Carolina Head Coach

LM117

I've only met one so far: Ivan Koloff (RIP), former pro wrestler.

He did a meet-and-greet at Kmart (also RIP) in Goldsboro, NC and me & my dad met him there in December 2006. We were living in Fremont at the time, so we weren't far from Goldsboro. My mom was working at Kmart and she told us he was there. We got his autographs and had our pic taken with him. Cool dude. My dad felt like a kid again, which looking back, was good to see since he ended up going blind nearly 4 years later, thanks to a combination of diabetes and a side effect of Zyvox.
“I don’t know whether to wind my ass or scratch my watch!” - Jim Cornette



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