Claims to Fame

Possibly seeing Robin from the Real World in Banana Republic the other day got me to thinking about my other brushes with stardom. You probably won’t be impressed.

• I once saw a guy that looked kind of like M. Night Shyamalan at a Ralph’s grocery store in Anaheim on our honeymoon.

• I was once in the Forum Shops at Caesar’s Palace in Vegas when some old guy named Pete Rose was sitting in front of a sports store, signing autographs for people that purchased any item. Jon knew who he was, and so did about five other people in the general area.

• Some confused old lady in Pottery Barn once mistook me for Claire Danes. Okay, that was an exaggeration. It went like this:

Her: You look so much like Claire Danes! Are you her sister?!?

Me: I’m not, but I have been told before that I look like her…

Her: [gasps midsentence] Oh! Oh…I thought you were going to say that you ARE her!

Yes, I took that picture specifically for this purpose, and no, I don't want to talk about it.

I only see it at certain angles. This one does the trick. I’ll allow it.

Tangent: Before I moved to Las Vegas after high school, I’d never been compared to anyone famous, but once I was there I got a new one almost every day. The most ridiculous one I ever heard: “a white Halle Barry”. The most offensive one ever: Drew Barrymore. Drew Barrymore?!?!! Take it back.

End tangent and continuing with my Claims to Fame list:

• I was the drum major for the Pau-Wa-Lu Middle School marching band. Here’s a picture of me leading the band down Highway 395 in Carson City for the Nevada Days parade. We were too poor to afford a camera with a zoom, apparently.

Despite my obscenely huge feet, the band teacher told me that I was the best drum major they EVER HAD. In your faces!

• I met with and shook Elder Bednar’s hand the day he was set apart as an apostle. Jon didn’t think it was a big deal, because he’d met him a few times previously at BYU-I when he was the president of the school (Bednar…not Jon). But I thought it was cool. It was especially interesting because he and his wife were walking out of the Fashion Place mall when we bumped into them. On a Sunday. Right after being announced as an apostle. I like to think he was squeezing in some shopping after the general session of conference and before his next meeting.

• Peter Noon from Herman’s Hermits once autographed my shirt. Two of my friends and I went to a concert in Reno wearing matching wife beaters:

And got a little love from the lead singer. Warning: Scary/ugly picture of us coming up. ESPECIALLY of Peter Noon.

We stopped at a Krispy Kremes on our way back to Gardnerville to eat donuts and take stupid pictures.

Also, try saying Herman Hermits fast. I’ve been plagued my entire life to say “Herman Herbits” when I get too excited about it. And by “my entire life”, I mean the past six years or so, because the first time I’d ever heard about them was the night before the concert when we three got together to make our tank tops.

Anyway, last but not least on my list of brushes with stardom: I once passed Eugenia from America’s Next Top Model walking down the sidewalk in New York City last year.

And that’s it. The end. Pretty sad. Forget I even mentioned it.