I don't do the "Spot-a-Celebrity Freakout"

"OMG! I just saw ..."

Whatever. They are just people, doing a thing to make a living. I don't want an autograph. I don't want an audience with them. I don't want anything from them, except for them to get outta my way*.

Usually.

There are a few of exceptions (in no particular order):

Winona Ryder (I confessed this years ago in a weekly newspaper column)
Hillary Swank (You read it hear first)
Kurt Vonnegut (he's dead, but I'd still love to bump into him on the street)
and
The Dali Lama (He's sooooo cute. Doncha just wanna take him home? OMG!)

Those are in no particular order.

In very particular order, there's just one celebrity on top of my "OMG!" list, light years from the crowd.

Janeane Garofalo. She's got it all. No shit. ALL.

OMG!

And guess who I saw in the Village yesterday!?!?!

OMG! Oh-My-BigGee-odd!

Janeane Garofalo -- stridin', talkin' gesturin' -- just like Janeane Garofalo. That sounds kinda ridiculous when typed out, but it isn't a given. Daryl Hannah, for example, required a double take. "Is that? Maybe? Yes."

Not Ms. Garofalo. Straight up, no doubt about it. In the flesh. Right there. Yessiree. Wow. OMG ...

The best thing about this casual brush with celebrity has to be that I didn't falter, trip, exclaim, get arrested, run into anything or even wobble. But I had a really good day.

Thanks, Ms. Garofalo.

And thanks Trader Joe's ... where I found a pretty decent $3 bottle of wine about 30 minutes later. Coincidence? I think not.





* Back in my first stay in New York City, I lived for a while off Union Square. I ran into Andy Warhol ... twice. Knocked him over. Come on! What the hell? Get outta my way, Andy. "I'm walkin' here!"