Brush with Greatness

[Uncle_Tricky]

I spent 10 minutes alone in a room shooting the shit with Ross Perot. There was a impressionist print on the wall. He asked me if it was one a them Mo-Net paintings. I said yes. He said "yeah I bought the wife a few of those back in the early 80s. Now I could make a killing selling them to the Japanese, but she done fell in love with them Mo-Nets and won't let me. Women!"

 

I've seen U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein make at least five people cry.

 

I burnt parsley with this guy in Westport, WA who I later learned was a former Olympic snowboarding champion from mooseland who had lost his gold medal the previous winter after failing a drug test because he "happened to be at a party where people were smoking parsley-like substances."

[catbirdseat]

Our own Uncle_Tricky. Every post a gem.

 

I'll bet Diane Feinstein's five acquaintenances were not shedding tears of joy.

[mountaingirl]

I was just at the VGA's and got Tony Hawk's autograph (and saw Steve-O and Pointius' dicks!)

[ncascademtns]

I shook President Bill Clinton's hand.

Shut it !

I only did it because he was president and it would have been impolite not to.

Greatness...no,

Shortness....yes.

[willstrickland]

Ahh...why not:

 

Puffed tuff with: Oteil and Kofi Burbridge (of Allman Bros Band and Aquarium Rescue Unit), Dave Schools, Sunny and JoJo (of Widespread Panic), Chris Wood (of Medeski,Martin, &Wood).

 

Met and partied with: Phish, Govt Mule.

 

Played high school ball with: Jake Reed (of Vikings, Saints) and his half brother Dale Carter (KC Chiefs and others)

 

Had college classes with: Travis Best, Stephon Marbury, John Barry, Drew Barry (NBA players), Dorsey Levens (Packers).

 

As far as climbing, who cares? Go spend a season in Camp 4 and you'll meet more "big name" climbers than you can shake a stick at. (yes that is improper sentence structure). What you'll actually discover is that there are TONS of people out there you've never heard of doing some really impressive climbing.

[iain]

had lunch with gary payton in middle school when he was with Oregon State. I stole his strawberry jello. sucker.

[Billygoat]

willstrickland said:

What you'll actually discover is that there are TONS of people out there you've never heard of doing some really impressive climbing.

 

I've always noticed this. The ones you hear about are the ones that feel they have to sell themselves or like the attention or both, IMVHO.

[JRCO]

Kid Rock and Pam Anderson pulled up next to me on Kid's Harley at a stop light in Evergreen, Colorado. I shit you not. Later found out he was in town for a concert as I did not beleive what I was seeing. They were so close I could have reached out the window and grabbed Pam's ass.

[nonanon]

I worked for Karim Abdul Jabbar in the eighties. We’d talk about biking. He had a Strawberry with a top tube that came up to my shoulders. Nice guy.

 

One morning I got to the compound in Brentwood and the only car in the courtyard was his Blazer. No security staff, no housekeepers or landscrapers or contractor’s vans, it was very odd… I rang the buzzer and waited by the gate but no one answered. I could see his car and someone was always there, so I just kept ringing. Finally, Karim comes over the intercom in a very bad mood and shouts, “Who is it?” “It’s me,” says I, “here to install your trophy shelves.” “Well you’ll have to come back tomorrow,” he moaned. I apologized but insisted on coming in as all my tools were on site and I had a truck load of shelving materials to off-load.

 

Eventually, he caved and buzzed me in. Sometime after lunch a couple of tile setters showed up. Apparently, the Lakers had lost the NBA championships the night before. Who knew? Karim stopped talking to me after that.

[Off_White]

Pete Wilson (of California politics) is my sister's godfather.

 

I was once arrested for trying to assassinate Pres. Gerald Ford with a paper airplane.

[stinkyclimber]

Likely only other canucks will appreciate this (or hate it, depending on your view of the man):

 

I shook hands with Pierre Trudeau in the mid-90s - bumped into him at his book signing at UBC.

 

I was tempted to give him the PET double 1-fingered salute, but only for fun....there is no better photo of a politican than that of PET flipping both birds off the back of that train in Salmon Arm. RIP PET

[Rainierwon]

Saw Kurt Cobain at a street corner in Belltown while I was in town . Turns out that it was during the time he was "missing" before he committed suicide .

-jh

[Dr_Flash_Amazing]

Off_White said:

 

I was once arrested for trying to assassinate Pres. Gerald Ford with a paper airplane.

 

 

An air strike, eh? Not too subtle, there, Mr. White.

[willstrickland]

Here's one Canyukers can appreciate:

 

I hung out with Marc Emery in his office a couple of months ago.

[klenke]

iain said:

had lunch with gary payton in middle school when he was with Oregon State. I stole his strawberry jello. sucker.

On two occassions in the mid-90's before he was really famous, I played pool at Jillian's in Seattle on the table next to Gary. The man may be a great cager, but he sucks at billiards! Even so, he always tried to play up his game with his pals. On a few occassions in taking our shots we'd get in each other's way. Even though he sucked at pool, he was a pretty fun guy to be around. I suppose that would be the case when you make millions of $$$ per year.

[Bug]

At the first GoodWill Games they hired Ronald Reagan to be the keynote speaker for the opening ceremonies. There were colored tagboard placards in all the seats so at the MC's signal, one side or the other would hold them up and make a mosaic. They also made good megaphones and when Ronnie walked right past us we BOOED him as loud as we could. I thought the crowd was going to kill us.

[Alex]

I tied into the rope with trask, once.

 

 

[rbw1966]

Had sex with a famous rock stars wife; they got divorced shortly thereafter. Hung out with Penny Lane a couple of times. Drank beers with the former drummer for the Foo Fighters at the Monkey. Shook hands with Casper Weinberger.

 

Rubbed one out by the terwilliger curves at Winter's request.

[Norsky]

I can't believe I almost forgot this one.

Three of us were up at Squamish this summer and were space-cruising through the south part of town looking for the brewery. Soon we found ourselves driving by a very crowded Casino named "Wild Cherry" WTF? When the hell did they get this casino? It was the lighting crew and gaffers that tipped us off that it was a movie set. We pulled over and watched a few scenes being shot outside with The Rock and Johnny Knoxville. It was enough for some small talk over the beers that night.

[Norsky]

rbw1966 said:

. Shook hands with Casper Weinberger.

did you sucker punch him?

[Al_Pine]

oooo! I went to a game-show taping once.

[minx]

i've met erik

 

 

...and trask

[ketch]

Norsky said:

I can't believe I almost forgot this one.....

It was the lighting crew and gaffers that tipped us off that it was a movie set.

 

No such luck for me. A buddy and I were on a road trip, as we passed Jack Murphy stadium in San Diego we saw some weird party. It looked a lot like a cross between a tailgate party and a food fight. They had a whole truck load of vegies they were throwin and kickin and shit. We thought it looked like fun so parked the car and started in stompin on vegies and throwin with every one else. About 15 min. later we found out that was the finale scene from Attack of the Killer Tomatoes. They left us in as extras

[dberdinka]

Early October this year I got on a shuttle in Zion and chit-chatted with Ron Olevsky and Jeff Lowe. Both are pioneers of bigwall climbing in Zion and pretty much put up all the classics in the end of the canyon. Jeff has MS it was really quite depressing.

 

Early November this year I was in Moab. Talked to Ron Olevsky again in a cafe. He thought we were wankers. Small little world sometimes.

 

I also knocked Bird Lew off the trail to Applebee Dome once with my overloaded pack. She didn't look happy, we didn't actually meet.

 

Fred Beckey refused to talk to me or my buddy one rainy day in Squamish Starbucks. Ole curmugin....

[Al_Pine]

ketch said:

No such luck for me. A buddy and I were on a road trip, as we passed Jack Murphy stadium in San Diego we saw some weird party. It looked a lot like a cross between a tailgate party and a food fight. They had a whole truck load of vegies they were throwin and kickin and shit. We thought it looked like fun so parked the car and started in stompin on vegies and throwin with every one else. About 15 min. later we found out that was the finale scene from Attack of the Killer Tomatoes. They left us in as extras

 

Now that is a brush with greatness! Awesome story Ketch .