If you like musicians, my photography teacher in high school was the father of the drummer for Anti-Flag.

When we were sophomores in high school, my best friend beat out a senior named Bill Gates for the third board on the varsity chess team. But that was before he was famous.

"But that was before he was famous."

Well, don't keep us in suspense. Who did the friend grow up to be?

Well, he didn't have Bill Gates' career (or Paul Allen's - whom we also went to school with), but he's now an assistant professor of psychology in the Department of Psychiatry at Children’s Hospital-Boston, Harvard Medical School. He also founded a non-profit organization to provide information about state and local resources to low income families. Not bad, really...

I yelled "you suck" at Craig Benson when he was giving a speech at Hampton Beach.

That's awesome, mostly because you were right.

I have mostly six-degress type brushes:

I once got an email reply from Yo La Tengo. I had mentioned to them that I loved the fact that the refrain in "Deeper into Movies" said "Rusty makes the turn and heads for home" in apparant homage to Mr. Staub. They goodnaturedly corrected my mishearing, noting that it was Husky, not Rusty who was heading for home.

My piano teacher in 3rd grade was Armande Asante's mother (and, yes, I still have his autographed photo from 1982)

I pissed off famed Broadway director Marshall Mason by saying in back cover copy for a book he pubbed with us that he coaxed and cajoled actors into great performances. He told his editor that he was offended because he did no such thing with actors.

For you sci-fi/fantasy fans out there, I'm about to go dine with Melissa Scott, a well-regarded sci/fant writer who was the partner of the very editor in the previous comment. I don't read in the genre, but she's supposed to be fabulous, and she's one of the three smartest people I ever met.

Among cohorts....

My pal Greg went on a bachelor party. One of the guys in the van was a crazed one-armed dude who would open the door as the van was moving and hang on for sport, screaming with glee. It turns out this guy made national news a few years back: he was the hiker who had been stranded in CO with his arm under a rock, amputating his own arm with a pocket knife to save his life.

An editor at the company I work for is the ex-brother in law of Jeff Tweedy.

The mother of the managing editor here double dated with Johnny Weismueller.

In the context of this site, the "other Kenny Rogers" is the chicken guy. He was actually friendly to us elves, and hung out with us a bit. I've also performed with Barry Manilow, but he's an ###.

There's a former "Kenny Rogers's Roasters" along my daily commute. About a year ago, it changed to being called "Irene's Restaurant," but kept the same big sign out front that said "Irene's" over the same "Roasters" that had been there before. A couple of months ago, the sign was blown up, and the rubble was just sitting there for days and days.

Joe Montana and Randy Cross were at my first birthday party.

My uncle dated Paula Zahn's sister, my other Aunt and her future husband my other Uncle went to school with Paula Zahn and she was in his school movie project. My mother went to school with John Belushi while my other aunts went to school with Jim Belushi. John Belushi got married in my grandfathers restaurant. My youngest Aunt went to Marquette with Chris Farley.


A couple of years back I was watching the local news in a bar and I saw that a girl I went to school with was Milwaukee TV reporter.

There's a former "Kenny Rogers's Roasters" along my daily commute. About a year ago, it changed to being called "Irene's Restaurant," but kept the same big sign out front that said "Irene's" over the same "Roasters" that had been there before. A couple of months ago, the sign was blown up, and the rubble was just sitting there for days and days.

B-a-a-a-a-d chicken! Mess you up!

My closest brush with fame was being on a Detroit-RDU flight with Jerry Stackhouse. I was proudly wearing a Duke cap, and he said something like, "trade that in for a real school"