I have an alarming habit of
passing famous people on the street.
It happens often enough for me to worry I’m an unwitting stalker. If I found a copy of The Catcher in the Rye in my house, I’d check in to my local police station, offering myself up for voluntary arrest. Either that, or get a job writing the Mirror’s 3am column. They’re not fussy. They'd accept stories in potato print.
It started when I saw Frank Carson in the mid-90s, drinking a can of lager on a Stevenage park bench. That opened up the floodgates. Now the list is endless.
I’ve seen Suggs so many times I've lost count; the most notable being at The Enterprise Pub in Camden, when Madness were rehearsing in the same room after us. They didn’t do their trademark walk as they passed us on the stairs, which made me feel cheated.
I spotted David Tennant on the Tube, making me terrified of an imminent Cyberman attack. I didn’t fancy being assimilated. I’ve had Boris Johnson cycle past me (stupid hair flapping in the breeze), shared a pavement with Paul Weller (his coolness masking equally stupid hair) and seen Timmy Mallett in a Welcome Break. Paul McCartney called me “man” on two separate occasions; a relief, as I’ve never actually checked.
My local garage is a c-list celebrity hotbed. I’ve seen Frankie Dettori there (flicking through the Racing Post), Pixie Lott and ‘The Bloke From Feeder’. I don’t know his name and chose never to learn it.
The best sighting took place in the Vintage Magazine Shop in Soho. I was in the basement, looking at old copies of Mojo, when I spotted a guy flicking though a pile of movie posters. At first, I thought he was someone I knew. Our eyes met briefly, I nodded and smiled and he did the same back. It was only on walking up the stairs that I realised he was Quentin Tarantino. It was the perfect place to see him. Thank God he didn’t shoot me in the head.
It happens often enough for me to worry I’m an unwitting stalker. If I found a copy of The Catcher in the Rye in my house, I’d check in to my local police station, offering myself up for voluntary arrest. Either that, or get a job writing the Mirror’s 3am column. They’re not fussy. They'd accept stories in potato print.
It started when I saw Frank Carson in the mid-90s, drinking a can of lager on a Stevenage park bench. That opened up the floodgates. Now the list is endless.
I’ve seen Suggs so many times I've lost count; the most notable being at The Enterprise Pub in Camden, when Madness were rehearsing in the same room after us. They didn’t do their trademark walk as they passed us on the stairs, which made me feel cheated.
I spotted David Tennant on the Tube, making me terrified of an imminent Cyberman attack. I didn’t fancy being assimilated. I’ve had Boris Johnson cycle past me (stupid hair flapping in the breeze), shared a pavement with Paul Weller (his coolness masking equally stupid hair) and seen Timmy Mallett in a Welcome Break. Paul McCartney called me “man” on two separate occasions; a relief, as I’ve never actually checked.
My local garage is a c-list celebrity hotbed. I’ve seen Frankie Dettori there (flicking through the Racing Post), Pixie Lott and ‘The Bloke From Feeder’. I don’t know his name and chose never to learn it.
The best sighting took place in the Vintage Magazine Shop in Soho. I was in the basement, looking at old copies of Mojo, when I spotted a guy flicking though a pile of movie posters. At first, I thought he was someone I knew. Our eyes met briefly, I nodded and smiled and he did the same back. It was only on walking up the stairs that I realised he was Quentin Tarantino. It was the perfect place to see him. Thank God he didn’t shoot me in the head.