celebrity sighting #2*

i passed jim jarmusch on bowery today. he was rockin' that crazy eraserhead hairdo and drawing hard on a cigarette, taller than i'd thought he was and wearing a signature patterned button-down shirt, looking real cool, even though it was damn hot. i had been walking for about an hour and was dirty and sweaty and bedraggled, wearing an ugly, unevenly faded pair of cropped khaki pants with a blood stain on the leg that are really only good for being dirty and sweaty and bedraggled in, and i did not look cool. but even if i had looked cool, i wouldn't have, because i was also trying to shove half of a very crumbly cookie about the size of my fist into my decidedly un-fist-sized mouth, and this futile square-peg-into-oblong-hole effort had spattered spelty debris all over my chin and chest. in addition to being elephantine, the cookie was fairly dry, which made it that much more difficult not to choke when my brain stage-whispered, "HEY! that's jim jarmusch! holy crap, that's jim jarmusch! jim jarmusch, who made down by law and night on earth and dead man and broken flowers! jesus, don't look at him! not with your cheeks all puffed out like a hamster's around that mouthful of cookie you can't swallow and that trail of grimy crumbs parading into your cleavage, come on, stop looking, he'll know and then he'll look at you, and then he'll see you, and it'll be AWFUL OH MY GOD DON'T LOOK DON'T LOOK!!!!"

but it was too late. i was lost in the beautifully confident ease of the hand holding his cigarette, of his stride, and i stared dead into his face, like a possum in love with a goodyear tripletred. our eyes met and we held the gaze for what seemed like an impossibly long time; what could he have been thinking? perhaps, "i wonder if that homeless girl is going to ask me for money? or maybe even an autograph? either way, i can always burn her with my cigarette and run." or maybe, "jesus, how stoned do you have to be to eat that much cookie in those pants in public?" maybe something less complicated, like, "please don't talk to me."

but then again it could have been something entirely different, something thoughtful or even touching, such as, "now that looks like a girl who would love a juniper titmouse." who knows? no one but jim, which means i will never know, and honestly, since what's done is done and i can't change any part of it, i guess i'd be equally willing to accept any of the above. he didn't try to burn me, anyway, so there's that.





* celebrity sighting #1 occurred a few weeks ago, but i didn't mention it, because really it's only alleged celebrity sighting #1. i am 99% certain that i passed jack mcbrayer in the union square station. for those of you who don't know, jack mcbrayer plays kenneth parcell on 30 rock and looks like this (on the right):


magically geekalicious, no? and i am thrilled to say that, if my sighting was legit, his actual everyday haircut is just like that, only dweebier. awesome.