Monday, March 21, 2011

Dealing with Celebrities: The Sasha Baron Cohen Edition

So I was hanging out in my local dive this past Saturday night trying to hit on my favorite bartender for what was probably the millionth time. She dismissed my usual advances, then leaned in a bit closer.

"Brendan, do you know Sasha Baron Cohen?" she asked me.
"You mean, Borat?" I replied.
"Yeah. Look to your right."

So I peeked furtively to my good side, and there, 20 feet away, was Sasha Baron Cohen himself. All 6'4'' of him (or some stupid number of meters, as he would probably say). He was dressed in a tweed jacket with a vest and a paperboy cap, as inconspicuous as a tall, goofy looking guy who looks exactly like SBC can look. From the looks of it, there was some sort of small party going on. He and his friends had brought a few boxes of pizza with them, and they were all casually standing around eating some slices, drinking some beers and chatting normally with each other. I'm not great at picking up subtle clues, but that's an invitation to be interrupted if I've ever seen one... right?

But really, I thought about it. Every time someone would put on a goofy accent and say "Hi-five!" I would have a story. "I saw Sasha Baron Cohen! He was in the same bar as I was!" I mean, that's cool, but it's not much of a story. What is this, catch-and-release fishing? "Yeah, Sasha Baron Cohen was there! He was like, this big *stretches arms out*" If it was going to be a good story, I knew I was going to have to talk to him. Or mount him on my wall, but one seemed more feasible and less likely to get me in arrested.

So no shit, there we were. Me and SBC. He was talking to his friend, I was creepily looking over his shoulder. I tugged his sleeve discreetly, and he turned towards me, pulling off a mask that covered his face to reveal that he was actually an alien.* I looked at him, and bashfully started to speak.
*this last bit about him being an alien is not true. Just making sure you're actually paying attention.

"Excuse me, I don't want to make a big deal of this," I started.
He interrupted me to say, "No, don't make a big deal of it, it's fine" (in writing, that makes him sound like a jerk, but he really said it in a nice, encouraging way).
"But, do people ever tell you you look like..." I paused a second. "You look like a dick in that cap?"

He looked at me with a straight face for a second.

"Actually, my father tells me that all the time. That's actually why I'm growing out my beard; I want to make my chin look like hairy balls," he continued, scratching at the scraggly growth on his face.
"It's working," I replied. "If you really want to make it better, I can give you the name of a plastic surgeon, and he can give you a great cleft chin."

Neither of us seemed to be a novice at bullshitting.

So we shot the shit for a a bit more, just talking about how he could look like a dick. My friend joined us, and we got into a two minute conversation about who we were. I really didn't want to overstay my welcome, so we left a few minutes later.

Now, I had just insulted a complete stranger. He took it well, but he didn't know me, so thought an apology was in order. On my way out, I decided I really should tell him I was sorry. Fortunately, some more people had come into the bar. A group of them was wearing dumb hats. Like, really dumb hats. Straw farmer's hats and pirates hats and whatnot. I pushed my way to the back of the bar again, found him and tapped him on the shoulder again.

"Listen, you know, I'm really sorry. I said you look like a dick earlier, and I was wrong. You don't look like a dick. Those guys look like dicks," I said, gesturing towards the pirate fAARRRRRmers (heh heh) in the front of the bar. He thanked me for apologizing and told me not to worry about it.
"I never caught your name, by the way. I'm Brendan."
"Sorry, I'm Mohammed."

Damnit, and I thought I had a story about talking to Sasha Baron Cohen!

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