"Hey Pandas, Tell Me How You Met A Famous Person"

The very first time I went to London, I checked into my hotel, then went to walk around the neighborhood with a friend. Not 10 minutes later we turned a corner and there she was, The Iron Lady herself, Margaret Thatcher. Not expecting that.

But one of my favorites was coming back from London, sitting on a plane that was about 1/4 full, complaining to my friend that my luck had run out since for the first time in over a dozen times, I hadn't met anyone famous. He was disappointed, too. Suddenly, I looked over my friend's shoulder, and met the eyes of one of the most famous people in the world. I got a huge smile on my face, especially as this person was walking towards me. He came over, smiled, introduced himself to my friend, and he laughed, and said to me, "I believe you know who I am." "Yes, Sir Richard, I do know who you are." He sat down and we chatted until after take-off, about 30 minutes. He asked where we had been, where we stayed, shows we had seen - I had a Bring in Da Noise, Bring In Da Funk shirt, just a nice normal chat. People around us ask who he was. I told them to open the magazine in their magazine and look at the photo on the cover. They still looked confused. DUH! I said, " he owns this airline, as well as many other things!" This was before spaceflight.

I rarely ask for pictures with celebrities, but as we exited the plane, he was shaking everyone's hands, and I asked for a pic. His bodyguard said no., but Richard took my camera, handed it to his bodyguard, and had him take the picture.

My husband and I were both flight attendants for several years, so we've both met our share of celebrities. Mark had lunch with Cate Winslet in a crowded airport bar once. He was seated by himself at a table for four, and Winslet's personal assistant asked if they could sit at his table.

I had Prince on a flight once. Before he boarded, we were instructed that he would be boarding first, and that if we wanted to communicate with him, we were to go through his manager, who was seated next to him. We were told he wanted to avoid attention, but I don't think that's true, considering that he boarded the flight wearing a neon lime green skin tight body suit and six inch glittering platform shoes. He locked himself in the lav 5 minutes before landing and wouldn't come out until the plane was at the gate and all the other passengers had deplaned.