h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Neil Davidge, sometime producer of Massive Attack and the creator of the sublime keyboard riff on Teardrop, was the engineer who twiddled the knobs at the studio in Bath where my band recorded a demo.
Did four songs: he said the second one was 'top ten material', yet I'm still toiling away in obscurity.

Pity we can't post MP3's here. Then you could launch yourselves to this exclusive lot.

Still, that option wasn't even in the pipeline before H2G2 went down.

I used to sort-of know the Flaming Lips when I lived in Norman, OK. Before they became major stars and were smart enough to move.

And my second cousin twice removed, or something like that...he was my grandfather's cousin, was William Conrad, Jr. (aka "Jake and the Fat Man"--guess which one he was, and also the narrator for "The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show"). Not that it matters now, of course.

Today I lost one of my links with the Famous.

Donald Woods, the writer of Biko, upon which the film Cry Freedom was based death was announced in the papers. I played chess with and against Donald at Surbiton Chess club. I've writen a short article about him here.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A618978

As well as a short note in my journal.

Rest in Peace Donald. Enjoy your reunion with Steve Biko.

When my sister was at college, one of her friends was the wife of Frank Oz, or Muppet / film direting fame.

In a restuarant in Denver (the Mercury Cafe), I ended up chatting to a guy who'd worked with a guy who once played with the Cocteau Twins.

I know someone who went to the same high school as Frank Zappa (but not when he was going there).

My brother's friend's cousin once gave a to a well-known former children's TV presenter on a beach in Greece.

Hmmm.... lets see:

- Sold ice-cream to a couple of tennis-players (including Michael Stich, Carlos Moya)
- tried to sell ice-cream to Boris Becker and allmost got bashed by his body-guards for disturbing his concentration after he lost a match.
- Erm... dropped a full tray of champagne-glasses on a german politician (Edmund Stoiber)...
- ... on another occasion I ran into a politician, only this time with 3 pots of soup in my hand... Helmut Kohl took it rather cool... His advisors did not
- in fact I am celebrity myself... I gave several interviews regarding the tennis-matches. I was selling ice-cream there, so you can imagine how good they were

Chili

Right

I used to be friends with the son of Alexander Morton who plays "Golly" in Monarch of the Glen and also knows Robert Carlyle

One of my friends once attended Bjork's new year part, but then he is Icelandic

I once stood behind Phil Kay in Alldays on Great Western Road in Glasgow, he seemed a quite nervous and thin person

One of my best mates from college helped smash up a McDonalds and (anarchy!) a Bureau de Change in the May 2000 May Day riots in London and got onto Crimewatch UK! He's also barred from England, as far as I know.

since Robert Carlyle cropped up...
my ex-roomate stood behind him in a queue in safeways.. she says he's really really short

I saw George Lucas, the creator of Star Wars, driving in a red sportscar near his ranch in California.

I saw Bruce Willis at a golf course in California. My grandparents have a house on the 1st hole and I was sitting on the deck when this guy comes up to me and asked if I saw where his ball went. I recognized him before but didnt know exactly who he was until he talked and I recognized his voice.

Numerous famous musicians have come to my school to perform at it's big auditorium if they can't sell out the football stadium or somewhere like that. Among them, The Backstreet Boys came 5 yrs ago and played basketball with the 1st period gym class.

My cousin is friends with the girl who played Lex in Jurassic Park and with a kid in American Pie.

A friend of mine once shared a line of an illicit white powder with Ben from curiosity killed the cat.

Oh and Pat Cash used to shop at my local Sainsburys.

my aunt cooks for the princes william and harry when theyre at home.

I went to the same primary school that some of the Village People went to (but they were many years above me).

Do Archbishops/Bishops/Cardinals count?

I once walked backwards into the late Cardinal Winning of Scotland.

I've shaken hands with the Papal Nuncio to England and Wales. He's very short.

The Bishop of Westminster once offered me a sweet on a train in Bordeaux.

The Archbishop of Liverpool once saluted me.

Why do I seem to have had so many encounters with members of the cloth?

One of my friends is a novelist (quite well known, but as she's a friend, I'm not going to bandy her name about). Her agent once gave her a birthday present that Jeffrey Archer helped him chose.
The same friend once chatted to Terry Pratchett for about half an hour at a publishing do.

Another friend of mine roadied for the rock band Mud one night in the early 80's (after they were famous). This same friend also knows the sister of one of the writers of 'Red Dwarf'.

I am a fairly close relative of Grace Darling in some way I can't quite remember at the moment, and one of my great uncles (called Jimmy, I think) played for Newcastle United.

A friend of my Mum's is a neighbour of Freddy Garrity (sorry if I've spelt that wrongly) of Freddy and the Dreamers. Mum once met him at a party at her friend's house.

A friend of mine who worked in a music shop in Macclesfield once sold some gear to a couple of members of New Order. This same friend is a master at blagging momentos from rock gigs. At a Marillion gig, he managed to obtained a half empty glass of water that Steve Hogarth had been drinking from, and when we saw Rick Wakeman, he got Rick's empty beer bottle.

Oh yes - my sister was quoted in the book 'Creation - Life and How to Make it' by Steve Grand, which was read and reviewed by the late great DNA himself (Steve Grand knew him). So DNA read something that my sister wrote.

Amazing how many of these you can come up with, once you get started.

A girl I knew in high school once went trick or treating at Stephen King's house.

Another girl I used to know in college used to know Daron Malakian, guitar player for System of a Down. As he was able to take her backstage at Ozzfest, she also met Ozzy Osbourne's wife, the band Incubus, and a few others.

Chrisina Ricci once filmed a scene for the remake of Disney's "That Darn Cat" in my hometown.

One of my college proffesors knew the man who was the basis for Burt Reynold's character in "Cannonball Run." Apparently, he's a really dorky guy.

I live in the same state from which Hootie and the Blowfish (you know, that band people used to like) originated. One of my old high school teachers used to go see them play before they became famous.
Also, I have the same last name as Barry White, and I've seen several famous people on tv, but I don't think those count.


And since we're connecting people to celebrities, I might as well mention:


The H2G2 Celebrity Game! at http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A637120


Sorry about the last part. I couldn't help it.

TMSC,

Do you mean the Cardinal Archibishop of Westminster? If so, which one: Basil Hume (the last one) or Cormac Murphy-O'Connor (the present one)? I recall now that I've met both, but completely forgot that when contributing to this thread some months ago!

Well, let's see. Apart from having attended DNA's memorial service along with various celebrities of the Angus Deayton/Clive Anderson/Ben Elton variety (ooh, ooh, and Terry Gilliam!), er..... I used to work beside (and still have the e-mail address of) one of the guitarists from obscure indie band Felt.

I think we ought to give prizes - walking backwards into a bishop was my favourite so far - until "trick-or-treating Steven King" came up. That really takes the biscuit!