Hey, isn't that...?

Wanna know what's funny?

When a brand new white Rolls-Royce parks in front of you at the Costco. It struck me as really funny when it happened to me last week. There I was, unloading Baby G from his car seat to do a little (a lot) bit of damage at the sample stands inside and up it rolls, the Rolls. Pulls in right in front of me, and I promise you that car looks as expensive at it is.

I mean, is it me or is it just funny when a Rolls-Royce pulls into the Costco? Isn't it sort of like seeing a Bentley at the K-Mart? And am I showing my Southern roots by using "the" before the name of any major shopping chain? Don't you guys go the Wal-Mart? Where's my Southern posse?

Anyway, I bet you want to know who got out, right? No? That was just me?

Well...I was curious. So I lingered a little in the baby extraction process. (Hey, it took him over twenty four hours to decide to come out during labor. A little pay back isn't going to kill him.) Out of the the Rolls climbed three dudes and some things were immediately obvious: this was not an old rich guy's present to himself, none of these guys were likely attorneys, and I had a feeling I shouldn't cut in line if they were first at the Adele's sausage sample table.

I had a couple of guesses right off. Possibly they were in a rock band. The t-shirts, jeans, shaved heads and tattoos were a clue. Except for (1) they had muscles, and (2) you could just feel for an absolute certainty that if any of these guys ever wore skinny jeans, someone paid a violent price to make that happen. More likely: pro athletes. BUT, they were too short for the NBA, too slender for the NFL, and too....uh, gothic for pro baseball. Which led to the obvious conclusion of UFC fighters.

What, that's not an obvious jump to you? Probably that's because you don't live where every fifth former high school wrestler is angling to become the next cage fighting champ. Oh, yeah...and Tito Ortiz is from here. He's kind of a big deal in mixed martial arts/Ultimate Fighting circles. You know, where I hang out.

Anyway, I suspicioned it was Tito Ortiz. Because he was a tall, totally ripped dude flanked by two short, muscle-y dudes. As it turns out, I was right. My first clue was when I was standing in line behind them and Tito Ortiz was wearing a jersey that said, "Ortiz" across the back.

The second clue was when we ran into each other at the freezer case full of chicken and his friend said he loved my shirt. Because it was my Goonies shirt. And seriously, I could go to Costco topless and still get less comments than I do on my Goonies shirt. (Which I bought as a fluke one time when I forgot to bring clothes on a date with Kenny, but that's another story.) And then some loud dude was like, "Hey, you're Tito Ortiz, right?" and all kinds of craziness ensued. I snuck away but three minutes later the cheese case was abuzz with people bragging, "I shook his hand!" "Well, I got a picture with him!" "Oh, yeah? I made out with him for twenty seconds in front of the mango juice!" (but nobody believed that guy).

And then I thought to myself, "I think fame would suck." I've seen a ton of celebrities in real life in random situations (the ballet, grocery store, sidewalk, casino, blah blah blah) and NOT ONCE have a I NOT seen some misguided passers-by act like total idiots around them. And I feel bad for the famous folks. I have never asked for an autograph and probably wouldn't. I just think they ought to be left alone to do their thing unless they're walking the red carpet or something, you know? I think the best kind of fame would be where everyone knows your name, but no one knows your face.

Like say, if I were a famous author. . .