What Did You Do Tonight?

I for one went to a USO event. I won’t call it a show, because it was just two people talking for a coupla minutes, then signing autographs and taking pictures.

You see, yesterday, I saw a flyer for this event. I decided that I had to go because I really wanted to see one of the celebs. I went at 1500Z (7:30 PM local time), and there were thirty guys standing outside, but no show. I rechecked, and saw that there were two flyers: one said 1500, the other said 1600. So I went back at 1600 and it was a damn ghost town.

I went back to the office, called the Morale, Welfare, and Recreation office and yelled for a few minutes until I felt better, and they told me the show was moved to today.

I had to go to the post office at about 1100 (3:30 PM local time), so I hopped in our truck and drove there (I have a big package, hehe). The post office is right next door to the air terminal, where I saw a bunch of people milling about. I figured the celebs had arrived, so I parked the truck and walked over, meeting the celeb I wanted to meet and basically saying, “Welcome to Afghanistan, my name is Shane”. I didn’t want to bug him because he just finished a 6 hour plane ride in a C130, which is the equivalent of 18 hours in a commercial plane.

I got back to the office and immediately called Kinyahbrutha to rub it in his face. I repeated the above story to him and said, “So guess who I met, byotch?” To which he replied, “I don’t know, Henry Rollins?”

It was Henry Rollins and it incensed me that Sean had stolen my chance to rub it in his face. Apparently he was recently on Hank’s website to purchase the darling daughters some Search and Destroy t-shirts (a particularly well-suited gift for a toddler and infant, if you ask me) and noticed that Hank was touring with the USO.

I got over my rage and went to the event at 1600. There were about 300 people there. Hank did his spoken-word/comedy thing for about twenty minutes then invited everyone up for autographs and pictures. I sat down and talked to a buddy for about an hour because I wanted to let the troops go first, so I ended up waiting about 2 hours until I got up to see him.

What would you figure I would say to him? This is a man that, although it might be too strong a word, I idolized since I was 13. During high school I listened to nothing but Henry Rollins CDs. While driving a newspaper truck I listened to his Get in the Van tapes over and over again in the middle of the night. I watched Johnny Mnemonic more than once on purpose because he was in it. What do you think I’d say in the 15-20 seconds allotted to me between shaking his hand and getting my photo snapped, the thing that wouldn’t sound sycophantic or inane, that he hadn’t heard 1,000 times before?

“So in Heat, one of the top 3 American movies of all time, Al Pacino kicks your ass? I’m not buying it.”

I think it was the only thing to say.

In the photo, you can see Hank on the left, me in the middle, and actor Patrick Kilpatrick on the right. You might know Patrick from Last Man Standing and Minority Report. When I met Rollins at the air terminal, he was really cool and friendly. When I saw him tonight, he seemed kinda grumpy, probably from signing autographs for two hours. Kilpatrick, on the other hand, must have taken a nap, because he was friendly as all hell.

~ by kinshay on 2004-12-15.