I moved from Canada to London in 2004 and worked for a while in one of Gordon Ramsay's restaurant. One night, David Beckham came in and he entered through the kitchen not to cause havoc... knowing nothing about soccer, I had no idea who he was. I only learned later who he was when my flatmates couldn't believe I didn't know of him.

My brother once was in a restaurant, making small talk with a guy sitting at the bar. Toward the end of their conversation the bartender comes up to the guy and politely asks if he could get an autograph. My brother says, "What, you think you're famous or something?"

The dude laughs and says yeah and leaves. He found out from the bartender it was David Byrne of the Talking Heads.

For a few years, I worked at Goorin Brothers in North Beach (in San Francisco) and one day this guy came in with a bunch of his friends. They were obviously a bit toasted from drinks they were having in the neighborhood but all very friendly, funny guys.

They kept calling one gentleman “Geri” and I immediately hit it off with Geri. He was telling me about how he recently went surfing in Half Moon Bay and simply loved the Bay Area. As a lifelong Bay Area native, I appreciated his enthusiasm and encouraged him to move here, telling him he would absolutely love it, even if he just got a small apartment, despite the rising rent costs in the Bay Area. We really did get along very swimmingly, as me and my co-worker helped him & his friends to pick out some hats.

At one point, he stepped outside.

My co-worker asked: “Um, you know who that is right?”
I replied: “uh…no?”
Co-worker: “That’s Gerard Butler.”
Me: “Um…I’m not sure who that is.”
Co-worker: “Have you ever seen 300?”
Me: “….wait. The lead guy?”
Co-worker: “Yes!”
Me: “But…that guy has black hair in that movie…”
Co-worker: “Oh my GOD he’s an actor and he dyed his hair!”
Me: “….oh.”

So when he came back, with this knowledge, I still tried to be courteous to him and it seemed to be to a benefit because he later invited both of us to a screening of his new movie in downtown SF. My co-worker couldn’t make it so I took my boyfriend at the time to the theater.

Well, as we walked up, security intensely walked over to us and said “excuse me, what are you here for?” and before I could finish, I heard someone go “MOOOONIIIIIIQUUUEEE!”

It was Gerard Butler. He came running up to me at full speed, picked me up and twirled me around with a full hug. The look of defeat on my boyfriends face is a look I will never forget.

Anyway, he was happy to see me and lead us into the theater where he announced his new film “Machine Gun Preacher.”

He was a very friendly guy and this is one of my favorite stories. I hope you are doing well today, Geri!

* Gestures vaguely at everything.

The entire credit score system.

Insulin prices.

COLLEGE TEXT BOOKS. You need edition 10 for this class. They change one chapter in the book make it a new edition over price it and f**k the college kids. Always drove me nuts when I was in college.

Tipping instead of actually raising wages for waiters

Edit: I was referring to tipping as a necessary law. Yes people tip, but should they be the ones to ultimately blame if you haven’t been tipped and can’t survive the week? No. It’s the firms that you’re working in. They should pay you enough to not have to DEPEND on just tips to make a living.

2 Party Political System.

I am a tall woman. I am 6 feet tall.(183 cm)

A man came up to me and kept commenting on how tall I was. I was very clear I didn't want my height to be the topic of the conversation but he just did not get it. He kept going on and on about how beautiful I was and how long my legs were and how wonderful it was to find a woman who was as tall as me. Then he leans back to his friend and under his breath says "man, I'm going to climb that mountain" thinking that only his friend could hear him.

I told him that this mountain's a lot like Everest and he would likely die if he tried to climb me. I said it with a straight face, psychopath eyes. He got scared and wandered off.