Flying with Barack

(Originally posted on December 22, 2005 at "the Minister of Booty has spoken")

Barack Obama was on my flight this morning!!! I was just sitting there at Reagan (gag) National Airport at 5:30 a.m. and Barack Obama sauntered over in jeans with a black Tumi bag and sat down next to me and opened up the Washington Post to read about Senate's latest doings and I just sat there and looked at him, looked down at his bag, his "Senator Obama" tag, me too tired to know what to do. I thought maybe I should just leave him alone and nobody else seemed to notice that our future president was just sitting there, eating his bagel and reading his Post. When he went to the trash can and opened his OJ, I figured I had to at least say "hi," so I stood up as he came back to his seat, and I said, "Senator Obama, my name is KJ Mohr and I voted for you and I'm real glad you're here. Thank you for all your work." and he had a really limp handshake and he kind of brushed me off, but I forgive him, cause it was 5:30 in the morning, after all. Then I couldn't look at him anymore, cause I have this issue with celebrity and all. He sat a row in front of me in coach and I watched him sleep and watched him read the "Arts" section of the New York Times and watched him chatting with an airport employee when we deplaned in Chicago, all like nothing special. I mean, I thought it was cool when Chris Rock was on my friend Shannon's flight to SF after Chris Farley's funeral and we were standing behind him in line. Or when Rita Ribeiro and I sat next to each other and chatted all the way from Sao Paulo to Rio. But this takes the cake.