My Own Celebrity Sighting

This morning I was up at the crack of dawn again, although I have been at three conferences in four days in DC. Brain over-stimulation, of course. I turned on the flat screen TV in my hotel room and since I am a C-SPAN junkie, happened upon the Radio & Television Correspondents' Dinner, not to be confused with the White House Correspondents' Dinner of two months ago.

Yes, President Obama was there in his tuxedo and gave a charming speech, knocking himself as well as the reporters in the room. It's really funny, and he is quite adorable in how he delivers a line, hears the laughter, and then gets the joke himself. Check it out on Youtube.

After the President spoke, John Hodgman came to the podium. Following the President? John Hodgman is the potato-skinned satirist from The Daily Show who also appears as the PC in Apple's computer commercials. He was brilliant and understated, as only John Hodgman can be. See his performance.

Here is my celebrity sighting: I was on line to get the noon Acela back to New York and who was just a few people ahead of me but John Hodgman and his delightful wife, partner, whomever.

"Mr. Hodgman," I said, "you were brilliant at the correspondents' dinner last night."

"Were you there?" he asked.

"No, I was up at 5:30 this morning and saw it on C-SPAN," I replied.

Without cracking a smile or missing a beat, he responded, "I arranged that."

Then I had to ask him the ultimate question. "Were you terrified?"

That's when his delightful wife joined in, "He was so nervous he would hardly speak to me for weeks."

"I was terrified," he said and we got onto the train, although in different cars.