Brushes with people who had brushes with fame

A few tidbits of miscellany about famous people I've never met:

- I found myself at dinner chez M. T- this weekend with a relative of Nathan Gunn's wife!  For some reason this was very exciting at the time.  I had just posted the Barihunk entry, and he was still on my mind.  (Btw, I fixed this link.)  No good gossip: SUV for his 5 kids, really nice guy, practicing a lot for Billy Budd, doesn't like hotels much, forced by directors to take his shirt off a lot, blah blah. Stalking was discouraged, mostly because it wouldn't be all that interesting.

- Mlle L- in London reports that a friend recently visited the Matthew Barney/Björk Guðmundsdóttir abode in SoHo (the one in NY), and relayed that the apartment is covered in light blue felt.  It sounds tactilely delightful if it's true.

- The ever-roaming M. R-, who's settled for the time being in Boston, reports meeting a gentleman who was forced to spend a unexpected 14-hour layover in Reykjavik due to some flight irregularity.  Whilst wandering aimlessly along Laugavegur or Austurstraeti or some such lane, M. R-'s friend spotted the unmistakable figure of Guðmund's daughter coming down the street.  Being a longtime Bjork follower, he was dumbstruck by his good fortune: just 14 hours in Iceland, and look who's out for a stroll!  But being caught off guard, he couldn't think of anything to say (though I suppose he could have just said, "Hello, Bjork") and as she passed he blurted out, "Bbbbbb ubububububa yyyyuggh".  Or something equally unintelligible.  In any case, she simply replied, "I need my privacy" and walked on by.  No hard feelings toward Bjork, of course -- she must have known that anything she said would have been reported by a pathetic blogguer like me -- but I feel bad that it was such an unsatisfying encounter for M. R-'s gentleman caller.

- And finally, my own quasi-brush (comb?) with fame yesterday came in the form of a link to my little blague of a blogue from Alex Ross, music critic for the New Yorker.  If you haven't read his piece from February titled Listen to This, please do so now.  In it I found all of my thoughts and perspectives on music reflected back with more clarity, organization, persuasiveness and elegance than I've ever been able to achieve myself. There's also a good interview with him in today's Morning News, where he suggests that Lorraine Hunt Lieberson just might be the greatest musician alive, a hypothesis I've supported for years.  Holy fuck, can that woman sing.  I've enjoyed Alex's writing since he was at the New York Times, a sample of which is here.  (I hope that my fellow superdorks laugh as heartily as I did reading it.)  So thanks for the link, Alex.  And thank you for the columns, the words you're writing.  Thanks for all the thoughts you're inciting.  Who could live without them, I ask in all honesty?