Tell Me What You Want...

They are back, so now would be a good time for story time...

I was out in California visiting a good friend from college. While we were planning on what to do the next day, the news came on that the Spice Girls were in town for the world premiere of their film "Spice World." I made some suggestion as how much fun that would be, which was quickly shot down... several times. After getting the point, we decided to head to downtown Los Angeles the next day to see what we could. Well, when we got down there, we saw a line forming, a very short line near Grauman's Chinese Theater. For some reason my friend decided we should park the car and at least go and heckle the people in line. This then turned into us standing in line for a little bit, and then being ushered into bleachers across from the red carpet rolled out in front of the theater. After several hours of listening to junior high girls debate their favorite Spice, and one really freaky guy who claimed to be their "True Number One Fan," we began to wonder what we had gotten ourselves into.

Soon enough an announcer told the ever growing crowd that in minutes some of the biggest names in entertainment would be walking down that red carpet before our very eyes. Names like Spike Lee, Harrison Ford, Tom Arnold, Steven Spielberg, Rod Steward, and others. Needless to say, most of the big names didn't appear. We did see Mary Kate and Ashley, Jonathan Lipnicki, and Brandy, and a bunch of other WB stars.

Then after more hours than I like to admit, the traditional British double decker bus draped in the Union Jack turned the corner. There in the front of the topless bus, were the five Spice Girls. Again, hating to admit it, but feeling it only adds to the story, the two of us let out a shriek, which was closely followed with a "What did we just do" look towards each other.

After the gals got of the bus, signed a few autographs, and headed into the theater, all of us who arrived early enough to get wristbands were allowed into a theater to watch the film as well. For a few moments we debated skipping out on the film or not, but decided that the story would be incomplete without the film. Plus we knew we would never pay money to see the film. The free popcorn and sodas closed the deal.

Now the story could end there, and you would go away thinking that I needed help. Trust me, we attended more as a joke. We are not "true fans." But the story doesn't end there. A couple days later while waiting on a flight out of LAX, I tried to call a friend to tell him what had just happened. Before I could tell the story, another friend got on the phone and asked if I was in Los Angeles. He then asked if I was at the Spice Girls film the other night. This was odd, as I had only told one person, who had no way of contacting my friends. So when I asked him how he knew, (not to mention blowing my chance of telling a fun story) he relayed how one of the guys from our Bible study was walking down the hall in his hospital. He happened to look at one of the televisions and swore he saw me on CNN's coverage of the Spice World premiere. And as Paul Harvey says, "now you know the rest of the story."

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