We ran into several people from work there, and I should pause to say that Safety Harbor is a very eccentric, quirky town. As Mandy and I collected our glasses of wine, we noticed a guy sitting at the bar just going to town on some beef jerky. It seemed odd, even for a bar in a small town, but we laughed it off and headed outside to join some friends from work. Of course, that's where we found a couple older men hawking their own homemade beef jerky.
Which, of course, we could not turn down. Didn't you know wine and beef jerky complement one another perfectly?? I found the spicy garlic went the best with Riesling.
Classy.
As we were enjoying the amazing fall weather and sampling different varieties of jerky, one of my friends from work came walking very quickly out the door. "Joey FATONE is in there!" She said, her eyes wide.
It took me a moment to place the name, but we quickly made the connection and I was walking, very quickly, into the pub to see if he was actually Joey or just a Joey lookalike. It was totally him, and moments later Mandy and I were walking super casually past him to go to the bathroom.
"Laugh!" Mandy demanded, and I acquiesced, breaking into a fake horse laugh similar to Julia Robert's in Pretty Woman, all teeth and guffaws. Then I raised my wine glass as I cut my eyes to the side to check out the subject, and simultaneously took a super smooth sip.
And that's when I spilled my wine right down my shirt.
Even classier.
After I made an idiot of myself, I was basically out of ideas, so I skulked back outside with Mandy. As I saw Joey leave the pub, amazing ideas started to come to me.
"I should have read his wikipedia page and then went up to him and quoted all his stats and made him think I was a stalker!" Everyone laughed. I was on a roll.
"I should have asked him to sing Dirty Pop!" Another one. We were all rolling.
"Oh my goodness, I should have asked him if he could introduce us to JUSTIN!" Silence reigned and jaws dropped at the table as we all processed the fact that we had been just one degree away from Justin Timberlake.
After we recovered, Mandy headed for the bathroom. Just a moment later, she came busting back through the door.
"I. Need. You. To come with me NOW!" She exclaimed. I stumbled over my feet getting out of my seat and went after her, knowing whatever was happening had to be big. A moment later, she was slamming the bathroom door behind us and locking it, then showing me this:
"Laugh!" Mandy demanded, and I acquiesced, breaking into a fake horse laugh similar to Julia Robert's in Pretty Woman, all teeth and guffaws. Then I raised my wine glass as I cut my eyes to the side to check out the subject, and simultaneously took a super smooth sip.
And that's when I spilled my wine right down my shirt.
Even classier.
After I made an idiot of myself, I was basically out of ideas, so I skulked back outside with Mandy. As I saw Joey leave the pub, amazing ideas started to come to me.
"I should have read his wikipedia page and then went up to him and quoted all his stats and made him think I was a stalker!" Everyone laughed. I was on a roll.
"I should have asked him to sing Dirty Pop!" Another one. We were all rolling.
"Oh my goodness, I should have asked him if he could introduce us to JUSTIN!" Silence reigned and jaws dropped at the table as we all processed the fact that we had been just one degree away from Justin Timberlake.
After we recovered, Mandy headed for the bathroom. Just a moment later, she came busting back through the door.
"I. Need. You. To come with me NOW!" She exclaimed. I stumbled over my feet getting out of my seat and went after her, knowing whatever was happening had to be big. A moment later, she was slamming the bathroom door behind us and locking it, then showing me this:
Which was placed squarely above the urinal. Joey Fatone left an autograph. While he was peeing.
Which was totally the classiest thing that happened all night.
