You turn on the television and they are there – beautiful people, with perfect makeup and clothes, saying clever things at just the right time – celebrities.

Movie stars and even our national newscasters seem so out of reach, so otherworldly sometimes. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to say hello, to see them in person, maybe even shake their hand?

Well, it’s possible, my friend – and sometimes it’s easier than you think. Here are a few tips that have helped me satisfy my need for a brush with fame.

Getting started

• Focus: start with a targeted group of celebrities. When they gather, you’ll have a better chance at hitting one of them. For instance, NASCAR drivers or ballet dancers.
• Patience is a virtue: Especially if you have a major celebrity in mind, you may have to wait a long time for the right opportunity, and a long line may be in your future. Accept this fact and wait for the right moment.
• Manners make the man: Realize that if a celebrity has opened that door to a wall of fans dying to meet them, they are being very brave and patient, and they are hoping that each fan is not a psycho. Don’t be that psycho.
• Know your celebrity: What is your idol up to? Are they on a speaking tour for their favorite charity, selling an autobiography or helping a politician they like get elected? Keep informed.
• Out of their element, in with you: When rock stars are writing children’s books, or comedians are giving ’serious’ presentations, they are out of their element. This means the crowd around them is not as large, only true fans or business partners have come to see them, and they are much more grateful for the attention they are getting. This is a golden opportunity to get your photo or an autograph.
• Accept your mission: Autographs? Photos with you and the band? In most cases you will have a split second with the celeb, and no re-takes, so decide ahead of time. Actually, decide now. The band may walk into the restaurant any minute now. However: when they say NO, it’s usually best to accept that. In more cases photos are OK and autographs are not, because celebs know the value of their scribbles.
• How much is your celebrity worth? Yes, you might have to spend some money. Some stars charge for an autograph, whether it’s on a piece of paper or on an 8″ x 10″ glossy photo they are selling you. Or you may have to buy a ticket to a book signing, and even buy their book (again!) Why? Signing 200 photos at $20 each might be this week’s income. Hey, it’s a living.

Places stars hang out

• Charity auctions/benefits
• Book signings
• Film screenings/premieres
• eBay
• Product launches – for their signature perfume, clothing line, sneakers etc.
• Fan conventions – comic book conventions, horror conventions, Star Trek conventions, etcetera. Don’t be surprised if the stars in the autograph tent extend beyond the main theme of the convention, and be prepared at these events to pay for an autograph and/or a glossy photo of your favorite star.
• University campuses. If you graduated from somewhere, put that alumni card to use! If not, poke your nose into the local campus and get on their mailing list.
• Fan newsletters, sports team websites etc. If you are the fan you say you are, suck up every piece of info you can. Buy tickets to any special-access event the day they become available, and get your butt out there and be first in line!
• THEIR WEBSITE – many celebrities are only stars to a small group of people. Try writing an e-mail or the treasured hand-written note. You would be surprised how many people will return the favor.
• Twitter – there are as many real celebs on Twitter as there are fake ones. And there are dozens of lists of “Celebrities on Twitter” to help you decipher the difference. Use those tools before you find yourself following an impostor.

Good luck meeting your idol. And remember, be polite!

(I previously published part of this article on Squidoo.)

I’m looking forward to embarking on a new adventure as a corporate tweeter. As such, I’ve taken a good deal of time accumulating best practices for corporate accounts. Many of these are the same as I would recommend for anyone operating a business Twitter account for themselves:

1. Have a mission/message in mind before you post your first tweet.
2. Your message should also consider your target audience.
3. Twitter directories are a good way to gain some followers initially, but there is no get followers quick solution.
4. Be selective in following. There is no need to follow everyone who follows you.
5. Be careful of your language. This is even more important for corporations than for individuals.
6. Your posts are 100% public. Remember that bad news travels faster than good news and anything your shareholders wouldn’t like will travel out of the Twitterverse and onto TV screens and into newspapers.
7. Corporations need to select a voice. It’s best if one person, or a couple of people, man the account, for consistency, and to be sure there’s no redundancy. Most corporations invoke the royal ‘we.’  Other more customer-service oriented Twitter accounts have used an individual speaking from the first person.
8. A regular stream of content is important to any Twitter feed to maintain followers. Appropriate corporate topics include:

• • respond to follower/customer inquiries
  • retweet satisfied customer tweets
  • link to updated/interesting information on corporate websites/blogs
  • retweet updates from affiliated Twitter accounts
  • Twitter contests
  • advance notice of corporate news
  • Twitter discount codes
  • stimulate Twitter discussions with product-related questions
  • product-related trivia
  • run online surveys
  • photos of corporate events

Have some other ideas? Please share in the comments!

Bird art by Triax Mills.

We lost some big names in entertainment this year, I just wanted the chance to say one last goodbye to some of my favorites.

• Actor Patrick Swayze, 57 – I really enjoyed Dirty Dancing and many more of his movies.
• Director John Hughes, 59 – His films were some of the first that I rented from video stores and watched over and over again.
• Actress Farrah Fawcett, 62 – What a courageous documentary she made at the end of her life.
• Actor Dom DeLuise, 75 – Always made me laugh.
• Actor Ricardo Montalban, 88 – I still want to visit Fantasy Island.
• George Michael, sports broadcaster, 70 – I watched his ‘Sports Machine’ show for years in DC.
• Vic Chesnutt, singer/songwriter, 45 – Just an amazing talent.
• Actress Brittany Murphy, 32 – I loved her voice work for King of the Hill.
• Ed McMahon, 86 – I’ll remember him from Star Search, way before American Idol.
• Pitchman Billy Mays, 50 – He could sell me the shoes on my feet, what a guy.
• Walter Cronkite, 92 – Sad to see him go, but that’s the way it is.

There were many more notable deaths, as The New York Times notes in their annual review.

I come back from vacation to learn that once again The Washington Post is in the news, which is a crazy sort of meta situation that I’m learning to live with. Journalists like to write about journalism and Washington likes to talk about one of its oldest employers. But this is just silliness.

If there was a fight in your office, what would happen? Would there be gossip in the lunch room? Chats in the parking lot? Not here. A spat in The Post newsroom gets splattered onto blogs all over town and blown out of proportion.

Here are some of the stories that posted around town. My favorite is the perspective from Gene Weingarten, a veteran Washington Post columnist, who still writes for The Washington Post Magazine.

• Mediabistro: Fishbowl DC
• The Washingtonian’s Capitol Comment blog
• Politico’s Click
• Washington City Paper’s City Desk
• The Washington Post: Gene Weingarten’s Chatalogical Humor
• Wonkette: Brawl At WaPo Office
• update: Washington City Paper’s YouTube video
• update: Tonsil: Hank Steuver
• update: Washington City Paper’s Final Thoughts

As I find more response and feedback, I’m adding it. The way this story is unfolding is really intriguing to me for obvious reasons.

I had heard rumors that Mr. Cronkite was not well, and many of us were hoping he could hang on until the majority of Michael Jackson’s funeral hoopla had past. It seems Cronkite still knows the news cycle and waited until Friday, July 17. Good for him. He deserves substantial news coverage, and he’s gotten it.

You might have read in my Nathan’s post that I waited on Cronkite there. I can’t tell you if he was a good tipper or not, I didn’t pay attention. I was concentrating on not dropping his plates. My manager had put the fear of God into me. But you can be certain that Cronkite was not the kind of person that demanded special attention. He just got it because everyone respected him so much.

Not too long ago, a New York Post cartoonist upset a large number of people by drawing an unfunny and tasteless editorial cartoon, and it’s screwing things up for me personally. (And I’m sure some other folks too.)

The Washington Post subsequently published a preemptive apology, regarding a funny and tasteful cartoon illustration running in The Washington Post Magazine. What is this world coming to?

I happen to like monkeys. (For the sake of this post, I’m including gorillas and chimpanzees in that category, although I am an educated person and I know that is incorrect usage.)

When my sister was young, we said she was the monkey of the family. She was great at climbing trees and rarely sat in a conventional position in a chair. She was proud of this nickname as a kid, and as an adult, she is certified to teach yoga. We call my nephew a silly monkey. He loves Curious George.

Last year, I bought a beautiful book called Monkey Portraits of photos of monkeys (apes, gorillas and chimps too) for a number of my friends, all of whom find monkeys intriguing or endearing for one reason or another.

I confess to be anglo-saxon-American. However, I’m also quite sure those apes in that photo book and I are distant cousins, in a Darwinian sort of way. But neither has to do with why I dig simians.

I also like cats and bears.

Monkeys are funny and remarkable because they are like us. Like ALL of us. So I’ll be keeping my monkeys.

W had his big press conference yesterday and the press gave him some face time. But why did SO MANY front pages choose to give him the same kind of face time? Is there a conspiracy in the layout departments of our nation’s newspapers? What gives?