Studio 60 on Lake Avenue

So it's Friday night, and after phone consultation with Dr. Wife, we decide that I'll grab takeout at Sharkey's, one of our favorite "casual dining" places. I wheel Dot in her stroller -- Henry likes to run up and down the ramp inside the restaurant.

For a Friday, it's pretty darn quiet -- only a couple of people at the tables.  Ahead of me at the counter: another dad, waiting for his takeout, while his 7-year-old son loads up with salsa in those tiny little urine sample cups.

While the counter staff takes my order, Dot is flirting with the other dad, who flirts back -- she grabs his proferred fingers so he can wheel her back and forth in the stroller.  And then it hits me:  Other Dad is Bradley Whitford.

When I run into celebrities in civilian life, my policy is to leave 'em alone.  One, we don't get many around this part of greater metro LA -- and the ones we do get tend to be the ones with families who want quiet lives, not West Side glamor.  I figure they've got a right to some privacy and personal life, and I don't want to come off as a creepy stalker type, even when it's someone whose work I admire (like when I bumped into Jamie Lee Curtis and Christopher Guest sometime in the early '90's, or John C. Reilly last year).

However, Bradley IS playing with my children, so I guess I have a right to talk to him ...

And I introduce myself, because we met many years ago when we both attended St. Michael's.  "Bradley," he says, taking my hand.  "I know who you are, you're in my living room every week," I say (not quite true since West Wing was canceled -- just can't get into the new show, sorry, Bradley).

And it's just a couple of guys talking about church business (St. Mike's is in trouble with the IRS lately, because their former rector was foaming at the mouth from the pulpit during election time).  He gets his food, I get mine, we say goodbye and leave. 

This never happened when I covered the news in Fruita, Colorado.