I'm really good at embarrassing myself in front of celebrities part 2

Having a birthday in the 1980s has thankfully lead me to avert the current frenzy of Disney’s factory-produced, long-haired, skinny-jeans-clad trio the Jonas Brothers. I assumed that my graduation from high school immediately excluded me from hyperventilating at one sight of a young(ish) male with a musical instrument... Until last August.

One night, I was hanging out at Derek’s house, when, between facebook chatting, I came across an ad on a local radio station’s website. The front banner read, “ SEE JOHN MAYER FRONT ROW!” Previously, I thought I had a better chance of my Macbook instantly transforming into solid gold and spitting Gucci handbags out of the CD drive than meeting John Mayer. I frantically clicked the link, wondering how quickly I was going to be able to make the doe eyed, tattooed, blues singing, guitar player my boyfriend. As the page loaded, I discovered the fine print. The lanky singer is featured on the gossip blogs as quite the Casanova, so it was no surprise the contest was advertised as a,“ John Mayer ex-girlfriend look-a-like contest.”

“Caity!” Derek exclaimed. “ You should so enter this!”
I stared back at him blankly. John Mayer’s list of ex-ladies include actress Cameron Diaz, blonde bombshell singer Jessica Simpson, and the inspiration for his first major single,“ Your Body is A Wonderland,” Jennifer Love Hewitt.

“Derek, seriously?” I replied. “ I don’t have a single movie on the shelves of Blockbuster, I get booed off the stage when I even attempt karaoke, and my body is definitely not a wonderland.”

Despite the fact my dreams were crushed, he laughed at me.

“Dude, you have blonde hair, you’re a girl, and you’re under 40. That immediately eliminates half of Fort Myers!” he said.

“Well,” I thought, “ I can’t win if I don’t enter, so I’ll give it a shot.” I took a picture, e-mailed the radio station, and moved on with my life, minus John Mayer.

A few days later, I was checking my e-mail, when I received a message from an address I didn’t recognize.

“Cathy,” it began, “ Thanks for your submission for the WINK96.9 John Mayer contest. You’ve made the top 10! We will be calling you tomorrow morning for a radio interview at 8:00 a.m.!” “ Good job, Cathy,” I thought, defeated. “Wait. Cathy?” I had a second thought. “ They misspelled my name. Oh my God! I’m Cathy! I’m in the top 10!”

The next morning, I was up at 7:30 a.m. waiting for my phone call from the morning show personalities. My phone rang and I groggily answered, greeted by the chipper voices of the DJs Rich and Tanya.

The first question they asked me, “So, Cameron Diaz, what are you going to do when you’re in John Mayer’s dressing room?” Excuse me? Dressing room? I was going backstage? My head was spinning with all the different scenarios involving John Mayer and myself. Would he propose that evening? Fly me off to Cabo San Lucas in his private jet while my friends looked at all the paparazzi photos of us on TMZ.com?

The next four days I waited in anticipation, wondering if I would triumph the other pseudo ex-girlfriends. The Friday before the concert, I received the phone call. I, Cameron Diaz, was going to meeting John Mayer and seeing his concert from the front row! Thanks to my shameless self-promotion and a host of Facebook friends I barely know, I was the winner with over 1,000 votes.





The DJ, Tanya, bid me one final warning, “ What happens in John Mayer’s dressing room, stays in John Mayer’s dressing room!” At that moment, I looked over at my desk, half expecting a Gucci handbag to fall out of my Macbook and onto the floor.

The day of the concert, I drove up to Tampa with my “ plus one,” my best friend Jenna. Fortunately, I was allowed to bring a friend in case I needed a witness for my impromptu wedding with John (one of my scenarios of his dressing room involved an on-call minister so we could elope post-encore). The hour and a half drive felt like four hours, and I rehearsed in my head how my conversation with my future husband would go.

We arrived at the stadium in Tampa, FL, and walked nervously towards the ticket booth. As we approached, a short, young girl with a brown hair and a pixie haircut who had a “backstage” lanyard around her neck greeted us. I put on my best smile, and she herded us past the general audience who were waiting in line to get to their seats. I replayed in my imagined scenery of Gardenia scented, white tea candles and Dom Perignon champagne, while John waited for me, guitar in hand, hair blowing in the wind (yes, there was wind indoors), shirtless, on a plush red couch in the back of his dressing room. It was a scene off of the cover of a trashy romance novel, and John was my Fabio.

We circled around the stadium until we reached the back of the stage, and a velvet rope brought us to a halt. There we were, in a dark, empty room with a backdrop that was printed with “ JOHN MAYER: PRESENTED BY BLACKBERRY” and one camera on a tripod.

“ Excuse me,” I thought. “ Where are the candles? The champagne? The minister? And John! Where is John?”

John finally came out, dressed in a white v-neck shirt and dingy green cargo pants. I couldn’t believe it! My future husband! There he was, five feet from me. Okay, so he was not as tall as I expected, yet still so gorgeous, and so… dirty looking? Whatever, he was going for 90s grunge. Not quite a deal-breaker.

I shoved Jenna in line before me, so she could test out the waters before I instantaneously stole John’s heart. However, Jenna, bless her heart, isn’t best known for thinking before she speaks. She sauntered up to John, with the swagger she has with her hips in front, and shakes his hand. She hands him her ticket to sign, and he asks her name.

He scratched away with his Sharpie and hands it back. She looks down at his autograph loudly exclaims, “You spelled my name right!” John looks back at her and dryly replies, “Yeah. Your name is Jenna. Who DOESN’T know how to spell your name?”

“Great,” I thought to myself, “Jenna is officially uninvited to our wedding.”

Jenna walked off to the side, and it was my turn to meet John. I threw my shoulders back and confidently stepped up to him and shook his hand. “Be smooth, be smooth,” I thought to myself.
The problem is, when I’m nervous, smooth isn’t exactly my forte. Instead, I managed to spit out the most awkward sentence for both him and me:

“I just really wanted to tell you, I’m really glad you date a lot of blondes, ‘cause that’s why I’m here.”

Right after I said it, I immediately regretted it. “OH MY GOD CATHY? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?” I wished I had a verbal Shop-Vac to suck those words right out of John’s ears and back into my mouth.
The slightly confused singer stared back at me, cocked his head slightly to the left, and slowly replied, “Uh, well, I’m glad too?”

Mortified, I gave him a wide-eyed, half smile, took my photo and scurried away as fast as my Juicy Couture wedges would take me.

With that, John disappeared back into his dressing room. DJ Tanya was right: What happens in John’s dressing room, stays in John’s dressing room.

here's the awkward photo that resulted:


FYI - his latest CD is coming out soon, its called "Battle Studies."