A group of us (husband, sister, nephews) went to hibachi for dinner on Saturday night, by request of Kevin, the older nephew. A fairly new place just opened up by our home - no, it's not the Asian Hooters (aka - Beni Hana). It's called Sakura. They have a sushi area and then a big hibachi area in the back. I only go to Hibachi when people are in town as Hibachi is not really very healthy, but that's besides the point. We were seated at a hibachi table and the five of us took up one half of the table. Each table seats 10 so the other half was taken up by a party of four consisting of a man, his wife, a son and their son's friend. In comparison to other tables, we had a very relaxed and quiet table. Our side was tired from the day's activities and bagging up the remainder of the leaves from around the house. The other side - couldn't tell you why they were so quiet. But from the moment they sat down, I kept thinking to myself, 'That guy looks SO familiar!' All throughout dinner, I kept thinking of places where I might know this man from. No one in the rest of his party looked familiar to me - so it was bugging me that I couldn't place a name with his face.
My sister decided to take a picture of my husband and Kevin - so she did that and the nice woman across the table asked if she wanted us to have a group picture - we said sure so the son's friend took our picture and that was that. Dinner was over. When we finally made it outside, I told my sister - 'That guy looked so familiar.' Then she said the words that made everything click, 'He kinda looks like that Rodriguez guy from government.' And that was it - I kept thinking maybe I saw his picture on Realtor listings because we had been house hunting for as long as this guy was actually in office.
Next came the "what's his first name" game. With a last name like Gonzales, the only first name that kept coming to me was 'Tony' but he's a TE for the KC Chiefs.
My sister said, 'Juan' but he's a baseball player. 
It was killing me that we couldn't figure out his first name. So when we got home, I immediately did a search on 'Attorney General Gonzales' because by now, I figured out that he was the ex-Attorney General. And sure enough - there was a whole mess of listings for Alberto Gonzales.
But the real confirmation had to come from a photo of his wife - she actually spoke to us and was nice so I would be able to identify her - and I saw a picture of Alberto, his wife, with the Bushes - and knew that we had just had dinner with Alberto Gonzales.I called my brother-in-law to tell him because he likes watching 'Meet the Press' and all that other political stuff - he was too busy playing Wii with the dudes to talk much. He did ask if I spoke to him. Yeah right - had I known who he was at the time, what would I say? 'So - whatcha been up to? Freelancing much?'
The next night, I called my Dad to tell him because he knows his stuff - and after I told him about having dinner with Alberto Gonzales, let's just say that I'm REALLY glad my Dad wasn't with us during this dinner. My Dad went off on what a crook he was, how he was Bush's running dog and so on and so forth - and he ended it by saying, 'If I were you, I would've got up and left.' Well - it's not like we asked to be placed with the Gonzaleses - in fact, we were the first ones at the hibachi table. And the fact that I couldn't remember who he was helped keep me in my seat for the duration of dinner.
So there it is - my big, scandalous political sighting. I don't think anyone else knew who he was - but that's okay - wouldn't want to draw negative and unwanted attention to our table.
Happy New Year!
No comments:
Post a Comment