In almost 7 years of living in Seattle, I met the mayor (Greg Nickels) once, by accident. It was an almost forgettable encounter, except that the whole thing was so weird and awkward since I didn’t recognize who he was. I’ve met Rudy Giuliani too, which was entirely memorable as he managed to look me in the eye while shaking my hand and saying my name with no obvious glance to my nametag. Very impressive party trick.

I can now confidently say that I’ve met the next mayor of Washington, DC. I can say that because I have met all of the mayoral candidates for Washington, DC. Some of them twice. The conversation goes like this:

Me: late for the Metro, trying to avoid eye contact with the newspaper pushers and strange crowd of over-dressed people with flyers in their hands, not getting to the escalator without talking to…

Mayoral Candidate: “Hi. Good morning. How are you? (shakes my hand) I’m Michael Brown/Linda Cropp/Adrian Fenty/Marie Johns/Vincent Orange and I’m running for mayor. Do you have a minute?”

Me: “Not a DC voter.”

Mayoral Candidate: turns to the person behind me. “Hi. Good morning. How are you? (shakes their hand) I’m Michael Brown/Linda Cropp/Adrian Fenty/Marie Johns/Vincent Orange and I’m running for mayor. Do you have a minute?”