Okay. So one time I met Joe Biden.

To be more specific, Joe Biden and I were in a cafe together. Once.

I tell this story over on Instagram ( http://instagram.com/bibliogato ) if you want to see me tell it with all my facial expressions but here:

I was on deadline for THE SPY WITH THE RED BALLOON in spring 2017 and was writing at Brew Ha Ha in Greenville, DE (a ritzy town in northern DE). I was in full panic writing mode. I did not fit in. I had on like two sweatshirts, headphones, and was panic typing through brunch.

And next to me, this woman was being THE MOST OBNOXIOUS WOMAN IN GREENVILLE (saying something). She was rearranging chairs and trying to get all matchy chairs at her table in a cafe that has eclectic seating. Also she was trying to get her toddler into one of those baby seats.

He was doing that toddler thing where he looked like a cat trying to be wrangled into a carrier. Four limbs in every direction, screeching.

I kept typing.

A guy gets up from a nearby table where he'd been sitting alone (I think reading the paper) and comes over to help.

He helps her get the baby into the chair and says to her that she looks familiar. She says she worked for another senator and they'd met before on the Hill. And he was like "Oh right!" and they kept chatting.

I ignored. Because deadline.

Then he got his stuff and started to walk past my table. I looked up, curious, and it was Joe Biden, right there on the other side of my little table. We made eye contact and he stopped, ready to do the politician thing when I said something.

But my brain was in storyland.

I could not say anything. I gaped at him. This was my face.

He WAITED. He must have stood there for like ten seconds, making eye contact with me, waiting for me to process. But I was like PROCESS, BRAIN. And my brain was like wahhhhhaaatttttt iiiissssssss happppennnnniinnnnngg because uh that's how I am when I'm interrupted.

He finally gave up on me when he realized that I was literally never going to process fast enough and started to exit. He stopped a parent carrying their kid in, kissed the baby, shook the manager's hand, slid on his sunglasses and exited.

And I remained jaw dropped.

My reaction to this was a very reasonable one in which I waited until his very slick car had left the parking lot, packed up my stuff, left the cafe and never ever returned for fear of running into him again.