The Daily Tonic: Dexys Midnight Bummer

Today is the 72nd birthday of Grace Jones: one of the all-time Popbitch Greats. From her prodigious cocaine use, to her outrageous rider demands, to her methods of dodging fans while out buying fags in the Co-Op, absolutely everything she does is unmistakably Grace Jones – even the small stuff.

Back when Grace’s music career was in full swing, she was picked up at the airport for a meeting with her UK record company by a young lad, for whom looking after Grace was his first proper job in the music industry.

While driving into London, Grace suddenly announced she was hungry and ordered him to pull the car over. She demanded her new assistant buy her Hula-Hoops, which she then insisted on eating off his fingers.

There were some excellent stories of celebrity lost property in yesterday – including a few we’ll hold back for Thursday’s weekly. Today though, we want to know your best stories of riding on a superstar’s coattails and the sorts of goodies that you can mop up as a result.

Today’s Question: What are the best/weirdest/most unlikely freebies you’ve managed to blag by exploiting some sort of celebrity connection? (Bonus points if it was unauthorised…)

Send your stories of +1 goodies to hello@popbitch.com and we’ll send our favourites a few goodies of our own.

captain_chubby writes:
“I once had to take Sash to a TV interview at the Natural History Museum. When we arrived, Sash asked if he could leave his bag in the boot of my car. The interview over-ran and he ended up leaving for dinner without his bag.

“I didn’t hear from him about the bag and I only remembered a couple of days later. Well, curiosity got the better of me and I sneaked a peek at the contents. He had previously been at a photo shoot so I was perplexed to find the following:

“Two pairs of garish Bermuda shorts, three pots of Tipp-Ex, two packets of ‘jumbo’ elastic bands, and a black plastic potato masher.

“To this day I still haven’t figured out a reasonable connection between these items”

SW writes:
“A number of years ago I was at the Q Awards. There were free shuttles in between the venue and the aftershow, which I took after we’d vacated the hotel. We pulled up in front of the aftershow club and waiting for me outside was a sad and forlorn Kevin Rowland of Dexys Midnight Runners.

“‘Excuse me, mate. I was in this car 10 minutes ago. Don’t suppose you’ve found my glasses, have you?’ I got out of the car and did indeed find his glasses – in three pieces – stuck to my bum.

“He was perfectly lovely about it and wore them like a pince-nez for the rest of the evening.”

mahall writes:
“Years ago I was voting in an off-year election (not Presidential) on the Upper West Side in New York City. Five or six people in line ahead of me for the voting booth. I see a driver’s license on a table– it’s obviously been left. As I pick it up I say: ‘Who’s…’ and then read off the name: ‘Holly Hunter?’

“A rather small, hugely talented actress says ‘Oh, that’s me!’ in a rich Southern accent.

“Very nice about it, before going off to vote.”

You know the deal. Ten songs. Twenty points. A 22 year span in 2 minutes 12 seconds.

[Here you go]

Scatman portraits, painted in…
[…scat?]

Jennifer Garner is a fan of Iceland’s Eurovision entry
[Her poor cat]

Soho pub crowdfunder of the week
[The French House]