There I was, a quick run down to Whole Foods to buy some stuff – you know, hadn’t showered and all of that. It was the small Whole Foods in Valley Village (or Sherman Oaks or whatever you want to call it). Tiny store. So small you can’t really walk past people without rubbing or bumping. It is awkward. I have seen many a celeb in there before but no one with the kind of star power of Mel Gibson. Nevertheless, there was that familiar voice. And I turn around and there is Mr. Gibson. He is chattering on his cell phone and acting fairly “normal,” if it’s possible to act normal and be a celebrity.

I started nervously sweating, as one does when one encounters something rare and famous and well, let’s face it, to say Mel Gibson has been in the tabloids is to greatly underplay. I was doing what I always do when I have to dwell in the presence of someone really famous like that — not make eye contact, barely acknowledge their presence. One has to completely ignore them because otherwise one falls victim to one of the biggest sins here in Los Angeles: acting impressed by celebrities. You have to pretend they aren’t famous. And they are probably grateful when you do.

And yet, every time I turned around, there he was. I kept hoping he was one but there he’d be walking down the coconut water aisle. There he’d be in the fish section. There he’d be in the vitamins area. I think he might have been getting baby stuff. That would make sense.

He was quite amiable, conversing happily with one of the clerks. My overall impression of him, despite the news reports to the contrary: really nice guy.

At one point I was staring at the soy sauce shelf and I whipped around and Mel and I locked eyes briefly before flicking our eyes away and shopping. It was in that moment that I saw real fear in his eyes. That moment could have played out in several ways. The way it should have played out: I smiled graciously and said “excuse me.” He smiled back and all is right with the world.

His worst nightmare would have been me acting shocked and trapping him on the spot, “Oh my god! Are you MEL GIBSON?”

Or worse, “Hey, why did you dump your baby mama?”

Even worse, “Did you really call that cop sugar tits?”

So the frightened-eyes-darting-away option wasn’t so bad. Him asking me for my phone number was definitely not going to happen, even though I am quite busty — and I peg him as a breast man. He wouldn’t much care for me because A) I’m an atheist. B) I’m half-Jewish. C) I am too tall for him.

I have to say, I found him quite attractive. But that could be due to the fact that he was the source of most of my teenage lust back in the ’80s. The Year of Living Dangerously, Mad Max, Lethal Weapon. He was my ideal sex god. I still think he is the most good looking man ever to grace the big screen.

But yeah, homeboy’s got issues.

After leaving the store, I scanned the crowded parking lot for Mel’s car and sure enough, sitting as out of place as the actor himself was a truly sick midnight blue Mazarati.

And in another universe, in a different body, I would wait by the car, pretend to have trouble getting my groceries out of the car and Mel would come walking out — and very kindly help me load the car. Very shortly after we’d be contorted in all sorts of tawdry positions in the back of his Mazarati, sweat pouring off of my sugar tits, my ’80s sex fantasies realized at last – his blue eyes—.

What really happened: as I was driving out of the parking lot Mel came out with his two grocery bags very earnestly carrying them to his car. I drove by and pretended not to notice him.

But this is what he looks like – posted on Guys with iPhones:

And this is what he looked like when he turned my bones to liquid: