Meeting Mr. Mantooth

This is the day I had been waiting for. My husband and I were leaving for Oklahoma City to see Randy. We live in San Antonio, Texas, so we planned on leaving for OC right after work due to the long drive. It was almost impossible for me to concentrate on work that day. I was practically bouncing off the walls, so at 4:00pm my boss told me to go ahead and go. I was so hyped up that I think I was driving my co-workers nuts.

I got home and packed in record-breaking time. We were ready to go! There was one slight problem though….San Antonio was in the midst of a torrential rainstorm. San Antonio is a city that rarely sees rain, so when we get a bad storm, the city practically closes down. This storm was the remnants of a tropical storm from the Gulf of Mexico, just my luck that this had to happen on the one day of the year that I am desperate to drive out of town. We had to drive through the storm all the way from San Antonio to Austin. Needless to say, this delayed our arrival in OC. By the time we arrived at our hotel (2:30am), I was slightly tired and cranky. As tired as I was, I was so excited about the next day that I could not go to sleep. So, I spent the next hour placing the floor of our hotel room, much to the displeasure and irritation of my husband Nick. I must have worn myself out because I think I passed out around 3:30am from sheer exhaustion and excitement.

I sprang out of bed at 9:30am. For me this is a complete miracle because I firmly believe that Saturdays exist for the sole purpose of sleeping until 12 noon. After getting ready, we headed for Quail Springs Mall. Luckily, it was just across the street from our hotel.

We quickly located the TV Land set-up and my eyes were eagerly darting around for any possible sign of Randy. I was wearing my newsgroup t-shirt and got the attention right away of Palaytia Dream (Vanessa) and Shauna from the newsgroup. We sat down and began excitedly babbling on and on about Randy. I really honestly can’t remember a single thing that I said. Needless to say, I was a wreck. Vanessa, Shauna and I decided to go get in line at the autograph table. We wanted to make sure that we were at the head of the line to meet Randy.

During this time, my husband had wandered off to look around. As we were standing in the autograph line, my husband came up to me to tell me that he had seen Randy escorted by two guards in the Food Court. I screamed. Mostly because I was now aware that Randy was in the building, and second because my husband had seen him FIRST. My mind was racing, and I began drilling my husband with every question possible about his Randy sighting, “what was Randy wearing?, how did he look?, are you sure it was him?, where is he now?, etc, etc..”.

Finally, I found the strength to compose myself, as I did not want to appear to be a drooling vegetable when Randy finally arrived. I was still a wreck though. Every time that Vanessa or Shauna would point to something in the mall I would jump and say, “Do you see Randy? where…where…where…?”

At this point, the TV Land production was getting under way a short distance from us. They had audience members up on the stage and were asking them TV trivia questions in a game show format. I wasn’t paying much attention until I heard the words announced “Randolph Mantooth”. I heard applause and started eagerly jumping around to get my first glimpse of him. And there he was up on the stage. Vanessa, Shauna and I began to debate whether we should give up our place in line to go get a closer look. After a moment, I decided to go get a few pictures of Randy up close. I was able to get pretty close to the stage and got some really good pictures. After getting a few snapshots, I went back to my place in line to wait for Randy to come over. I still remember watching him walk over to the table. It was hard for me to believe that I was actually about to meet him.

There was one lady and a little girl in line ahead of us. The girl must have been about eight years old. Randy said to her “what’s your name sweetheart?”. My heart just melted because he would always call girls in the show sweetheart when he was trying to console them during a rescue. He called her sweetheart a few more times, and I felt like complete putty. Then I realized that I was next in line. Somehow, somewhere, some unknown force of nature gave me the power to walk up to him and shake his hand. I was actually able to intelligently introduce Vanessa as well as Shauna and myself. Randy noticed my newsgroup t-shirt right away and smiled. He was also amused when I informed him that I was a very proud member of the Gage Brigade. Randy signed my Project 51 poster and I asked him if we could get a couple of pictures for me to post for the newsgroup. Randy was so sweet about it. He graciously let us take our pictures even though there was a line a mile long of people waiting to meet him. Right before I left him I had to ask what his middle name was. He said with a smile, “do mean Johnny’s”. And I said “I know Johnny’s is Roderick, but what about yours?”. Randy then smiled and said, “I’m not telling”.

My mind went blank after that. I assume that I stood around and gawked at him for an appropriate amount of time. Finally, my husband was able to pry me away from the scene.

I had my autographed poster in hand, and I had met Randy. What an incredible day!

(P.S. …. To my husband Nick…. thanks for being such a good sport about all this silliness, I love you.)

Randy answering questions during
the Q&A session with the audience.