My new best bud, Mike Rowe!

Monica, Dalton, me & the girlies made the treck to Sapelo on Tuesday night in anticipation of Mike's arrival on the island on Thursday. For those of you who aren't in the know... Mike Rowe is the host of Dirty Jobs with Mike Rowe and the narrator for Deadliest Catch, both on the Discovery Channel. About lunchtime on Wednesday, Da made the run to Meridian and picked up Dave Barski (Yeah, Barski was there) and a couple of camera guys, who spent the rest of the day scouting locations, etc. in prep for Thursday's shoot of Dirty Jobs at the UGA Labs, focusing on their bug problems. They were also supposed to shoot at Da's house, but apparently we weren't buggy enough for them, or they had more than they could handle over at the lab. Anyway, we were told Mike wasn't coming in until Thursday for shooting, no biggy. Well, just as Chick was ready to pull our grilled chicken off the grill at home, Da called from the lighthouse where they had all gone at sunset to check things out, and low and behold, Mike had slipped onto the island. Turns out the crew member who was supposed to handle their supper had dropped the ball, not fully understanding there were no stores, etc. on Sapelo, and they were desperate for meal preparations to feed a crew of 15. Da called in the troops! We dropped the chicken in the oven to stay warm and lit out to the mansion. At roughly 8 pm, Monica and I had taken inventory of the freezers and in about 5 minutes flat had a menu planned and with the girls and Yeah-Yeah's help, were beginning prep when Da arrived and we kicked it in high gear. We managed to have a full dinner of a beautiful green salad, bacon wrapped scallops, low country boil and lemon merange pie in less than 2 hours. Needless to say, we were proud of ourselves.

Well, we knew Mike was on the island, but didn't know where he was or how he was with "fans", so in the kitchen of the mansion we were in the middle of lecturing the girls and Dalton of how not to make a fuss, and let him initiate the contact and to kind of lay low until we could feel him out. Well, here he comes up behind Megan, saying "hello folks, how's it going tonight?", nearly making her pee her pants. Dalton's mouth hung open and Monica actually squealed! Da and Wayne kidded me and Monica about us having to be tied up to keep from jumping on him, but it was actually the girls who we had to contain. Megan said, "that is one fine, old dude". And Jessica's excited claim of, "I served Mike his pie, and he called me darling!" said it all. And during the pictures, he rubbed their backs and I thought they were gonna fall down....

He was so nice and just like he is on tv. Very approachable and hospitable. He talked with Dalton about the captains on Deadliest Catch, and the girls toured him around the mansion, ending up in the Circus Room, where he sat down at the piano and played them a couple of tunes. He thanked us all again and again, for feeding them on such short notice, and seemed to really enjoy the meal. It was after midnight when we finally cleaned up and headed home for our grilled chicken, but, WHAT A NIGHT!