Trip to Canada and Tom Ridge

So I was driving back from Canada with my girlfriend Jess this afternoon (met the parents, friends and walked around Toronto -- had a blast!) As we drove through Breezewood, PA -- I wanted to stop for gas and an MTO at a Pennsylvania classic -- Sheetz...

So I fill up with gas, we go in and order a couple MTO's and then as I'm walking towards the counter I walk by Secretary of Homeland Security, Tom Ridge... He walks by and starts making himself a large coffee... I tell Jess and then notice 2-3 secret service agents and Tom Ridge's wife, who walks into Sheetz.

I asked Jess if she had a camera and she said she had it in her purse! So as Tom Ridge comes up, I say "Governor Ridge!" and put out my hand and we start talking... We probably spoke for a couple minutes -- I got a few pictures with him (soon to be developed and uploaded) and then we talked about what was up -- I mentioned that I was heading back to DC and he asked me where I lived -- I said I lived in Falls Church with a couple roommates. He said he was heading back to DC after visiting his daughter going to college in Pittsburgh. I told him I graduated from Geneva College, and he said "really! that's in Beaver Falls right? That used to be in my congressional district... when did you graduate?" I told him '99 and that I moved to DC in 2001... then he asked me what I did... I told him I worked for Stratfor... "Have you heard of it?" -- He replied "no, what do they do?" My response: "geopolitical intelligence" I had to repeat myself... so he says -- "did you guys get the election right?" and I said -- "as a matter of fact, we did..." Then we talked a bit about the election results and how pleased we both were and that looking at a county-by-county map of the US, it was basically almost ALL red, with a few blue dots for metro areas... we were chuckling about how the Dems totally missed what America wanted... Then I said "how 'bout Thume??" and we chuckled some more about Daschle losing to Thume and how the final 10 days saw Thume pull a massive team together to campaign... Ridge was using terms like "full court press" and "blockin and tacklin" for Thume's campaign team -- definately a western Pennsylvania native talkin football analogies... :) I mentioned that my roommate had taken vacation time to fly out to work for Thume's campaign during the final week...

Anyway, I left the conversation with "great to meet you, by the way my name is Jeremy Wilcox" and I shook his hand one more time... Then on the way out to the car, Jess said she had my business card, so I went back but Ridge was in the restroom -- I asked his secret service agent to give the card to Ridge and that I worked for an intelligence company that offered something he would find useful and the agent said he would make sure he got it...

So that was pretty cool... ;)