"I was catching a connecting flight from Cincinatti to NYC on Christmas evening when I see none other than Dave sitting at our gate by himself, with gifts in hand. I jumped at the chance and introduced myself and sat down with him.

Dave did most of the talking that day because I was a little star struck. He just kept asking me questions about what I was doing in New York, and what I was doing for New Years. He said he was going to Zimbabwe for the millenium New Years that week.

We talked about the new album (the Lillywhite one), and he said he was going into the studio the next week to begin it, and that he'd written some new ones. I think I had been listening to John the Revelator on this bootleg that week, and I told him how much I liked that song (I think it had only been played once at the time), and he said that he only gets to play that when "Carlos" is around. We went on to talk about Charleston and him playing at my school down there. Towards the end of our conversation, Dave pulled out this drawing from his pocket and asked me if I would like to have it, and went on to apologize that it was drawn on a barf bag. I didn't mind.

Anyway, the thing that was most notable was that about an hour later (after having parted ways 45 minutes prior) I walked through first class and dave was sitting there by himself again, and I thanked him for the "barf bag", and he says "Your welcome. Have a merry Christmas John." The dude remembered my name.

And thats my story.
BY: John Vinson