Do you have a friend that is always running late? She takes forever to do her hair or figure out what to wear and meanwhile you’re perpetually left waiting? I do too and her name is Tonya. As a somewhat impatient person this quality usually annoys me terribly, but it actually came in handy a couple of weeks ago. I’ve met a lot of celebrities over the years. I’ve attended the Oscars and movie premiers and red carpet events. But one of my all-time favorite celebrity encounters happened during our recent trip to New York City to appear on The Today Show– and it wouldn’t have happened if Tonya hadn’t taken forever to get ready. We were running late to dinner and I was leading the pack down 51st street to catch a cab to the Meatpacking District. Dawn, Melly, Morgenne and Tonya were a few steps behind me, looking down at someone’s phone. As we approached a corner I almost literally ran into Steve Carell. “Steve!” I exclaimed as though I was bumping into an old friend. “Would you mind taking a quick picture with us. This is a special weekend for us. We’re in town to be on The Today Show.” I stuck my arm out and kindly ushered him to the edge of the sidewalk. At this point my friends looked up. Dawn screamed and Steve giggled and shooshed her at the same time. He knew that if we freaked out, surely other people who freak out and soon he’d have a mob surrounding him.

So we quickly posed for pictures and Steve offered us some words of encouragement for our upcoming interview. “You’ll do great,” he said. “They’re so nice over there.” Morgenne told him she was looking forward to his new movie and he said that’s why he was in town. I also told him we were actually just talking about him because earlier in the day we laughed about the scene in Date Night where they end up at the boat house– the quietest place in New York City.

A few minutes later he was gone, leaving behind a pool of giggly, starstruck girls in his wake. We spent the rest of the evening gushing over how kind he was, wondering what other celebrities we might randomly meet and agreeing that anybody else would surely be a let down after sharing such a special moment with our pal Steve.

When we showed up to do our interview on The Today Show we told the producer about our amazing encounter. “You should mentioned that!” Angela said. So when Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb asked us on air about how our trip to New York City was we gladly said, “We bumped into Steve Carell and he said you guys were great!” But of course none of that would have happened if Tonya hadn’t taken her sweet time getting ready. So in the future Tonya, take all the time you need!