Mistaken identity

When you break it down, Mike Walter is a pretty unremarkable name. It's just two first names. Yet so many people have trouble with it. They always want to put an s on the end of my name to make me plural. Could you imagine two of me? At any rate I remember years ago when Braniff was going belly up I was interviewing stranded travelers when I stumbled across Hugh Downs.

This was back when he was the co-host of 20-20 on Friday evenings. His co-host at the time was Barbara Walters. He needed to get back to New York in a hurry, and the clock was ticking, and the planes were grounded. I immediately introduced myself to him. He couldn't get over my name. The conversation went a little like this.

Downs: "Walters?"

Me: "No it's Walter!"

Downs: "So Walters did you say?"

Me: "No, it's Walter."

Downs: "Oh are you related to Barbara?"

Me: "No it's Walter, not Walters, I'm not related to Barbara!"

(Downs puzzled expression)

Downs: "Oh."

Hugh Downs eventually got on a TWA flight and that was that. I hadn't had a bout of mistaken identity until recently. I'm not quite sure why it's happening. But it has happened a couple of times in the last couple of weeks.

Janet Terry who basically runs rough shod over the 9 a.m. broadcast here at the station called me one afternoon. There was a sense of alarm in her voice.

Janet: "Where are you?"

Me: "What do you mean, where am I?"

Janet: "There is a guy here, in the lobby, and he says he has an appointment with you, and he's waiting, and he's getting mad."

I was stunned. I was also at home and had no interest in coming back to the station. I had no recollection of ever scheduling an appointment with anyone.

Me: "Can you go ask him why he's here? I really have no memory of anyone coming, and it's not on my calendar."

Janet: "Okay I'll call you back."

Quite a bit of time passed, and there was no phone call. So I called Janet. The visitor wasn't there to see me at all. He was here to see our News Director Mike Ward. Now it's pretty amazing that anyone could get us confused. To the right is a picture of our news director. Okay I'm kidding of course. He's not really Shaggy from Scooby Doo. But I couldn't find a likeness of him anywhere. This is the closest thing I could find. He is thin, has hair sort of like this guy, and a beard, so hey what the heck right?

Next up, comes this call from a very high powered agent in Los Angeles. She represents some of the top people in the profession. She leaves me this message, she wants to help me with my needs. Well I don't have an agent right now, so why not call her back, what do I have to lose.

This call was completely unsolicited, so naturally I'm curious why she called me, and flattered that she wants to talk to me.

So the calls go back and forth. I leave a message, she leaves a message. It's a game of phone chess. I make a move, she makes a move, until yesterday finally phone checkmate. She reaches me. As phone conversations go this one is beyond bizarre. She's asking me all these questions, and I respond. But there is an unnatural tone to the conversation. It's like two people passing one another but not connecting. I'm talking in one direction, she's talking in another. Until finally she says, "You know I'm sorry I was under the mistaken belief that you were a news director." So I'm thinking pretty soon maybe I'll just start hiring people, and I'll get the last laugh. If you are reading this Mike, that was a joke, and the picture, forget about it, I really think you look like this guy. So the ultimate lesson to this story is this. Who needs an agent if you know how to suck up right?