Tangential anecdote warning. Also TL-with-no-DR-summary warning; sorry. If there's a better forum or thread for this, please let me know.
I was at the opening of Star Trek: The Experience in January 1998. My employer was licensed to make a Trek collectible card game and we were invited to a licensees' summit at the Hilton, which was purposely scheduled to overlap the ST:TE opening at night, which we were also invited to. It was a big media event with a bunch of stars from the franchise. I remember a limo pulling up and depositing Jeri Ryan onto a velvet-rope-bordered red carpet, which she pounded like a runway model as photographers snapped away and pulsing music did its best to make us into Shatner's newest tinnitus cousins.
I don't think any mere mortals got near Ryan, but we licensees were surprisingly free to wander around and hobnob with the other celebrities. I briefly got to speak with Tim Russ, Nana Visitor, Alexander Siddig, and Christopher McDonald (Castillo in Yesterday's Enterprise). I don't remember now who else may have been at the meet & greet, other than René Auberjonois and Armin Shimerman hanging out together and being purposely pantomime-goofy, sort of play-hiding behind columns and things and "observing" all these strange humans. I did not approach them as they seemed to not so much be in hobnobbable mode.
Anyway, the celebrities and the licensees were all invited to be the first to have The Experience. (IIRC, it was actually the night before the official opening, but memories fade.) Sadly the Promenade was kind of dark and Quark's was not quite open yet; but the motion-simulator ride was running (though not yet running 100% correctly, as it would turn out). I got in the line — the very long line — for the ride, and was delighted to discover that the two people right behind me in line were Grace Lee Whitney and her son. Hundreds of regular nobodies just like me, and I lucked into standing next to Star Trek royalty as we waited our turn on the ride. They were stuck with me as their queue-neighbor for quite a little while.
She was just lovely. Kind, happy to talk, and totally down to earth. She introduced me to her son, who was also cool. Sadly I don't remember if it was Jon or Scott, but either way he was also Trek royalty, having appeared in Miri (although I did not know that at the time). All along the line to the ride, there were little kiosks, like museum exhibits, displaying all kinds of Trek information. We walked along, talking, reading the kiosks, and commenting on them. At one point, Grace pointed out that something printed on a kisk about her was incorrect. She wasn't offended or anything, just more like somebody observing "well that part isn't right."
It was a remarkably ordinary interaction, for such an extraordinary meeting. I did not pepper her with questions or request an autograph or anything like that; we just talked like three people standing in line waiting to get on an amusement park ride and passing the time with words. I was surprised that I did not feel awkward or nervous about it all; Ms. Whitney was just that disarming and nice and normal. I remember being so happy for her that she seemed to have overcome the abuse she suffered on the show and her own struggles with substance addiction (not that we talked about any of that, of course); for someone who was almost 68 at the time, she seemed mentally sharp and in good spirits. Maybe that perspective was a factor in me not acting like the idiot Trek fanboy I actually was, and just talking to them like they were people, and also just shutting my mouth and listening, too.
Sorry, I'm sure this didn't really belong in this thread. When I read her name on your book list, the memories staggered back and I thought TrekBBS would be the only real place to share them where people would understand the details of the situation and the emotional context of my unexpected interaction. The motion-sim ride was fun, but really for me the best experience of Star Trek: The Experience was chatting with those two beforehand.
Back around to the topic, I think I need to go back and re-read The Longest Trek.
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