On October 24th, 2025, I attended the Chill Out Expo New Jersey. After the event, I went to the Irish pub next door, Auld Shebeen, and sat down at the bar. There was one empty stool to my left. A husband and wife walked up — she took the open seat while the man remained standing. Little did I know, he was Larry Thomas with his significant other  Heidi, best known as “The Soup Nazi” from Seinfeld.

After about ten minutes, Heidi struck up some small talk with me. Fifteen minutes later, I offered my seat to her husband because they were such genuinely nice people. Larry politely declined at first but accepted the offer about an hour later. We ended up chatting for nearly two hours. I think he even mentioned some things about the Seinfeld show, but I’ll admit — I wasn’t listening at full capacity.

Finally, I asked her, “Are you guys here for the Chill Out Expo?” She replied, “Yes! We flew in from California for this, and my husband Larry is an actor.” I had recognized him from Seinfeld before, but for some reason, it hadn’t registered immediately. The cool part was that Larry was wearing an orange T-shirt with a Brooklyn/Boca Raton reference. I told him I’d be wearing an orange Satriale’s Pork Store T-shirt from The Sopranos the following day.

On October 25th, 2025, I posted a photo of me with Larry Thomas on social media. That evening, after the event, I went back to the same Irish pub and saw Larry there again. I didn’t want to bother him since it was crowded, so I went upstairs and had a couple of beers with my new friend Voley, a local pilot.

About an hour later, my phone rang — it was my friend Alec Austin, who had seen my post. He told me he was a huge Seinfeld fan and even had all of the Soup Nazi’s recipes. By pure kismet, Larry happened to wander upstairs. While talking to Alec, I quietly said to Larry, “My friend is a huge fan — would you mind saying hello?” Like the mensch that he is, Larry agreed and spoke with Alec on the phone.