About 15 years ago, or maybe a little longer than that, a young girl wrote a 4 page letter, double sided and in five different colors and sent it to the Rosemont Horizon. That letter was addressed to the New Kids on the Block, and each of the colors in the letter was for each member of the group - Joey, Jordan, Jonathan, Donnie and my assigned favorite, Danny. Assigned? you ask? Well, my sisters and cousins were fans, too, so each of us had a favorite. Jonathan Knight was Melanie’s favorite. Donnie Wahlberg was Claudine’s. Jordan Knight was Marian’s. Joey McIntyre was Fatima’s. So I was left with Danny Wood. Not that there was anything wrong with Danny…he definitely was cute. But I think if it was left up to me, I would have picked Jordan or Jonathan. Nevertheless, I was a good fan to Danny. We hung their posters on our walls. We got their albums as soon as they came out (cassettes, of course). We sang their songs together. We watched their videos. We were hoping that one day, we’d be their “Covergirl”s. (I’m rolling my eyes at myself for even typing that last sentence) At night I would lay my head on my pillow, nuzzling my face on my NKOTB pillow case.

Aaaanyway…I don’t really remember what I wrote in that letter - probably that I loved them…I only know that I had written to them and sent it to the Rosemont Horizon because I was going to their concert later that week and a little bit of me was hoping that I could bypass writing a letter to their official fanclub and risk it getting lost among thousands of other letters, and they would get it when they landed in Chicago and that during their concert they would say, “Christine, we got your letter…come up on stage!”

Alas, it never happened.

Since that letter, a lot has happened in my life. Had my first boyfriend. Graduated high school. Went to college. Graduated from college. Got married. Had a kid. Every now and then I would get reminders of them - Joey’s solo hit, Donnie’s appearance in “Sixth Sense”, Jordan’s one solo hit, and the pale, pudgy, creepy Jordan in the Surreal Life. Outside of that, life had moved on after NKOTB spurned me in my youth.

Until earlier this year, when I found out about the New Kids on the Block reunion, and saw their publicity photo, realizing that they had aged pretty well.

Then I found out that they were having a reunion tour. Didn’t really think much of it since I’m not a concert going person anymore. However, I believe it was my cousin Kathy that brought up coming to Chicago to watch the concert with the gals. How could I say no to a visit from my favorite Texan?

I was surprised that the Chicago concert sold out in several days - they had even added a second show. I didn’t think that people still cared. Truthfully, I was looking forward to a fun night with the girls, and to reminisce on a long gone time of my life. I wasn’t really expecting a lot from the concert.

But I’ll be the first to admit that it was one of the best concerts I’ve ever been to. When we got there (security made me return my DSLR camera to the car - there was no security check when we went to the American Idol concert) there was a massive line for t-shirts…it took about an hour just to get to the front of the line. Also, the average age was about 30, and there was about 100 females to every male. It was fun to see what people were wearing, from t-shirts and jeans to some skankalicious club tops and high heels to the 40 year old women wearing New Kids shirts from 15 years ago (admittedly, I would have worn mine if a) I could find it and b) I’d fit it).

The opening act was RnB star Colby O’Donis (who? yeah, that’s what I said, too) who sang his only hit as the last song of his act, and that’s when I was like, “Oh, ok…he’s the guy who sings THAT song…” The second opening act was a treat - Natasha Bedingfield. She was definitely incredible. Her voice (which was obviously live) was strong and she sang all her hits. It’s great to hear someone sing live well. Anytime the opening acts would mention “New Kids on the Block” the arena would erupt into high pitched screams - but what I would realize later was only a mere fraction of the ear shattering sound it would reach later than night.

Before the show, the screens next to the stage asked people to text messages to a number to get moved up to the front row and get backstage passes. During the intermission after Natasha’s set, it was fun to read the messages that people sent in, because they put them on the big screens. “This time the concert isn’t after my bedtime” and “It’s been 15 years since I went to your last concert and my seats are no better now than they were then” and “I wish you had Debbie Gibson as your opening act!” and “I still fit into the NKOTB shirt I had when I was 12!”.

Finally, the lights went out, and the stadium went crazy. After several fake-outs by the band, the New Kids finally came on stage, and let me tell you, the audience went apeshit out of their minds. I was thinking my eardrums would pop out! Of course, I was screaming too, because it was just so crazy. They started off with one of their new songs, but later segued to “My Favorite Girl”, a song that I totally forgot but the lyrics came back to me quickly, which was something that happened often throughout the night. They had a good mix of old songs and new songs, and we all sang along with the ones we remembered, which was a lot. By “we” I mean the 18,000 fans that were there, shouting out the lyrics. There’s a weird thing that happens when you’re singing along to “The Right Stuff” with an arena full of estrogen screaming at five men in their mid-thirties. It became like a timewarp, and we were all giddy 15 year olds at our first concerts, who had begged our parents to let us go, who came their with our best friends and saved our money for months to pay for tickets, a t-shirt and program. We screamed, we looked at each other and giggled, I even waved my hands in the air during “Hanging Tough”…

So yes, it was one of the best concerts I have ever been to. I was with the best people possible - Melanie, Kathy, Claudine, Fatima and Kim, who were also transformed into squealing fangirls. There were definitely some highlights in the show, and I’d have to say that the most surprising thing was….and if you don’t want spoilers you may want to skip down to the next paragraph…the most surprising thing was Jordan Knight, coming up in a white button down shirt, unbuttoning it to reveal some INCREDIBLE abs (click here for proof). Those of you who watched the Surreal Life may remember him as pudgy and a little creepy, but man, it was incredible. I was giggling and screaming at the same time and just about lost my mind. We were transported to a time when we didn’t care about work, our kids, paying bills, the economy, or the election - a time when we were happy and didn’t have a care in the world.

One of Mel’s pics

What also made the concert so great was how the guys have matured. They’ve all aged pretty well - to me, Danny probably aged the best - he’s got this hard edge to him now and has grown into his strong facial features (and incredible biceps). Jordan is no longer a pretty boy, he’s just plain hot now…not sure what happened to the fangs he used to have before. The rest of them look pretty good - makes me laugh that Donnie’s still wearing hats on stage. There was some swearing during the concert and definitely a lot more crotch grabbing than I remembered from 15 years ago. The guys (except for Jonathan, but he gets a pass) seemed a lot more at ease on stage, a lot more confident and dare I say sexy. They’re no longer babies - they’ve been around the block, and it was obvious by their charisma and how they played to the crowd. They seemed just as amazed as we were at our reactions.

Anyway, it was a great time. At the end of the night, Donnie thanked the audience, because their comeback tour would have been really crappy if no one bought any tickets. I think it was a surprise to everyone how quickly the tickets sold. In the end, though I have to thank the New Kids (it makes me laugh to say that because come on, they’re not kids) for giving all of us a carefree night with 18,000 of my best friends, singing my heart out without a care in the world.

The pre-Ben happiest day of my life happened 5 years ago today. I was planning on writing so much more today, but I’m sneezing and congested, and we had two parties we went today. It’s been a busy day for us and I just have under an hour to make this post before it’s technically tomorrow.

So yeah, Dave and I got married 5 years ago - it’s incredible how quickly time has gone by, and how much our lives have changed. Married life is never a fairy tale, and it takes some work, but we have grown so much together and it’s all worth it. I don’t want to sound like a cheesy Hallmark card, but essentially, it’s been a awesome, happy, loving five years.

I’ve been scanning all my wedding negatives over the last several months (we had our wedding before most photographers did weddings digitally), but haven’t had a chance to finish them. Be on the lookout for pictures, though…most of them are done, and that was my goal - to have my wedding pictures up, finally, after five years!

Today my mom would have been 65 years old.

Sometimes I think about what life would be like if she was still here…I don’t think my own life would be much different, though I know that she would really love spending time with Ben. She would nag me about his finicky eating habits, give him cute little nicknames, let him sit on her lap as she played mah jong with the titas. She would by him overalls and cheesy outfits, things I wouldn’t let him wear out in public unless he was going to visit her. She would come through our front door and he would run to her as he screams “Lola!!!” and run into her arms.

I’m sure that outside of my life, things would have been different. She had an uncanny way of diffusing drama, maybe because she tried so hard to please everyone, but more likely because she just cared so much about people. There has been WAY too much drama since she’s been gone.

It goes without saying - I still miss her a lot.

Happy Birthday, Mommy.

Happy birthday to my “little” cousin Marilyn, who turns 21 today…

She started out a little dramatic baby 21 years ago:

…the the beautiful drama queen she is now:

Pretty, isn’t she? But of course, I’m not to talk - me and my fluorescent yellow Guess sweatshirt up there. I have no idea why we’re all so serious - we were happy kids - really!

I remember 21 years ago, getting the call that she had just been born and they were planning on naming her “Margaret”. I scoffed at the name, and later found out that they named her “Marilyn”, I’m assuming after Marilyn Monroe who had died 25 years before she was born. Since then she has never failed to live a boring life, just like her namesake. She’s like a little sister to me - she still calls my dad “Daddy Vic” because we used to babysit her a lot when she was young.

We’ll be going out this weekend for some good times - I’ll be sure to take some pictures and report!

As I mentioned a couple weeks ago, one of my favorite comic book artists, Michael Turner, had passed away at the age of 37. I had been a fan of his for as long as I could remember - his career was taking off a few years after I had started collecting comic books.

My first love will always be Jim Lee, but Mike will always be a personal favorite. I loved his art, it always made the stories better. Witchblade was my favorite book when it started out. He even got better when Fathom came out. When he broke off from Top Cow and started his own company, I followed.

What made Mike more of a role model than his incredible art was his spirit. As I just said, I loved Fathom - the book he had created. There had been several months that had passed since I had seen a new issue (which, in comics, really isn’t all that unusual). During a trip to my comic book store, I mentioned to my LCS guy, “What’s up with Fathom? Why’s it so late?” to which he answered, “Dude, didn’t you hear? He has cancer!” Of course, I felt horrible.

That was in 2000. One removed hip, three pounds of removed bone, physical therapy, radiation and too many health ups and downs to count later, it’s 2008. In that time, his star continued to rise. He did the covers for DC’s Identity Crisis (right) as well as a story arc for Superman/Batman. Any comic that he had a part in saw an increase in sales. He was still attending conventions, and the lines for his autograph were always packed. Even though he was in pain, he still pushed on. He didn’t HAVE to work…he could have just sat on the side and let others in his company do the work. But he loved it, and he loved the fans. He had his special cushion-y chair to sit in as he did autographs and the occasional sketch, and he always did it with a smile.

Throughout the years of reading comics, going to conventions and living on the West coast, our paths had crossed several times, leaving me with some wonderful memories of the man who other artists remarked was “one of the best of us.” Here are a couple of my favorites:

When I first met him at the Chicago Comic Convention many years ago, he had really liked my thumb ring, which had waves on it (Fathom, underwater, waves, get it?). He jokingly asked me if he could have it, and I replied for $15 he could. He then asked to try it on. He put it on his pinky, and it got stuck. After much pulling and laughing, we got it off, and he drew this marvelous sketch for me in return for my troubles. He rarely did quick sketches for people, since there were always a lot of people in line - I was lucky that his finger got stuck!

The year the Mike started his own company, Aspen MLT, me and my sister Fatima were lucky enough to get to work at their booth during the convention. It was a ton of fun! I had to leave early because I had to catch a plane to LA. I’m sitting at the airport talking on the phone and reading my comics, when who saunters over to the gate but Mike Turner! So I sneak up to him and ask him to sign my book. He looks up, surprised, and laughs. He invites me to sit and chill with him before the flight. He got on the plane before I did, but when I boarded I passed by him and he waved hello. Of course, my seat was pretty much in the back of the plane. Once we landed, it was a while before I actually got off the plane. But as soon as I got into the terminal, who’s standing out there waiting for me? Mike! He actually waited for me to get off the plane and walk with me to baggage claim. I was really touched. Then once we got there the president of X-Systems (my boss) came up to me and in my head I prayed that he wouldn’t yell at me in front of Mike Turner, which he didn’t. Anyway, he didn’t have to wait for me - I’m sure he was excited to get home and he was probably really tired. But he did, and for that he will always have a place in my heart.

At the convention this year, the day after he passed away, a bunch of artists took turns sitting at his booth doing free sketches for fans in his honor. It was really touching to see people who had worked with him, who called him friend and brother, come together with hugs and tears. If there was one thing I knew for sure about Mike, is that he surrounded himself with good people. I definitely missed my Aspen people this year - Peter, Frank, Mark, Vince and everyone else, and the booth was so empty without them. So it helped to see all of these talented artists come together.

If you’d like to read other artists speak about Mike, click on this link. It has artists who had worked with Mike, as well as those who only knew him in passing, and some of them were Mike’s closest friends.

I guess another reason why his death has hit me so hard is because it reminds me of my mom. She had a long battle with cancer, but she fought it. In the end, it was just too much. But after her passing, I had realized how much she had touched the lives of others, how much other people loved her.

Cancer sucks.

Rest in Peace, Mike.

If you would like to send condolences to Michael’s family you are encouraged to do so. Please send them to:

Aspen MLT, Inc
C/O Michael Turner
5855 Green Valley Circle, Suite 111
Culver City, CA, 90230

His company Aspen Comics is also encouraging anyone wishing to do so to send a charitable donation big or small in Mike’s name to The American Cancer Society or the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

I’ve been wanting to post this for a long time, but have been knee deep in other projects lately (sorry for the lack of updates!)

I can’t say I’ve watched “Meet the Press” a lot, or that I really keep up with politics. I don’t know all the big names, know where all our politicians stand on all issues or watch news stations all the time. But I knew Tim Russert. As someone who had pledged almost a decade ago that I would vote to make a difference, Tim became a beacon of light that made politics interesting. Seeing his face, you knew that this guy was real. He didn’t have evil ulterior motives and unlike many of the politicians that he had interacted with, he told the truth. He was constantly trying to make politicians accountable for what they have said without attacking.

It’s interesting that his death has hit me so hard. I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s because it’s an election year, and Tim made the whole process understandable. Maybe it’s because he seemed like such a genuine person, even though you knew he was someone of great intelligence, it never seemed like he was talking down to us.

Now I wish I knew more about him. I’ve been watching all of the special reports and the tributes. Behind the man we saw on TV was a deeply religious man, a man who appreciated where he came from, who always let his family know how he felt about them, who lived an incredible life. Today, I’m watching the memorial (and it’s INCREDIBLE annoying that the sound keeps on cutting out on MSNBC) and it’s beautiful and heartbreaking at the same time. It’s obvious that all who knew him were affected by him, and are deeply saddened to lose a colleague and friend. He was a great man that had died too young. But behind him he has left a wonderful legacy - he has set the bar for interviewing, for our politicians to be prepared and be held accountable for their words and promises, and a beautiful, loving wife and a son that reflects so many of his qualities.

Rest in Peace, Tim. No one will ever be able to take your place.

When me and my sisters were little, we were “latchkey kids”. Does anyone remember that term? There were times that we had people at home, like my grandmother, aunts or uncles that lived with us, but we always had keys to get into the house, just in case no one was home.

As a kid, I was pretty irresponsible, and I lost EVERYTHING. Especially my house keys. It got to the point where my father gave me a HUGE keychain. You know how doctor’s offices use those big ass paddles to hold their bathroom keys? That was pretty similar to the one my dad put on my house keys. He wanted to make it big enough so I didn’t lose it. Even with that, I still lost those keys once or twice.

I had flashbacks to my youth this week, after I had lost my work keys. Even though I work at home, I’ve got a keychain that holds luggage keys and a little electronic code generator that I need to log onto our network VPN (don’t bother stealing it - you need the code AND my secret pin to log in). I can work just fine outside of our network, but if I want to use outlook or our company’s intranet sites, I have to be logged in. I am constantly misplacing my keys, usually finding them stuck inside or under the couch. However, in the last weeks, these keys have been MIA. I was a little worried that they could have been packed away somewhere while we were getting ready for an open house, or even worse, that Ben could have thrown them in the garbage (which he NEVER does, but who knows that that kid does when I’m not looking?). Usually when I’m done using my keys, I through them in my backpack, but I digged through the 200 pockets in my bag and didn’t see them. I was starting to get worried since I needed to log into request time off for the comic convention.

Finally, after ransacking the whole house, I decided to empty out my backpack. I know that I said that I had digged through my backpack, but to tell the truth, there’s a lot of crap in there. I’ve got tons of pens, a graphic tablet, mouse and stylus, a flask shaped external hard drive w/usb cable, a USB cable for my camera, nail cutter, 2 sets of ear buds, 2 packages of thank you cards i’ve never sent out (so if you gave Ben a gift for his birthday, THANKS!), a camera filter, a couple flash drives, old CDs, loose change, papers, envelopes, and loads of other junk. There was a chance that in the 30 times that I had checked my backpack, that I had missed it.

So I started taking things out, and discovered, in pocket #153, my keys. They had been in there the whole time. Argh!

Maybe I need to ask my dad if he has an extra paddle-sized keychain that he can lend me…

You know, something I’ve always inspired to do, but never really had the drive to really accomplish, is to make a difference in someone’s life. I try doing little things, random acts that make people’s lives better, and I suppose that yes, I have touched some lives. When I think of my mother, and how her passing affected so much people, I want to have the same effect on the people around me (without the whole dying part, of course).

Last week, Claudine sent me an email telling me that one of our highschool teachers had died. Not just any teacher, it was one of the teachers that you look back on your life and think, “He taught us a lot more than what was on the lesson plan.” Mr. M was probably my second favorite teacher ever (first, of course, being my high school band teacher). He was a history teacher, but he was so much more. I went to an all-girl Catholic high school, and he knew it was his responsibility to make us great. When we started out as freshman, we weren’t people to him - once we were able to think on our own, not to be afraid to challenge and debate and not just spout words from books, THAT’S when we became people. History wasn’t just stuff in a textbook, it was a lesson in life. He brought in movies to highlight events in time, he used MTV as a teaching tool, “We Didn’t Start the Fire” was a large part of his teaching plan, we learned about Vietnam from his own personal experiences. He didn’t talk to us, he talked with us. Also, since he taught a lot of the honors classes, he knew that his students were often stressed, but always told his students of the bigger picture - high school wasn’t everything. Tests were just stop signs in the road of life. Anyone who took his class knew how much he cared for each one of his students - he wanted us to be great, he pushed us to think, and he loved to make us laugh. He had such a passion for teaching, and put it on his shoulders to make sure that we were ready for the world out there. I’d have to say, though, that one of my favorite memories was on Halloween, when he brought in “The Evil Dead 2″ for us to watch.

My highschool set up a memory book where people could write in their favorite memories…it was beautiful to read. He started teaching at my school in 1979, and was still teaching until he passed. For 30 years, he had been making an impact on these womens’ lives - there were many who wrote that he had been their inspiration to go into teaching, or to pursue political science in law. I can only hope that he knew how much he has meant to so many people…

So goodbye, Mr. M, and I hope that heaven has a lot of Polo cologne in stock.

I may have mentioned it before on my blog, but we’ve put our house on the market. Yes, the housing market in Chicago is really horrible and we may lose money, but Dave’s commute to his new job (which really isn’t that new anymore) is pretty long, and if we lived closer he would be able to stay at home and come in whenever work needs him, rather than just staying at the hospital like he does now.

So we’ve been planning on putting our house up for sale for a while now, and last month finally made the decision that the time was right. It’s tough, though, because this is our first house and we adore it. It’s the house where Ben was born (not literally, of course) and there are so many wonderful memories associated with it. Long ago, when we first found the place, we fell in love with it instantly. It wasn’t in an up and coming, “cool” neighborhood, it was on a busy street, and it was a duplex, but there was just something about it that we really loved. Four years later, it’s time for us to go. If we didn’t have to, we probably would have stayed here for much longer, but it just wasn’t meant to be.

Today is our open house. We’re camped at Dave’s parents’ place (where they’re having a party and we’re in one of the rooms listening to them karaoke and scream in laughter - it’s funny) waiting for a good time to return home. We’ve cleaned our house like we’ve never cleaned it before. Every nook and cranny has felt the wrath of my bottle of Fantastic or my Mr. Clean Magic Eraser. And I know I’ve mentioned it before, but the magic eraser is awesome. I had scrubbed our shower for hours trying to get off soap scum, trying several cleaners. I checked online and saw that the magic eraser was pretty effective, and *poof*, just a little bit of scrubbing and my shower door was sparkling clean.

Truthfully, I don’t want to part with this house. I love this house. It’s not just a house, it’s our home. I always joke around with Dave that me and Ben were going to cut eyeholes in some white sheets Brady Bunch style and haunt the house as people come to see it. I know, though, that it’s time to let it go and let someone else enjoy it. *cries*

The walk was COLD AND RAINY, and even though we opted to only do the mile route, we also took into consideration the extra weight of our clothes being soaked with water AND having to fight the wind and adjust our umbrellas when they turned inside out. Even with the crap-taculous weather, there were a TON of people out - I would say thousands of people, who came to do the race. Next year we want to do a little more organizing and start fund raising early. So even though we were complaining all the time, at least we were all together and were able to laugh about it! I’ll post up pictures (I only used my camera phone) later!

To you mommies out there, HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY!