Today's the day.

Remember this post, way back in February?


(You may not, since I didn't really have what one would call a "readership" back then. And by "readership," I do mean each and every three of you.)


Anyway, I'll save you a click--it said something to the effect of "If there's a reunion, we are so there."

There IS a reunion.


And we are almost there.

Today is Tuesday, October 11, and I'm about to hit the hay. But when I wake up (it'll still be Tuesday because I'm up late), it's go time. It's Step Five. It's the Sprint Center in Kansas City with darling Emily and darling Sarah.

I CANNOT TELL YOU how excited I am!

It's been a long road, getting here. In May or so, they announced it: they were coming back, and had a fairly limited number of tour dates that would go on sale soon. The closest to us was Chicago, and I half-heartedly attempted to gather the old crew back (I'm so happy you're having a baby, Alena, but next time--time it to come WAY AFTER the New Kids' reunion, huh? We miss you!)..by the time I checked for tickets, a few days after they went on sale, they were gone. (Oh, wait, there were a few deluxe $500 tickets left. Those tickets that let you have a whole room with food service and stuff. But they're way up high! Who wants to be FAR from Joey? Who would WANT that?)

I was sad, but Chicago would have been tough for everyone.

THEN....they added dates.

THEY ADDED DATES!

I was totally determined to get to the St Louis or Kansas City show, but knew my friends may have needed a little convincing.


Now, Sarah and a couple local friends had asked if I wanted a bachelorette party. "Eh," I said. Sitting around in a circle opening lacy underthings and penis pasta from Olde Un and pretending not to be COMPLETELY uncomfortable? Eh.


What I'd really love would just be a girls' night/weekend, where we'd hang out, eat dinner somewhere wonderful, play board games, watch DVDs of Who's The Boss and Hangin' Tough Live in the hotel room....

Wait, what?

Why, I asked myself, should we limit ourselves to a mere video??

So I CHOSE my bachelorette party. "Sarah," I said. (I called her the moment I got the idea.) "I know what my bachelorette party should be!"


"Oh, good!" she replied. (I don't think she knew what she was getting herself into.)


Of course, Sarah being the sweet, sweet, always accommodating friend that she is, was all for it...we roped dear Emily into joining us, decided on Kansas City since it was roughly in between all of us...and I waited one Saturday by the computer for the tickets to go on sale. They were supposed to go on sale at midnight. I was ready at 11:45.


At midnight exactly, I clicked on "3 tickets" at the "Best available" rate, and waited in anticipation.


"System down for maintenance every Saturday at midnight. Please check back later."

WHAT.

"Listen up, Ticketmaster or whatever it was. DO NOT release tickets to the public at MIDNIGHT when your SYSTEM is MAINTAINING at that exact time."


I tried several more times, wondering if they'd do it quickly...but no.


So, after coming to the realization that this may be a long night, I settled onto the couch, with my cell phone set to ring every half hour to wake me up so I could keep checking. And that's what I did.


Shortly after five a.m., I got in. I have no idea how good our tickets are...they seemed okay, according to the seating plan, but I was sleep-deprived and excited and delirious. It may not have surprised me if I later discovered I'd booked us great seats to see Michael Flatley instead.


Since then, several things have happened.

1. I got married

2. "The Block" was released, providing some extra study material for the show, since surely they're not going to release a CD in the middle of their tour and not promote it.

Because of #1, I hadn't had much of a chance to listen to the new CD until mid-October.

It's not bad, but...it's about sex. A lot. And I'm no prude...but...Joey's talking about sex?!! My Joey? This Joey here?

(Oh, this is SOOO my favorite Joey-look. Muffin-top, almost out of control hair [yet carefully controlled at the sides and back], slim-fitting jackets and pants, unnaturally consistent skin tone, and guyliner. His voice also got real cute and froggy at this stage.)

Okay, to be fair, a lot of the sex-talk comes from Donnie. He was always the dirty, sexy one.


I really have to go to bed. But I'll close with tonight's tragedy:

I knew I wanted to take my NKOTB CDs for the car ride with Emily. Hangin' Tough and Step by Step, as well as the new one. I hadn't gotten them out of their alphabetized folders yet, because I knew exactly where they were: in our media cabinet, where they had been since we moved in last September.

Which we had emptied and rearranged to be more user-friendly before the wedding.

I *believe* I packed the CD folders into tubs at some point, but didn't label it, thinking "I'm pretty dumb, so I won't label this. After all, it contains my entire CD collection. Why would I ever need it again?"

I went methodically through every tub I could get to tonight, needing to hear "I Remember When" or "Games" or "Call it What You Want"--the more obscure numbers I had almost forgotten.

No soap.


So I'll stick to "The Block," putting my fingers in my ears whenever Donnie talks about the girl making a grown man ready to blow or anything having to do with cream.


I'll be back Wednesday, with a full report to follow, and maybe even photos that I took!!