Johnny Depp is stalking me!

Ok, so that's in my wildest dreams, but he'll soon be somewhere I just was....According to www.johnnydeppreads.com, JD may be attending a benefit with his former band, The Kids, on Aug. 29 &30th. That's not the weird part; the concert is in Pompano Beach, Florida, where I vacationed to exactly one month prior to this concert.

Yeah, so I'm really reaching here, but how bizarre is that? I drove past Club Cinema several times during my week's stay. If I had known this ahead of time, I could've taken a picture outside and with my Photoshop skills, included JD in the pic. How funny would that have been?
This month also has not been Depp-free for me. Last week, my sisters and I toured Little Bohemia in Manitowish Waters, and met some awesome people who shared their "Johnny" stories with us. 'Artsy', my non-deppaholic sis, really opened up to the idea of even meeting him some day (which, by the way, surprised the hell outta me!). Others shared how warm, kind and truly genuine JD is and JD expressed how much he loved the Northwoods.....See, we have that in common now too! hahaha(View of Little Star Lake from Little Bo)

After leaving Little Bohemia, we stopped at a local antique store which was down the road. Little did we know but it was run by Ruth Gardner, niece to Emil and Nan Wanatka, the former owners of Little Bohemia during the FBI shootout in April of 1934. Nan was the one who slipped the note into a pack of cigarettes that alerted and summoned the FBI.

Ruth is quite a character, telling us stories of her family and her knowledge of that wild time period of gangsters, moonshine runs to Racine, and other nuggets of info. She did this of course, while she fed raw hamburger meat to her 12 year old wolf-mixed dog. Yep, quite the character she was. She also showed us several pieces of furniture and pictures that will be used in Public Enemies. Universal execs came to her shop to use vintage artifacts at Little Bo. One of those pics is this dog below.Anyhow, there was so much that occurred that weekend in the Northwoods that kept the Public Enemies theme alive for me but it's too hard to put into words and if I did, this blog would be uber-lengthy!

Is it freakish that I was in the same place/places as was/will be Mr. Depp? Yeah, if you want to believe in coincidences...But I have always believed that things happen for a reason. So, Johnny, if you're stalking me now, I've left Pompano Beach and am back to the old grind of work and more work. However, if you do catch up with me, I'll have a bottle of chilled wine waiting....

Public Enemies: White vans, Black SUVs and Johnny Depp

Ok, so it's been a month, but the Depp Effect continues. I recently have been in touch with the woman whose daughter had her hair twirled in the video I posted on YouTube. She sent me more pics and this one is the best! When I got it in my email, I just sat and stared...then I was critical! Look at my hands! How can someone give a decent hug with TWO cameras in her hands??? If you know me in real life, you will know that I am never without a camera, or two, or three...I teach digital photography and movie making...what do you expect??? But still, my hands were full...I would've never been able to hug appropriately...or use my hands in a better manner...

Anyhow, when I saw this pic, I hadn't realized that he had rested his hand on my shoulder...Why does the Depp Effect take that away from us? I don't remember this...I was obviously too busy talking!

As I said earlier, not only has the Depp Effect continued, but so has the Public Enemies effect. Two days ago I was driving my son to summer school and there was a van in front of us, a WHITE VAN!
Now mind you, there were windows in the back which would NOT be an ideal Extras van, but my mind wandered and I replayed some fun base camp experiences in my head (while getting out my cell phone to take this pic...) Then ironically, around the next bend, lo and behold, what did I see?

Needless to say, I had a pretty solid chuckle, and the kid asks "What's so funny?" What do I say? I saw two white vans? HILARIOUS, I know... I made up some little white lie and went back to my imaginings...

So the question here today has to do with the withdrawals of Public Enemies...are you going through some of the same hallucinations? When you see a black SUV, do you look for the half rolled down window with the hand extended? Do you see yellow police tape, and in no way relate it to a horrendous crime, but a neatly blocked off area with barricades?

My advice...(whether it is asked for or not!) Keep up the hallucinations, the chuckles at white vans, the tape and barricades, because you never know when that hand extended out the window is Johnny Depp's!

Public Enemies

I found this pic on one of the Johnny Depp sites that I peruse through and thought it was awesome! I think it's someone's avatar for Johnny Depp Reads. I don't mean to steal, and will give credit when I find out...

Anyhow, I really miss the PE hunt. There are several of the readers on PEC who have gone to Chicago/Statesville prison shoots and saw nothing, but then I got an email from Becky. She said she got home at 4:30 am this morning after having met JD. How psyched she was...I miss that adrenaline!

I'm not a stalker...I'm not a "fangirl". I am really very intrigued with the whole process and that places we all know and are familiar with are a part of an $80 million movie by Michael Mann! Of course, getting to meet Johnny is by far a wonderful benefit.

I tried to explain this to one of my "non-PE" sisters yesterday. I'll refer to her as 'Artsy'. She couldn't understand my obsession with PE and why someone would want to meet JD more than once. My partner in crime sister, Stargazer, is the one who got me into all of this, and we have become fodder for laughter and ridicule by our family regarding our pursuits. In fact, my own mother said that I wasn't like "normal people" the other night at dinner...(Since then she has retracted her statement and feels terribly guilty...We are Catholic, you know...)

Anyhow, I digress...I showed Artsy the video of meeting JD in Milwaukee, on the unplanned m&g night and she realized how truly invested JD is in his fans. (watch it below!) She actually sat through the whole five minutes and viewed some of the pics! I, in no way, converted her, but I think she has a better understanding of why we do what we do.

I bring up this point because having talked to so many of these fans at the m&g's, I have heard that over and over again "People think I'm weird", "They don't understand why I invest so much time", blah blah blah. I don't think we need to explain ourselves to others...

This is some of my fun, my enjoyment. I don't drink or party it up at bars, I spend most of my time caring for my son and doing things for him. This is fun for me! Do I need to explain???

I will never regret the times spent in the rain, the cold, in the car traveling, etc. It has been awesome to see beautiful places like Oshkosh, Columbus, Beaver Dam, Madison, and Milwaukee transformed back into the 1930's...I have met awesome people and have started to network with people of similar interests from all over the world! (Pic of cars in Oshkosh)

And I have had some great laughs...Here's some of the funny things that occurred last week in Milwaukee.


These two young men, at around 2:30 am, bar time in Milwaukee, snuck into the PE shoot! They were sooooo unbelievably drunk and snuck up to the 9th floor where the filming occurred. They made it past three groups of security and rode up on the elevator with crew members! (How no one noticed is beyond me, because while taking this pic, I almost fell over from the fumes!) Finally, someone figured it out and Jerry brought them back down. Jerry even had a smile on his face, which surprised me!

However the police were called and you can see how humble these guys were when surrounded by the authorities!
There was one other incident that night of a drunken girl claiming she needed to go get her friend's dog and walk it. Her friend supposedly lived on the 13th floor...Ok, but there wasn't one. Drunken people don't make the best decisions!
But it sure was fun to watch!


So for those of you who are chastised by friends or family regarding your interest in PE or JD or CB or whomever, CARRY ON! We sure need plenty of energy to get us through the next year when Public Enemies is finally released!

Sorry for the long post today, but I've been M.I.A. lately...hope you made it through!

Here's the video of the meet and greet in Milwaukee. http://tinyurl.com/43vaza
Note about 2 min. in that a guy runs by and yells, "Holy shit"! I guess he didn't bank on seeing JD on his morning run. Also note how quiet and calm the crowd was. JD was so intent on giving each of us a bit of his time. He only did one autograph, and that was the little girl. At the end, he gets a pic with her and he's playing with her hair... Jerry was intent on only ONE AUTOGRAPH! Please forgive the poor video quality. I was wrangling both cameras! Enjoy!