Ice Dreams: Bad Romance in Bensen-Where-the-Hell-Is-THAT-ville, Illinois!

(talk about your ice dreams... :)

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Petition update:

We are at 9,100+ signatures in just one week!

Our goal is to reach 10,000 ASAP!

Please sign right now if you haven't already!

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From Johnny Weir's Twitter feed (yes! You can follow him on Twitter! You can even get his tweets sent as texts to your cell, so when you hear that special "incoming-text" ring tone, you can pretend for one sparkly second that Johnny's really texting you personally!):

I'm so excited to be performing for @cutiescitrus Ice Dreams on April 1 in IL. Come see my Bad Romance! www.icedreams2010.com! 6:41 p.m. March 12

Excited to work my version of "Bad Romance" tomorrow. Think gold lamé, chains and buckles... Love to all! 10:28 p.m. March 14

Off to the rink. It's never to early to get your Gaga on. About 8 hours ago

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Yay! Johnny will be on the ice again April 1--just a few short weeks away!--with (*fingers crossed*) a hot new costume and routine set to Lady Gaga's Bad Romance.

He'll be the star performer at Cutie's Ice Dreams, hosted by the truly lovely 1976 Olympic gold medalist Dorothy Hamill, at the Edge Ice Arena, 735 East Jefferson, Bensenville, Illinois (map here, because I keep getting Bensenville mixed up with Belleville, and then from there I start thinking, "Oh wait--maybe it's Belvidere?" and then, "No, Ben-something--Benton? Benson? No, no, I know it's something-ville ... Wait, Naperville?" And then a giant mongoose appears and bites my head off.)

Anyway, since Sort-of-Southwest-of-O'Hare-ville is a scant
three-hour drive for me, I wanted to buy tickets--general admission, $25-- for myself and my two kids. But I have never actually been to a figure-skating event. Which now leaves me wondering what the hell I've been DOING with my life up to this point.

So I called both the arena itself and Johnny's agentress Tara Modlin's office last Tuesday, March 9, to confirm that Johnny would indeed be performing at Ice Dreams April 1, and to find out about the general admission thing. I believe I spoke to Tara's assistant, a very nice young man who I think had no idea what was about to hit him oh, say, one week and 9,000 signatures later...

At that time, I asked if the event was sold out because hello? JOHNNY WEIR?

And the very nice young man LAUGHED and said no, they still had tickets.

Then, in my next call, when I asked the Edge's receptionist how early we should come to the arena to be guaranteed a seat (remembering general-admission-rock-concert-stampedes of my youth), there was an awkward pause.

And then she soothed, "Oh, I don't think we have to worry about that. Maybe about an hour early, tops?"

And then I realized:

(1) Not a lot of sold-out figure-skating shows in recent years, apparently. Thank you, Smucker's Satyrs on Ice, for screwing that up for everybody. And:

(2) Ice arenas may somewhat cater to--how shall we say this?--an income bracket QUITE a bit higher than my own. As we spoke, I was idly looking at the arena's web site, and I saw that two hours of daily practice time for your child costs $275 per week. (Though the Edge does offer drop-in public skate time at a very reasonable rate of about $8, for which I commend them.)

So suddenly it dawned on me that ice arenas--or at least the one in Almost-Addison-Where-There's-a-Really-Great-Italian-Bakery-ville may be used to a rather more sedate, moneyed audience that strolls in, takes their seats quietly, and enjoys the show with polite enthusiasm.

Which in no way describes how I or any of the 33,440 Facebook fans I have met thus far will be acting when we see Johnny.

God help those nice Edge people on April 1.

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Breaking news update! I had another enjoyable conversation with Tara's assistant (and I really MUST get his name, because he has been so kind to me and very patient with all my questions and has never once used the words "stalker" or "restraining order" in our conversations) at Fireworks yesterday. He says that $125 VIP tickets will be available shortly that will get you into a two-hour fan meet-and-greet (also known as Heaven. Or Nirvana. Or Paradise, although I'm guessing without the 72 virgins) with Johnny after the show!

If, like me, you've already purchased a $25 ticket, you can pay the extra $100 to upgrade to the VIP ticket. They will be posting this info on Johnny's Facebook page and on the Cuties Ice Dreams Facebook page soon--it's already on the updated Ice Dreams page--but the very kind man said it was OK for me to go ahead and share these details now if I would please stop calling this number.

(Even if you can't make it to Ice Dreams, you can participate in a special thank-you from the fans to Johnny. More details here!)

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Special thanks to http://johnnyweir.ning.com/ for the fabulous photos!
copyright 2010 / Binky and the Misfit Mimes / Lynn V. Ingogly / all rights reserved