What a year it has been. It was almost a year ago in January that Deansplanet posted a request for article writers. Even though my writing skills were not the best, my grammar blew, and my spelling? fogettaboutit, and getting pretty bored with the whole message board thing, I decided to give it a whirl. I don't think anyone imagined at the time, I know I didn't, that what started in February with me interviewing Christie Wood, a hot chick who made out with Beetlejuice in exchange for a plug, would end with me interviewing a legend from my youth, a God among mere men, Grandpa Al Lewis.

What is even more unbelievable to me is that the guy is still alive. When he made us all laugh on the Munsters he was old as the hills THEN. Anyone who has visited my tribute to Howard will notice that "legitimate" celebrities are far and few between. Grandpa was one of the few who had crossover appeal for me. Great TV career and all but his many appearances on the Howard Stern show and inparticular his memorable shrine-worthy appearance at the FCC rally was why I tapped Grandpa for induction. As you can imagine Grandpa and the Munster gang are very popular in the autograph world. To handle all of the requests Grandpa is assisted by autograph brokers, if you will, his friends Pierce and Shelly at www.pscelebrities.com. Visiting their site I read that signed memorabilia was a mere $15. I got that kind of cash. But what should I ask him to sign. This was very early in the construction of the shrine and I was working on the top of the main display case at the time. I had purchased a book at a discount book store, The Completely Unauthorized Howard Stern. This book had some excellent color photos of Howard and I planned to cut out and use several of them for the display top. Lo and behold there was a great photo of Howard in his prison garb standing with Grandpa at the rally. FANTASTIC!! I mailed it to Shelly and waited and waited and waited. After a few weeks I e-mailed to see if everything was going as planned. The volume of requests is so great for Grandpa's signature that they send them to him quarterly and I had just missed the last shipment. Once Grandpa was sent my picture, my wait was not long and I was hanging one of my favorite autographs in the shrine. I recently contacted Shelly to see if Grandpa would be interested in doing an interview. She e-mailed me back and asked me to send her some questions and she would get them to Mr. Lewis. Her shipment when out to Grandpa on Dec. 6th, the answers sent back to her and later arrived in my mailbox Dec. 26th. What a great Christmas gift. Thank you Shelly and Grandpa.

Knowing that I would not be able to ask any follow-up questions with this "interview" I typed a shitload of questions and suggested for them to pick out the best 10-15 or so that looked good to them. Well, it didn't quite go that way. Grandpa answered all 45. HAHAHAHA!! No one is sure who wrote the answers, whether it was Grandpa or his wife or someone else but the answers are clearly those of Grandpa. Short and sweet and sassy. At 92 and counting, Grandpa Al Lewis, still tough as nails, still very opinionated, still very young at heart, still banging the old lady, and still the coolest vampire in the world. Would I have gotten more out of Grandpa if I would have put double spaces between the questions? Maybe, but what we got is good enough for me. Hope you agree.

If you would like to add Grandpa's autograph to your collection please visit Pierce and Shelly at www.pscelebrities.com while supplies last.

Where do we go from here? 2002 will be a tough act to follow. This may be my last interview for all I know. To be honest, if it is I can die a very happy man. Special thanks to everyone who contributed to the shrine this year and to those who did interviews with me. A very special thanks, of course, to Dean. He is DA MAN !!

For 2003, if you have contact with anyone who is already in the shrine but has not been interviewed yet and may want to or maybe someone who you feel is shrine-worthy but not yet included please e-mail me or have them e-mail me.
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Thanks to everyone for all of the nice e-mails and support in 2002. We will also be accepting shrine donation in 2003. If you would like to display your own collection of Stern memorabilia on the Shrine site or even include the items in the actual shrine itself just let me know. Until ???, peace out my niggas, Doc