About Klein

Oh boy! I kind of clicked on this page at random wondering where to begin on updating my website and realized that I haven’t updated this in about ten years so here we go…

Hi, I’m Klein the not-so-humble narrator/maintainer of this blog/site. I am 39 years old and the mother of one (who for our purposes here is nicknamed zilla). I’m short only 4’10 and I normally have obnoxiously bright hair which is currently a mix of purple and blue.

In general, I prefer to be the one behind the camera and taking the photos rather than having my photo taken (apparently the secret to my actually wanting to have my photo taken is if I am having my photo taken with a certain tall British actor) so this is likely the only glimpse of me you will see.  My photography has been featured in magazines such as Ningyou & Dolly Wish, newspapers and most puzzingly of all art exhibits and a doll museum.

Things I post about…
Anime- Anime is kind of the nexus point that it all comes back to, so I guess I should start here. Sea Prince and Fire Child was the first anime I remember watching, though I often count Sailor Moon as my first true anime as it was the first one that I actively pushed aside the Americanized dub of and started actively hunting for the original Japanese version of. Remember fan-subbed tapes? I used to save up my allowance to buy them at my local comic book shop. At some point, I started collecting figures of my favorite anime characters as well, I’ve slowed way down on it in recent years but I still enjoy a nendoroid or whatever figure happens to catch my interest purchase every now and again. Nendoroids in particular are kind of my weakness.

Anime favorites include (in no order)- Rozen Maiden, Slayers, Fate/Zero, Fate Apocrypha, Saikano, Mahoromatic, Evangelion, Puella Magi Madoka Magica and Tanya the Evil.

Dolls- It does in fact all go back to anime because without I doubt I would have really gotten into dolls. Back in late 2006, I kind of took a break from anime as I didn’t care for many of the newer shows and found myself just returning to old favorites. I attended Anime Boston in early 2007 hoping to find something to peak my interest again and I did most unexpectedly while waiting in the hall for one of the panels, I got handed me a PSP with the first few episodes of Rozen Maiden loaded up on it. A mad hunt for all things Rozen Maiden ensued and I found these odd dolls with big heads called Pullips that was doing a collaboration with Rozen Maiden at the time. I received Pullip Rozen Maiden Shinku for my birthday and wouldn’t you know it, I liked her so much I ordered myself Pullip Suiseiseki that night. I eventually managed to get all of the Rozen Maiden Pullips and Dals but I didn’t stop there. I also now have a number of Dollfie Dreams, BJDs, Blythes, Azone dolls, several different doll brands I just have one or two from and even playline stuff like Monster High. I easily own over a 1000 dolls.

Other- From time to time I’ll post about things other than anime figures or dolls…

Comics- My interests have kind of flipflopped over time. My comic interest had primarily been Batman related well really interested more in his villains like Joker and Harley Quinn who I loved and adored. I loved the Batman Animated series as a kid, unfortunately my grandmother gave away all my toys from it as a kid because they “weren’t for girls and girls shouldn’t play with Batman toys”. I ended up buying most of the toys I had back as a kid again as an adult, I now have a huge collection of Joker and Harley Quinn stuff (mostly Harley Quinn) as well as some other characters I really like such as Poison Ivy. I kind of fell behind on the DC comics when everything kept getting reset which was around the time I started getting really into the MCU and launching myself in reading all things Marvel comics. I am definitely more Marvel centric than DC centric these days, thanks to the MCU. Loki is my favorite character in the comics/MCU… and oh boy if you thought I had a lot of Harley Quinn and Joker stuff then you haven’t seen my collection of Loki stuff.  Other favorite Marvel characters are Bucky Barnes/Winter Soldier, Mystique, Nebula, Ghost Spider and Magneto.

I grew up watching the Batman Animated Series as a kid, my grandmother unforI’m a keen Batman fan, well not so much Batman as I am the villains Joker and Harley Quinn in particular. Currently I’m working on my goal of reading every Joker and Harley Quinn comic like ever, I think I’ve just about read all the Harley Quinn now unfortunately the Joker is in a great many comics so I’ll be at it for a while still with him. I loved Batman the Animated Series as a kid, so I find myself buying a lot of my old favorite action figures (that my grandmother gave away because I was a girl and girls shouldn’t play with Batman toys ). I’ve got a huge collection of figures of Joker and Harley Quinn but I also collect lesser favorite characters like Poison Ivy, Catwoman and Batman himself to some extent. In general I’m not as keen on Marvel comics but I do love Emma Frost, Black Cat and Mystique.

Video Games– I don’t often really post about video game related stuff just the odd toy every now and again but I do still really love playing video games. Most of the time these days day to day I just play Fortnite and Animal Crossing, but I still love playing the Elder Scroll series, Arkham Series, Disgaea, Dead or Alive, Tekken, Final Fantasy, Halo & Bioshock.
also love playing video games mostly stuff like Skyrim, the Arkham series, DoA, Disgaea, Tekken, Final Fantasy series, Halo & Bioshock. My system of preference at the moment is the Xbox Series X and my Nintendo Switch but we do own a fair few gaming systems. We currently own Playstation I, II, III, IV and 5, PSP, PSP Vita, Nintendo 64, Game Cube, DS, DS Lite, Nintendo Switch(es), XBox, XBox 360, XBox One, Atari, Dreamcast and a Sega Genesis.

What else do you do? For the most part, I like to keep my private life well private.

For a long time due to different to different circumstances I was kind of stuck at home for a long time now that everything is mostly resolved- I’ve kind of hit the ground running have been going out on adventures a bit more. Finally even got to go see a few plays on Broadway which was a lifetime goal for me.

Concerts- I still enjoy going to concerts, usually I ideally like to go to at least a couple of concerts a year but I somehow saw about 20 different bands live in 2023 including Escape the Fate, ZZ Top, Ice Nine Kills, Franz Ferdinand, Blink-182 and Weezer. I’ve seen a fairly wide variety of things live over the years everything from the likes of Frank Sinatra and Jimmy Buffet to System of a Down and Green Day.

Conventions- I never really tried to force anime as an interest on my daughter, as a kid I wasn’t traditionally feminine (I’m still not) and I had a lot of things kind of forced on me that I was supposed to be interested in like ballet which I hated or had my Batman toys given away because I was a girl and therefore wasn’t supposed to have them. I am happy to say over the last few years that my daughter has become very interested in anime and manga all on her own, we have been watching a lot of newer series like the newer Fruits Basket series, My Hero Academia and Demon Slayer. I took her to NYCC 2019 and we have since attended a whole bunch of anime and/or generalized pop culture conventions together. She is currently working on a goal of getting a signed Funko Pop of each different characters from My Hero Academia and Demon Slayer…which both have a whole ton of characters so we might be at this a while. We went to 13 different conventions in 2023 including NYCC, a couple of Galaxycons, Fan Expos, RICC and I even worked at Connecticon.

I’ve also started collecting signed Funko Pops (and Laser Discs to a lesser extent for older things that don’t have pops) that I get signed at the different conventions. Very thankful that one of my first goals while doing this was to get a Batman animated series pop signed by Kevin Conroy and that I was able to meet him before his death as that series was such an intregral part of my childhood.

I also like to read I’m basically obsessed with everything Neil Gaiman, I love the Song of Ice and Fire books (less so the TV show though I love the new series House of the Dragon!). Other than that most of what I read is horror or satire though I do have an peculiar level of interest in British dystopian fiction from the 1960s-1970s. I also really love watching movies, Stardust is my favorite movie but I enjoy a wide variety of films.

Updated 1/7/2024