Kelly Clarkson

My workmate only wants one thing in life. Well, one person. He wants Kelly Clarkson, first-year winner of the screamingly popular American Idol. He wrote me an email the other night extolling—as always—Kelly Clarkson’s virtues and begging that I figure out a way to satisfy this one wish.

Granted, the girl has got gifts. Consider such songs as those my pal plays incessantly, songs such as “Since U Been Gone” and “Before Your Love/A Moment Like This” (both of which have some mildly decent metaphors). She sings them with a moderately skilled range, appeals to a great number of listeners (and viewers) in a semi-sexy semi-cutesy fashion, and has a clarity and familiarity of song lyrics that even this old lady can appreciate at some level.

But my young friend is serious about having Kelly Clarkson as a friend. He just wants to hang out with her, drink coffee, go on hikes…and you know, I can see them as hitting it off quite well in this respect. Kelly seems active, engaged, dynamic, willing to go on those mountain treks one day or futz about in the orchid garden another.

But I can’t be cliché and give him Kelly Clarkson CDs; and besides, he belongs to one of those MP3 download clubs. I could do the next obvious thing and give him a Kelly Clarkson poster, or better, a life-sized Kelly Clarkson stand-up cardboard cutout. Or a Kelly Clarkson mug or potholder or keychain.

And I have heard about the stars who are accessible for such odd requests—along the lines of the baseball star who promises to hit a homer for the kid in the hospital—as making a quick video greeting or phone message, but my friend doesn’t have any debilitating illness or disturbing brain damage, really, so Kelly might likely ignore my letters and requests.

And a one-time private concert won’t do, for my spoiled friend says, no, he wants her singing here every day, delighting in her laughs, sharing her soul.

I understand his obsession (which is, don’t worry, quite tongue-in-cheek innocuous); I have obsessions of my own, but my friend’s rejection of the gardening tools, Anne Rice books, and pounds of chocolate as inferior gifts, along with his adamancy about getting Kelly Clarkson here in all their stead is driving me bonkers!

Britney Jean Spears (b. December 2, 1981, McComb, Mississippi) is an American pop music singer, songwriter, and dancer. She currently resides in Beverly Hills, California.

She is best known for her studio albums, music videos, and songs such as "...Baby One More Time", "Oops!...I Did It Again", "I'm a Slave 4 U" and "Toxic", for which she won a Grammy Award.In the early 2000s, Spears' success as a singer led her way to high-profile advertising deals and endorsements, as well as forays into other forms of media, including film and reality television. Her third and fourth albums, Britney and In the Zone, were released during this era. In 2004, she married back-up dancer and aspiring rap artist Kevin Federline, and the following year she gave birth to their first son, Sean Preston. Their second son, Jayden James, was born in 2006. Spears filed for divorce from Federline on November 7, 2006 citing irreconcilable differences. The divorce was finalized on July 30, 2007.

Spears has sold over seventy-six million albums worldwide according to Time magazine The RIAA ranks her as the eighth best-selling female artist in American music history, having sold thirty-one million albums in the U.S.