April 21: Purple rain hits hard as we lose Prince April 21 — The purple rain fell a little heavier on this day in 2016 when we learned we’d lost Prince. Prince Rogers Nelson died of an overdose of fentanyl, the result of treatment for injuries and wear and tear…

April 18 — Birthday wishes for a couple of greats … Conan O’Brien (1963) is 58 today, having turned a comedic writing career into sketch comedy and late-night hosting since 1993. He went from being president of the Harvard Lampoon to host of “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” (1993–2009). There…

April 17 — OTD in GenX history, a beautiful spy and a Cincinnati Bengal who was really good at football … Jennifer Garner (1972), 49, got our attention long before she started asking what was in our wallets. She was a spy in “Alias” (2001–06), a superhero in “Daredevil” (2003)…

April 15 — Cake, candles, and some whiskey to wash it down … Chris Stapleton (1978) turns 43 today. A hidden gem in country music until just a few years ago, Stapleton was a prolific songwriter until he finally started recording on his own in 2015. He’s written or co-written…

April 14 — Cake and candles for the Brat Pack and a Buffy … Anthony Michael Hall (1968) turns 53 today. We first saw him as the original Rusty in “National Lampoon’s Vacation” (1983), but he hit it big as the Brat Pack came together in “Sixteen Candles” (1984), “The…

April 13 — Raise a Crystal Pepsi for Ricky Schroder’s birthday … Ricky Schroder (1970) … er, sorry, RICK Schroder … turns 51. We all knew him as Ricky during his run on “Silver Spoons” (1982–86), but he went and got all big on us. That included a run on…

April 12 — Big day in the news as GenX’ers grew up … The United States launched the first space shuttle, Columbia, in 1981. Billed as STS-1 (Space Transportation System 1), carrying a crew of two as it orbited Earth 36 times in 54.5 hours before returning safely to Edward…

April 11 — Cake and candles for a clone … Tricia Helfer (1974) is 47, №6, and no. 1 in our hearts, all wrapped up in one geeky cybernetic package. …

April 9 — Birthday wishes for Joe Scarborough (1963) and Paulina Porizkova (1965). Scarborough is not, in fact, the lookalike older brother of Matthew Perry from “Friends.” He’s a former Republican Congressman from Florida and has hosted a news opinion show on MSNBC since 2003. Porizkova, now 56, first turned heads as the first woman from central Europe to grace the cover of SI’s swimsuit issue, and the first since Christie Brinkley to do so back-to-back (1984–85). She met Ric Ocasek on the set of the video for The Cars’ “Drive” in 1984, married him in 1989, and stayed with him until his death in 2019.