Encyclical Letter Deus caritas est: "God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him" (1 John 4:16). Pope Benedict XVI has released his first encyclical, Deus Caritas Est (God is Love), an exploration into Christianity's central message that invites all Christians to realize that the church's work of caring and charity is as much a part of its mission as celebrating the sacraments and spreading the Gospels. This is a good thing, yes? When Evan learned this earlier today quite accidentally while doing some research on Tom Cruise, he quickly realized that he could do worse than actually take a few minutes and read what the Pope had written, and stopped his research and staring at his three fish ... named for no particular reason Snap, Crackle and Pop though Evan still frequently thought of Pop by his original name of Scott Peterson as well his nickname of Fat Boy ... long enough to do exactly that. He observed that the encyclical also explored lust but did not address the Katie Holmes scenes missing from the latest screening of Thank You for Smoking. Read encyclical ...

Speaking of Beatle tribute bands ... here's one with an interesting twist ... George Harrison's sister Louise is the manager of the Liverpool Legends and it sounds like this show in a high school auditorium in Taunton MA was fun. Read more ...

Tribute Bands and Impersonators? Who's dreaming who? Why did I wake up this morning thinking about this? It's been a very long time since I saw my last Beatle's tribute band ... somewhere in DC about 8 years ago ... and I'm not really thinking I need to see another anytime soon. For no sane reason I did a quick look-up on web site and news hits related to tribute bands and impersonators. Some numbers:

Performer	News Item Count	Web Hit Count
Elvis	156	453,000
Beatles	47	361,000
Stones	4	233,000
Pink Floyd	19	90,000
Hendrix	6	89,100
Barbara Streisand	3	38,500
Judy Garland	2	26,600
Sammy Davis Jr	1	15,300

And what exactly does any of this mean? Haven't got a clue ... except that apparently any fool can and will, given almost any excuse, be an Elvis impersonator.

What would Nancy Drew? After a year of living Episcopalian, Evan has decided to buy a fish tank and start collecting Nancy Drew. Mina, in the mean time, is immersed in 1001 variations of Mahjong, Sidoku and Grand Theft Auto.