Hello, everybody. The biggest entertainment story of this week was not the release of the highly-anticipated "Sex and the City" movie or the denial of Angelina Jolie giving birth to twins in France, but of this man.

For the last 72 hours, the attention of Alaska was focused on Sir Elton John, who played this state as only he could with sold-out shows in Anchorage on Wednesday and Friday and here in Fairbanks on Thursday. And even though I failed in trying to get a ticket to the Fairbanks concert (I already told you about that last time), I'm pretty sure the crowds at both the Carlson Center here and the Sullivan Arena in Anchorage weren't sorely disappointed.

As far as the Fairbanks show went? Well, from what I've learned, parking at the Carlson Center was so full it stretched to as far as Pioneer Park right next door. Also, Elton drew the largest attendance in the venue's 18-year history (it opened in 1990; but was new to me when I returned in '92) largely thanks to an additional 100 or so floor seats being up for grabs on Tuesday, giving us one more chance for tickets. One local TV station did cover the concert...only to have their tapes confiscated by security! But as expected, somebody did manage to get "Rocket Man" and a portion of"Benny & The Jets" and put it on good ol' YouTube; most of the other stuff were from the first Anchorage show.

(UPDATE (6/4): It appears that all the videos from Elton's Anchorage and Fairbanks shows were removed from YouTube)

Like I said, even though I missed out on all this, I'm sure the rest of Fairbanks had the time of their lives on Thursday night. We had the brief meeting of Pope John Paul II and President Reagan in 1984, the 2003 Iditarod restart, and John Leguizamo at the Ice Park in 2006...but Elton John setting foot here on May 29, 2008 is yet another chapter written in the Fairbanks history books. And to quote a line from "Rocket Man"...the wait for a mega-star act in the Golden Heart City was indeed a long, long time. So long and stay strong!