Hello, everybody. There has been so much happening this week, and you know where we start with: the Chilean miners' rescue.

The attention of the entire world was focused on that one country and the San Jose Mine in Copiapo as a billion television viewers held their breath watching, in 15- to 30-minute intervals, all 33 miners seeing the light for the first time after 69 days in the dark. It began shortly after 7:00 pm Alaska Time with Florencio Avalos being the first one out, and ended 22 hours later with Manuel Gonzalez.

Not since Baby Jessica (which I'll get to in a bit) has there ever been worldwide jubilation over all the miners coming out alive and well, though one of them, Yonni Barrios, claims to have had a mistress. But nonetheless, they're already instant celebrities, and from magazines to "60 Minutes" to Oprah Winfrey, everybody wants a piece of all this so we can learn more about the ordeal in their own words.

Now I tweeted that the rescue is reminiscent of Jessica McClure's in 1987, when she was trapped inside an abandoned well in Midland, Texas and we were on pins and needles right in front of our TVs hoping and praying they would get her out alive. Now Jessica Morales, she's married with a kid and they still live in Midland.

However, the same thing couldn't be said for Kathy Fiscus 38 years prior to that. Fiscus fell down a 14-inch-wide well outside of Los Angeles and reporter Stan Chambers covered every moment of the ordeal round-the-clock for KTLA. Sadly, Fiscus died before rescuers would reach her, and grief was spread not throughout Southern California, but around the country as well.

Chambers recently retired from KTLA after spending almost a lifetime there, but his non-stop reporting of the Fiscus tragedy was the watershed event for the fledgling medium even though radio was still king in the late '40s.

A lot of lessons have learned from Kathy Fiscus, Baby Jessica, and now the Chilean miners over the course of the last 60 years.

Well, it didn't take long to shift subjects from that to another war of words on "The View" as Whoopi Goldberg and Joy Behar briefly stormed off the show over guest Bill O'Reilly's take about a mosque being placed near Ground Zero. Now CBS's "View" clone "The Talk", premieres on Monday, and here's hoping we won't be seeing any walk-offs right at the start.

It was a week of two unexpected celebrity breakups: First, Courteney Cox and David Arquette followed by Christina Aguilera and Jordan Bratman with Aguilera filing divorce papers just a short while later.

For Aguilera, she knew how to handle it very quickly, as she and son Max were out and about at a pumpkin patch with Christina later in Hawaii. But what led to the couple being no more?

Poor sales for her recent album "Bionic" plus the cancellation of her summer tour are likely to blame, but remember: she did shoot "Burlesque" with Cher which comes out next month, and like I said in the "2009 Year in Review", this could be Christina's chance to come back on top this time without Jordan's help.

And last but not least: When I moved back to Fairbanks for the second time in 1985 after 1 1/2 years in Phoenix, we felt it had it all: an Arby's, a Baskin-Robbins, a Nordstrom's, JCPenney, two Burger Kings, a Sizzler, even a Dairy Queen. Well, flash forward to 2010...we have none of these anymore!

Okay, we still have Burger Kings in Fort Wainwright and Eielson, but they're off limits to us civilians. The remaining Fairbanks BK closed down in 2007 and if you still want a Whopper, the nearest one is in Wasilla -- 350 miles down the Parks Highway! And except for Sizzler (which left Fairbanks by the time I returned in '92), the same can be said for all the other eateries an additional 50 miles in -- you guessed it -- my hometown, ANCHORAGE!!!!

Recently, Carl's Jr. opened up their second Fairbanks location on my side of town across the street from Taco Bell, but let's face it: Burger King and Arby's are still missed here. Of those two, Burger King may come crawling back here sometime soon; my best bet is between 2011 and 2012.

As for breakfast? Even though IHOP is also eight hours away in Anchorage, our best bets here are Sam's Sourdough Cafe and The Cookie Jar. Applebees? I ate there for lunch while in Mississippi a decade ago, but if I want to do it again, there's two of them in Anchorage for my disposal. And the next time I want to go on another DVD shopping spree at Best Buy...ah, you know.

With all of us already spending our PFD money to go along with whatever else we have in our bank accounts, Anchorage has always been the one place to blow it on. Like I said on this blog before, we're doing most of our upscale shopping there even if we have two Fred Meyers and a Walmart. But don't worry, folks: Fairbanks is hosting their second Alaska Federation of Natives convention next week, and for businesses large and small, this is their moment to shine. But if they want to "Have It Their Way"...forget it! So long and stay strong.