The truth is, er, somewhere around here

Before there was Cher, Madonna, or the Artist-known-as-however-you-pronounce-that-squiggly-thing, there was Elvis. No single name in this century has been as universally recognized.

While the "King of Rock & Roll" still inspires reverence among the true believers, the king of pop culture icons is also the subject of irreverent satire, ranging from the paranoid to the tasteless to the just plain weird. Nor tour of online Elvisiana would be complete without considering both the sublime and the ridiculous.

For fans suspicious of the official party line, "Elvis Ain't Dead" has two message boards -- one for theories on how the death hoax was carried out, the other for eyewitness Elvis sightings. One fan, for example, is convinced that Elvis was an extra in "Men in Black." Maybe the aliens brought him back.

On December 21, 1970, Elvis met with then-U.S. President Richard Nixon. That meeting is documented on a page at the National Security Archives, a collection of declassified government documents at George Washington University. According to the site, the official photo of Elvis and Nixon shaking hands is the most-requested document in the collection of the National Archives, beating out the U.S. Constitution and Declaration of Independence.

The Nixon meeting figures prominently in "Elvis Shot JFK!" The satirical grand unification conspiracy theory implicates Nixon and former FBI chief J.Edgar Hoover alongside Presley.

Don't be cruel? Fun at Elvis' expense

Yeah, yeah. But what's the connection between Elvis and Kevin Bacon? Well, Bacon was in "JFK" with Ed Asner, who was in Elvis' "Change of Habit." This and many other shocking revelations can be found at The Oracle of Elvis at Virginia, a King-sized version of the popular Kevin Bacon game.

Americans for Cloning Elvis looks at Dolly, the ewe recently cloned in Scotland, and sees hope for the generation born too late to see Elvis perform. You can add your name to the growing list of signers of the online petition.

Singer Mojo Nixon once said that extraterrestrials would look like Elvis -- Elvisians from Another Planet would no doubt agree. The page, a production of Elvis' San Francisco fan club, says that "We are earthly 'Elvisians' who believe that Elvis Presley fans can be found in outer reaches of the solar system and hope to someday communicate with these extraterrestrials through the music and art of Elvis." Might make for an interesting remake of "Close Encounters of the Third Kind."

Not last but probably least, there's Gimme that dang pill! In this game, which requires the Shockwave plug-in, your job is to flush the pills down the toilet before Elvis can get to them.

Moving from bad to verse, Dan's Elvis poetry page offers the following hope for the Web-wide world: "If all mankind joins Elvis fans,/there will be Elvis peace in all the lands."

Amen. Thankyouverymuch.

Elvis site-ings on the Web