Congratulations to Alex Doonesbury.

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Congratulations Alex Doonesbury on your perfect score on the SATs. We figured you had it in you, being a Deaniac and all.

O.K., so she's not real. But, I'm a comic freak and while I rag on people who obsess over celebrities and royals, I actually do understand the phenomena. When you learn about a person, real or not, part of your real life or not, to the point that you get to know who they are and what has happened in their life, you have a natural instinct to care. I have a passing interest in the life of Alex Doonesbury (the high school aged daughter of Mike Doonesbury, the title character), for the same reason that I have an interest in the lives of my inlaws, my wife's friends, and my distant cousins (such as the one's whose home town in Finland I put a push pin in at the Scandinavian bakery this morning). Overall, the instict does more good than harm. At it's worst, it is usually just harmless fun, at its best, it encourages caring and support for people with whom you have even weak relationships. This planet could definitely use a little more love.