This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Editor's note • Robert Kirby went to England to search for Eric Clapton's used tissues. This is a reprint of an earlier column.

My parents are trying to sell their home in Holladay. To determine the real market value, we need to figure out if Elvis is haunting it. In today's real estate market, a King Creole-shaped watermark on the ceiling could make all the difference.

Even better would be a draft in the attic that sounds like "Heartbreak Hotel." We will take whatever we can get.

Scoff if you will, but a woman in Memphis got large offers on her home because it has a sliding glass door where the image of Elvis sometimes appears when condensation forms. It's the fat Vegas Elvis, too, not the slim "Return to Sender" Elvis.

Thirty-eight years after he died, Elvis is still a hot market item.

Fans all over the world recently celebrated the anniversary of his death with candlelight vigils, rock concerts and volume purchases of black velvet paintings of Elvis and Jesus together.

What is it with our pop stars that makes them so attractive that we still weep decades after their death? What is so magnetic about them that years after they croak, normally responsible adults still gnash their teeth?

Elvis memorabilia still sells (although the same cannot be said for my parents' home).

A hankie with certified Elvis sweat on it recently sold for $2,500. Somebody else got $800 for six strands of his hair. Dirt from the exact spot where Elvis did pushups in the Army goes for $60 a gram.

Meanwhile, a banana peel alleged to have contained a banana actually used by Elvis in fashioning one of his famous "peanut butter and nanner" sandwiches was slated to bring $110, but instead was torn to bits during a brawl.

Today, grown men dress up like Elvis. Deluded women have sex with anyone who can sneer like Elvis. A pair of Teddy Bear underpants (unwashed) that Elvis wore for nine straight days was recently swapped for an open-heart surgery.

If people aren't trying to prove Elvis is going "boo" in their home, they are taking out second mortgages to travel to Graceland and see where the King of Rock 'n' Roll actually lived.

Others try to throw themselves on Elvis' grave just for the honor of getting maced by Graceland security guards.

"This here's a picture of Lulabelle's actual fat lip that she got from an actual guard at the actual grave of Elvis. Them are tears of actual joy, not pain."

In terms of Elvis' contributions to the betterment of the world, it's not like somebody we actually needed died.

Did Elvis cure a disease, save the whales or solve world hunger?

NOTE TO ELVIS FANS: This was a rhetorical question. Had it been a real question, the answer would still be no. Sue me.

We got Marilyn Monroe impersonators, but nobody dresses up like Madam Curie. People impersonate John Wayne, but nobody (outside of a mental hospital) impersonates Philo T. Farnsworth. Nobody dresses up as Jonas Salk.

Maybe it's because the world's truly important people have zero charisma.

Or maybe it's because the rest of us are idiots.

The idiot option explains why sightings of Elvis continue today. If the King isn't being spotted in a Miami car wash, he's turning up flipping burgers in Oregon.

That's just the "real" Elvis. Ghostly images of him are routinely found in parquet floors, gum wads and rust spots.

This year I gave in to an impulse and handed over some money for a bit of Elvisness.

I bought a button that says, "Elvis is dead. Give it up."

Robert Kirby can be reached at rkirby@sltrib.com or facebook.com/stillnotpatbagley.