Michael Jackson owes $24.5m on Neverland. Photograph: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images
Finally, a reason to care about the sub-prime crisis, as one of America's finest residential fairgrounds teeters on the brink of repossession. Sorry, kids: it seems Neverland was bought on the never-never.
We speak, of course, of the sprawling California ranch that was constructed to the exact specifications of Michael Jackson's dreams, but which ultimately became a repository of nightmares as the singer faced repeated molestation allegations from children, all of whom were boys, all of a similar age. He was found not guilty.
Indeed, which of us can forget the euphoria, the fresh hope - the sense of justice served - attending that June 2005 day, as 10 "not guilty" verdicts were read out, and some number one fan attempted to get herself taken into care by releasing 10 white doves into the skies above the Santa Barbara courthouse.
How quickly new hope turns to despair.
Today the carousel creaks in the breeze, the zoo has long been cleared, the flowerbeds of childnip have withered and perished, and the giant clock has stopped, its hands frozen at some secret hour - perhaps that at which the master of the house decided to move to Bahrain with his three perma-veiled, Caucasian children.
And now, on March 19, that same Santa Barbara courthouse might auction the property off, unless Michael comes up with some of the $24.5m he owes on Neverland, which is - let's not forget - so much more than a house.
In fact, the auction notice stipulates that the lot will include "all elevators, all railroad tracks, railroad equipment, trains,
locomotives, rail cars and other rolling stock; all ferris wheels, carousels, merry-go-round type devices". Mmm ... No one really gave a toss what he was doing up there, did they?
However, contrary to reports suggesting the sale is an inevitability, a source close to Jackson has insisted that Neverland will never fall. Foiled again, Captain Hook! Once again, you fail to nemesise Peter.
"Michael Jackson's ranch is not going to be auctioned off at the courthouse," this insider tells CNN. "The financing is all being worked out. There are plenty of lenders willing to work with him."
There are? Jesus, America! You're not going to be satisfied till Alistair Darling has had to nationalise Coutts, are you? Stop lending bad creditors money. You are directly affecting Lost in Showbiz's ability to never think about the future.
And were that gnawing uncertainty not enough, no one is clear on the precise legal status of the erstwhile denizens of the Neverland zoo - a whole menagerie of animals who were only temporarily taken into care two years ago after they were found to have been left almost without food.
Are these reconditioned creatures technically goods and chattels and part of the estate? Should the ranch indeed be sold, would they be become the automatic property of the owner?
Lost in Showbiz has a vision of Bubbles the chimp and all the others being returned to Neverland under cover of darkness, and waking with an ancient, haunting sense of deja vu. Kind of like at the start of Brideshead when the dawn light comes up and Jeremy Irons realises where his wartime regiment has been billeted. "The house is up there, round the corner," his junior officer babbles. "Great barrack of a place. Very ornate, I'd call it ... all rocks and sort of carved animals. You never saw such a thing."
"Yes, Hooper, I did," comes the weary reply. "I've been here before ... "
Bubbles in the Irons role, obviously. Only the chimp has the requisite gravitas.
