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The mystery of his life still eludes us; the shadows move but the dark is never quite dispersed.

-- King Tut archaeologist Howard Carter

Tut. We're at the Tut thing. Downtown Fort Lauderdale. Yeah � No. Tut. King Tut. The mummy. I don't know. I guess it's an art museum. The building with the stairs out front. Right across from the fountain. No, we'll eat after. Meet us here. Everybody's here."

Yes, that cell phone conservation was recently overheard outside the Museum of Art in Fort Lauderdale, where, since Dec. 15, thousands of people have come to take a gander at the treasures on display in Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs. It seems everyone has either already seen the show or is planning to see it before it closes April 23. Buses carrying schoolkids, senior citizens, even country music fans have pulled up outside the museum with one goal in mind: "to travel back in time to 1330 B.C." Downtown Fort Lauderdale has been turned into a virtual Tutville. The boy king's life was short, but the lines to see his goods are long.

These Tutters mean well. They really do. It's just that the 90-second film museumgoers see before entering the exhibit must not be schooling them quite enough. The audio headset tour can't seem to keep up with their questions and observations, which may very well be more priceless than the artifacts themselves.

So we decided to forgo the audio tour and just listen to them -- via some old-fashioned eavesdropping -- and report back with our findings. Think of this article as a public service, because if you do go to the show and elect to wear the headset, you'll miss some great stuff escaping from the mouths of your fellow Tutters.

Overheard remarks such as "That necklace looks like something I saw on QVC" and "Didn't Geraldo find him?" are enough to unravel any mummy. But there are plenty more where those came from.

Reactions to the treasures

Entranceway approaching Temple of Amun
"This is where Britney Spears got her ideas for her outfits."

Cosmetic container in the form of a duck
"So, makeup goes way back."

Statuette of a leonine goddess
"It looks like something I saw on eBay."
"That's a bear."

Staff depicting a Nubian captive
Sidney: "Look at how long that cane is. He had to be over 6 feet tall."
Cheryl: "But they said he was a tiny man."
Sidney: "Not if he used that cane he wasn't."
Cheryl [to her friend]: "Pat, Sidney says he had to be over 6 feet tall to use that cane."
Ben: "That's not a cane. It's a staff. It's used as a sign of power, not to � "
Cheryl: "But Sidney says � "
Ben: "Well, Sidney's an idiot."

Bust of a cow goddess
"Their god was a cow?"

Colossal statue of Amenhotep IV
"That'd make a great waterfall at our complex."

Gilded funerary mask of Tjuya
"They should melt it down for teeth."

Ceremonial dagger
"I'd like to take that knife fishing with me and git-r-done."

Wall inscription reading, "He was the son of Amenhotep III and Queen Tiye and probably the father of Tutankhamun"
" 'Probably.' Everything's 'probably this' and 'probably that.' I'm sick of that. Are they just making it up as they go? Probably. I probably should have stayed home."

Part of a balustrade depicting Akhenaten and his family under the sun god
"Is that a basketball?"

Photos depicting how items in Tut's tomb were found
"It looks just like my garage."
"I'd hate to be stuck for all eternity with everything in my apartment."

Face from a composite statue of Nefertiti
"She looks like one of the Coneheads from Saturday Night Live."

From their mouths to the sun god's ears
In the ticket line
"Twenty-five dollars! I thought you said it was $8. Forget it; I'm not going to have any money left for Quiznos."

In the souvenir shop
"Chocolate Tut!"

Best searching-for-a-place-to-sit-down quote
"I'm going into the next period to see if there's a bench."

The past meets the present
A grade-school chaperone: "The valley of the kings was used from approximately 1550 B.C. to 1070 and contains some 80 tombs. If you have to go to the bathroom, go now!"

Requisite religious comment
"This guy was here before Jesus? [Then] who cares?"

What's the big deal?
"He wasn't famous for anything, right? I mean, he didn't do anything special. He was just a 13-year-old who died, and they found his bones, right?"

Revelation upon spotting photo of mustachioed excavator entering Tut's tomb
"See the guy in the picture? It is Geraldo. I told you."

Best exchange beside video projection of Tut's mummy onto slab
"He has such skinny ankles."
"That's just bone, you moron."

Simply astounding quotes
"Boy, they really did a nice job re-creating all this stuff."
"This is pretty, whatever it is."
"These are real?"

Keeping up with the Tutankhamuns
"I don't give a fuck what King Tut had. He still didn't have more jewelry than me."

Most romantic remark in front of a statue of the serpent goddess
"The serpent goddess wants to give you a hug."

Best bragging by a dentist
"I was talking to one of the staffers of the museum earlier, and she asked a group of us if we knew how they could tell the sex of mummies without unwrapping them. And I immediately said, 'MRI.' And she said, 'How did you know that? Are you a nurse?' I said, 'No, I'm a dentist.' "

Best find in photo of King Tut's possessions by an amateur
"Those are 1950 soda-jerk stools. Where do you think they got the idea?"

Grande dame moment
A blowup photo of the ancient stairs that led into the Valley of the Kings hangs next to the stairs that go down to the exhibit's re-creation of Tut's tomb. An elderly woman holding a huge handbag and wearing a small bonnet stopped, looked at the stairs and asked, "Are those the actual stairs? I'm taking the elevator."

Best excuse from a man hacking up phlegm
"What? I told you I'm allergic to this ancient shit."

Geekiest observation by woman studying map of ancient Egypt
"On Stargate, Abydos is one of the planets."

Conversation between two friends
"It's technically an honor to die as a king."
"Yeah, that's what they all say."
"OK, it sucks to die."

Parting shots
"I've seen better in Vegas."

"I guess I'm a very shallow museumgoer, but I wanted to see some dead people."

"I left my Xbox for this?"

"I'm going to the restroom. I've been holding it in since 1330."

Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs runs through April 23 at the Museum of Art, 1 E. Las Olas Blvd., in Fort Lauderdale. Tickets cost $25-$30. Call 954/525-5500 or visit www.moafl.org.