We at the Pepper were at work, and this is what happens when you work in pop (or is it Pope?) culture:

Coworker #1: We have a Pope!
Pepper and others get up and RUN to see CNN. Wolf is doing his thang, interrupting the action as usual.

Cardinal Jorge Arturo Medina Estevez emerges to announce the pope. Those of us not schooled in popery think that he's the pope.

Coworker #2: Old white guy. Big surprise there!
Coworker #3: No, that's not the pope. That's the warm-up act! (Those hoping for the Nigerian guy take heart.)

Estevez reads in Latin and translates, "Brothers and sisters ..."

Coworker #3: Are you ready to par-tay?

(By this point, we at the Pepper are hoping we're not all going to hell in a handbasket.)

And then ... after all those melodious Latin words that sound so good rolling off the tongue of Estevez ... we hear the one non-melodious word:

RATZINGER

Well, glory be! Ratzinger it is! We at the Pepper didn't even pick him in the Fantasy Convocation League, just because, well, he is really, really old (try 78).

But old-school seems to be what they're looking for, as he is a fierce traditionalist. Those of you hoping for a better diplomatic relationship between the Vatican and the uterus, you'll have to wait until the next pope.

Oh, and since CNN has been treating the pope's election in even worse taste than we at the Pepper, we are expecting a special "" segment in which Toure and pals wax giddy over Ratzinger, now known as Pope Benedict XVI.