Celebutards by Andrea Peyser

help, but there was no one to hear.
    Britney, bald and visibly nuts, next was photographed attacking the paparazzi with an umbrella she wielded like a javelin. In July 2007, OK ! magazine took the unprecedented step of printing an article detailing a disastrous photo shoot, in which Britney wiped her fried chicken-grease covered hands on a $274 dress and picked up her puppy’s poop with a $6,700 Zac Posen gown. Britney then was said to flee the shoot wearing $12,861 worth of jewelry, a $974 Vera Wang dress, $380 Lanvin heels and a $281 Pucci scarf. Rock bottom was rushing up to greet her.
    Los Angeles Superior Court Commissioner Scott Gordon is a patient man. He gave Britney umpteen chances to undergo random drug testing and to see a parenting coach. But despite all her chances, she failed to comply. She wouldn’t even take his calls.
    In September 2007, Gordon labeled Britney a “habitual, frequent and continuous” user of alcohol and drugs. Ouch. Early the next month, the kids were taken from her, and handed to her ex, Federline. Her last moments with the kids were spent in typical fashion—Britney took them to a fast-food drive-through window. In the irony that often goes hand-in-hand with celebrity, in this company, the sponge-like K-Fed looked like Father of the Year.
    Britney seemed determined to blow her shot at a comeback. Sleep-walking, unrehearsed, through the MTV Video Music Awards in Vegas, the formerly fresh-faced starlet looked bloated in a black, sequined bikini. It was painful to watch.
    In January 2008, Britney lost it completely. This time, she threatened to take others with her.
    After a visit with her sons, she was to return the boys to their dad. Instead she grabbed hysterical Jayden James, pulled him into a bathroom, and locked the door, keeping him inside the room for three hours as powerless authorities tried to coax her out. Federline said he was scared; he’d given Britney a gun for her birthday. The judge forbade Britney from seeing her children.
    Proving that her parents are the dumbest Hillbillies in creation, they initially called not Britney, but Dr. Phil McGraw. Dr. Phil held a press conference to say that Britney was in trouble. Ya think?
    Finally, her dad took over legal conservatorship—finally!—distanced Britney from her friends, enablers and lovers, and got her locked in UCLA Medical Center’s psychiatric ward.
    She was released after six days.
    One last note, if you can stand it. Just before Christmas 2007 Britney’s little sister, Jamie Lynn, found an odd way to upstage her more famous sister. She announced she was pregnant by her boyfriend at the age of sixteen—too young to legally drink alcohol or drive her kid home from the hospital in some states. And too young to legally have sex with her man, Casey Aldridge, eighteen, who risked statutory rape charges.
    The revelation sent shock waves through publishing circles. Mom Lynne Spears’ book on, of all things, how to be a celebrity parent, was abruptly canceled, and she said she’d raise her daughter’s baby. Scary, when you consider what a fine job Lynne did for her own two girls. Meanwhile, the cable TV channel Nickelodeon struggled over how to handle the baby’s baby bump on Jamie Lynn’s kiddie show, Zoey 101 . And moms like me worried about how to explain to our daughters why they should read books rather than take life lessons from the likes of Lindsay, Paris, Britney and Jamie Lynn Spears.
    Parents, I beg you. Don’t let your babies grow up to be celebutards.

8
All I Wanna Do Is Have Some Dumb
SHERYL CROW
    I propose a limitation be put on how many squares of toilet paper can be used in any one sitting…I think we are an industrious enough people that we can make it work with only one square per restroom visit, except, of course, on those pesky occasions where two to three could be required.
    —Sheryl Crow’s Weblog, April 20, 2007
    I T SURE DIDN’T SOUND like a joke. A joke would require a sense of