YOUR AD HERE »

Addicted to celebrity dirt

Alison Berkley

I thought I had become one of those people who has a meaningful life and is competent and intellectual enough to live without TV. I imagined curling up on the couch in the evenings with a hot cup of tea, reading the classics and listening to ragtime on KAJX or maybe even trying to like poetry. I figured if I really got bored, I might even write.Instead, I just lay around in the bathtub all night reading celebrity tabloid magazines.It’s out of control. Sometimes I’ll take two baths and read two magazines in one night. I’m like a crack addict. If I don’t pace it right, I’ll finish reading them all before the new ones come out. Then I end up in a panic, standing in front of the magazine rack at Alpine Market, eyeballs darting back and forth over all those covers I’ve already seen, the smell of corn dogs wafting up my nose. It’s a bad scene.My favorites are Us Weekly, In Touch, and if I’m really desperate, Life & Style. No, I don’t read Cosmo. I certainly do not need to rely on a magazine to tell me the Top 85 Ways to Drive Your Guy Wild, thankyouverymuch. I need to know about Brad and Angelina.But what I’m really worried about is this whole Katie Holmes-Tom Cruise charade. I hate to be the one to say this, but men who need to make a huge production of being in love by jumping up and down on couches and making these outlandish declarations are gayer than a candy cane and just don’t want anyone to know. Not to mention Cruise has the worst Napoleon complex I’ve ever seen. Believe you me, I have nothing against short gay men who are pretending to be straight (that’s a story I’ll save for another day). What really gets me is the Scientology racket. Cruise clearly has no idea what he’s talking about when it comes to psychiatry because he has never met my dog. If he saw the before and after pictures of Psycho Paws now that he’s on Lexapro, he might change his mind. The dog has gone from a Class 5 hurricane to a sunny day in St. Tropez. I keep thinking I’m going to come home one of these days and find him lounging on the couch sipping a piña colada and whistling Jimmy Buffett tunes. Katie Holmes isn’t just Catholic, she’s also from Ohio. Do you really think her Rotary Club parents are going to be kosher with the fact that she’s been knocked up by some guy who believes in aliens and silent birth? I’m sure Brooke Shields can be rest assured knowing Cruise is finally going to learn a thing or two about partum depression – before, during and after.My dad delivered babies in Shreveport, La., when he was a doctor in the Air Force in the early ’70s. He says there is nothing noisier than a Southern African-American woman in labor. After a few drinks he’ll do a great imitation of them screaming “Jesus Christ our savior Lord in heaven” and carrying on. He can vouch for the fact that birth and silence are an oxymoron. Anyway, the girl’s life as she once knew it is over. One day she’s going to look back and wish she never broke things off with Chris Klein. He’s a nice boy. I know that for a fact because this one time I saw him at the House of Blues in Hollywood and pinched his ass, and he yelled at me instead of buying me a drink.I can’t even tell you how upset I am for poor Jennifer Aniston. Jen gave us all hope because she’s a testament to what good hair can do for a person. Let’s face it, the woman couldn’t act her way out of a speeding ticket, but she’s so damn likable and familiar. Plus, she made us girls believe that maybe the Brad Pitts of the world aren’t out of our reach.Of course, Angelina Jolie had to come along and ruin everything. No doubt the woman is drop-dead gorgeous, and if I were into that kind of thing, I’d do her. But still. She’s the quintessential vixen. Speaking of Midwesterners, she’s going to chew that Oklahoma boy up and spit him out and go right back to where she came from, doing heroin and making out with her brother. She’s kind of like Cruise in that regard, rescuing babies from Third World countries and running around Washington, D.C., in a blazer. Give me a break. That’s one thing she has over Jen. The woman can act.The funniest thing about these celebrity mags is how everyone tries to pretend they don’t like them. Picture the scene: my old boyfriend, an intellectual Bostonian, reading the New Yorker in bed next to me while I’m curled up with my In Touch magazine. Of course he’s like, “I can’t believe you read those things.” Two seconds later he’s reading over my shoulder screaming, “Oh my god! J. Lo and Ben broke up?!?” so loud he even startled the dog.It’s the same thing with my mom. I always casually toss one or two of the magazines onto the checkout stand before she can say anything while she huffs and puffs and rolls her eyes and says, “I can’t believe you call yourself a writer and you read that crap.” Then when we get home and are lying around on the couch, she pretends to read The New York Times and inevitably chimes in, “Do you think Angelina’s lips are real?” So I know it’s not just me. I really have no idea what this fascination with celebrities is all about. Maybe I’m losing touch with reality. Or maybe I’m just a little too In Touch.The Princess promises her life will get more interesting again once snowboarding season starts. E-mail some good gossip to alison@berkleymedia.com