• Britney Spears might be a repeat offender when it comes to child neglect. Spears' other repeated offenses include releasing albums, wearing scrunchies, and humping K-Fed. [TMZ]
• Courtney Love reportedly has her shit together and was acting, yes, like a lady at the Chateau Marmont. Unfortunately, she's so reformed that we're not sure New York will ever get her back. Time to start auditioning replacements. [Page Six]
• Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban give one another cold, Aussie glares. [IOL]
• Jay-Z is reportedly at work at another album. No surprise there — everyone knows that when speaking Hova, "retirement" means "new record." [Page Six]
• Mario Batali's landlord thinks he's a orange-clogged pirate. [Lowdown]
• Ralph Fiennes ends his 11-year romance with Francesca Annis. 'Tis the season, after all. [R&M]

• While you were limping up and down Broadway and losing digits to hypothermia, rest assured union leader Roger Toussaint was enjoying a leisurely two-hour meal with six cronies at a nice restaurant. Would you be any less livid if we noted the restaurant was in Harlem? Yeah, didn't think so. [Page Six]
• Last year, Lloyd Grove banished Paris Hilton from his column and went on the Today show to tell the world. This year, he's banishing Brad Pitt, but you won't see Lloyd on TV to talk about it — perhaps because he is making a very, very grave mistake. Put down the pipe, G, and get it together. [Lowdown]
• Don't get in a tizzy about OK! editor Sarah Ivens sucking face with ad exec Ben Kennedy — she's been separated from her husband since October. Suck freely, liberated lady! [Gatecrasher]
• Broke-ass Courtney Love is looking to sell the entire song catalogue of her late husband Kurt Cobain and Nirvana. Those of you still mentally stuck in Seattle circa 1993 are no doubt displeased. [Page Six]
• Elton John continues to call Madonna a miserable cow. You'd think legally sanctioned assfucking would mellow him out a bit, but you'd be wrong. [Scoop]

Cityrag compares these photos taken of Courtney Love at a September probation violations hearing and a Friday court appearance in which a merciful judge allowed Love to finish rehab in an outpatient facility, surmising that some eye work might've enhanced the apparent effects of clean living. Bravo to Love's image consultant for realizing that some subtle cosmetic surgery might influence the court to take it easy on her, and abandoning an earlier, far more transparent plan to bolt her head to a high-backed chair to avoid another embarrassing, ill-timed instance of the "sentencing nods."

Late Tuesday, we short-ended a link to a Craigslist Seattle ad (since removed) seeking a fresh set of bandmates for Courtney Love, who's apparently looking to make a big musical comeback after rehab. It looks like the cattle call's been extended to L.A.

· EMI is trolling Craigslist for a variety of "types" to fill out Courtney Love's back-up band. (Once she graduates rehab, of course.) No hard drugs required, but those with reliable connections for the inevitable, explosive Love relapse will be given preference.
· The LAT launched The Envelope today, its full-service awards site. And by "full-service." we mean that it has about 147 blogs, roughly one for each envelope (see how that ties in?) opened during awards season.
· We defy you to find a headline touting less consequential information, anywhere, on any subject whatsoever: Dennis Rodman Settles Speeding Ticket.
· Midlevel Gawker Media functionary Lockhart Steele (not his real name) has a mini blog empire of his own, launching an L.A. version of real estate site Curbed mere hours ago. Disclosure: Lockhart processes our payroll later today. Hi, Lock! New blog looks awesome!
· Harvey Weinstein might be embracing a new policy of fiscal sanity, but he'll still happily splurge on some ring-kissers when he knows the press will be around.

• Courtney Love's mother, Linda Carroll, is selling out her pill-popping daughter in a tell-all book. None too surprisingly, we learn that Courtney took psychedelics at age 4, was in therapy at age 6, discovered porn at 9 and booze at 12. Who knew the hooch would come last? [Page Six]
• Since cokey supermodel Kate Moss isn't able to promote much of anything besides South American natural resources, maybe the internet gambling industry will take her in. [Lowdown (2nd item)]
• Lizzie Grubman's PR firm is promoting Range Rover — because, you know, she didn't run over white trash with one of those. [Page Six]
• Actor George Clooney and Fox News robot Bill O'Reilly kind of kiss and make-up, which means that we're already bored just writing about it. [R&M]
• Charlize Theron was dealt pretty cards in life, and we're just going to have to accept her aesthetic superiority. [Scoop (2nd item)]

Until cultural anthropologists discover the hidden bomb shelter on whose walls Courtney Love has been secretly scrawling a diary in her own blood for the past twenty years, our best shot at truly understanding the troubled rock star's inimitable brand of crazy might be her mother's upcoming memoir. It seems that Love had a pretty typical childhood, if one's idea of "typical" is playing a game of "Let's Feed the Baby Some Acid and Make Her Look Like the Blacklight Poster." From Page Six:

Courtney Love's couch-based assault of a sleeping musician last year has finally made its way to the courts, and as is typical of most Love antics, the reality is more authentically batshit insane than any jokey version we could come up with:

We suppose that this is what Courtney Love's daughter Frances was talking about when she said, "I don't really like her hardmetal stuff, or when she doesn't brush her hair." Courtney gives more good face here.

Next week's issue of Teen Vogue, your go-to source for fashion-focussed chats with the offspring of famous, emotionally unstable musicians, features one Frances Bean Cobain's first ever interview, in which she holds forth on mother Courtney Love's sense of style:

Loyal substance-abuser Courtney Love's roost at 30 Crosby Street may be listed with Corcoran (of course!), but the 4,200-square-foot loft is facing foreclosure from The Man. Apparently our beloved lady in belligerence, who was clearly too busy making her own moonshine, has failed to make two $30,000 mortgage payments for July and August, and the Mercury Capital Group has filed suit. Love has borrowed a wee $3 million from the mortgage company, which would explain why she'd expect anyone to pay $5.5 million for a property that likely has syringes embedded in the floorboards.

· "Yet again, a tabloid has been caught lying.Thankfully the judicial process worked, but how many cases like this will it take before these tabloids feel obligated to print the truth? Have they no shame?" God, it's so hot when a publicist gets indignant!
· The strangest, saddest story we've heard in a while takes a turn towards the stranger and sadder. Dying from suffocation underneath a heart attack victim is something out of the first two minutes of a Six Feet Under episode.
· On his 50th birthday, breakout Project Greenlight director John Gulager will suddenly and mysteriously find himself drawn to badly written science fiction and nautical attire.
· FilmStew puts on the tinfoil helmet, smelling something fishy in Steve Coogan's denial of the rumor that he knocked up Courtney Love.
· Don't fuck with Jack White, for he will not hesitate to publicly humiliate you.

The LAT corrects some of the details of its Saturday story about Courtney Love's latest court-ordered smackdown, in which an exasperated judge sentenced her to yet another stint in rehab. Love's troubled backstory proves pretty tricky:

If this Page Six item plugging journalist Neil Strauss's new book on pick-up artists is to be believed, life veered into sitcom territory when the writer "inadvertently" seduced Courtney Love (we hate it when that happens!) with his new skills during an interview and found himself with a wacky, unexpected roommate. Hilarity, it seems, ensued:

Courtney Love can't catch a break. On Friday, a judge ignored the fact that a drug-addled Love is much more entertaining than a sober one and sentenced her to yet another stint in rehab. Now the random gossip headline generators employed by the always-innovative UK tabloids have knocked up Love with British actor Steve "Alan Partridge" Coogan's baby. (Dry runs involving David Beckham and a plate of fish and chips were dismissed as "unbelievable" and "too Pythonesque," respectively.) We don't know how much contact Love is allowed with the outside world at Promises Malibu (or wherever she's landed), but it's likely that the first time she'll hear about her unexpected pregnancy will be from the orderly she bribes to replace her morning vitamins with a dose of Vicodin potent enough to kill a horse.

We often spend our afternoons in seclusion, where we can have the peace and quiet necessary to effectively brainstorm and think of the most insane possibilities for what might be Courtney Love's next headline. In all of our creative sessions, however, we never once got so fucked up as to imagine today's news: Courtney Love is claiming to be pregnant with the baby of British actor Steve Coogan, who's best known for his portrayal of fictional radio loser Alan Partridge.

• Courtney Love admits that she's on drugs. Really?! You don't say. A judge has now sentenced her to long-term inpatient rehab, which means Comedy Central roasts will return to their typical suckiness. [Reuters]
• Already vote for Gawker Hotties but still itching to make your opinion count? Take on Bruni vs. William Grimes. [Amateur Gourmet]
• It's the moment you've been waiting for: Starting Monday, the San Fran Chronicle will run Sean Penn's thespiatic dispatches from his time in Iran. Goody. [E&P]
• Desperate Housewife Marcia Cross is so not a lesbian that she's even getting married to a man. [CNN]
• Meanwhile, former pin-up turned bad sitcom possibility Jenny McCarthy is getting divorced. Playboy reunion spread TK. [Us Weekly]
• Feast upon the full line-up for this year's New Yorker Festival, Indie Rock edition. Save your pennies now, tix go on sale August 25. [ProductshopNYC]
• Or don't buy tickets at all out of protest; far be it from you to support this week's Target-sponsored New Yorker abortion. [ChiST]

Clip 'n save this headline, because you'll probably need it again after about 28 days.

From the Drudge Report, a strange item on a mysterious, false rumor:

We were so proud of her. But Courtney Love has come full circle, folks, and we cannot continue to ignore her very public fall from "grace:"