Those who know my family are aware that we have a son named Beeber, pronounced the same as the last name of that popular young male singer, Justin Bieber.  But my son got his cute little nickname from his big sister, who was not even 2 years old when he was born – she could not say his real name, Christopher, and so “Beeber” stuck.  That was way before Justin Bieber became so popular, I might add…

So now that my disclaimer is out of the way, I can share the following story, which has nothing to do with my son Beeber and everything to do with Justin Bieber.  A few weeks ago, someone spotted Justin Bieber drinking beer at a bar, so they called the cops to report underage drinking because apparently Mr. Bieber is just a teenager.  But when the cops showed up and ID’d Mr. Bieber, they found that the “underage drinker” was a 27-year-old woman named Katie.  Given the pic below, honest mistake, don’t you think?  That would be Katie on the left and Justin on the right.

(Thanks to tmz.com for the story and picture)

Do you remember the extremely cheesy Saturday morning kids’ sitcom on NBC called Saved by the Bell?  The show saw the beginning of the careers of famous now-adult actors and reality show hosts Mario Lopez, Mark-Paul Gosselaar, and Tiffani-Amber Thiessen.

I used to watch Saved by the Bell every week, and I caught every episode at least once again in syndication.  There was at least one spinoff: Saved By The Bell – The College Years, and a few made-for-tv-movies that followed the exploits of the Bayside High School crew.  In one of the movies, that famous on-again, off-again couple from the show, Zach and Kelly (played by Gosselaar and Thiessen) were united in holy matrimony…  I didn’t know that, since I was only interested in the original show, not so much the spin-offs or updates.

Sometimes I peruse the celebrity gossip (and sometimes current events info) site tmz.com, especially lately when they’ve been reporting a lead in the Stacy Peterson case (a missing woman from the Chicago area whose case I’ve been following because I used to live in the area).  For their part, tmz.com seems to have quite accurate info and usually has it much earlier than other news outlets.  So the other day, I noticed a headline on Tmz saying that “Kelly” – aka Tiffani-Amber Thiessen – is pregnant and looking ready to pop, as they say.  At the bottom of that article, there was a link to another Saved by the Bell story:  Zach Morris and Kelly Kapowski –  Back Together! If you click the link, you’ll find that the Saved by the Bell actors were out and about together in NYC in September.

Interesting…  wasn’t September about 9 months ago?  An interesting footnote to this story is that I read that Mark-Paul Gosselaar was divorced from his wife only weeks ago.  So are Zach and Kelly from Saved by the Bell having a baby together?  Did you read it here first?  Most importantly, will the actors continue their name-hyphenating tradition when they name the baby?  How about Saved by the Bell – The Baby Years?  Stay tuned…

There has been a rash of celebrity deaths lately – Art Linkletter, Gary Coleman, Dennis Hopper, and Rue McClanahan (second to last survivor of the Golden Girls) to name a few.  As with many celebrities, circumstances surrounding some of these deaths have been quite out of the ordinary.

Dennis Hopper was in the midst of a frantic and nasty divorce when he lost his battle to cancer.  His wife is currently battling for her share of the estate – seems the pre-nup stipulated that the couple be married AND living together at the time of his death.  She contends that living in the guest house on the same property IS living together…

I listened to  the 911 call from Gary Coleman’s wife, and it’s creepy to say the least.  I’ve never heard a person so cold – “”send someone quick because I don’t know if he’s going to, like, be alive.”  And that she can’t help him because she “doesn’t want to be traumatized right now…” and “I’ve got blood on myself, I’m gagging, I can’t deal.”  Me, me, me.   So WOW.  Does Shannon (aka Mrs. Coleman – well, not really…  as it turns out,  there was a secret divorce back  in ’08) have something to hide?  My guess is that she is digging herself a deeper hole with every press conference, er, day that goes by…  It’s especially interesting how she is quick to do press conferences, shooting a video for tmz.com just one day after her husband’s er, roommate’s death.  You can listen to Shannon’s refusal to help Gary here in the sad 911 call, and here is a link to the video shot a day later when she contradicts herself – in the 911 call, she says she can’t help Gary because she has seizures so she can’t drive, whereas in the video, she says that Gary has done nice things for her, like buy her a car.  So…  why would he buy her a car if she can’t drive?  Oh, and not a tear has fallen from Shannon’s eyes publicly since Gary’s death.  Something’s fishy here, and Ms. Price’s penchant for being in the spotlight is going to be the catalyst to her unraveling, it seems.

Last night was the first night I was able to spend at home in a long time.  I was excited to see that the Cubs had a night game, and I was looking forward to getting to sit and watch my first entire baseball game since opening day…  but I had read the schedule wrong – actually I’ve been a day off all week.  My husband being off work on Memorial Day got me a day behind, and then somehow I overcompensated and got a day ahead in the later part of the week.  Just the latest on a lengthening list of stupid things I’ve done lately – where is my brain?  So anyway, baseball-gameless, I decided to watch some “junk tv” – whatever I could find in useless reality shows or documentaries.  I was looking for “Fantastic Houseboats”, but I couldn’t find the Travel Channel (have I mentioned that I never watch tv?  I don’t even know what our channels are!  Well, I know Noggin, PBS, and Nickleodeon by heart, but nothing other than kids’ channels…), so I ended up watching something called “Jail” that was really a Cops knock-off and then an interesting show on E! –  20 Most Horrifying Hollywood Murders.  Ah, celebrity gossip meets true crime = perfect junk tv!  It was quite interesting; though I had already known about most of the cases which included:  Nicole Brown Simpson, Bonnie Lee Bakley, Rebecca Shaeffer (an 80s tv star that was murdered by a stalker, how sad), Dominique Dunne, Bob Crane, Sharon Tate, Black Dahlia, Tupac Shakur, Biggie Smalls, and Jose and Kitty Menendez.  I did miss a little bit of the show, but I kept waiting for the Phil Hartman case to come on – I thought that would be considered ‘horrifying’ as he was unexpectedly murdered by his cocaine-addicted wife Brynn who then committed suicide.  Perhaps it was one of the 20 on the show and I just missed it?  And the show also spotlighted something I’d like to try if I ever find myself in Hollywood again: the Dearly Departed Tours.  The name speaks for itself.  I have a macabre sense of curiosity that way, which is also why I’d like time someday to delve into Steven Bocho’s (famous producer who gave us NYPD Blue, Hill Street Blues, and Doogie Howser, MD) first attempt at a novel  – where I got the title of this post.  Found Death By Hollywood at the Dollar Store and it looked worth a buck to sit on my shelf for years until I had the time to read it.

So anyway, lots of death in Hollywood lately, and it’s sad.  Even for those of us with somewhat morbid curiosities; there were still people behind the celebrity facades, and their loved ones left behind are hurting.  No matter to what degree of fame they rose, they were all human beings, so how could their deaths be anything but sad?

I’m not really hip with pop culture these days.  Sure, I read my share of celebrity gossip whenever it happens upon cnn.com, but I’m really out of it when it comes to the latest tv shows and music.  I am such a nerd that I had to wikipedia ‘Jersey Shore’ because I got sick of reading all these headlines about it and not knowing what the heck they were talking about.  Sounds like kind of a dumb show, by the way, not for me.

Because I listen to country music, mainstream music is usually of no interest to me.  But I couldn’t help but take notice when a snappy tune came out of the tv this morning – it was Sesame Street, and there was a musical guest.  I know that Sesame Street has celebrity guest-stars all the time, so I chose what seemed to be the title of the song and did a search on youtube.com.  The song is “I’m Yours”, and it’s sung by Jason Mraz.  Even all my reading of celebrity gossip didn’t help me here – I’ve never heard of Jason Mraz, but I have to say that I like his sound.  But that shouldn’t really come as a surprise that I’ve never heard of him – I don’t think he’s a regular in my pop culture circle that includes such characters as Dora, Miss Spider, Little Bear, or Wow Wow Wubbzy.  My 18-month-old son and I couldn’t help but bounce and groove to this song; see if you feel the same.  By the way, when Mr. Mraz performed this song on Sesame Street, the lyrics were changed to make the song be about playing outside, making it more kid-friendly.  Cute.

You may have heard all the brouhaha about the TLC reality show Jon and Kate Plus Eight that’s been in the news lately.  If not, a quick re-cap:  Jon and Kate Gosselin were a young couple who had a set of twins and a set of sextuplets, giving them a grand total of 8 kids before either one of them had even hit the age of 30.  They filmed a show for TLC chronicling their lives with all the little ones, and the special was such a success that they soon found themselves celebrities with their own reality show.  Apparently the sudden mega-stardom caused too much strain on the family, and the marriage did not survive.  Amidst accusations of infidelity and other ugly, yet very public issues, the couple filed for divorce earlier this year.  Scarcely a move has been made by either party since without full coverage from the media.

I watched a few episodes of the show back when the Gosselin’s were one big happy family, mostly because it was interesting to watch such a large family function as well as they did, err, as well as they seemed to function anyway.  But ever since the big family fall-out, things have been getting increasingly worse for the clan.  TLC announced yesterday that Jon would no longer be a major part of the show, and they were re-naming it Kate Plus Eight.  Ouch.  There are millions of people who follow the plight of the Gosselins; there are Kate fans and there are Jon fans, and then there are people who are mainly concerned for the welfare of the 8 kids.  The media has certainly vilified Jon, though it’s difficult to determine how much of it he has done to himself.  No matter how much the accusations about Kate’s controlling and domineering nature tend to be proven true by her behavior, she is always able to appear to be the better person through her public statements.  Maybe she really is the better person of the two, or perhaps she is more intelligent or has a better spokesperson advising her than Jon has.  But whatever the case, one thing is clear – those 8 kids they created together should not have to be caught in the middle of all of this, it’s disgusting.

The reason I decided to join in on the media storm and write about this is because of the latest chapter that broke yesterday – when TLC kicked Jon off the show.  His response?  He legally banned all production crews from the house he still co-owns with Kate, where the children live and the parents take turns visiting.  He has threatened to slap TLC with criminal charges if they come onto his property.  He hasn’t said whether this includes a ban on filming the children, but one can guess, based upon his actions, that it’s no longer ok with Jon that his kids star in a reality show.  It’s completely understandable – many people, including child psychology experts, etc, were constantly saying how unhealthy it was for the 8 kids to be filmed on a daily basis.  But Jon (along with Kate, back when they actually agreed on something) was always a staunch defender of the show and the fact that he and Kate had the kids’ best interests at heart.  But now that Jon got himself kicked off the show, it looks like he’s decided that reality tv is no longer a healthy lifestyle for his children.  And that’s fine and even makes sense, but one does have to question his intentions when his legal action to stop the show comes the very day that news is released that he is no longer a part of the show himself.  As a well-written gossip column stated, “Jon is acting like the kid who didn’t get picked to be on a team for the neighborhood baseball game, so he’s taking his ball and going home.”  Whatever his intentions, I am among the many former fans who just want what is best for the 8 kids while the rest of it goes away.  But before that happens, I am very interested to hear the spin Jon puts on his reasons for his actions – all of them.  He is giving a live interview on Larry King Live tonight on CNN, and I’m almost ashamed to admit that I will be watching (the midnight replay of course – there is no way this would ever take precedent over a new episode of The Office).  Then again, why bother watching the interview when I know the “highlights” will be shoved down our throats for the next few days – or at least until Jon’s careless behavior provides enough fodder to make yet another story…