The numbers from your weekend, when all but the most quality-tolerant moviegoers stayed at home to catch up on what's been moldering on their TiVo's.

—The LAW's Nikki Finke on why we should've seen Michael Eisner's time-delayed resignation coming a mile away.
—The writer of Boxing Helena squats on the Buddha's head, which is somewhat predictably upsetting to Buddhists everywhere.
—Foul-mouthed sister blog Wonkette offers an illustrated definition of "compassionate conservatism."
—This happens every time: An actress gives in to motherhood, saddles the infant with an utterly retarded name, then loses the will to work. We'd secretly hoped that Gwyneth would rise above that particular cliché.
—LA.comfidential expands our vocabulary, ensuring that we'll be slapped the next time we're out at a club.

Remember those first couple of seasons of Malcolm in the Middle, when Frankie Muniz was an adorable kid with a habit of breaking the fourth wall and talking to the camera? Then puberty happened, and Agent Cody Banks happened, and now we get a report that other stuff is happening, too:

We haven't been able to confirm if it's true (you'd be surprised how wildly ineffective opening the window and shouting is for "reporting," unless you're trying to find out if the ice cream guy has any Bomb Pops left), but we're hearing rumors that a (failed) kidnapping attempt was made against Catherine Zeta Jones in Mexico, where she's shooting Mask of Zorro sequel Legend of Zorro. If it turns out that an attempt was made at snatching CZJ, it sounds like going out for cocktails with her sleepy stalker might be less dangerous than down time on that movie set. She should consider spending some quality time at her mansion in Majorca, even with the ever-present risk of encountering Michael Douglas in a Speedo.

Friday
1. Celebrate what the MPAA ratings system once considered tittilating in the pre-pie-fucking era at the Egyptian Theatre's "For Adults Only: Pre-NC17 Cinema in America," featuring Last Tango in Paris, A Clockwork Orange, and Midnight Cowboy. (Runs tonight through Sunday.)
2. Have you never seen a pig in person, except for on the end of a spoiled actor's leash during his "exotic pet" phase? Remedy that situation at the L.A. County Fair, which opens today in Pomona.
Saturday
3. If you've always wanted to see Radiohead in concert but fear eighteen-minute, atmospheric jams full of computerized bleeps, maybe you'd enjoy a night with Keane at Avalon. They're also doing an in-store at Virgin Megastore earlier that day, should you find yourself working out at Crunch and want to see some music.
Sunday
4. Ben Watt of Buzzin’ Fly (formerly of Everything But The Girl) will perform at Deep on behalf of Rock the Vote to encourage the dance community to exercise their power in the upcoming election. We suppose they could've called the event "Dance the Vote," but that just has too much of a Broadway vibe. "Drop X to the Vote"? Now that really would've brought the crowds.

How do you know when an entertainment publicist is lying? Her lips are moving, her vocal chords are converting her thoughts into sound waves, and your ears are translating that sound into what you recognize as language. Today's Lloyd Grove column in the NY Daily News gives us opportunity to break down the words of the flacktastic Leslie Sloane Zelnik, Britney Spears' rep, concerning a rumor that Spears plans to rent the $10,000 per night Palms Casino "Real World" suite to throw fiance/out-of-work background dancer Kevin Federline a bachelor party.

A reader submits this report of the "anti-piracy protest" from all the way in Toronto. We imagine that the audience was largely Canadian (despite the many Hollywood functionaries covering the festival), and given that our neighbors to the north are bred to be reflexively, painfully polite, we consider this mini-protest a major coup. Unfortunately, there was no "Manny Perry Makes Movies" propaganda PSA to ridicule, but we learned long ago we can't have everything we want:

Following in the recent, business-savvy footsteps of celebutante/entrepreneur Paris Hilton, Christina Aguilera has applied to trademark her name to brand about 450 future products. Strangely, we couldn't find "hair dye" or "nipple rings" in the trademark application, but here are five more or less randomly selected items that might bear her brand: bathroom and facial tissue; eyeglasses and contact lenses; panties; decorations for Christmas trees; paper party goods, namely party hats, cake decorations and table cloths. Imagine the new holiday tradition that could be born, as families adopt the practice of solemnly placing a Christina skank-angel on top of the Christmas tree!

Welcome to the post-Labor day, pre-holiday wasteland movie-release wasteland, when it's a much wiser decision to obsessively reorder your NetFlix queue rather than venture out to the multiplex.

All of this recent talk of Pamela Anderson's anti-KFC campaign for PETA is having some fairly foreseeable, yet obviously unintended, consequences, as a reader finds that the publicity has reactivated her jones for the Colonel's torture victims:

· Now that all those chiefly involved have gotten the "let's sue each other" bug out of their systems, Basic Instinct 2 is back on track. Michael Caton-Jones (City by the Sea) is in negotiations to direct, taking up the challenge of making an upskirt shot of a much more, um, mature Sharon Stone seem hot. [THR]
· Americans have apparently tired of Bravo's style homos rummaging through their underwear drawers and exposing their tragically unfashionable skid-marks, as Queer Eye for the Straight Guy is suffering a massive second season ratings drop. [THR]
· Fox signs Dave "Insomniac" Attell to a development deal. This could be a perfect match; Fox also has Tara Reid under contract and Attell's thing is following around drunks and making fun of them. [THR]
· VH1 orders another season of The Surreal Life after a strong premiere, continuing the important public service of reminding us week after week why these people should immediately be returned to obscurity after VH1 is done torturing them. [Variety, sub. req'd]

Who would've thought that kicking your gossipy make-up artist to the curb could be so messy? Jennifer Lopez fired face-painter Scott Barnes for leaking top secret J.Lo dirt to the tabloids, and now he's running around making trouble for her. He told US Weekly that she still owes him money (and an apology!), and now he's blabbing that J-to-the-Lo keeps some kind of voodoo priestess around to do on-the-spot aura repair and throw hexes on her enemies (remember when Michael Jackson pulled that move on Spielberg?). You'd think that with all of that supernatural firepower on call she could've done better than Marc Anthony for a rebound husband. On the other hand, the evil-eye seems to have done the job on Affleck. Maybe J. Lo's voodoo department deserves a raise after all.

Michael Eisner has announced that he plans on stepping down as CEO/Supreme Emperor Cast Member of Disney, ending his two-decade tenure running the company. Before you gather all of your stuffed Goofy, Minnie, and Donald dolls in the backyard for a tear-soaked memorial service for his stewardship of the Magic Kingdom, realize that he's not set to leave until his contract runs out in September...of 2006—a full two years from now—to ensure there's adequate time to find a successor. Not too long ago, bloodthirsty shareholder mobs were marching on Eisner's office with pitchforks and torches and demanding Eisner's body be dragged behind the Electric Parade; had the board of directors handed Eisner over, we're pretty certain they would have come up with a replacement in less than two years. The good news: This extended national mourning period/farewell tour should give Eisner plenty of time to officially install as CEO the Frankenstein Mickey Mouse doll that's secretly been running the company for the last five years.

—That white tiger did a pretty good job on Roy using only what God gave him. But imagine what might have happened to Father of the Pride if the tiger had gotten his paws on a handgun.
—Plushy-loving sister site Fleshbot takes an in-depth look at the intersection between mainstream celebrity and the porn world. Specifically a one-night intersection of a Wayans brother and porn star Mari Possa. Be careful, ladies of the adult entertainment world, you know what they say: Sleeping with one Wayans is like sleeping with them all. [NSFW]
—One of Kevin Federline's kids is surprisingly precocious, e-mailing her mom about her day with her evil step-Britney.
—Dogs can shoot guns, they can walk on their hind legs in movies—how long until one of these amazin' mutts winds up engaged to Britney Spears?

The Jewlicious blog reports a Madonna sighting...in Jerusalem. Looks like she's making good on her promise to spend the coming Rosh Hashanah holiday in Israel, selling magical bottles of water and red string bracelets (and probably some incense to balance her inventory) from a dirty blanket on the sidewalk.

Despite a curious dearth of drug or gay sex references in Ted's blind items, you happily obliged us with your guesses. It must have been that astoundingly poetic turn of phrase, "brought you to a towering to-do whenever you wanted via her perfectly lip-glossed pucker" that held your interest long enough to fire off an e-mail. A quick recap:

1. See how the movie industry has depicted your favorite city (hey, at least pretend L.A.'s your favorite city for the duration of this item, Mr. Frustrated East Coaster) on-screen in Los Angeles Plays Itself tonight at the Egyptian Theatre. Our pals over at LA.com are hosting the event and practically promise a blogger fist-fight over the film's sometimes controversial opinions. How can you afford to miss that?
2. Celebrate "the current popularity and success of women's sports" at the opening of the "Game Face" photography exhibit at USC's Fisher Gallery. Or, if you're Tom Cruise, maybe stop by to look for some extremely fit movie premiere dates.
3. And as if we needed to tell you, the second season of The Apprentice starts tonight. Watch as 18 greedy, fame-mongering zombies suck each other's upwardly-mobile blood for the opportunity to get a close-up look at the thing that died on top of Donald Trump's head. This, of course, is a ringing endorsement. Our TiVos are set.

Each season of The Real World is inevitably another lockstep installment of carefully casted types, i.e. The Angry Black Guy, The Gay Guy, The Slut, The Bi-Curious Girl, etc. But it looks like the casting department might have unknowingly scored some much-needed novelty in putting Landon Lueck in the current seaon's Philadelphia house, who, according to The Smoking Gun, is doing double duty as The Standard Jock and a seemingly new type, the Asshole Who Gets Drunk At A Football Game and Tries to Wrestle a Horse. Actually, now that we think about it, Trishelle from the Las Vegas cast might have done too many tequila shots at Rain and wrestled a horse in the hot tub. These shows really do bleed together after a while.

The WOW Report's James St. James stumbles into the Spotlight, the legendary hustler bar on Cahuenga, and encounters John Waters and the cast from his upcoming sex-addict movie A Dirty Shame.

We still haven't received any photos or phone-cam shots of Pamela Anderson's anti-KFC PETA billboards from around town (have none of you been to Inglewood today?), but we do have a special treat: a rejected, early draft of the billboard's design that would have better utilized Anderson's spokesperson assets. Click on the thumbnail at left to see how PETA might have offered a fitting challenge to Vincent Gallo's publicity antics. (You can see the actual ad here.)