As Britney Spears shakes off a walloping hangover after a night of toasting to her minor victory in family court yesterday—child visits one night a week, supervised by several 450-pound baby monitors plucked from the lower ranks of K-Fed's ever-growing security/poop-wiping detail—we thought we'd turn to topics more cheery than irreversibly-scarred toddlers: Britney's new album! Possibly one of the most anticipated records of this year or any other, In Rainbows Blackout is a welcome return to form, poised to catapult the preoccupied singer back up the charts with songs like "Get Naked (I Got A Plan)," "Hot As Ice," and "Why Should I Be Sad." As it turns out, the photo circulating yesterday of a windswept Spears biting seductively on a digit was in fact not the official album cover, which People exclusively unveiled today: a colorful collage of fedoras, wristbands, zebra prints, and vertigo-inducing spirals that's sure to put a spell on even the staunchest Britney detractor.

James Lipton, host of Bravo's Inside The Actor's Studio, has a book! It's called Inside Inside and we got our copy today. It's 492 pages long and costs $27.95. If the first two pages are any indication, it might be the most gloriously horrendous book ever written. You have to love a man who starts the memoir of his middle-brow career with an epigraph by Chaucer, from 'The Canterbury Tales': "And gladly wolde he lerne and gladly teche." Nearly as trenchant as Dostoevsky's "Raskolnikov seemed offended." (Crime and Punishment, pg 144.) Or Faulkner's immortal words, "'Such good beer,' she said." (Sanctuary, pg 140.) Except with the added benefit that Chaucer is a) in Middle English and b) in the prologue. Let's face it, Lipton only has time for prologues. He's a busy guy and can barely read. But can he write? You decide.

· We realize we left many of you hanging last week when we posted the shocking clip in which the beloved Olly Girls of Sunset Tan were let go for failing to fully commit to their accelerator-pimping duties. As this Yo on E! clip plainly shows, however, the girls are in good spirits, and ready for whatever spray-on-nozzle-clearing challenges lie ahead.
· Drew Carey waxes philosophical about suddenly finding himself in a game show ghetto.
· Now it's Virgie Arthur vs. Howard K. Stern on the Anna Nicole Sue-Go-Round.
· Every lyric from Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire," explained with a hyperlink.
· No, your eyes are not deceiving you. That's Barbara Walters making out with Star Jones on a New York city street!

Sure, we could all just sit around and gripe about the sorry state of affairs for women writers, directors, producers, and studio execs in 2007 Hollywood, but Glamour magazine, in conjunction with Clinique Happy ("So that you might find the man that will one day make you Happy!"™), have actually done something about it. The concept is simple:

It is with a heavy heart that we report on the passing of an internet legend. Minoza, Japan's largest seal, died last week of unknown causes. Though he delighted thousands of children from his tank in Enoshima Aquarium, he is best known as the original "I has a bucket" LOLseal. No longer will you be able to stuff your friends' inboxes with new pictures of a giant creature speaking poorly about container-related matters. Sometimes you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone. [Note: A helpful commenter pointed out that the seal died all the way back in 2005. However, in the wake of such a tragedy should we really be dwelling on things like "dates" and "fact checking?" That kind of negative thinking won't bring Minoza back, people.] [japantimes.co.jp]

· Music round-up: Rogue Wave play the El Rey, Dillinger Escape Plan are at the Key Club, and Nellie McKay is at Largo.
· The THC Comedy Show returns to the Hollywood Improv, with a special show benefiting NORML. Greg Fitzsimmons and Neal Brennan will be there, but you don't need to be stoned to find them funny. But as with anything else, it doesn't hurt.
· Did you ever want to ask a Mexican something, but for whatever reason were simply too shy? The Los Angeles Press Club presents An Evening with Gustavo Arellano (you may know from his Ask a Mexican column in the LA Weekly), who'll be on hand to answer your burning gringo questions.

Having within the space of just a few weeks been stripped of her two children, a leather bustier, and yet another a pair of overly constricting panties, a vulnerable-like-never-before Britney Spears (whose new album drops Oct. 30—check out the fierce cover art!) made a rare appearance in court today, in the hopes of convincing Superior Court Commissioner Scott Gordon to reconsider allowing overnight visits with her sons:

They can deny it a million times over, their publicists can use the "just good friends" defense 'til they're blue in the face, but an enterprising paparazzo has finally gotten incontrovertible proof that Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem are, in fact, hooking up! And if said hooking up takes its natural course, the lovers will produce an offspring with an accent thicker than a McDonald's milkshake, suitable only for giving voice to an animated bee in a Nasonex commercial.
Bonus link: If that's not enough, the two have already done the nasty in the 1992 Silver Lion award-winning film Jamón, jamón . Here's an NSFW clip featuring Penelope's language-barrier-resistant boobs!

Things we learned when Jake Gyllenhaal stopped to talk to Simon Cowell's girlfriend on the Rendition premiere red carpet: His bearish new look is for the movie Brothers, he's dating his rather humorless bodyguard, and he likes long walks on the beach. [Extra]

While we've already paid one visit today to Kid Nation—by way of some exclusive Junior Miss cheesecake glamour shots of Taylor, or "Queen of the Yellow Hankies" as she insists her disciples refer to her— we thought we'd return once again to the outhouse-deficient Shangri-La, this time with clip in tow. In last night's stunning turn of events, the citizens of Bonanza City were again offered a choice as steeped in moral implication as the TVs vs. Poop-Shacks vote of the debut episode.

There's lots of things Bobby Brown should be in denial about: The drunk driving, the spousal abuse, the prison time, the Ghostbusters 2 cameo. Yet, that stuff makes it to the press and he basically keeps mum. The ex-Mr. Houston only draws the line when it comes to his thrombosis. Despite the fact that his own lawyer told the AP Bobby suffered a mild heart attack due to stress and diet, Brown claims it's all a joke:

In what is quickly escalating into a bitter, Riggs vs. King-esque volley played out on the cement courts of the media—first Deadline Hollywood Daily claimed Warner Bros. president of production Jeff Robinov was scrawling "DEEP TURNAROUND" in pink hi-liter on any project with a female lead, then Robinov fights back by listing every chick-flick he's ever made, will make, or hopes to remake for Variety—now Salon enters the fray, assembling an impressive panel of industry women to weigh in on the state of the Hollywood sexes. While the discussion takes several interesting turns, we join them in the midst of a lively debate over the feminist merits of beauty-and-the-schlub megahit Knocked Up:

View nurturer Barbara Walters quietly pulled Anne Heche aside before an audience of several million today to explain how she knew all along that her marriage to Coley Laffoon would end up in heartbreak: It's because Heche "is all heart, and I don't think you always think with your head," she explained, choosing to keep her next thought, "Probably because your head is usually preoccupied with instructions from various intergalactic beings," to herself. [People]

Do you have a pesky baby stuck in your tum tum? Want to get it out of there? Then follow Dr. Tracy Morgan's advice and eat a New York City pushcart hotdog, stat! Here he is, from last night's Late Night with Conan O'Brien, proving that even if the courts won't let him drink alcohol anymore, his ability to bring the crazy will not be impaired.

· The WGA, in an aggressive measure meant to show the studios that the protracted ball-tickling session that's defined the negotiations until now must come to an end, has redrafted and broadened their strike rules to now allow for "pug-faced studio types so much as looking at us funny." [Variety]
· Hollywood's dreamy consciences George Clooney and Leonardo DiCaprio may team up for Warner Bros.'s adaptation of Farragut North, a play loosely based on the Howard Dean campaign. (Sorry Jake, torture-lovers not invited to the party.) [Variety]
· The rumors are true! After 50 years, NBC is moving from its legendary plot in Burbank to a spot across the street from Universal Studios. NBC plans to sell the real estate to a single wholesale retail giant, who'll develop it into independent nation state Costcovia, where every man, woman, and child is guaranteed a pickle-barrel-sized container of mayonnaise. [Variety]
· Private Practice's audience continues to grow, and Pushing Daisies won its timeslot despite coming down from its premiere numbers. Bionic Woman, however continues to plunge steadily since its first week, throwing the future of Isaiah Washington's triumphant comeback into question. [THR]
· Medium creator Glenn Gordon Caron gets a two-year deal at CBS, mainly on the strength of his Patricia-Arquette's-Rack-in-3D initiatives. [THR]

Perhaps you've heard some mutterings that the producers of Kid Nation exploited their underage cast and violated child labor laws. Pshaw! At least one of those kids arrived to the show pre-exploited.

Acting is all about the craft? Fuck that! It's the easiest paycheck you'll ever cash, says Joaquin Phoenix: "I never prepare. I think that's completely overrated. It's a very simple job. All you have to do is . . . stand in the right spot and say the line. So I don't really believe in preparation." [Page Six]

Howard K. Stern dropped by Larry King Live last night, his first time swinging at the fossilized CNN inquisitor's legendary softballs since he appeared shortly after Daniel Smith's death to assure the world he was indeed Dannielynn's father. (He now explains that minor oversight away to some confusion over ovulation schedules and Anna Nicole hand-off times.)

Nothing starts your morning off better than a cold, hard look at Britney Spears's lady parts. Since Brit is currently fighting for the right to overnight visits with Sean Preston and Jayden James, we can only assume that this is her way of showing the judge that she's able to have some consistency and stability in her life when it comes to not wearing panties. Or possibly, it's to distract us from her hideous case of pink eye. That's right, it's being reported that the entire Spears clan (K-Fed and the kids too) have all got the dreaded eye infection conjunctivitis, which is caused by fecal matter getting in the eyeball. Good parenting all around, guys!

The Film Experience blog took the time to list and blurb about every gay person currently working in Hollywood, from the most insignificant (Reichen's body-makeup artist) to the most influential (Reichen). [Film Experience]