So this Sunday Liz Smith broke the news that former Lowdown columnist Lloyd Grove, "has landed on his feet with Graydon Carter and Vanity Fair." We got in touch with Lloyd, whose bio at the News made mention of the fact that, "Aside from newspapers, he also has written extensively for Vanity Fair and Harper's Bazaar magazines," and he issued a demure response: "I love Liz Smith. Actually, I'm doing a little piece for VF while I decide among various interesting options for my next gig."

Liz Smith plays defense for Team Madonna today, opening her column with this gem: "IT'S HARD for me to understand exactly what it is Madonna has done personally to all who are so violently critical of her recent plunge into Third World child-caring, money-giving and adoption. The press continues to turn her into a monster."

Liz Smith, today:

We've called Liz Smith a few unpleasant names over the last few years: "doughy," "antediluvian," "senile," "past her prime," "washed up," "an escapee from the nursing home," "ready for her Aricept," that sort of thing. Still, we bear her no general ill will and today, in fact, find ourselves in some sort of sympathy with her:

From antiqued gossip Liz Smith's column today:

• Liz Smith: Marlene Dietrich had a tumultuous love affair with French actor Jean Gabin. Tomorrow, Liz hears that Guy Lombardo was spotted at the Rainbow Room with a visibly drunk Jo Stafford. [Liz Smith]
• Someone at Page Six has it in for Vincent Parco. [Page Six]
• Quincy Jones' daughter mistakes leather softener for moisturizer. Jessica Simpson demands royalties. [Lowdown]
• The publicist for The Pump is apparently under the impression that Harry Connick, Jr., is a worthwhile name to drop. [R&M]
• Warner Wolf takes solace in Channel 2's poor news ratings. Warner Wolf is too still alive! [Page Six]

A glimpse into the future: from right, Lindsay Lohan at ages 19, 25, and 30.

• Assuming a net worth of $1.3 billion, and spotting him a generous five inches to start with, Mark Cuban's penis is fifteen inches long. [Page Six]
• Speaking of penises, Charlie Sheen may have been spending quality time with Las Vegas transvestite Kayle Coxx. The extra "x" is for how super creeped out we are by this story. [R&M]
• Staying on the topic of dicks, former NYT executive editor Howell Raines is living in Pennsylvania and working on a civil war novel in which Robert E. Lee explains how the war was everyone's fault but his own. [Lowdown]
• Suge Knight is down to his last eleven dollars. Apparently dangling Vanilla Ice out of a window doesn't produce as much loose change as it used to. [Daily Dish]
• If a stroke hadn't felled Jay Presson Allen, Liz Smith would have killed her with Vioxx. [Liz Smith]

• Bruce Willis settles conflict between U.S. and Colombia, tells our troops to stand down. [R&M]
• Peggy Siegal gets whisked about the country via private jet while Liz Smith must suffer the indignities of airport security. Truly, there is no justice in this world.[Liz Smith]
• If you want to read an item that features both "Sting" and "fantasy sex parties," go ahead. We won't judge you. Although we're pretty sure God will.. [Page Six]
• Britney Spears is probably not pregnant, based on the logic that she was seen drinking a Cosmo. And we all know how responsible a mom she is. [R&M (2nd item)]
• Is Howard Stern's hair real? Is your life so empty that this is actually a question that concerns you? If you're Lloyd Grove, the answers are no and yes, respectively. [Lowdown]

Aged and increasingly irrelevant gossipeuse Liz Smith, in today's Palm Beach Post:

As a coda to her controversial column "Nicole Kidman deserves to be happy," antediluvian tattler Liz Smith notes that her own recent appearance on "CBS Sunday Morning" sent her book Dishing (a "little work about celebrity and food"; and here we'd thought Gael Greene had cornered the market on geriatric culinary gossip) soaring toward the rafters of the Amazon rankings. In a subtle dig at the inability of The Post to move merchandise, Liz puts this down to the power of television. We're just impressed that the seven aged viewers of "CBS Sunday Morning" were able to switch from their TV screens to their internet connections and successfully order the book, which, hopefully, is available in large-print format.

We know we often don't react to news — especially news of human tragedies — the way we're supposed to. And so we reading Liz Smith today, we got worried:

The Smoking Gun, Sunday: "The Man Who Conned Oprah: 'Book Club' author's best-selling nonfiction memoir filled with fabrications, falsehoods, other fakery, TSG probe finds."

To put it plainly, these past three days have turned me into something of a Unabomber. I'm unwashed and somewhat slightly dazed. Meals became bananas and Trader Joe's cheesey puffs (Brit I totally get it now). And yet! And yet I feel like we've really accomplished something here. See, Dad! I did make something of my life! I've become a fill-in Defamerette! Like Liz Smith, but hairier! (Ed.: Factcheckers, verify that.)

A reader notes that Adrien Brody did in fact thank Roman Polanski in his Oscar speech (contrary to Cindy Adams' report yesterday.) His exact words were, "I'd like to thank Roman Polanski for the role of a lifetime." If, however, Mrs. Adams' quote was correct, this wasn't quite enthusiastic enough for Polanski.

Liz Smith's assistant on her recent Vegas trip: "I took refuge on Petrossian's nearly empty patio to watch hordes of grossly fat and nearly naked Americans wearing shorts trying to get into the caf . I couldn't help but think of the millions of seriously thoughtful people around the world who were walking to protest the threat of a war with Iraq at that moment. Then I ordered a second martini."
Can't keep me away from "mamma" [Liz Smith]

· Palm Beach's Landmarks Preservation Commission think Donald Trump's coat-of-arms logos with his surname beneath them are "unseemly." Trump uses the same logo to advertise for his Park Avenue condos in New York, and the Palm Beachers believe the "New York" brand dilutes the value of the "Palm Beach" estate. [Page Six]
· Denise Rich is said to be another Leona Helmsley. She fires staffers citing budget cuts, but always replaces them, and came onto her ex-partner, Herbert Black. [Page Six]
· Liz Smith on the invite to the Vanity Fair Oscar party: "This came on some kind of heavy vellum papier-mache that must have cost newspaper tycoon Si Newhouse of Cond Nast a pretty penny. (The envelope alone is made of something one is tempted to keep and have made into a bulletproof vest.)" [Liz Smith]
· Courtney Love says "Every woman in America is on Xanax...You can go to a taco stand in L.A. and get it. It's the No. 2 drug in America, and it's completely addictive." Items on Bruce Springsteen's concert rider: beluga caviar on Carr water crackers, imported cheese, white linen tablecloths and a "large" box of Belgian chocolates. [NY Daily News]

· NY Magazine columnist Mark Malkin accused of manipulating Guatemalan presidential politics by reporting that Guatemalan President, Alfonso Portillo Cabrera, was competing against Enrique Iglesias for a $30,000 Vacheron Constantin watch. [Page Six]
· The World's Most Decadent Hamburger ($41), made from cows that are beer-fed and hand-massaged, comes to New York. [Page Six]
· Gwyneth's advice to J-Lo: "marriage should not be taken lightly." [Page Six]
· A "Sopranos" movie may be in the works. [Page Six]
· Giuliani is the keynote for the 2004 Republican convention. [Cindy Adams]
· Liz Smith discovers WhoRepresents.com. [Liz Smith]
· Martha Stewart voted "Most Annoying Person of 2002." [Celeb News]
· "Gigli" sucks. [Celeb News]
· James Woods slams Hillary; Andre Balazs spends New Year's Eve hallucinating after being attacked by a scorpion; Davis on Diller: "Those fags sure have funny ways of having fun"; and Balkan pianist Marina Arsenijevic makes her Carnegie Hall debut tomorrow. [NY Daily News]

Here's why I quite like the Mugger column in the New York Press. Mugger rehashes Jay McInerney's comment that Page Six leans right, politically, while Liz Smith leans left. But he can't resist describing McInerney, who wrote Story of my life a lifetime ago, as a washed-up novelist; and he wonders whether Liz Smith isn't ghostwritten while the aged publicist lunches uptown. Mean.
The Constitution's Best Buddy [Mugger in the New York Press]

We're beginning to think New York gossip columnists are feeling a bit too much Holiday-related goodwill. For example:
· Page Six defends Steve Bing, explaining that he has "been unfairly depicted." [Page Six]
· Page Six says nice things about PETA. [Page Six]
· The late John Galliher, international courtier and "walker" for Nan Kempner, Pat Buckley and Carol Petrie, is nicely eulogized. [Page Six]
· Liz Smith implores New Yorkers to support the mayor's Public Private Initiative. [Liz Smith]
No, no, no! You're gossip columnists! You're not supposed to be nice! That's not how it works! We should know; we've been doing this for three whole weeks! When you sign on the dotted line, you agree to be mean and nasty, and Satan agrees to give you a nice cushy job with a major circulation newspaper.