Laid off? Update Your Resume and Take Time to Admire the Gold Sparkly Drag Queen

I thought I’d gotten out. A little over two years ago, I was doing our tax prep. Although I’d had a great year creatively, with 3 films either in festivals or theatrical release, TV work and a challenging play, my reward for that was less than 1/16 of my husband’s salaried income that year. Shortly thereafter, Simon and I had a long conversation over many drinks. I was beyond tired of fighting for film parts I didn’t even want, going to parties in the city or (yes) the Hamptons to chat up directors and producers in the hopes of finally landing a breakout role. I turned to my other life, my at that time 9+ year graphic design career, and decided that it was time to get a job. I’d had many rewarding jobs in the graphics field throughout my time in NYC, but for the first time I was going to put all my energy into one thing. Within two weeks I had the perfect job with a great company and a top notch salary at just the right time. Johan was 14 months old and in the process of weaning himself. The time was right and I leaped.

Going to work in a retail corporate headquarters is a little bit like being shot from a cannon every morning, and I ate it up. There was nothing I liked more than to dive into a project with a venti latte at 9am only to come up for air at around 1pm with a growling belly and cold coffee. Yes, I do eat a normal lunch every day, just not until I notice I’m hungry! My work was very detailed with lots of room for creative flexing — my passions were fed, and fed well. I was happier, and it showed. Instead of looking around for industry professionals to meet at parties, I concentrated on enjoying where I was; a welcome change. It’s more fun to first admire the gold sparkly drag queen at the party rather than wonder immediately if she has a script for you.

All of a sudden, producers from a series I’d screen-tested for a year prior called. They had a green light, a full cast, a crew and were ready to roll. Our lives had completely changed due to me going back to work full time. Did we really want to do this? The producers worked hard to convince us. It was a reality show, so wouldn’t take up as much time as a drama. They’d film evenings, weekends and basically not get in the way. After much argy-bargy we said, “What the hell,” and began a journey that continues today.

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Authorities say a fire has destroyed the main lodge at a small ski operation co-owned by Bruce Willis.

Camas County Chief Deputy Brian Miller says the Soldier Mountain Ski Resort lodge and an adjacent ski rental building were destroyed in the Monday morning blaze. No one was injured.

Willis has been working with forest officials on a new master development plan for the south-central Idaho resort, with runs in the mountains of the Sawtooth National Forest. The “Die Hard” actor has a home in nearby Hailey.

The resort closed for the season last week.

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Mariah Carey and Nick Cannon - who celebrate their one-year anniversary in May - are prepping for parenthood: They bought a dog.

“I got her a short-haired Jack Russell terrier — a girl, named Cha-Cha. She’s 8 weeks,” Cannon, 28, told Usmagazine.com Saturday at a concert at Cabana One in Coconut Grove, Fla.

He and Carey, 39, secretly wed in Eleuthera in the Bahamas last spring.

Cannon said being married to Carey is “the most amazing thing ever. I couldn’t wish for anything else. She’s the most incredible woman. Being in a strong union and being there for each other is something that I’d never really experienced before, so to experience it with my wife is remarkable. We’re together as one, and that’s important to me.”

He was mum on their anniversary plans, but told Us, “We never went on a honeymoon, so I guess I can tell you we’ll probably go to Barbados.”

Asked if there are any babies in the near future, he laughed.

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Coming to a store near you: Kendra Wilkinson’s new line of stripper poles!

“I’m coming out with my own stripper pole. Stripper pole, and stripper pole workout,” The Girls Next Door star, 23, told Usmagazine.com at the American Red Cross Red Tie Affair in Santa Monica Saturday.

“It’s like Carmen Electra’s, but mine is better,” she continued. “Mine will connect to the ceiling, and you can spin on it and do all that stuff on it.”

Wilkinson is busy promoting her new E! reality show, Kendra, which follows her engagement and marriage to Philadelphia Eagles’ beau Hank Baskett.

“It’s been fun,” she said of taping the series, which premieres this summer. “A lot of work, but fun. I’m used to Holly and Bridget, but now it’s just me. My show’s kind of — our show — is kind of like I Love Lucy, but newlyweds. It’s funny.”

How’s wedding planning going?

“Still working on the dress,” Wilkinson — who was worried about looking too “’80s Prom” — told Us. “We’re talking to a really cool florist. He’s making the flowers amazing — 6-foot centerpieces! It’s going to look like a fair-tale wedding. I’m really excited about it.”

Her mom, on the other hand, is “really nervous,” Wilkinson admitted. “She’s more nervous than excited. I don’t think she believes I’m going to get married until the day. I think she doesn’t want to lose me.”

The couple will say “I Do” June 27 at the Playboy mansion.

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Madonna dashed from the airport to an impoverished Malawi village to discuss a school she is planning to build, saying nothing to the hordes of reporters on her trail Sunday about whether she is planning to start the process of adopting a second Malawian child.

The singer, casually dressed in a white fedora, walked in Chinkhota, a village near the capital of this AIDS- and poverty-stricken southern African country, holding the hand of her 12-year-old daughter, Lourdes. Dozens of reporters looked on.

The 50-year-old Madonna refused to answer questions about reports that she was in Malawi to adopt a 4-year-old girl. She said it was “amazing” to be back in the country where she runs a charity organization and from where she adopted her son David, 3, last year.

Then she rushed away in a convoy of at least three sport utility vehicles, as crowds of shouting, waving children ran after her.

Madonna was expected to appear Monday in court in Lilongwe, the capital, to sign adoption papers.

A security guard with the convoy said Madonna spoke to villagers about building a school, and she was seen looking at an artist’s impression of the proposed building.

Madonna first traveled to Malawi in 2006 while doing charity work and filming a documentary on the devastating poverty and AIDS crisis here. Her Raising Malawi organization, founded in 2006, raises funds to fight poverty by providing food, shelter, education and health care for children here.

The U.N. estimates that half of the 1 million Malawian children with one or no parents was orphaned by AIDS, and that the virus that causes AIDS has infected 14 percent of adults here. Of the population of 13 million, 65 percent live below the poverty line, and most of those living in poverty are women. Madonna plans a special school for girls to increase opportunities for girls and young women in Malawi.

It was not clear if the school she discussed Sunday was her proposed Raising Malawi Academy for Girls.

A Malawian welfare official and another person involved in the adoption proceedings have said the girl Madonna is hoping to adopt is about 4 years old and her unmarried mother died soon after she was born. The girl’s father is believed to be alive but no other details were available. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the case is considered sensitive.

A U.S. government official has also confirmed that an adoption bid by Madonna, an American citizen, is under way.

Madonna has faced harsh criticism for years over David’s adoption. Children’s advocacy groups accused her of wielding her immense wealth and influence to circumvent Malawian law requiring an 18- to 24-month assessment period before adoption.

But locals were not so condemning.

Wilson Kalibwanji, a resident of Chinkhota, said he would willingly place his own son in her care to ensure the boy a better life.

“We are poor people,” he said Sunday. “If a child’s mother dies, it is hard for the man to bring the child up.”

Austin Msowoya, legal researcher with Malawi’s Law Commission, played down concerns that a second adoption by Madonna would violate any laws. He said the best interests of the child would be taken into account - whether that was staying in an orphanage in Malawi or getting “an education with Madonna.”

“When you look at these two options, then perhaps it becomes in the best interests of the child to allow the adoption if the parents and the guardians consent to it,” he told Associated Press Television News on Saturday.

But Save the Children UK said the recently divorced superstar risked sending the wrong message by going through with the second adoption.

“International adoption can actually exacerbate the problem it hopes to solve,” spokesman Dominic Nutt said Saturday. “The very existence of orphanages encourages poor parents to abandon children in the hope that they will have a better life.”

Nutt said he was not suggesting that Madonna was doing anything wrong - but he said the whole process of international adoptions was often flawed and sometimes linked to criminal activity.

He said, barring exceptional circumstances, children should be kept in the care of their extended families or within their communities.

Madonna’s spokeswoman Liz Rosenberg in New York, who has not commented on the adoption reports, told The Associated Press the star would not respond to comments from Save the Children.

Madonna told Malawi’s The Nation newspaper that she was considering another adoption but would only do it if she had “the support of the Malawian people and government.”

If the adoption goes through, Madonna would become a single mother of four. She also has an 8-year-old son, Rocco, with former husband and British film director Guy Ritchie and her daughter Lourdes from a previous relationship.

She and Ritchie, who were married in 2000, obtained a preliminary divorce decree in November 2008.

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It has become one of the most popular social networking site for the stars but now Twitter is hitting the headlines for all the wrong reasons as it appears to have sparked its first libel action courtesy of singer Courtney Love.

The 44-year-old is being sued by a fashion designer who alleges that she has attempted a smear campaign against her.

Dawn Simorangkir claims the Hole singer ‘has embarked in what is nothing short of an obsessive and delusional crusade to terrorise and destroy’ her in court papers filed last week at the Los Angeles County Superior Court.

The suit cites remarks from Love’s Twitter and MySpace pages, and in the feedback section of Etsy.com.

It said the mother of one called Ms Simorangkir a ‘nasty lying hosebag thief’ and accused her of being a drug addict and a prostitute.

Simorangkir says that Courtney has attempted to ruin her business and destroy her good name and is suing for invasion of privacy, as well as emotional distress.

According to a report in The Independent, court papers laying out the claim state: ‘Whether caused by drug-induced psychosis, a warped understanding of reality, or the belief that money and fame allow her to disregard the law, Love has embarked on what is nothing short of an obsessive and delusional crusade to destroy Ms Simorangkir’s reputation and her livelihood.’

The designer says that Courtney turned against her after she billed the singer in February for around $4,000 of clothes she had made for her.

Before that, Courtney had been buying ready-made items from the fashion website on which Ms Simorangkir trades.

Courtney contacted the designer and flew her to Los Angeles last November and in January to give her bags of remnants to turn into bespoke garments.

The court documents say that Courtney was furious that Ms Simorangkir stopped working for her after she failed to pay her bill; this led to ‘an intense level of animosity … well beyond what any reasonable person would consider acceptable behaviour’.

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Hayden Panettiere found fame in the cult US TV show Heroes as a strong-willed teenager.

But in real life the actress feels much more grown up, as she shows in her latest photoshoot for In Sight magazine.

Despite being only 19 blonde-haired Hayden reveals she is planning a large family.

‘I always said I want four kids – I love kids,’ she said.

‘I would love to be a mum and to have a family – for Italians, it’s the most important thing you can have.’

But Hayden says she would not want her children to follow her into the acting world.

‘I think you have to be a pretty strong person to enter the industry that young and not be affected by it,’ she said.
‘I was lucky, but I’d never want my kids to be subject to that much criticism at such a young age.’

However Hayden may have to wait before she starts her family.

Last month she broke up with her 31-year-old Heroes co-star Milo Ventimiglia, with sources citing the 12-year age gap as a factor.

Rumours of their romance first circulated when they were seen kissing at an Emmys party in September 2007 - and by the end of the year, they were regularly seen out together at showbiz events.

Milo had previously denied rumours of a relationship with the star, who was then 18.

In Heroes Hayden plays the character Claire Bennet, who has the ability to regenerate, while Milo plays her uncle Peter Petrelli, who is able to take on other characters’ superpowers.

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