● The end of the world won’t be coming in 2012; it’s happening September 2011, when Oprah goes off the air. [WSJ]
● Mariah Carey’s demand to be surrounded by 20 white kittens and 100 white doves for the Westfield Christmas Lighting ceremony was denied, although she will be chauffeured in a Rolls Royce and escorted by 80 security guards. [DailyMail]
● Pamela Anderson finally had "the talk" with her kids. No, not the sex talk, the "your father and I made a sex tape" talk, telling her sons that: “Mommy and Daddy were massively in love, we videotaped everything and you’re probably going hear about [it] at school.” [RadarOnline]

The thing about being a beauty junkie is that you're allowed to be a novice. It's not about turning into a highlight-obsessed Bergdorf Blonde or investing your 401K in indulgent anti-aging treatments. Personally, I think it means actively exploring what you like and what makes you feel good, being scrappy about saving dough, and basically making that whole commercial beauty enterprise work for you. But then again, I'm a novice. I happen to be a lucky junkie and can get my fix of the next big beauty obsession thanks to the nature of my job; but I never obsess or buy into every promised-land product that comes my way. To be honest, homemade scrubs and a 10-minute morning routine puts me in the "low maintenance" bracket. Except when it comes to one thing: eyebrows. I am diligently obsessed and frequently frustrated with my eyebrows, though for some reason I have never fronted the time or money to see an actual professional brow-shaper. Until I found Sue Ellen Gifford at the Pierre Michel Salon, that is.

So two genteel ladies had a sit-down. And everyone tuned in and then offered their own two shillings on the matter. The pair bantered about what it was like to be women in a man's world, coming thisclose to performing a spirited duet of "It's A Man's World". Mostly, as Sarah Palin's Going Rogue book tour stormed into Harpo Studios yesterday, we couldn't help but wonder what secrets Palin was hiding in that big hair of hers. Was she hiding a razor blade for self-defense, in case she found herself on the South Side? Did she have a secret blueprint on how to fix the economy -- the type she'd offer up to the country only if we offered her the Oval Office in exchange? Maybe Sarah Palin had insidery knowledge about what Levi's Johnston looks like behind that perilous fig leaf. In any case, one shameful, abhorrent truth was certain: That you couldn't help but feel for Palin. Whether she demystified the hot-messery of the 2008 Republican campaign or laid bare Palin family secrets. Her Oprah drop-by was a lot like one of Mo'Nique's monologues in Precious: That a-ha! moment when the crazy in her eye sparkles its brightest. A list of reasons why you probably admired the gay icon after the break.

So Sarah Palin just finished filming a segment for The Oprah Winfrey Show. When Oprah hit a raw nerve, Palin cut her off and kept saying, "Oprah, you’re being inappropriate. You really are. Oprah, it’s completely confidential. And you’re being inappropriate, OK?" before removing her mic and then mouthing the words, "That line of questioning was just too inappropriate." Oh, woops. I'm confusing one glassy-eyed wingnut bimbo for another, aren't I? Apologies. Anyway, Oprah did an interview post-game where she dished very broadly on the interview without giving anything away. The urgency of the affair was made discernible by her breathless recap of what we can look forward to when the segment airs on Monday. The teaser's after the break.

Inside midtown Manhattan’s Bistro Milano, television screens broadcast an Italian soccer game, around which the majority of servers and patrons have crowded to gasp, cheer, and clap in unity. But first-time actress Gabourey Sidibe, oblivious, drowns out the clatter with her frequent snort-punctuated laughter. “My roommate and I love Chipotle. It’s so awesome!” she says, chuckling. “We go around noon, and we’re like, How badass would it be if we got a Corona with our burrito -- we’re such derelicts.” Sidibe’s definition of what makes a derelict couldn’t be further from the abuse she suffers as the title character in Lee Daniel’s Precious. Alongside Mo’Nique as her bilious mother, Sidibe plays a teenager who is twice impregnated by her HIV-positive father. The film, a dark but hopeful story about urban poverty and spiritual endurance, was produced by Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry, and will quite possibly garner Oscar nominations for its two leads. Here, the charming and spirited Sidibe explains the magic of being in the same room with Oprah, Mariah and, um, Steve Buscemi. (For more on Sidibe, check out the upcoming December/January issue of BlackBook -- this is just the gossipy stuff.)

Hollywood’s gossip-in-chief Nikki Finke reported yesterday that as of September 2011, Oprah Winfrey will stop syndicating her talk show and move it to the as yet unlaunched Oprah Winfrey Network. Or in real talk: Oprah’s jumping to some unspecified channel you don’t even get yet. This move, if it plays out, is bad news for CBS (who currently sells Oprah to other TV stations), for people who don’t like exploring the wilds of cable’s triple digits, and possibly even for Oprah herself, depending on how many viewers make the effort to find her on OWN. (She’s lucky she has a more dedicated fan base than Howard Stern). But, as Oprah would remind us, it’s better to focus on the positive. Who are the folks who benefit if The Big O moves off the dial?

Oprah is broadcasting live from Central Park tomorrow, and you can still get tickets if you're lucky. She's doing the show from the Central Park Summerstage and will have a guest list including Mariah Carey, Regis Philbin and Kelly Ripa. She's also going to announce her latest Book Club selection and has some other "surprises" up her sleeve.

So once all of you stop spazzing about MTV, you can start spazzing out about how Whitney Houston, whose album I Look to You topped Billboard charts last week, is going to have an intimate chat with Oprah, in front of a studio audience and about twenty seven billion other people. And stories are flitting left and right about Whitney's SHOCKING REVELATIONS. Apparently a woman whose fall from pop titan to crack addict has been highly profiled in the media can still surprise us.

You won't see a lot of interviews with Michael Moore in the lead-up to his new doc Capitalism: A Love Story. Why not? Well, as the LA Times’ Patrick Goldstein recently found out, Moore’s doing a sit-down with Oprah on September 22, and the price of her oh-so-critical attention is total exclusivity. The doyenne-of-daytime doesn’t want anyone stealing her thunder. A New York Times piece and a Leno appearance scraped by because they preceded the Oprah booking, but otherwise that’s it until the 23rd when the film drops in NY and LA.

Most known for her foibles as Sasha Fierce and possibly as the once-famous drag king Sisqo whose legacy included songs about thongs, Beyoncé has now landed the cover of Forbes. Direct your cries of What were they thinking?, print is dead!, who reads Forbes anyway?, and how can I achieve such a disproportionately cinched waist? here. Otherwise, read on for the shakedown of the top 10.