This week's dish about Real Houswife Teresa.

Publications: In Touch, Weekly Life & Style
Date: 24 Oct. 2011

Teresa Giudice is vying with Taylor Armstrong as the Real Housewife with the most mentions on the covers of the gossip rags this year, and this week noses into the lead. Here are the headlines.

• In Touch: Teresa leaving the show?
• Weekly Life & Style: How fame changed Teresa

All this week's Real Housewives stuff. And there's a lot.

Publications: Star, In Touch, Us Weekly, Weekly Life & Style
Date: 17 Oct. 2011

Welcome to gossip hell and good bye, Jacqueline Laurita! The Real Housewife gets her first mention on the cover of a supermarket rag this year just as she is quitting the show.

Wise move as far as I can tell, though I don't watch this stuff.

I mean, like ever. Not even stopping for a minute while using the clicker.

Here are the headlines.

• Weekly Life & Style: Housewives fight
  Why Jacqueline quit
• Star: Bethenny divorce
  Her mom tells all
• In Touch: Jacqueline attacks Teresa!
  Why she snapped
• Us Weekly: Teresa's plot to destroy Melissa

Damn You Skinny Alert™ and Problems With Plastic Alert™: Stories about Lindsay Lohan's little sister Ali

Publications: Star, In Touch
Date: 26 Sept. 2011

Welcome to gossip hell, Ali Lohan! Lindsay's little sister works as a model and is only 17, but she's already had a remarkably unnecessary and unattractive plastic surgery and has lost a ridiculous amount of weight.

Another shining testament to the parenting skills of the elder Lohans.

Here are the headlines.

• In Touch: Dying to be thin (pictures of Lohan and Taylor Armstrong)
• Star: Ali Lohan plastic surgery scandal
  She's only 17
  

I debated whether the phrase "dying to be thin" should be considered a figure of speech or if Lohan and Armstrong should be put on the tabloid vulture watch. Given how tough a stretch Taylor Armstrong is going through and what a mess the Lohan family is, I decided it should be considered more literal than figurative and used the label Not Long 4 This World (indirect), the lowest level of tabloid death watch. Both probably have long lives in front of them, but adding them to the list is not going to ruin the tabloids' track record, which is very bad indeed. After adding these names, there have been 91 people marked for death in the rags since the beginning of 2010 and only ten of them have died so far.

Meanest story nominee: Murder shockers!

Publication: Globe
Date: 29 Sept. 2011

In what shapes up to be a very mean week in the gossip rags, the Globe claims that two dead people were in fact murdered, though official causes say otherwise.

Russell Armstrong, widely reported to have committed suicide, was instead executed, according to the Globe.

Promising autopsy secrets and new evidence, the cover story also claims James Brown was assassinated while in the hospital.

This is a nominee for Meanest Story of the Week.

Bells Are Ringing Alert™: Teresa renews her vows with jailbird Joe.

Publication: In Touch
Date: 19 Sept. 2011

Teresa Giudice, she of the low forehead and scary eyebrows, is renewing her vows with her husband Joe, who is supposed to be heading to The Big House, if memory serves. Here are the headlines.

• A wedding to save the relationship
• Exclusive photos
• Despite Joe's drunken bullying, Teresa refuses to leave him.
• Inside their emotional - over-the-top second wedding
  

Tammy Wynette would be proud.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Obsessed with dieting

Publication: Weekly Life & Style
Date: 19 Sept. 2011

Yet another grab bag story about female celebrities who are way too skinny, this time from Weekly Life & Style. Here are the particulars.

• Brad begs Angie to eat as the frail star drops to her lowest weight ever
• Delusional Katie: I'm too fat to make it in Hollywood
• Devastated Taylor: barely eating
• LeAnn: Starving to keep her man
• Stars' Dangerous Tricks for Not Feeling Hungry
  
  

We gotta collpser! Taylor Armstrong collapses!

Publication: In Touch
Date: 19 Sept. 2011

You might think the supermarket rags would realize that they are an important component in the horrible ecology of reality TV fame and the misery it causes.

Well, they might realize it, but most of them don't give a rat's ass.

One more story about Taylor Armstrong after her estranged husband (and accused wife beater) commits suicide.

Reality TV wrecks lives!

Publication: National Examiner
Date: 12 Sept. 2011

I rarely commend the low rent Examiner, but I'm glad to see them come out against reality TV in general. If another supermarket rag did this, it would likely be hypocritical, but the low rent Examiner doesn't do stories about the Kardashians or Teen Mom the rest of the shows that snoop into not famous people's lives for no good reason. They will tell stories about Dancing With The Stars or cooking shows, but that's a slightly different part of the genre.

The sub-headline says that reality TV has cause nine suicides and twenty divorces, and they have pictures of Camille Grammer of Real Housewives, Kat Von D. of LA Ink and Justin Tennison of The Deadliest Catch, who was found dead in a Homer, Alaska hotel room last February.

They also have a poll inside to find out what their viewers think.

Damn You Skinny Alert™: Bethenny Frankel says "I know I'm too thin."

Publication: Weekly Life & Style

Date: 29 August 2011



I don't claim this blog is of earth shattering importance, but the idea is to keep track of stories over time. Weekly Life & Style has a quote from Bethenny Frankel admitting that she is too thin right now. In February, Us Weekly had a story that she said she used to be obsessed about being thin.



The first step is admitting you have a problem.

New scandals from The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.

Publication: Star

Date: 22 August 2011



Star has a story of new scandals on The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, with pictures of Camille Grammer, Lisa Vanderpump and Eddie Cibrian's ex-wife Brandi Glanville on the cover.



These scandals pale in comparison to the suicide of Taylor Armstrong's estranged husband Russell yesterday, well after the magazine hit the stands.

Breaking news: Russell Armstrong of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills commits suicide.

Publication: TMZ online

Date: 16 August 2011



TMZ reports that Russell Armstrong, estranged husband of Taylor Armstrong of the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills has hung himself. No note has been found.

Taylor Armstrong surgery after husband's brutal beating.

Publication: National Enquirer

Date: 15 August 2011



Fresh trash tomorrow! Last trash of the week... right now!



Most stories about Real Housewife Taylor Armstrong discuss her anorexia. This new story from the Flagship says her husband dislocated her jaw and almost blinded her and she needed surgery to recover.



It should be noted that Russell Armstrong committed suicide just days after this story hit the stands.

Annoying label bookkeeping #15

This is a link to the post above, made necessary by too many labels.

Real Housewife Teresa: "I'm terrified of being poor."

Publication: In Touch
Date: 1 August 2011

Fresh trash on Thursdays! Real Housewife Teresa Giudice is still the focus of the women chosen from the New Jersey version, now that her husband is going to jail and she is filing for bankruptcy. Here are the headlines.

• The truth about their shocking debt
• Bullied by "friends" for being broke
• Her marriage crisis: "I hope my girls never have to rely on a man."
  
  

There are also smaller pictures of 11 other housewives who are going broke. Names are not included, so I'm not sure who they are. I'm sure Karen Zipdrive could look at all the pictures and identify them, but that sounds like work and I wouldn't make her do that.

Problems With Plastic Alert™: Teresa gets Botox and a butt lift.

Publication: In Touch
Date: 25 July 2011

The supermarket checkout rags not owned by AMI - People, OK!, Weekly Life & Style, Us Weekly and In Touch - don't beat up real celebrities as much as the AMI publications do, because they actually get interviews and they need to keep access. On the other hand, they don't have to worry about access to reality TV stars, because the shows make certain they can get publicity, whether positive or negative. Because they do not fear reality TV stars, the magazines can tell as many negative stories as they want.

Right now, the most exploited sitting ducks are a whole mess of young girls from Teen Mom, the silly publicity hounds on The Bachelor/Bachelorette and Teresa Guidice from The Real Housewives of New Jersey. Once again, she is mocked for having yet more plastic surgery.

This week's drama from The Real Housewives of New Jersey.

Publications: In Touch, Us Weekly, OK!
Date: 11 July 2011

The Real Housewives franchise always has a selection of women, but each season someone turns out to be Queen Bitch and gets all the tabloid headlines. In this season of the New Jersey story, it's Teresa Giudice. The Queen Bitch usually need an aggrieved adversary, and that role is being played by Melissa Gorga. Here are the headlines.

• In Touch: Baby boy for Teresa
  Pregnancy bombshell
  With her husband facing prison, she shares her bittersweet news
  crazy cravings and terrified of gaining 50 pounds again
  Her fears over raising 5 kids alone
  PLUS: the baby's name - revealed!
• Us Weekly: Melissa hurt by Teresa's lies
• OK! As husband Joe faces jail, Teresa pursues a new man