She's not doing this with him todaaaaaaaaaaay

Or any other day, apparently. To my utter astonishment, Whitney Houston has filed for divorce from Bobby Brown. I'm still waiting to see if it'll take, honestly, because I can't imagine these two separate from each other.

And that was love, or so I certainly thought. Didn't they almost have it all?

Someone at VIBE magazine must have known the end was nigh when they bumped Christina Aguilera off the cover in favor of Bobby. The intro of the article points out how Being Bobby Brown -- the greatest show ever to air on television -- painted Bobby in a better light than Whitney, but it also showed the strange tenderness the two of them shared.

And America couldn't look away. Bravo is still airing the show regularly; there hasn't been a new episode since the Christmas debacle in December, but you can count on seeing BBB on the Bravo schedule at least once every couple weeks, and usually in multi-episode marathons. I know I'm not the only one clamoring for DVDs of the first season. (I guess we can forget all about the second season, though; that one will probably only air in the bootleg theater of my mind.)

Looking back over clips of the first -- only (sob!) -- season, I guess I can say there were a few hints. For instance, the two of them didn't seem to communicate very well:

And they were both pretty quick to raise a fist to the other, even as a "joke."

Come to think of it, that whole Christmas special was one big cry for help. The only family member who seemed to be doing okay was Bobbi Kristina, lil' BK, and she's apparently taken to posting hoochie'd up pictures of herself on her MySpace account -- which isn't the end of the world, but it's not a great idea for a 13-year-old, either. I'm hoping that during Whitney's most recent stay in rehab, the importance of counseling for lil' BK was impressed upon her.

The Washington Post has a fantastic op-ed piece on Whitney and Bobby today. "It was impossible to look away as these two rich and famous stars acted out the saying that cocaine is God's way of telling you that you have too much money." Too right, sir. That's her in the blond wig. Looks every second of 43 years old, doesn't she?

In other news, I'm holding off on commenting on Anna Nicole Smith's tragic loss of her 20-year-old son days after the birth of her daughter until more is known about the boy's death. I will say this, though: Daniel certainly came across as sane, level-headed and kind in the snippets of The Anna Nicole Show that I've seen. And I can't imagine how Anna must be feeling right now.

Similarly, I can't imagine how Britney Spears must be feeling right now, to have reproduced with Kevin Federline twice, on purpose, within one year. I'm gonna hold off on commenting until we have some confirmation on what they're naming the new Federspawn. I'm hoping it'll be something breathtakingly stupid. As stupid as, say, this photo from Britney's Web site:

I can picture her standing over some poor Photoshop artist, insisting, "I wanna have the eye of the tiger! Gimme the eye of the tiger!" To this, and to so much in Britney's life, I say: careful what you wish for, babe.

Comments

[Cheesemeister]

Young BK's behavior is a manifestation of living in such a screwed-up family and is very sad.
Anna Nicole Smith may have done many questionable and laughable things, but in no way does she deserve the pain she's undeniably suffering right now. I really feel for her.
As for Brittney, I can only hope that her children were bestowed some kind of recessive gene blessing them with at least average intelligence, because neither of their parents seem to have any!

[Cath]

You know what's really sad? I find myself singing Bobby's "Hope they got a bathroom here" song an awful lot -- even when I don't particularly need to urinate.