The year in gossip

The Olsen twins turn 18, go to college, deny drug addiction.
They grow up so fast, don't they? Within days of Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen's 18th birthday this past June -- a date that stopped countdown clocks across the Web cold in their tracks -- the twins' spokesman, Michael Pagnotta, announced that Mary-Kate (the brunet) had checked herself into an unnamed institution for treatment for an eating disorder. And no sooner had Mary-Kate checked herself in than the rumor mill cranked and sputtered and coughed up speculation that the young actor was actually fighting an addiction to drugs -- cocaine, to be precise. And no sooner had that rumor begun to take flight, despite the twins' spokesman's firm denial, than the Olsens found themselves dropped from MilkPEP's "Got Milk" campaign. (That white stuff on the upper lip started to seem a tad too suggestive, we suppose.) And no sooner had Mary-Kate returned to college at New York University than she was rumored to have been spotted smoking a cigarette. Puff, puff.

Fun and fisticuffs at the Lohan family picnic? Lindsay distances herself from her dad, proves she's a party girl par excellence.
Leaving behind -- at least for a time -- that ongoing feud with fellow teen queen Hilary Duff (they both dated Aaron Carter), Lindsay Lohan spent much of the year dealing with troubles brewed in her very own family.

Back in May, after a family party celebrating Lohan's little brother's first Communion, her dad, Michael, got into a scuffle with his brother-in-law and ended up brutally attacking him with his shoe. Lindsay's mother, Dina, has since taken out a restraining order against her husband, which he recently violated. Charged with criminal contempt and driving under the influence, Michael Lohan is currently cooling his heels in rehab.

But despite the fact that he has become a favorite whipping boy of the tabloids, he hasn't stopped talking to the press. When Lindsay was sick in the hospital with an undisclosed illness, he blabbed that drugs might be to blame (she says she was just exhausted) -- and struck out at her handlers for not allowing him near Lindsay's side. Talk about a parent trap.

Meanwhile, the New York tabloid gossips have kept their eyes trained on the underage actress as she parties all over town. Not that she minds all that much: "The good part of it is people are taking the time to make things up about me. It's very flattering," she recently told Rolling Stone. "Also, you know, when it comes to this business, you aspire to have that recognition and be in those tabloids."

Martha Stewart: The good things just keep coming.
Just because Martha Stewart's in lockup doesn't mean we haven't been treated to a steady diet of tidbits about Martha's life. Quite the contrary. We've heard in great detail about how Martha has spent her time at West Virginia's Alderson Federal Prison Camp, whom she has made friends with, who has visited her, what she's wearing and what she's eating. For Thanksgiving, for instance, Stewart dug into the usual prison holiday grub of turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, dressing and pumpkin pie, prepared by inmates in the camp kitchen -- nothing fancy or Martha-esue. ("We have an established menu already in place that goes through an examination by a dietician and we don't let the inmates have input into how we run our menu," said a prison spokeswoman.) What did Martha have for Christmas dinner? Stay tuned.

Dave Matthews' bus driver drops sewage on tourists' heads, then takes a lot of crap for it.
It's the gossip story of 2004 most likely to make you say "Eeeeew!" Tourists enjoying a popular architectural cruise on the Chicago River in early August were treated to what the Illinois attorney general estimates was "at least 800 pounds of liquid human waste" raining down on their upturned faces as they examined the underside of a grated bridge. Photos taken at the scene linked the sewage dump to Dave Matthews' tour bus. The band, which was not aboard the bus at the time, insisted that its driver was wrongly accused of emptying the bus' septic tank in an unlawful, unsanitary and truly repulsive manner, saying, "Our driver has stated that he was not involved in this incident."

But though the state of Illinois is still investigating the matter, the Dave Matthews Band decided in October that they had had enough bad publicity and donated $68,000 to the Chicago Park District and a nonprofit group that protects the Chicago River. "We know we cannot erase what happened that day," the band said in a message posted on its official Web site, "but we hope by reaching out and helping now this will help demonstrate our commitment to step up if we are found to be the responsible party." Come to think of it, maybe Matthews wasn't quite so shameless after all.

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