Pete Doherty sure is going to have one heck of a messy life to clean up when he gets out of jail in a few weeks. The Mirror is reporting that Pete is thousands of dollars in debt to all sorts of people, including his dealers and his landlord. Both have (not surprisingly) gotten fed up with Pete. The landlord stopped by to check on the nine bedroom country estate, only to find that it had been trashed. Pete had sprayed human blood all over the place, had scrawled on the walls, and had abandoned his nine cats there.

Popping over to check on the place the landlord was horrified to find that his beautiful country pad had become a stinking hovel. The walls, floor and even some of the windows have been daubed with human blood. And we’re told the stench from his abandoned nine cats is so strong it would turn the strongest stomach. After taking one look at the carnage, the landlord canceled Doherty’s tenancy.

A close source says: “Pete is homeless, broke and owes thousands to dealers. He destroyed the place by scribbling on the walls, the floor, anywhere he felt like it. The beautiful heavy curtains were ripped down and the cats are just running around abandoned. It’s a really pathetic state of affairs. No one in their right mind is going to rent him a property after what he did.” The junkie has been receiving threats from out-of-pocket dealers while he’s been inside Wormwood Scrubs [prison], and things aren’t going to get any better for him when he’s released next month.

[From the Mirror]

Pete’s old friends and dealers have also been stopping by the country estate and taking his things to sell in an attempt to collect some of the money he owes them. The Mirror tries to make it sound like they’re taking advantage of Pete, but considering they also state they’re just doing it to make back some of the money they’re owed, it doesn’t sound that out of line.

The friends and dealers probably aren’t going about it in a legal manner, but considering the other things dealers are known to do to get their money, Pete’s probably pretty damn lucky. Something tells me that all of this isn’t going to make it any easier for Pete Doherty to get back on his feet. But let’s be honest, it’s not like there’s any reason to believe he was going to pull it all together at this point.

Paris Hilton has pissed off a lot of people with her habitual purchasing and (subsequent disregarding) of animals as though they’re pieces of jewelry. She has a kinkajou, 2 ferrets, a goat, something she calls a “big ass cat,” a chinchilla, and more dogs and cats than even she can keep count of. But apparently that’s not enough for the famous heirhead, because now she wants to buy a cheetah. Yes you heard me right, and no, that’s not some vaguely –veiled Britney Spears/Chester Cheeto joke. Paris supposedly did show some serious cheetah interest recently.

Paris Hilton kept the locals amused during her recent visit to South Africa, where she accompanied her Good Charlotte boyfriend, Benji Madden. The couple stayed at the ultra-luxe Mount Nelson Hotel in Cape Town, along with the Kaiser Chiefs and Korn, who were also in town for the My Coke Fest music event. (Apparently, calling a rock festival My Coke Fest isn’t ironic in South Africa.)

A hotel spy tells us: “Every time Paris saw something she liked, like a woman’s dress, she would ask how much it was. That included a cheetah she saw at an animal park. She asked how much it was and said, ‘If I bought a cheetah, would it run away from me or could I keep it?’” Perhaps Paris could take one home and feed it with her leftover Chihuahuas.

[From the New York Daily News]

If this were any other celebrity – even Britney Spears – I’d say this was bull, or she at least didn’t mean it. But this is Paris Hilton, and she buys all sorts of exotic animals on a whim. Buying a cheetah wouldn’t be all that out of character for her. Getting it back to her home might be a problem. Oh and actually taking care of it decently – that would be out of character for Paris Hilton. But being dumb and self-centered enough to buy herself a cheetah (probably to match the prints on her bags) doesn’t seem all that impossible for Paris.

Note by Celebitchy: I thought Paris’ kinkajou was taken away by animal authorities for being an illegal pet in California, but it might not have been. I could only find that story in one source and it’s undated. Paris was bitten by the kinkajou in August, 2006, and I couldn’t determine if she still has it locked up in a cage somewhere.

If a little monkey-like creature bit her and required a trip to the hospital I can only imagine what harm a cheetah is capable of inflicting on the clueless woman.

G.W. Little has dog supplies and toys for small breeds including cute little “indoor potties” that feature real-looking grass for your accessory pet. They also have a selection of celebrity-inspired squeaking chew toys called “Puparazzi Pup Toys.” For $14, your Shi Tzu can chomp on a stuffed animal that looks like a cartoon version of Britney Spears or Bruce Willis. The dolls have inventive dog-style names like “Biteme Spears” and “Brad Pittbull.”

Most of the toys are easy to identify, but a few don’t look exactly like their celebrity counterparts. Check out the photos below and see if you can guess which celebrities the dog toys are parodying. The pictures are linked to larger versions with the answers. Some of them are easier to guess than others, and we’ve numbered them in case you want to try in the comments first. (Note that the tags are covered in the small versions and that these images don’t show the full toy in some cases.)

[Thanks to this week’s In Touch Magazine for the heads up. GW Little has not contacted us or otherwise paid for an endorsement.]

Ellen Degeneres is launching a range of organic dog food, and you can eat it too!

She tells Parade magazine, “Ours (range) is all human grade. It’s all natural. And yes, you can eat it.”

“People love their animals so much so that they put little clothes on them and necklaces and booties and things like that. And if you love your animal, then you should feed them something that’s not dangerous for them. There’s a lot of poisonous stuff that they’re putting in a lot of that food, those by-products.”

KeyeTV

I don’t think that Ellen is actually suggesting that you should eat the food, just that you can if you want to. Or if you are ever caught in an emergency, like flooding or an earthquake, it’s good to know that it is safe to eat.

This follows Ellen’s previous issues with her adopted dog Iggy, where Ellen and partner Portia DeRossi adopted the dog and then gave it away, violating their agreement with the agency they took the dog from. Ellen cried about the new family losing custody of the pooch Iggy on her show, and got a huge amount of coverage for situation. Buying and promoting a dog food brand after that publicity is a great business move.

I might also suggest that it is a very subtle ‘up yours’ to the Mutts and Moms dog adoption agency, since she’s now used her infamous love of dogs to make money, while they have only received bad publicity.

Picture note by Celebitchy: Ellen Degeneres and Portia DeRossi are shown at the Primetime Emmy Awards on 9/16/07, thanks to PRPhotos.

I love a kooky old person – every time I meet someone with that kind of personality I look forward to being able to have a dozen cats and eat ice cream for breakfast, the kind of things you can’t do when you’re younger. When you’re old people say “oh, she hasn’t got much longer to live, let her have her fun” which is really quite depressing when you think about it. When you’re young they say “Get rid of the cats and get a man!” which is a bit sad too.

Anyway, when I grow old I want to be like Shirley Maclaine except with cats instead of 12 dogs:

Veteran actress Shirley Maclaine is convinced her pet dog can communicate with her. The Terms Of Endearment star owns 11 other canines but insists her relationship with rat terrier Terry is so unique, pet and owner understand one another. She says, “I talk to her and she answers me. I have serious discussions with her and I’m convinced that on some level she really listens. “She is selective about the questions she answers, though. For instance, she likes the question, ‘What shall we do next in the kitchen?’ Other questions she just thinks are a waste of time.”

Contact Music

Is there an old saying with something along the lines of ‘You aren’t crazy until they answer back’? Although she hasn’t crossed over the line to actually claiming that the terrier speaks, she just communicates.

As soon as I read this two thoughts came to mind. The first was that I suspect Shirley Maclaine lives alone, as in without any human companionship. I was right, although according to Wikipedia she shares a birthday with Barbara Streisand and they celebrate together every year.

The second was that there’s another dog lover in Hollywood that I can really see heading down that path of talking to the animals and generally seeming a bit strange - Denise Richards. Here’s a link to a video of Denise on “The Dog Whisperer”

Note by Celebitchy: Shirley Maclaine published a book in 2003 about her psychic relationship with her dog called “Out on a Leash: Exploring the Nature of Reality and Love.” The first paragraph, available on Amazon.com describes how she knows she’s capable of unconditional love because of the way she relates to her dog in both the serious and playful times. Critics have panned the book as rambling and odd. I found this critique from Publisher’s Weekly particularly humorous:

The latest addition to actress MacLaine’s New Age/autobiography oeuvre (Going Within; My Lucky Stars, etc.) is an excellent example of what can happen when a book exists because of its author’s fame instead of her dedication to the craft of writing. Wandering, incoherent and self-congratulatory, MacLaine’s 10th book will not earn her new fans. The book alternates between MacLaine’s own voice and that of her dog, Terry, with whom the author communicates in “humanimal,” which, she says, is a “purer, more direct form of language” than English. Her devotion to Terry is somewhat unnerving; she calls the pet her “heart” and her “new daughter”; later she explains “I know Terry senses my thoughts” and avers that Terry is “holy.” MacLaine uses Terry’s ‘voice’ to point out what a good actress “Mistress Mother” is, to reveal their past lives together in ancient Egypt, and to articulate the opinions that “we never die” and that “nothing is evil.” In her own voice, MacLaine shares more of her belief system-an apparent combination of Nostradamus’ predictions, Hopi and Mayan prophecies, Edgar Cayce’s channelings, Egyptian mythology and the Bible. Along the way, we get brief glimpses of MacLaine’s life that might have proved interesting if they had been developed (e.g., “I missed a lot in my daughter’s life but I did it to avoid imposing on her”), as well as her disconnected musings on nature, the Iraqi war (”I see signs that we are on the cusp of a new and devastating reality”), and dog and human sex. MacLaine’s books have consistently sold well; no doubt those readers who enjoyed her previous volumes will find Terry’s musings on life fascinating as well.

[Publisher’s Weekly review found on Amazon.com]

Yeah, she’s crazy all right, but at least it’s her own brand of crazy and she’s not a cult member. I agree that you can have like a silent communication with your pets where you know what they want and how they’re feeling. Maclaine takes it a bit too far, though. Maybe that’s something she should keep to herself, but she’s never really hesitated to share her spiritual beliefs with anyone who will listen or buy her books.

Maclaine is shown on 12/11/06 at the Dreamgirls Premiere, thanks to PRPhotos. The inset photo is from the cover to her book.

Nicole Richie seems to have postponed her planned wedding to boyfriend Joel Madden until after their baby is born in January. There were reports that she was going to marry Joel sometime this month, but it seems like they are going to wait as we haven’t heard much more about it.

This weeks’ National Enquirer claims that Nicole’s dad, Lionel Richie, told her to hold off getting married until after she had the baby. He’s also said to have promised to foot the entire bill:

[Nicole Richie’s dad] Lionel Richie keeps advising his fragile princess to postpone the wedding, avoid all the nuptual frenzy and just chill! Said a family insider: “Lionel doesn’t think Nicole can handle the stress, and told her: ‘Baby, in life it’s first things first!’” Knowing Nicole’s vulnerable and worried about delivering a healthy baby, Lionel’s assured her that as Father of The Bride, he’ll spend big bucks for a spectacular wedding whenever she wants it - but right now, he wants her to focus solely on the birth.

[From The National Enquirer, print edition, Mike Walker’s column, November 12, 2007]

Nicole may be waiting to get married on the advice of her family, but she’s still preparing for the ceremony in little ways. Star Magazine reports that Nicole purchased costumes for her little dogs including a tuxedo for her Shih tzu, Honeychild, and a bridesmaid dress for Foxxy Cleopatra, her Pomeranian. That’s kind of cheesy, but it could also be cute:

[Nicole Richie] recently bought a canine tuxedo for her mutt, Honeychild, and a bridesmaid dress for her Pomeranian, Foxxy Cleopatra, from tony Santa Monica pet store The Wagging Tail. She wants the pooches to walk down the aisle with her when she weds her baby daddy.

[From Star Magazine, print edition, November 12, 2007]

Maybe the outfits were for Halloween, but since they could also serve as doggie wedding attire, it does sound like she’s planning for her pets to walk down the aisle with her. At least she has a soft spot for her animals considering how nasty and cold she’s rumored to be. Hopefully she’ll feel that way about her baby, too

Nicole Richie is shown in the header image on 10/30/07 shopping. Thanks to Splash News for this picture. She is seen with Honeychild and Foxxy Cleopatra in images found at Celebrity Dog Blog.

When the news of the Iggy the Dog story first came out, everyone was feeling sorry for weeping Ellen and the two little girls whose newly adopted dog seemed to be so abruptly snatched from them by the owner of the rescue agency from which Ellen adopted the pup. The owner of the Mutts and Moms agency, Marina Baktis, made a visit to the family of Ellen’s hairdresser after they filled out an online application two weeks after Ellen broke her adoption contract by transferring the dog to them. Instead of working with the family to find a solution for how the dog could stay in his new home, Baktis snatched him up, clutching Iggy for over an hour before the cops came and checked his microchip, which still listed her as his owner. Baktis then absconded with the dog and turned him over to yet a different family after the scandal broke. People were outraged that a slavish attention to legalities and red tape could strip a rescued dog from a loving family who wanted him.

The tide gradually turned on Ellen when we all had more perspective on the situation and realized that she had broke the contract her partner Portia signed under which it was stated that they would return the dog to the agency if he didn’t work out. Some people criticized her for openly weeping on television and bringing the whole media in on the situation, saying that she was abusing her celebrity status over a personal legal issue. A story also came out about another dog that Ellen gave away without notifying the original owner after she adopted him, and Howard Stern made the claim on his show that Ellen had regifted an incredible 9 dogs before, although this was never proven.

Now The Smoking Gun has all the e-mails exchanged between Ellen’s partner Porti DiRossi, the agency owner, Marina Baktis, and Ellen’s hairdresser who received the dog, Cheryl Marks. Baktis sounds perfectly reasonable in telling DiRossi and Marks that the dog was given to a new home in violation of the contract. She seemed willing to work with the new family to ensure that their adoption followed protocol:

Hi Cheryl,
We just spoke with Ellen and Portia. Iggy has to be returned to us today. You are more than welcome to fill out our adoption application online or in the store when you bring Iggy back. If all is well, we can proceed with his adoption to you and you will sign the same contract Portia did that states all of our covenants.

Our address is…

To expedite things, please come with your entire family including your dog. We do not adopt dogs to people we have not met.

I understand that you like Iggy, he’s a great little pup but the way things were done was wrong. This is not your fault or mine. Portia signed a legal, binding contract that if she could not keep Iggy that he would be returned to rescue. She violated the contract she signed and broke our trust. We are more than willing to consider you as a home for Iggy but not without meeting you and not without our process being followed.

Sincerely,
Marina
Mutts and Moms

[E-mail from Marina Baktis to Cheryl Marks dated Sunday, October 14, from The Smoking Gun]

Baktis’ actions afterwards don’t jibe with her written willingness to work with the family. Ellen’s hairdresser told TMZ that when Baktis came over she immediately honed in on the dog and didn’t talk to them much at all. I remember reading that the agency required that there be no children in the home under 14, and this family had two pre-teen daughters. Maybe once they filled out the application Baktis realized that they didn’t meet her agency’s stringent requirements and decided to seize Iggy as soon as possible.

Neither party comes across particularly logical or “right” in this case, and although there was a contract and rules it doesn’t seem like a dog should be removed from a good home if someone gives him away like that. Maybe the best solution would have been to tell the family that Iggy was with them on a trial basis. Their daughters were younger than required, but they were 11 and 12, not toddler-aged children who might grab and abuse a pet. You can tell that both sides just want the best for the dog but neither went about it the right way.

You can read all the e-mails between Di Rossi, Marks and Baktis on The Smoking Gun. Thanks to USWeekly for the heads up.

I’ve said a lot of mean things about Paris Hilton. When you work for an entertainment blog, you actually have to sign a contract saying that you’re willing to do that. But of all the mean things I’ve said about her (vapid, bigfoot, herpes haven, etc) I never thought I’d be writing about the heiress’s love of the raccoons. That’s right, Paris loves some ring-tailed goodness.

Paris Hilton can add another talent to her already expanding list of skills such as ‘model’, ‘actress’, ’singer’ and ‘entrepreneur’. It’s ‘raccoon expert’. And it’ll probably be the only legitimate skill she can claim. Paris claims that her raccoon expertise, like the majority of her ‘talents’, is all thanks to her family inheritance. This time thanks to the genes of her dad, Rick Hilton. The 26-year-old explained all by launching into story that was slightly disturbing to hear from a grown woman.

“My dad has a pet raccoon. He found it as a little baby and raised it. If you get to find them when they’re in the nest and still as babies they’ll open their eyes to you at first and they’ll think you’re their mother,” she enthused. But that’s not all, her raccoon knowledge was actually put to use during the making of her new film ‘Repo, A Genetic Opera’, which may be even worse than watching an entire series of ‘The Simple Life’ and about as convincing as her performance in ‘One Night in Paris.’ Director, Darren Lynn Bousman explained: “We had a family of raccoons on the set. We came back from lunch and they were sitting on chairs and on the actual monitors.” And probably doing a better job than the entire cast. “I wanted to hug them but Paris pointed out they had rabies, so I ran away.”

[From Holy Moly]

Paris is known for her irresponsible love of animals. I say irresponsible because she buys and discards them the way you or I might purchase a video game. She has a Kinkajou named Baby Luv, 2 ferrets (no not Brandon Davis, a real ferret), a self-described “big ass cat,” a chinchilla, and more dogs and cats than I can shake a litter box at. There’s even a website called “Tell Paris No!” (like you’d say to a bad dog, I’m assuming) who’s mission is to dissuade the heiress from collecting more exotic animals that she can’t care for. Something tells me we have Rick Hilton to thank for all of this. Just like Paris herself. Thanks, Rick. What other atrocities are you going to inflict on us?

Picture note by Jaybird: Here’s a video of 2 of Paris’s dogs escaping from her menagerie. They had to be rescued by TMZ photographers. Oh indignity of indignities!

I love Ellen DeGeneres: to me she can do no wrong. But it’s starting to look like Ellen has a bit of a history with quick dog turnovers. There’s a story in Page Six today that talks about another dog Ellen re-gifted a few years ago. Additionally, Howard Stern accused Ellen of giving away as many as nine dogs previously. A lot of articles are repeating this accusation, but I haven’t been able to find the transcripts, so I don’t know under what context Stern said this, and what his information is. The particular incident we do have some information about concerns a producer, Kerri Randles, who gave Ellen a mutt named Stormy a few years ago.

ELLEN DeGeneres’ latest doggy dealing wasn’t the first time she’d passed along a pup she’d adopted, says a Los Angeles producer who gave the talk-show queen a pooch she quickly got rid of. Kerri Randles says she gave DeGeneres a male mutt named Stormy two years ago, only to find out less than two months later that fickle Ellen had re-gifted him to a member of her staff. “She may have had it for much less time than that. I only say two months because that’s when I called to check on the dog and found out she no longer had it,” Randles said. “I was totally shocked. I thought she was out of her mind.”

DeGeneres may have passed along several other dogs over the years. Howard Stern said on his Sirius show that he’d heard she had done this nine times before. Viewers were shocked Tuesday when DeGeneres tearfully told her viewers that the Mutts & Moms agency had gone to her hairdresser’s house and confiscated the dog Ellen had adopted from the stylist. Mutts & Moms said she had signed a contract agreeing to return the dog only to the agency if she no longer wanted to care for it. Randles said DeGeneres seemed a perfect pet owner at first, but she quickly discovered the daytime TV hostess was “neurotic and crazy.”

When Randles took Stormy to NBC studios to meet DeGeneres, she was “drilled” for four hours by the star, her assistants and the crew. “Everyone on the show and in her entourage got themselves all involved,” Randles told Page Six’s Marianne Garvey. “They were all coming into the dressing room, playing with the dog as if it were a new extension of Ellen.” DeGeneres finally decided to keep the dog for a few nights to see if he’d fit into her home. She suggested that Randles take the dressing room next door to “tell the dog privately that she’d be going home with Ellen. I told her I’d already had a talk with the dog. She didn’t get my jokes,” said Randles. When she called to check on the pup a few days later, DeGeneres told her she’d decided to keep it. “She acted like she was keeping it for life,” Randles recalled.

[From the New York Post]

I’m probably not the most un-biased person to write this story; I freaking love Ellen. This is obviously only one side of the story. I don’t think it’s ever a good idea to give someone a pet as a present. That’s really something a person needs to make their own decision about. I would guess that someone like Ellen, who’s known for being an intense animal lover, would probably be given animals more than an average person. In terms of the “nine other dogs” she’s supposedly given away over the years, it is possible that people gave her animals as a present, which I’m sure was well-meaning but maybe not practical. Most people can only have so many pets. It would be one thing if Ellen were constantly adopting and discarding dogs on her own account. The story above sounds very weird, and I’m not totally inclined to believe the accuracy of Kerri Randles’s account. But as I said, I’m kind of biased. First off, it sounds like Randles’ gave the dog away in the first place. It doesn’t seem like she adopted the dog specifically for Ellen. So if Ellen did the same thing, who is she to call her out on it?

As someone who worked in a vet clinic and has owned many animals over the years, I can say that certain pets don’t always work out, and sometimes you have to find a new home for them. I’ve seen a lot of cases of a new pet being too aggressive towards an old pet, and have had owners spend hundreds of dollars on behaviorists to no avail. Then a new home is found, and for some reason it’s a better mix and the animal is fine. Sometimes the reasons have to do more with other pets than with the humans. There’s clearly a lot more to this story than just what’s written here. I can’t emphasize enough that I hope this doesn’t turn people off from adopting shelter pets. It’s a wonderful way to save a life and bring some happiness into your home.

Picture note by Jaybird: That’s not really a picture of the dog in question.

The Iggy the Dog scandal has reached critical mass, with news outlets all over the world reporting on the outrageous story of how a little pooch was snatched from a loving family after a minor bureaucratic snafu with the adoption agency. Ellen Degeneres, who gifted the dog to her hairdresser’s family after adopting it from the agency Mutts and Moms, has called for an end to the scandal, and asks us all to please move on.

People are so upset over how the dog was so heartlessly taken from the loving family Ellen transferred him to that they’ve been making death threats to the agency’s owner.

The woman from the agency, Marina Baktis, told the family she was coming over for a house check after they filled out an online application and then immediately grabbed the dog, holding him for two hours until the police came and checked its digital chip to verify that the agency, not the family with who Iggy had been living for two weeks, was the rightful owner.

At that point she fled with the little black dog, the theme song for the wicked witch of the west playing in everyone’s head.

TMZ has a video of the dog-napping and it’s quite damning. The woman is shown turning away from the concerned little girl several times while she clutches the dog. Baktis’ anger at how Ellen flouted rules by transferring ownership must have clouded her judgment and made her oblivious to all the bad PR that was about to be heaped onto her agency.

Baktis has already given the dog to another family, a fact that Ellen says she finds unbelievable and surreal. Still, Ellen says she doesn’t want any more hysteria over it and she’s not going to talk about it anymore unless there’s news that Iggy was returned to his last family. She says we all need to be aware of our rights when adopting pets and insist that they switch the microchips to the new owner’s names.

As JayBird mentioned yesterday, hopefully this won’t discourage people from adopting shelter pets who so badly need loving homes.