• Last night the White House staff set up a scavenger hunt for Malia and Sasha so they could learn about the history of their new home, and they found a huge surprise at the end.

• When the girls opened the doors at the end of the game, all three Jonas Brothers were waiting to hang out with them. Looks like it's going to be a fun four (eight?!?!?) years for those girls. [E!]
• Ugh, Kelly Rutherford's divorce got really dirty today when her husband accused her (in court documents) of not properly wiping their son's bottom. He also says he tried to potty train their 2-year-old son Hermes, but Rutherford hid the mini-toilet seat, and said it's not "reasonable or appropriate for [Rutherford] to be breast feeding when he is nearly 2 1/2 years old." [TMZ]
• A Veronica Mars movie is in the works! Show creator Rob Thomas says his next project will be writing the script, and he has already decided that it will focus on Veronica's last few weeks of college. Kristen Bell told him she wants to do it and he's been talking to other cast members. [E!]
• Here are some Lost spoilers for the first three episodes, which we will thoughtfully not repost here. And don't forget that Tracie will be liveblogging the premiere tonight! [E!]
• How I Met Your Mother's Josh Radnor and Lipstick Jungle's Lindsay Price revealed that they are a couple last night by attending an inauguration party together. Barack is bringing people together! [E!]
• Though Matt Dillion reportedly said "I screwed up, I know, I know" when a cop stopped him for speeding in December, today he had his lawyer enter a not guilty plea for him at a hearing. [Perez Hilton]
• In their continuing campaign to squash the rumors that their marriage is in trouble, J.Lo and Marc Anthony stared into each others eyes performed a duet at the Western Ball last night in D.C. Marc Anthony said he wrote the song, "She Sang To Me," for Lopez and they kissed at the end. [Perez Hilton]
• Jennifer Aniston and John Mayer had to reschedule her 40th birthday party because they are planning to go on vacation together for Valentine's Day and will be away for her real birthday on February 11. So does this mean her actual birthday party has been rescheduled, or just the double-secret probation wedding ceremony the tabloids insist they are planning for her 40th? [Pop Sugar]
• Sorry dudes ... and ladies. Katy Perry has announced that she has taken a vow of celibacy and won't be kissing anyone. Except of course, for her cat, Kitty Purry. [Just Jared]
• Nominations for the Razzies, the Oscar spoof that "dis-honors" the year's worst movies, are out! The Love Guru is leading with seven nominations for worst picture, and worst acting from Mike Myers, Jessica Alba, Verne Troyer, and Ben Kingsley. But is it worse than Paris Hilton's The Hottie and the Nottie? [USA Today]
• Michael Cera, the only major cast member who hasn't signed on to the Arrested Development movie, says the movie is "more hypothetical than people think" and he'd have to see a script before agreeing to the project. Which they can't write yet because they don't know if he'll be in the movie. We think he's making a huge mistake. [ONTD]
• There are new details about Britney's Circus tour. She rehearses seven hours a day, the stage will be in a 3-ring format, and they are testing some trick called "hide and seek" with Britney. [ONTD]
• Did Sigourney Weaver pull a Sharon Stone when she sat down with the ladies of The View this morning? There's a video, but the area in question has been covered with a star graphic. [TMZ]
• The West Wing's Bradley Whitford and Six Feet Under's Richard Jenkins have been cast in the horror film The Cabin in the Woods, which is co-written by Joss Whedon andCloverfield writer Drew Goddard. Jokes Goddard: "It's really just your basic typecasting: When you need two actors to run through the woods in low-cut nighties, you immediately think of Richard Jenkins and Bradley Whitford." [Entertainment Weekly]
• Evidence that this country is still in a lot of trouble: American Idol got higher ratings than Barack and Michelle's first dance at the Neighborhood Ball last night. [Perez Hilton]
• Victoria Lucas, the 9th grader who "booty bumped" with Barack Obama at the Neighborhood Ball last night, is complimenting the President's moves. "He was just a very smooth, cool, laidback dancer. He was just like a normal person," said Lucas. "You would never think this dude earlier today was sworn in as our next president." [People]
• "There's a peace to [being married] and a sense of togetherness that we just didn't have before. And I didn't even realize it would change as much as it has, but it's so lovely." - Portia de Rossi, who has been married to Ellen DeGeneres for five months. [People]

• Fergie and actor Josh Duhamel are engaged. We hope Fergie didn't wet her pants when he proposed! [People]
  
• Good news for society, bad news for Paris Hilton: Paris' grandfather, Baron Hilton, has decided to give 97% of his $2.3 billion fortune to charity when he dies. [Reuters]
  
• Lindsay Lohan spent Christmas Eve with Adrian Grenier at his Brooklyn apartment, but they're definitely not a couple. [Page Six]
  
• Also, Lindsay's dad called paparazzi photographers to tip them off to his reunion meeting with Lindsay at the Mercer Hotel. Aw, sweet! [Gatecrasher]
  
• Also: Lindsay's ex, Riley Giles, is selling his personal photos of her to the tabs. Again: How sweet! [MSNBC]
  
• Pete Doherty gave Amy Winehouse's husband Blake Fielder-Civil some tips on how to make the best of his prison time. Fielder has also asked Doherty to look out for Winehouse. Oh lord: Not a one of them stands a chance! [The Sun]

• Will Smith: Scientologist? [Page Six]
• Move over, Fergie: I Love New York star Tiffany "New York" Pollard is also engaged: Her future intended is show winner George "Tailor Made" Weisberger... [People]
• ...who is apparently already cheating on her. [Gatecrasher]
• Courtney Love is moving to New York. She bought a townhouse in the West Village. She says on her MySpace blog, "itllcost ...alot...to returjn it to a house biut fbc doesnt need to have all that space til she moves here at 18." [Gothamist]
• But whatever will Courtney fill all that space with after having been robbed yesterday? [Perez Hilton]
• Ah, nevermind: The stolen goods have been returned. [Perez Hilton]
• Britney had to return the kids back to K-Fed after spending Christmas with them. The exchange of progeny took place at a Starbucks, naturally. [Daily Mail]
• Johnny Depp: Too emotionally scarred to ever marry again. [MSNBC]
• Top Chef host / former model/former Mrs. Salman Rushdie Padma Lakshmi dnies that she and "financier" Teddy Forstmann are dating. [Page Six]
• Drew Barrymore and her boyfriend Justin "Mac Guy" Long: Definitely together, united against parking tickets. [Page Six]
• Leonardo DiCaprio and Bar Rafaeli are definitely back together. [Gatecrasher]
• Also a couple: Gossip Girl co-stars Blake "Serena van der Woodsen" Lively and Penn "Dan Humphrey" Badgley. [MSNBC]
• Jennifer Aniston reportedly celebrated Christmas with real-life best Friend Courteney Cox Arquette. [Daily Mail]
• Melanie "Scary Spice" Brown has won the custody battle for her daughter against her ex-husband, Jimmy Gulzar. Which is good, 'cause it's so much more effective when the Spice Girls sing "Mama" in their reunion tour when their very own kids are front and center. [TMZ]

LA Times:

If J.D. Salinger and Jackie Collins had a love child, she would be writing for 'Gossip Girl.' And although the [books on which the series is based] may not have quite captured the lush, almost fetishized fascination of prep school youth seen in 'The Catcher in the Rye,' the television version does...'A Separate Peace' on pheromones for the Information Age, 'Gossip Girl' is eye candy, and mind candy, as pretty as a perfectly prepared martini — one that some nasty, picture-perfect have-it-all may or may not have drugged. Just for the occasion.

NY Times:

It seems preposterous even to type the following sentence: The television version of 'Gossip Girl' on CW tonight does not quite live up to the novels... CW specializes in young-adult television, and certain public-trust habits are hard to break, like enriching spoiled, bratty characters with poignant back stories to make them more sympathetic...That 'Gossip Girl' novels have no underlying moral lesson is exactly the point; the tale of Hansel and Gretel has no redeeming social message either, except perhaps to beware of candy.

USA Today:

All fantasies are not for all people. Take 'Gossip Girl', a praiseworthy example of one of TV's more derided genres: the teen soap....[The show] knows who it's trying to please and what it takes to please them... As is common with teen soaps, the behavior is often more believable than the dialogue and the attitudes. But soap fans will likely be pleasantly surprised by how much 'Gossip' gets right...

Washington Post:

[I]n the CW's delicious new drama series 'Gossip Girl'... Josh Schwartz, who served up the canceled 'O.C.', carries on the legacy of that West Coast soap opera and perhaps turns it up a notch with both drama and sheer teen-soapy goodness... At times, it's overboard and maybe a bit giggle-inducing, like watching little kids play dress-up. But overboard is exactly where 'Gossip Girl' wants to be — and what viewers must embrace when taking the guilty plunge.

Boston Globe:

The CW's 'Gossip Girl' makes 'The O.C.', which debuted in 2003, look like innocent nostalgia... Ah, life was so simple back then....In the parallel world of celebrity, [the characters of 'Gossip Girl'] are Paris Hiltons... And, Lord help me, I loved spending an hour hating them, their pedigrees, and their unlimited credit cards. It was like studying the peculiar mating rituals and shopping habits of the species Manhattanus Elitus.

Chicago Tribune:

Why is 'Gossip Girl' so depressing? [The show] has many of the makings of an escapist soap: rich kids, a snooty private school, a Manhattan setting and lots of melodrama at swanky parties... Yet the first episode of 'Gossip Girl' is strangely deflating. This show posits that teens... live in an environment so competitive that the most ravenous shark might feel a twinge of pity for them. Their parents are unsympathetic and self-absorbed; their friendships exist solely as a means of establishing or reinforcing the pecking order; even the sex on the show — and there's a good amount of sex or near-sex — is either sadly mechanical or imbued with more than a hint of nasty violence.

• Jane Magazine's Brandon Holley got hitched. Like two weeks ago! [Gawker]
  
• Anna Wintour isn't the only one with a grudge against pachyderms: EBay has got it in for them too. [CNN]
  
• Angelina Jolie says she's going on hiatus. Wee! This might mean that more biological "blobs" are on the way! [USAToday]
  
• Veronica Mars dies a quiet death tonight. [NeptuneSite]
  
• The new, no-period birth control pill gets FDA approval; Tambrands weeps. [WSJ]