It’s not often that we see something as odd as a celebrity staircase up for auction on eBay. Indeed, Celine Dion’s golden spiral staircase can be yours — but it wasn’t ripped out of her home. This is essentially a glorified prop that was used during her tenure at Ceasar’s Palace in Las Vegas from 2003-2007. The listing says “this particular model is unique in that it was designed and fabricated as per Celine Dion’s specifications.” Apparently, total cost for the conception, steel fabrication and mechanical movement of the stairs was over $25K.

Proceeds from the auction, which ends today at 9PM EST, will benefit The Fondation des Gouverneurs de l’Espoir — a charity helping kids and their family affected by cancer, throughout a wide variety of activities. The highest current bid is just over $10K — but you can expect the shipping costs on something weighing 4,500 pounds to add to this.

Still, nothing like installing this on your roof and climbing to the top to sing your best rendition of “My Heart Will Go On”. To place a bid, jump here.

First Celine Dion, now Tommy Lee Jones?

A list of the biggest water consumers in San Antonio, Texas has been released and Mr. Jones has been ranked as the eighth-largest user in the city. Over the last seven months, the No Country For Old Men star has averaged 128,139 gallons per month! To put that in perspective, Celine Dion is now down to only 14,000 gallons per month (compared to the 1.6 million during a busted pipe).

What’s worse is that San Antone residents are on year-round water restrictions. According to TMZ, average home owners in the area only use consume between 8-9K per month. What the hell is Tommy watering?!

Apparently, Mr. Jones can expect a visit from authorities regarding his water use — and how he might manage things more efficiently. We just hope the guy saves some for everyone else.

Celine Dion would like you to know that she’s no water hog. Last month, it was revealed that her new estate down in Florida went through a whopping 6.5 million gallons of water between April 2007 and March 2008. Total bill? $36,000 — but the damage was considered even greater because of the state’s drought woes.

And she doesn’t even live there yet.

“Except for a few new trees that need heavy watering, barely any landscaping was done during that time,” said the Canadian star’s local lawyer, Michael Weeks, told Page2.1. “Something went wrong.”

Turns out, he’s right. Kind of.

A water main was broken under the property in May 2007 when construction crews were tearing down the previous home. Not until a few weeks later did anyone notice that the water bill had risen to $8,986 — due to an output of 1.6 million gallons! With that fixed, things gradually returned to normal.

Celine’s water bill in March of 2008? A little over $200 — considered one of the lowest in her area.

But we’re still a little suspect over water use unrelated to the apparent pipe breakage. If you take a look at her bill here, you’ll notice that her property was consuming almost a million gallons per month in both March and July. Well before and well after things went wrong. We understand plants need a good deal of moisture to get started, but we still agree with the Sierra Club’s Drew Martin who said, “‘If someone like Celine Dion planted natural plants and used ‘zeroscaping,’ then she probably wouldn’t need to use so much water.”

But hey — going forward, perhaps we’ll see greater care by the superstar (and those around her) in protecting such a precious natural resource. We’ll err on the side of optimism until the next bill is revealed.

via Page2.1

Paris is back on the blog once again, this time after being denied the purchase of a puppy in a Beverly Hills pet shop. The story starts on the way to a photo shoot when Paris decided she wanted to pose with a baby canine to make the picture look “cuter.” So, like how normal people stop at the gas station for a soda, Paris swung by The Puppy Store on Melrose to get herself a brand new baby yorkie. However, a wise employee quickly denied her the sale after realizing it was “clearly an impulse buy.” Well no one puts Paris in the corner! Apparently. Paris through a hissy fit and one “spy” in the shop says ”She started screaming, ‘I love my puppies! I want my baby!’” What the?

See, I don’t think Paris is a mean person. I’m sure she does love her dogs…but more like how a little child loves their new toy or how Celine Dion loves a new pair of shoes.  Taking care of a pet is a HUGE responsibility and since she already has about 4,503,232,112,317,239 animals I’m willing to bet that she can’t give each one the attention they deserve. 

So big ups to that employee over at The Puppy Store. I mean, true I’m pretty against stores like that, but it’s comforting to see that some of the employees really do have a solid stake in the well-being of their animals. And Paris…seriously…STOP BUYING PUPPIES!!!! 

thanks: film.com

Celine Dion really confessed that she is totally obsessed with shoes! Celine said, “My hobbies are shopping and golfing. I own between two and three thousand pairs of shoes.” That means that her closet (and/or closets) consists of like 6,000 individual shoes. WHAT???

That’s cool if you like shoes — I get it! But no single person needs that much of anything. If I was Celine I would go to Soles4Souls.org and join actors like Jessica Alba, Scarlett Johansson and Don Cheadle who have all donated some of their own footwear. 

Seriously Celine, you won’t wear like 75 percent of those!

The similarities are remarkable!

Researchers at the New England Historic Genealogical Society have discovered that actor and humanitarian Brad Pitt is actually related to Barack Obama. CREEPY! According to the society, Pitt and Obama are ninth cousins, linked by a man named Edwin Hickman who died in 1769 in Virginia.Then just when it couldn’t get stranger…it did! It was further revealed that Pitt’s long-term partner Angelina Jolie is also ninth cousins to another famous Democratic candidate… Hillary Clinton. What the Mr. and Mrs. Smith is going on? Jolie is connected to Clinton through Jean Cusson, who died in Quebec, Canada, in 1718.

The study also found Obama is related to British World War II Prime Minister Winston Churchill and US Vice President Dick Cheney, while Clinton has links to Madonna, Celine Dion and Alanis Morissette.

Now I don’t know a lot about genetics, but isn’t this strange to anyone else? The only famous person I’m related to is some guy who made the local paper in the 1800’s after getting hit by a train. Maybe that’s why I’M not running for president or saving New Orleans. Oh well.

thanks: femalefirst.co.uk

This past week, Celine Dion spent some quality time with 7-year-old son Rene, and 700-year-old husband Rene (not a typo), visiting an African’s Children Feeding Scheme center in Soweto, South Africa.

The ACFS helps to provide meals for poor, orphaned and abandoned kids living throughout South Africa, and Celine did her part by rolling up her sleeves (do Canadians wear sleeves? I joke) and dishing up some hot chow. The town thanked Celine for her visit with many happy faces and “traditional Zulu beadwork” (as opposed to non-traditional Zulu beadwork, I guess).

Ps-Did you know that Celine is the highest-selling female artist in South Africa? That’s crazy to me. I mean, even if you gave me a multiple choice test and the other possibilities were like Marilyn Manson, Fergie and Heidi Montag, I still wouldn’t have picked her…but I’m a poor test taker. Anyway, thanks Celine for pounding that chest and feeding the world one high note at a time.

via: pagesix.com

Paris Mayor, Bertrand Delanoe, and French singer and actress, Vanessa Paradis, were on site at the annual lighting of the trees which kicks off the holidays and has been a Paris tradition for 26 years.  However this year marks a new tradition: energy efficient light bulbs.  As you walk the path between the Arc de Triomphe and the Place de la Concorde you will notice that all one million bulbs are completely energy-efficient. They’ve estimated that it will provide eight times the shine and cut the bill by 70 percent.  As Ecorazzi reported earlier, NYC has also decided to green it up this holiday season with the lighting of the tree at Rockefeller Center, where celebrities such as Carrie Underwood and Celion Dion performed.

Dear France,

Thank you for kickin ass this holiday season and going green for the good of us all.

-Parrish

ps. Also, thank you for the Statue Of Liberty.  

Called the “first ever ‘green’ Christmas tree”, this year’s tree at Rockefeller Center will be draped with 30,000 light-emitting diodes- a five-mile strand of starry lights that will not only illuminate New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg believes will “inspire private-sector creativity” and allow the tree’s 500,000 daily visitors to “dream of a ‘green’ Christmas”.

While the 2007 Rockefeller Tree Lighting Ceremony isn’t until Wednesday, November 28th at 7 p.m., some lucky passersby have already spotted Carrie Underwood and her backup (ice) dancers practicing (or pre-taping?) her holiday performance.

Kelli Shields is a community outreach organizer with the Center for Biological Diversity.