Who needs a medical examiner when you have Star magazine? While the Broward County coroner is scheduled to make an announcement with the cause of Anna Nicole’s death on Monday morning, Star and National Enquirer (in a “joint newsgathering operation,” because they’re both owned by AMI and Star couldn’t find a celeb scoop with two hands and flashlight) are claiming to have already solved the mystery: Anna died of an overdose of chloral hydrate, a sleeping medication, which she was probably taking in very high doses because she was suffering from a blood infection, which would have eventually killed her not long after the sleeping pills did.

That good enough for ya? Honestly, that’s pretty damn good. So we’ll back up a little and give you some choice quotes from Star’s article.

[J]ust before she left the Bahamas for Florida on February 5 … Anna Nicole received an injection in her left buttock. Tests did not reveal what that substance was. “As she boarded the plane for Miami, Anna Nicole developed a painful abscess at the site of the injection,” said a source with knowledge of the case. “The needle wasn’t sterile. The pain kept getting worse as the abscess got larger and larger very quickly.”

Anna Nicole, unaware that her blood was being poisoned by infection, had also developed a second infection from a virulent form of norovirus, which causes intestinal problems.

Anna Nicole — and her entourage — made a fatal mistake. She refused to go to a hospital, a decision that would have saved her life. Instead, Anna’s people gave her an ice bath to control the fever, administered the antibiotic ciprofloxacin by mouth and gave her an over-the-counter flu medicine. As the needle-caused infection took over her body, she began vomiting, had severe diarrhea and could not urinate.

Anna just wanted some respite from the pain, so she took way too much chloral hydrate (this is the same stuff you see in suspense movies when the bad guy puts a cloth over the victim’s mouth and they pass out — that’s how intense this stuff is). She fell asleep, and never woke up.

Is it true? I’m going with yes. First off, it’s a fairly complex story to have been invented. I mean, a septic abscess? You can’t make that up. You just wouldn’t. There’s nothing glamorous about it. It’s a fantastically plebian way to die. Perhaps most importantly, AMI is so confident they’re right that they pinned both Star and National Enquirer’s name on it. When these mags are not sure, they hedge their bets and have their titles run different stories. So my guess is we’ll hear a very similar story from the mouth of the Broward County coroner on Monday morning, but only time will tell.

Woo hoo! I read, like, three articles about the Anna Nicole Smith saga today. Somebody give me a cookie! It really hurts my head to follow this stuff these days, but this seemed like an intriguing turn of events, so I decided to read up on it.

Anna Nicole loverboy and sometime Ari Gold henchman Larry Birkhead has parted ways with his attorney, Debra Opri, resulting in an eruption of finger-pointing.

“I just had enough,” Opri told Extra. “I can’t represent a client who has a middle man by the name of Howard K. Stern. I feel very comfortable in my decision, and I wish Larry the best. But I am worried about him. I couldn’t continue with the way things were going…I don’t want anyone to think that I’m jumping ship. He’s close enough…I didn’t abandon Larry.”

Larry tells a different story to Access Hollywood (what, the Wall Street Journal wasn’t interested?). “I have chosen to go in a different direction. I have complete confidence in my attorney, Emerick Knowles, who’s handling the Bahamas portion of my case.”

For what it’s worth, TMZ seems fairly confident that Birkhead was the one initiating the split. They’re also being all “we’re such insiders” about it, stating that Birkhead and Opri “were butting heads over various issues for weeks. Because of confidences, TMZ cannot be more specific.”

So what’s up with Larry and Howard K. Stern being all buddy-buddy these days? I thought they hated each other. There’s something very, very strange going on here, and, I’d bet, quite a bit of ass-covering. I’ve heard some very strange rumors these past weeks, the most disturbing (and recurring) of which is that some evidence suggests the real father of Dannielynn is actually Anna’s son, Daniel. Ew and gross.

Having bravely delved into this story in order to bring it to you, I shall now return to the relative safety and simplicity of making easy jokes about how Ryan Seacrest may occasionally enjoy doing sex stuff with men until we get the results of this paternity case.

I haven’t the words.

OJ is now joking around that he’s the dad of little Dannnnielynnnn. Even better? It seems he’s not joking about the fact that he rushed all over Anna’s field.

Documentary filmmaker Norm Pardo — who filmed 70 hours of footage with Simpson from 2000 to 2005 — told the New York Post that Simpson said “he knew Anna Nicole pretty well, and he said he had slow-moving sperm, and he might be the father.”

This story can not get any weirder. When they make the movie in 50 years (Like Seabiscuit) people won’t believe it could have happened on this planet.

Shout it from the rooftops. The murderer banged the bunny.

ANNA NICOLE! WE MISSED YOU!!

Thank goodness we now have a photo of the dress in which you were buried.

Evil aside, I actually kind of like this dress. You know what it reminds me of? That dress Abigail Breslin wore to the Oscars. Wow. That’s weird.