Karl Malden passed away today at the very ripe old age of 97.

Best known for his television role on The Streets of San Francisco – one of my all-time favorites as a kid – Malden also appeared in Streetcar Named Desire, On the Waterfront, and How the West Was Won.

In my personal estimation, his most admirable accomplishment is that he is survived by his wife of 71 years.  You read that right:  71 years.

Prayers and positive thoughts go out to the entire Malden family.

“For me, rebelling is done with words.  I love to write honest songs that name real people, then get up onstage and live out those emotions in front of 15,000 people. Penciling in a night to get wasted is not something I want to do.”

Taylor Swift, speaking in the upcoming issue of Glamour and basically ensuring that she never has another date.

I don’t know if everyone will remember Karen Mulder but in the early nineties (bottom picture) she was a pretty well-known (super?)model who did a lot of runway and Victoria’s Secret print work.  In the late part of that decade, she suffered from some serious mental issues in which she accused her father of sexually molesting her and Prince Albert of Monaco of using her as a sex slave.  She was admitted to a mental health clinic for several months, emerged, and recanted most of her earlier allegations.

I don’t really know what she’s been up to for the past ten years — the shelf life of a model is about the same as for a head of cabbage — but apparently one thing that’s been filling her days is plastic surgery.  Mulder was arrested on Monday for repeated verbal telephone assaults she allegedly made towards her plastic surgeon.  The model wanted an “unnamed procedure” (AKA boob job regret) reversed, but the female doctor refused her requests.  According to police, Karen’s calls became increasingly threatening in nature.

Karen, Karen, Karen.  You cannot go around threatening your surgeon because she didn’t remodel your deviated septum to your liking.  And by “deviated septum” I mean “D cups.”  But, if you insist on being some sort of crazy stalker, hot mess type, could you please throw a threat or two in the direction of Kellie Pickler’s doc?

Michael Jackson’s will was filed and there weren’t too many surprises.  One thing that was unexpected is that Jackson named Diana Ross as the guardian of his children if his mother Katherine was unable to fulfill the obligation.

Ross seems like such an odd choice considering her age (65), as well as her documented struggle with alcohol addiction.  Well, it would be an odd choice except for the fact that Michael Jackson was the decision maker.  Therefore, it really was to be expected.

In other oddities, he claimed that his estate was worth $500,000,000.  I’m assuming this number is pre-numerous lawsuits that have been pending against him.

Let’s hope that his kids can get settled and he can rest in peace.  Though, like Elvis, I suspect that’s never going to happen.

This is Courtney Love sleeping on walking down the streets of New York City yesterday.  Can someone please intervene on this woman’s behalf before we have another Michael Jackson on our hands?  Let’s not get to the point where she’s just dead and then every family member, friend, and aide around her tells the media that they knew this day would come. 

And if you think I’m overstating things, watch this little TMZ clip from a couple weeks ago.  Love shares the contents of her purse — syringes and pills! — and explains that she’s a Samurai.  Yeah, that sounds sober.

I didn’t even see this coming, but I think Lindsay Lohan is going to try her hand at stand-up comedy.  I was under the misguided impression that she was a dramatic actress, but then I read what she said in an interview to Britain’s OK Magazine:

It’s not that hard to be me, but I do work harder than most of my friends’ parents. I am the hardest-working person I know. I’m a workaholic. I don’t know what to do when I’m not working. I get creatively frustrated

I prefer to be making films. For most people - and for me, too - there’s something about going to the movies. It’s about being able to transform into different people and tell different stories. You can go to the movies if you’re depressed, and you can walk out later laughing. The fact that going into a theatre for two hours can do that is an amazing feeling.

To be the person who’s on that screen, who can make someone feel better, or bring out more emotion in someone, makes me feel really blessed that I’m able to do that. It’s just about finding the right roles, but when the time is right, they will come.

Lindsay doesn’t know what to do when she’s not working?  Sure she does!  Piles of coke are work, too!  And if there was a way that I could reach out to Linds, I would let her know that I, without a doubt, leave the theater laughing every time I go to a movie that she’s in.  Hysterical.  Hyena-like.  Laughter.

I expected Jackson album sales to be exceptionally high this week, but I had no idea just how staggering the numbers would be: Based on preliminary sales numbers from Nielsen SoundScan, the top nine positions on Billboard’s Top Pop Catalog Albums chart will house Jackson-related titles when the tally is released in the early morning on Wednesday. Remember, too, that SoundScan’s tracking ends on a Sunday — just three days after Michael’s death. These numbers will be even bigger for the coming week.

“Number Ones” will fittingly lead the pack at No. 1 with sales of 108,000 (an increase of 2,340 percent) while “The Essential Michael Jackson” and “Thriller” are in the second and third slots with 102,000 and 101,000, respectively. Last week “Number Ones” was the only Jackson title on the chart, at No. 20 with 4,000 copies; both “Essential” and “Thriller” re-enter the tally this week.

Additionally, his classic 1979 studio set “Off the Wall” re-enters at No. 4 with 33,000 while his 1987 album “Bad” returns at No. 6 with 17,000. At No. 5, the Jackson 5’s “The Ultimate Collection” debuts with 18,000. Jackson’s fourth studio album for Epic Records, 1991’s “Dangerous,” re-enters at No. 7 with 14,000, and his 2001 compilation, “Greatest Hits: HIStory — Volume 1,” returns to the list at No. 8 with 12,000. Finally, Jackson’s 2004 box set, “The Ultimate Collection,” charts its first week on the Pop Catalog chart, arriving at No. 9 with 11,000.

The lone non-Jackson-related set in the top 10 is a reissue of the “Woodstock” movie soundtrack, which bows at No. 10 with 8,000.

Oh, and BET Awards on Sunday — a last-minute Jackson tribute — brought in over 10M viewers. That’s even higher than the Jon & Kate season five premiere, and will probably wind up being the most-watched show in the network’s history. An estimated 10% of televisions that were on at that time were tuned to the ceremony.

Meanwhile, Michael’s will is expected to be filed in probate court very soon, but details are already starting to leak out: He left custody of his three children to his mother, Katherine, and the remainder of his assets be put in a private trust. His father, Joe Jackson, was not specifically excluded from the will, as had been rumored earlier.