A Starr-Crossed, Scary Sort of Year

Will the Real 1998 Please Stand Up?: Depending on which magazine you believe, 1998 was either the “year of living dangerously” (Time), “the year of living fearfully” (Newsweek), “one sexy year” (Us), “the year of the butt” (Rolling Stone, based on the fact that Ellen DeGeneres, Marilyn Manson and actress Rose McGowan all bared their behinds in public) or “the worst year ever--the scrapping, brawling, mauling, Starr-crossed, fluid-stained year that was!” (Esquire).

Gift Exchange Bureau: If you need a trade-in for unwanted Christmas presents, visit https://www.ship-of-fools.com and check out their bazaar of bizarre religious gadgets, such as the $25 Holy Family wristwatch, which has the images of Jesus, Mary and Joseph on its face, but no numbers--so when somebody asks you the time, you can reply: “Oh, it’s quarter to Mary” or “It’s half past Jesus.”

Other items include a Jesus paddle ball set--with Nativity scenes on each paddle--and small plots of land in Galilee. How small? According to Ship of Fools, each $40 parcel measures a mere 1 square inch, so “if you travel to Israel to stand on your own exclusive piece of God’s country, pack a pogo stick.”

From the Mouths of Boobs: the latest celebrity wisdom.

* “I myself have learned the value of spinach from Popeye the sailor man” (Fidel Castro, quoted in the New York Times).

* “We’re looking for somebody that likes to shoot at cars” (a Nevada sheriff’s sergeant, discussing the manhunt for a freeway sniper who shot four vehicles).

* “Leonardo DiCaprio is an androgynous wimp” (Sen. John McCain, quoted in George magazine).

Millennium Gong Show: A giant, 33-ton “World Peace Bell” is being built in Kentucky to ring in 2000. Commencing at 6 a.m. Dec. 31, the jumbo bell will chime once an hour in the small town of Newport, Ky.

Trial-of-the-Century Surplus Alert: Our favorite soulless media windbag, Alan Dershowitz, recently predicted that the impeachment trial of President Clinton would “truly be the trial of the century.” That prompted Chicago columnist Zay N. Smith to quip: “What we would seem to need now is a statute limiting trials of the century to one per decade.”

Loquacious Business Paraphernalia: Talking business cards will debut at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. The chatty cards cost about $10 each and can hold up to 20 seconds of sound, according to their inventor. One suggested use is for aspiring singers to trill a few verses into the card and then hand them out to agents or club owners.

Another is for media pundits to preserve their vocal cords by recording the phrase: “This will be the trial of the century.”

Best Supermarket Tabloid Headline: “Man Suffocates in New Bride’s 62-Inch Bosom, Say California Authorities! He Died With a Smile on His Face” (Weekly World News)

Roy Rivenburg’s e-mail address is roy.rivenburg@latimes.com. Unpaid Informants: Peter Carlson of the Washington Post, Valerie Marz, Eric Metaxas, Chicago Sun-Times, Wireless Flash News Service. Off-Kilter runs Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays during 1999, a.k.a. the year after the year of the butt.