A few years ago British starlet Sienna Miller was blonde, yes, and beautiful, also yes, but most famous for being publicly cuckolded by fiancé Jude Law, when he decided to do the nasty with his children's nanny while on location in New Orleans.

A couple of indie rockers and some Welsh actors followed, but Sienna made worldwide gossip headlines in July when she was busted in a relationship with early 90s heartthrob Balthazar Getty. She was 26 and newly broken up with actor Rhys Ifans. He was so married with four kids, the youngest of whom was just a baby.

Henceforth she was known as blonde, beautiful, and a hussy.

Their hanky pankying habits were revealed by my favourite British tabloid, The News of the World, who'd snapped the pair in Los Angeles. Photos later emerged of the couple smooching in Prague weeks previously, when Miller was still with Ifans and Getty had told his wife he was going to Germany to ‘visit his sick mother.'

Ouch. There's got to be some kind of karmic payback for that.

Getty's wife fled LA to Italy with her children - so where did her husband and his new bit decide to go on holiday? You guessed it. After being snapped publicly frolicking on a yacht off Italy's Amalfi Coast, Sienna sans bikini top, (the word ‘canoodling' was used liberally by the gossip press), Balthazar announced that he had separated from his wife several months previously.

Ah, that old chestnut.

Which was news to us all, mostly because none of us had thought much about Balthazar since his pretty boy heyday. It was also news to his wife, fashion designer Rosetta Millington Getty, whose pals swore the couple had never separated, one going as far to tell People magazine that "any implication otherwise is an absolute lie. Balthazar's affair has been utterly devastating to Rosetta and her family."

Reportedly Rosetta Getty's social influence in the LA showbiz and society scene was vast and all-encompassing. Kind of like the Godfather, but prettier and with better clothes. Her friends, amongst them Courteney Cox Arquette, sister-in-law Patricia, Mary-Louise Parker and Grey's Anatomy's Eric Dane and wife Rebecca Gayheart, froze Sienna out of their influential circle, causing worry that Miller may lose work due to her loose approach to love.

Coincidentally Sienna was also unwelcome in London, where she definitely wasn't flavour of the month with Ifans' mates, Kate Moss and her posse, after kicking his lanky ass to the curb.

The girl was called a few choice names - harlot and ho amongst them. ‘Serial Miller' got bandied around a bit, and the long-time classic ‘Sluttienna' seemed particularly apt. And in a move to surprise (and delight!) even the most harderned gossip hounds, someone spray painted the word 'SLUT' on the wall of Sienna's London home.

Six months later the couple has broken up, reunited, and recently rang in the New Year together in Mexico.

 

Baby fever!

July was also a month of babies, babies and more babies in Hollywood. Matthew McConaughey, he of the exposed torso and T-Rex style arms, was awaiting his first-born with model girlfriend Camila Alves. It was beyond exciting waiting to hear what kooky name Matt n' Camila would bestow upon their first born. Matthew's always been rather, er, liberal.

And kooky did run in the family. Just check out the website belonging to Matt's mama, Kay ‘KMac' McConaughey, iamazemyself.com. And consider the son of Matt's brother, Rooster, who bears the moniker Miller Lyte - named after Daddy's favourite beer.

So what was to expect from this sun loving twosome? Reefer? Havaiana? Capirinha? (Matthew's enjoyed a few, and Camila is Brazilian.) Rio de Janeiro? Texas?

The pair went for Levi Alves McConaughey. Some media outlets thought that was a weird name. If only they knew! Bronx Mowgli Wentz was still some months away.

Says the proud daddy at the time: "Levi was another name for the apostle Matthew in The Bible. They were, in fact, two names for the same person. Our son was born at 6:22 pm, and this particular time represents my favourite verse in the book of Matthew in The Bible: 'If thy eye be single, thy whole body will be full of light.'"

In the McConaughey spirit of looking up our birthday bible quotes, I checked out Matthew 17:6, my birthdate, online to see what the disciple decreed for the blessed event of my birth.

"When the disciples heard this, they fell facedown to the ground, terrified."

Coincidence? I think not.

Nicole Kidman and He Of The Thin Lips also had reason to celebrate with the birth of a baby girl, Sunday Rose of the Thin Lips. Okay, Sunday Rose Kidman Urban. Nicole was reportedly at a spin class the day before the baby's birth, prompting people to wonder if she was a) crazy, or b) faking it.

But there was a baby alright, and the new parents brushed aside the joviality had by people when they realized the new bub's moniker was very similar to ‘Sunday Roast.' Not that Nicole would have probably eaten one of those in the last 25 years.

Of course, the biggest baby news of the month, and the year, was the birth of the Jolie-Pitt twins in Nice, France. Twins! Nicole Kidman found herself bested. Brad, Angelina and family had been in France for a couple of months leading up to the twins arrival, and Angie had been admitted to hospital several days previously to prepare for the birth.

A rather overexcited mayor of Nice announced that the birth of Knox Leon and Vivienne Marcheline was ‘a pride for Nice and all its citizens.'

The rights to photos of the newborns later sold for an obscene amount of money, and the babies have never been seen since. I'm yet to see them turn water into wine or cure leprosy, so I'll save my worship for the sassiest of Jolie-Pitt kids and my long-time favourite, Zahara.

July was also the month that Drew Barrymore and that wet-looking guy from Dodgeball, Justin Long, broke up; Uma Thurman got engaged to the ex-fiance of another leggy stunner, Elle Macpherson; and Peaches Geldof dismissed rumours of the medical attention she needed for a reported drug overdose as being for ‘accidentally inhaling hair dye fumes.'

And Jay-Z took the cake - or the fruit platter - that month for an odd request he made while on tour in Nigeria. "One giant watermelon was split in two and ornately carved into a mould of Beyonce's breasts," they report in NW. "Two cherries were used as nipples."