The funniest part of Sarah Palin's new memoir turns out to be the (inexplicable) fact that the 413-page book doesn't have an index.

Much to the consternation of the Washington elite, all of whom having been dying to get their hands on Going Rogue: An American Life to see what she thinks about them, everyone is being forced to thumb through the entire book (black-market copies started circulating last Thursday night, in advance of Tuesday's publication date) to find the pertinent mentions.

Not surprisingly, John McCain's aides come off as the worst offenders in Palin's portrait of her experience on the presidential campaign trail.

She writes about how they stuck her with a $50,000 bill for the cost of her own vetting and, in a particularly compelling passage, how they botched the announcement of her teenage daughter's pregnancy. Palin talks about standing in the bathroom of a hotel room and watching the news about Bristol's pregnancy break on TV.

"I nearly gagged on my toothbrush . . . Oh God, I thought, here we go," she writes explaining she was upset because the campaign accidentally released a statement she had asked to revise.

While some portions of the book are predictable (with attacks on various media outlets), and others verge on tedious (how her upbringing shaped her maverick sensibilities), there are plenty of gems (including one about moose eyeballs) that already have Team McCain seeing red.

One in particular is an anecdote Palin tells about an odd conversation with top McCain aide Steve Schmidt who, she claims, suggested the campaign hire a nutritionist to tend to her. "He launched into a discussion of nutrition philosophy," Palin writes, "holding forth on the importance of carbohydrates to cognitive connections."

McCain aides are already denying the conversation was about Palin's "brain function" capacities. Instead, they say, they were concerned that she was dieting under so much pressure and appeared to be losing too much weight.

Either way, it looks like Palin -- who will appear on Oprah tomorrow -- isn't about to let this 15 minutes pass without settling quite a few scores.

SJP keeping options open

SOUNDS like new mom Sarah Jessica Parker isn't planning to stop at three kids. Speaking about her decision to have twin daughters Loretta and Tabitha (now five months old) via a surrogate, the actress tells the upcoming edition of Elle magazine: "I knew there would be lots of opinions about, 'Well, why didn't you adopt? Why didn't you do this? Why didn't you do that?' and the truth of the matter is, it wasn't one or the other for us," she says. "We had explored, and continue to explore, all options, and this one just happened first. This isn't the period at the end of the sentence."

SJP, who also has a seven-year-old son James with husband Matthew Broderick, says she loves everything about motherhood. Yes, everything. "I love the smell of diapers -- I even like when they're wet and you smell them all warm like a baked good," she gushes.

Asked if she has any fears about her daughters' futures, Parker goes into full Carrie Bradshaw mode when she says she frets that the girls might not be able to enjoy her legendary collection of designer shoes: "The only tragedy would be if their feet are bigger than mine."

Jackson's dad told to beat it

HIS son may have been the King of Pop but Joe Jackson's attempt to fund a celebrity lifestyle with money from the late singer's estate were dashed last week when a court ruled the 81-year-old wasn't entitled to a cent.

Just as Sony Pictures announced that the movie Michael Jackson's This Is It had passed the $200m (€134m) mark at the box office worldwide, the late entertainer's father was pleading with a judge to award him $20,000-a-month in expenses from Michael's estate, a fund that pays Jackson's mother Katherine a monthly allowance of $26,000.

Lawyers for Mr Jackson, who is estranged from his wife, filed papers last week suggesting that the family patriarch was entitled to the "same manner" of support.

Court documents detailed an itemised list of Mr Jackson's monthly expenses which include $1,200 on rent for his Vegas home, $2,500 on eating out, $1,000 on entertainment, and $2,000 on air travel plus $3,000 on hotels.

Noting that Mr Jackson has no legal standing with regards to his son's estate because he was excluded from MJ's will, the judge threw the claim out of court. Mr Jackson's subsequent attempt to discredit the estate executors -- John Branca and John McClain -- was also shot down by a different judge who validated their appointment, with the approval of Katherine Jackson, last Thursday.

Clinton gets

a reality check

TURNS out even the high and mighty have identity issues when it comes to celebrity.

Launching a charity auction last week, comic actor Chevy Chase admitted that people often assume his on-screen persona somehow reflects his real-life personality -- and his skill set.

Recalling how he giddily jumped at an invitation to Camp David from Bill Clinton, Chase admitted he was stunned when, soon after arriving, he realised the former Prez assumed he was a golfer because Clinton was a fan of the 1980 film Caddyshack in which Chase played a golf pro.

When Chase tried to tell Clinton he didn't play golf, the Prez didn't believe him.

Assuming the actor was being modest, Clinton "insisted I was good at golf", and laughed off Chase's attempts "to tell him I'm just an actor".

Clinton wised up after the first tee but, says Chase, he was a good sport and "ended up having to show me how to hold the club".

- Orla Healy

Sunday Independent