Pappy Days
Bryce Howard, 9 weeks old, is "absolutely thrilling" to pop Ron Howard, 27, once a child star as Opie of The Andy Griffith Show and now a child father. In fact, fatherhood is a bit of a trend among the old Happy Days crowd—Henry Winkler's daughter, Zoe, is now 7 months old—but paternity does have a way of killing the conversation. Whenever the new daddies get together, says Ron, "We find ourselves discussing the merits of Pampers versus Huggies."
A Fine Romance
Alan Arkin can nod sympathetically over pal Carol Burnett's recent troubles with the rag trade—he himself was once the victim of an armchair adventure in several tabloids at once. "About three years ago," he remembers, "I followed with great interest accounts of my romance with Liza Minnelli. Then finally I found out that she had dropped me for Burt Reynolds and I was saddened. The best part of all," added Arkin, married for over 16 years to dishy writer-actress Barbara Dana, "was that we'd never met."
Lumpen Proletariat
In a new book on dressing for success, Working Wardrobe by Janet Wallach, Republican Congresswoman Millicent Fenwick reveals that there's a loaf of bread inside the red leather briefcase she brings to Washington from New Jersey every Sunday night. Besides the usual reports and files, there's also a box of No. 8 Ronzoni spaghetti, "for my dinner every night." Fine, but does she ever reach in for a state paper and come up with pasta? "No," says the impressively organized Fenwick, "the bag is lumpy, so I know which side to go for."
Panic in Trailer Park
The Hollywood drug flap is making a lot of people nervous. Among the little-noticed nail biters are celeb moms. The mother of clean-liver Bill Devane became alarmed when she read that an unnamed actor had rented out his motor home for cocaine instead of money. Mom got right on the horn. Explains Bill: "I own a motor home that I rent to studios when I work. So my mother calls up and wants to know if I rent it for cash!"
Band Box
"It's so preppy it's unbelievable," White House Deputy Chief of Staff Mike Deaver is quoted as saying of Vice-President George Bush's habit of changing his gaily striped watchbands to match his suits. "We've all started buying him watchbands and handing them to him as we pass him in the hallways," grins Deaver. The Veep is apparently amused at jokes about his WASPish ways and has an answer for his hecklers. "If only," he says, "you would forget that one slip of the swearing-in, when I placed my right hand on the Bible and my left hand on the Preppy Handbook."
Furthermore
•He's been Army Secretary, Gerald Ford's campaign director and a Colorado Senate hopeful. Running on an anti-ERA platform, he lost in the GOP primary to Mary Estill Buchanan. Still, Howard "Bo" Callaway hasn't changed his stripes. Shown to a luncheon table in a downtown Denver restaurant, Callaway looked around and harrumphed to his (male) companion: "There's nothing but women back here!" He immediately summoned the hostess for a change of place.
•British singer Lynsey de Paul has this to say, among other things, about her drift away from lover James Coburn: "James always tells me he misses me, but he says he can't live in England because he has arthritis."
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