Even though we have no ------ clue what Memorial Day really means!!
There will be a scale at the front door. No girls over 100 pounds allowed in. Start starving yourself now. See you all then!!!"


Richie's publicist quickly released a statement to press: "This invitation was sent via e-mail to her friends who understand that she was responding in a joking manner to the constant untruths printed about her in the media. Her reference to Memorial Day was in no way meant to offend anyone but was simply an expression of her distaste for the current situation."

Got that?

Mischa Barton, 21, has never actually appeared on an MTV Movie Awards show. But she did appear in James Blunt's video message on the MTV Europe Music Awards in 2005. Sunday's show would have been a smart career-booster for an actress desperately trying to get a movie -- any movie -- career going. All she's been doing lately is signing sneakers in London and New York stores, part of her Keds endorsement gig.

But Barton, a guest at Richie's Memorial Day party, has problems too. She wound up in the emergency room at Sherman Oaks Hospital last weekend for a reported violent reaction to antibiotics and alcohol according the Associated Press and other press accounts.

Luckily -- and ironically -- no one else at the party -- including Paris Hilton -- had to be rushed to the hospital. So we can rule out food poisoning. Not that Nicole had bothered to stock up on party vittles. Mischa and Nicole were seen shopping at Ralph's Sunday afternoon. Click here to see pictures.

Visible in their cart are two purposefully covered bags (They kept the bags covered while Mischa loaded them into the car. Who does that? ) Was it beer? Quite visible are two medium-sized bags of charcoal. Let this be a lesson: never put scrawny chicks in charge of party noshes. No cheese, chips or salsa? No weiners, burgers or potato salad? What are these girls, air plants?

So if it wasn't food poisoning, what else could it have been? The New York Daily News reports that Barton's publicist insists that her celeb client was not, I repeat, NOT among the Memorial Day party-goers said to be munching on magic mushrooms. The paper quotes a source claiming she spent half an hour in the bathroom at the party before being taken by ambulance to the Sherman Oaks hospital. A defense could be that the fungi might have been the only food served at the party. But could the reax have been due to shrooms on an empty stomach?

"That's what everyone is wondering," confided a source at a freebie suite yesterday. Another babe working a swag booth at the Silver Spoon Buffet, added. "Mischa's always bumping into things," for whatever that's worth.

Full disclosure: I drank a cup of mushroom tea at Mrs. Brown's on a Jamaican vacation back in 1989. Seemed harmless at the time. It was tea, for crying out loud. Terrible- tasting tea at that. In 20 minutes, I barfed my brains out and spent the day curled in a fetal position in my hotel room watching the drapes turn into frothing dragons.

However, I think I speak for hundreds, perhaps thousands of people who have frequently mixed alcohol and antibiotics and have never gotten sick. Hey, I'm just saying.

The former "O.C." starlet will not attend the MTV show Sunday. Mischa's winging her way to Russia to start filming a movie which has been labeled by the press as an "as-yet-unnamed project." In fact, it's so as-yet-unnamed that it's not listed on IMDb.com, which catalogs all potential film projects, even those in pre-pre-pre-production. The only film listed for Barton is "Malice in Sunderland," which starts filming in England in October. Hmmm. Curiouser and curiouser.

Setting the tone for this MIA weekend, there were no problem-prone Party Girls at Wednesday night's Diesel boutique opening on Melrose Place, where the best-known blonde was Brittany Snow and Paris' pal Kim Kardashian became the night's most photographed babe.

Hollywood's Bad Girls were also noticeably absent from one of their usual shopping haunts, this week's Silver Spoon MTV Movie Awards Gifting Suite. With no scandalous celebs to bestow gifts on, less-stellar celebs benefited big-time. Paris' pal Caroline D'Amore and good girl Haylie Duff were loaded up with more loot than they could lug.

On Thursday, Ashley Scott -- an actress best known for dating Ashton Kutcher before Demi Moore robbed his cradle -- and Anne Heche -- best known for then-dating Ellen DeGeneres and now dumping her husband Corey Laffoon for her "Men in Trees" co-star -- raked in the goodies at Kari Feinstein's MTV Movie Awards Style Lounge. Jessica Alba -- an actual working actress without the stench of scandal about her -- was so loaded down with free stuff -- including duds from Scarlett Johansson's new Reebok sportswear line -- that one partygoer said "she needed a Sherpa to carry it and a truck to get it home."

The only big names at the Platinum Gifting Suites in the Meridian Hotel on Wednesday were Jennifer Lopez's ex-hubby Cris Judd, Jason Davis and Barton's former "O.C" squeeze Benjamin McKenzie. "It was like scraping the bottom of the celebrity barrel," reported a witness to the event. Thankfully "Heroes" hottie Hayden Panettiere and "Borat" star Ken Davitian showed up Thursday.

One longtime swag suite observer who witnessed the diminished star power resulting from the Memorial Day Meltdown moaned, "Those poor vendors who paid through the nose to get a spot in these MTV Movie Awards swag suites and rub elbows with stars must be ready to open a vein."

-- Additional reporting by Samantha Bonar