Get it? It's subtle but try to follow along.

Simpson is engaged to former 49ers tight end Eric Johnson.

RIHANNA AND CHRIS BROWN GO PUBLIC: For the first time in years, Chris Brown and Rihanna arrived at a public event together. They sat together and were semi-cuddily at Tuesday's Los Angeles Lakers-New York Knicks game in L.A.

The two arrived to Staples Center in the same car but got out of the vehicle separately, according to TMZ. This is important news you need to know.

The pair eventually met inside and sat down together in their courtside seats.

The pair hasn't officially announced that they're back together but have shared enough Twitter pictures and other evidence to convince us they're not just friends. As you know, Brown is still on probation after pleading guilty to assaulting Rihanna in 2009. Apparently, she's moved past it.

JANET JACKSON ENGAGED: Janet Jackson is engaged.

A source told Us Weekly that Qatari billionaire Wissam Al Mana "gave her a huge, expensive ring" earlier this year.

The source said, "She's afraid it will get lost, so she keeps it locked up."

Maybe she's afraid LaToya will try to hock it.

The luxury-brand mogul, 37, will spare no expense on his nuptials to Jackson, said to be set for spring in Qatar.

The affair "will cost millions," a Jackson insider revealed. "He is flying in all of Janet's friends and family on private jets."

He might need a 747. That's a lot of Jacksons.

Added the source, "He wants to get a top chef to create a custom menu."

Good idea. Nobody wants Qatari Taco Bell at a wedding.

BIEBER AND GOMEZ BEING FRIENDLY AGAIN: Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez are, like, totally making out in public and stuff.

OMG.

Sure, we all have been on the edge of our seats trying to figure out if these adorable kids are still together. And the latest good news is: yes. At least if playing tonsil hockey in Salt Lake City counts.

According to TMZ, the Biebs and the former "Wizards of Waverly Place" star were spotted canoodling and kissing in the airport in Salt Lake City, with Gomez sitting on Bieber's lap at one point and cuddling him.

Thank goodness. Some of us haven't got a full night's sleep since we heard their relationship was on the rocks.

Bieber and Gomez have been spending quite a bit of time together recently including hopping on a jet together in Van Nuys, Calif., on Wednesday. Since they supposedly broke up in November, it seems like they've been making up and breaking up almost every week.

SINGER SURVIVES MOTORCYCLE CRASH: "Big Time Rush" star Logan Henderson was in a nasty motorcycle wreck last week and might have been saved by his jacket, according to TMZ.

Sources told the website the Nickelodeon boy bander was cruising through the Hollywood and Vine intersection on his way to the studio when a car turned right in front of him.

Henderson swerved at the last second to avoid an accident and was violently tossed off his bike in the process.

Remarkably, he was able to stand afterward. The poor dear was scraped and bruised from bouncing across the pavement. But he emerged in better shape than one might expect, thanks in part to his Marc Jacobs jacket, which he says saved his back from becoming a mangled mess.

Sounds like an endorsement deal in the making ... not that anyone in Hollywood would milk a near-disaster for cash.

Henderson was OK, but his bike didn't fare as well. It's in the shop for the foreseeable future.

Contact Tony Hicks at thicks@bayareanewsgroup.com or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/BayAreaNewsGroup.TonyHicks.

DECEMBER 27 IN HISTORY

Thursday is Dec. 27, the 362nd day of 2012. There are four days left in the year.

1512: King Ferdinand II issued the original Laws of Burgos, which were intended to regulate the treatment of indigenous people on Hispaniola by Spanish settlers.

1831: Naturalist Charles Darwin set out on a round-the-world voyage aboard the HMS Beagle.

1904: James Barrie's play "Peter Pan: The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up" opened at the Duke of York's Theater in London.

1927: The musical play "Show Boat," with music by Jerome Kern and libretto by Oscar Hammerstein II, opened at the Ziegfeld Theater in New York.

1932: New York City's Radio City Music Hall opened to the public in midtown Manhattan. (Opening night, consisting of several hours of live acts, was considered a disaster, prompting the owners to shift to a format of showing a movie followed by a stage show.)

1945: 28 nations signed an agreement creating the World Bank.

1947: The original version of the puppet character Howdy Doody made its TV debut on NBC's "Puppet Playhouse."

1949: Queen Juliana of the Netherlands signed an act recognizing Indonesia's sovereignty after more than three centuries of Dutch rule.

1968: Apollo 8 and its three astronauts made a safe, nighttime splashdown in the Pacific.

1970: The musical play "Hello, Dolly!" closed on Broadway after a run of 2,844 performances.

1979: Soviet forces seized control of Afghanistan. President Hafizullah Amin, who was overthrown and executed, was replaced by Babrak Karmal.

1985: Palestinian guerrillas opened fire inside the Rome and Vienna airports; 19 victims were killed, plus four attackers who were slain by police and security personnel.

-- American naturalist Dian Fossey, 53, who had studied gorillas in the wild in Rwanda, was found hacked to death.

2002: A defiant North Korea ordered U.N. nuclear inspectors to leave the country and said it would restart a laboratory capable of producing plutonium for nuclear weapons. But the U.N. nuclear watchdog said its inspectors were "staying put" for the time being.

-- A suicide truck-bomb attack destroyed the headquarters of Chechnya's Moscow-backed government, killing 72 people.

-- Clonaid, a company founded by a religious sect that believes in space aliens, announced it had produced the world's first cloned baby, a claim subsequently dismissed by scientists for lack of proof.

2007: Opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated during a suicide bomb attack in Pakistan following a campaign rally.

-- Kenya held an election pitting incumbent president Mwai Kibaki against opposition candidate Raila Odinga, both candidates ended up claiming victory in a vote that observers said was seriously flawed. (Kenya was racked by weeks of ethnic violence; Kibaki and Odinga ended up forming a coalition government.)

2011: Tens of thousands of defiant Syrian protesters thronged the streets of Homs, calling for the execution of President Bashar Assad shortly after his army pulled its tanks back and allowed Arab League monitors in for the first time to the city at the heart of the anti-government uprising.

-- Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, a conservative Democrat, said he would retire from the Senate rather than seek a third term.

-- Abstract expressionist painter Helen Frankenthaler, 83, known for her bold, lyrical use of color, died in Darien, Conn.

BIRTHDAYS

Rockabilly musician Scotty Moore (81), actor John Amos (73), ABC News correspondent Cokie Roberts (69), rock musician Mick Jones (Foreigner) (68), actor Gerard Depardieu (64), rock musician David Knopfler (Dire Straits) (60), journalist-turned-politician Arthur Kent (59), actress Maryam D'Abo (52), former professional wrestler and actor Bill Goldberg (46), rock singer Hayley Williams (Paramore) (24).

Associated Press