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WHERE'S MARTHA?: It's one of the year's prime Martha Stewart times, yet the lifestyle guru is either conspicuously absent from or keeping a low profile in some of her usual pulpits.

Stewart's traditional Christmas TV special has been canceled, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reports.

Kmart, which had troubles of its own before Martha put her twist on stocking and stuffing, is using Stewart's voice but not her face in TV ads for her holiday collection.

A press release for Martha Stewart Everyday Holiday, her new line of holiday decorations, comes with a picture of seven young people identified as the line's designers. But not a Martha to be seen.

And the cover of her new book, Martha Stewart Living Annual Recipes 2003, doesn't have a picture of her, unlike the 2002 version, the New York Post says. (Stewart's spokesperson told the Post that the decisionmakers decided to go without her mug shot before it was known that she also could end up with one in the prison system.)

IN CASE YOU WERE WONDERING: Stewart's Kmart offerings include 1,000 new items in seven themes: Golden Luster, Christmas Favorites, Classic Christmas, Gumdrops & Candy Canes, Woodland Holiday, Winter Blossoms and First Snowfall. But not Tinsel Time in the Big House.

AND NOT TO PICK ON MARTHA, BUT . . . : She's launching a new magazine, Everyday Food, which becomes the first mag from her empire to not have her name in the title, the Post says.

MAYBE HE SHOULDN'T READ THE REST OF THE TRANSLATION: Michael Moore is very happy that his latest book, Stupid White Men, has been a bestseller around the world as well as in the United States. But, the San Francisco Chronicle reports, he admits to being humbled upon seeing the cover of the South Korean edition: His picture runs beside the translated title, This Dumb Guy.

WE CAN THINK OF A FEW OTHER ANIMALS: The year-end awards have started rolling in, and Richard Gere is the winner of the Foot in Mouth award, presented by Britain's Plain English Campaign for the most baffling celebrity quote:

"I know who I am. No one else knows who I am. If I was a giraffe and someone said I was a snake, I'd think, 'No, actually, I'm a giraffe,' " Gere told Britain's Guardian newspaper in June.

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