It’s a bit of a running commentary, in the Teeny Apartment here on the shores of the Gulf:

Some of our well-meaning friends and relatives back in California seem convinced that most news doesn’t travel to the other side of the world.

We have been informed about this or that major bit of news … a week after it was on the front page of our own newspaper, The National.  No, really, we do get the internet here. Disasters, et al … we know about.

But stuff we fail to pick up on? Or at least I do?

That “Entertainment Tonight” background pop-culture buzz. It just doesn’t exist to the same degree, across an ocean. And that is why these three developments gobsmacked me a few minutes ago. While looking for World Cup news on the Johannesburg Sunday Times website.

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, no longer an item? Headed for a breakup? And I didn’t even know there was trouble in paradise.

I mean, nobody expected they would celebrate a golden wedding anniversary … or a silver one … or that the two of them would ever get married at all. They’re actors. Their relationships don’t last. Especially when one seems as dumb as Brad Pitt and the other is as loony as Angelina Jolie.

But I didn’t know they were headed to splitsville. Incredibly, it has not been a major topic of conversation here in the souks … nor does it come up much on ESPN.com. So I didn’t even know they hadn’t been seen together in weeks.

Then there was shocker No. 2: The death of the “All My Children” character Palmer Cortland. Real name: James Mitchell. In a previous life (well, two previous lives, actually), I was sucked into watching AMC by women who loved-loved-loved the show. And, somewhat to my dismay, I found myself an inadvertent authority on Pine Valley — and Erica Kane & Co.  At one point in my life I believe I could name most of Erica’s husbands (like, 10 by now?). And I knew well the evil as well as prissy Palmer, always scheming to destroy someone. He lived to be 89, probably because he had been a dancer of some note earlier in his life. And now he’s gone. Pine Valley must be seriously short on villains these days, what with Phoebe Wallingford (Ruth Warrick of Mercury Players fame) also dead. Hmmm. But I imagine they somehow are pushing on, there in PV.

And now, missed pop culture item No. 3: Gary Coleman arrested.

Yes, that would be the little guy who made a career out of uttering the expression, “Whatchu talkin’ ’bout, Willis!” when he was surprised/agitated/angry. “Willis” being the TV name of his brother, to Coleman’s Arnold, in the astonishingly shlocky and preachy sitcom “Diff’rent Strokes.”

Just because Coleman is little (4-foot-8) doesn’t mean he isn’t small beer when it comes to making mischief. He was charged with assault in 1998 for punching a woman. There was a disorderly conduct citation in 2007, and another in 2009, when he also accused his wife of domestic violence. (Maybe she should pick on someone her own size.) And now he’s had another domestic incident, or maybe it’s for not appearing for some court date (it is a matter of debate) … but now he’s in jail again. In Utah.

None of this is particularly important. It’s all silly, actually. But this is the kind of news that doesn’t make it across the pond.

Plane crashes, earthquakes, football bowl scores … those I get.

It’s Palmer Cortland joining Phoebe Wallingford in Pine Valley Purgatory that I may never hear about. Feel free to enlighten me.