Jessica Simpson Copes with Bad Haircut, Nick Lachey Hook Up

For Jessica Simpson, life can be worse than a bad haircut.

Like watching your ex-husband hook up publicly with a talentless reality TV star.

"Oh, it hurt me," Simpson tells Elle in its March issue, about the actions of Nick Lachey and Kristin Cavallari. "Two or three weeks later? Yeah, I'd say it kind of hurt me."

Jessica, however, is still in touch with Lachey, who's now in a serious relationship with Vanessa Minnillo.

"He's so much a part of my life, how could I not be? Any guy who's going to be with me from this day forward has to understand that."

She won't say whether that guy could be corny singer John Mayer, with whom she's been linked off and on since the summer. But she grinned when asked if she were in love at the moment.

Simpson admds that she thought there was hope for her marriage up until a few days before she and Lachey announced their split. What changed?

"I watched The Notebook on a plane home to Waco to be with my grandparents," she says. "It's a great love story."

The movie itself, she says, was "not what sealed it. I just figured out the statement. It was about that moment of desperation. I needed to breathe."

We're sure Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams are glad they could help Jess see the light of love.