Alaska governor Sarah Palin is sort of talking about her daughter Bristol’s split with Levi Johnston. Gov. Palin was in a Juneau supermarket, helping out the Girl Scouts, when she gave what seems like an impromptu press conference. She brought along her three youngest children, as well as her grandchild Tripp, who is the son of Bristol and Levi.

I’m not sure what questions Gov. Palin got, but at some point someone asked where Bristol was, or how Bristol was doing. Gov. Palin answered that Bristol was appearing in her mother’s place at a miniature golf tournament/fundraiser, and that Bristol is “doing great, just great!” You betcha. People has more:

Alaska governor Sarah Palin strode through the produce section of Juneau’s Fred Meyer supermarket Saturday morning, smiling and waving with an entourage of youngsters in tow.

“These are my children, Willow, Piper and [11-month-old] Trig,” Palin told an excited group of Girl Scouts. Then Palin, 45, motioned to a baby bundled in a hoodie, held and bottle-fed by Piper. “And this is my grandbaby Tripp,” she said of the infant son of her daughter Bristol, 18.

“He’s only 2-months-old. It’s kind of surreal!,” she added.

Palin was taking a break from governing the nation’s largest state to help Juneau’s Girl Scout Troop 32 sell cookies after the group lost all for [sic] their previous proceeds in a robbery the week before. “I read about it in the newspaper and I said, ‘Well, me and the kids have an hour on Saturday, let’s go down and help,'” she explained. “This age is so precious.”

Missing from the Palin family group was Bristol, in the news after her split with Tripp’s father, Levi Johnston, 19. There’s no mystery, though. “Oh, Bristol is over at the state capitol building golfing in a miniature golf tournament,” Palin told PEOPLE. “It’s a fundraiser and she’s up there taking my place while I’m here.”

“Bristol is doing great, just great!,” Palin said.

During her hour and a half in the store, Palin, in jeans and purple down vest, walked the aisles urging shoppers to buy cookies while chatting with Girls Scouts clamoring to hold her hand. “Cool, she’s our babysitter!” said one of the scout moms with a laugh. Palin responded with a laugh of her own: “I was so glad to leave the office for this fun thing.”

Palin made several sweeps of the store (“Come buy cookies!) until she was diverted by an aisle of exercise equipment on sale. “Wait a minute, we need this for when it rains and I can’t run,” said the Governor, closely examining an elliptical trainer. PEOPLE asked Palin if she’d lost weight since the election. “I’ve lost weight since I had my baby,” she said. “Thanks for noticing!”

Still, Palin chipped in for several boxes of cookies for her family. “I love the Thin Mints,” she said. “But my daughters already told me I can’t get those, that I have to get the Samoas. Well, you know what? We’ll get both!”

From People Magazine

Mmm, Thin Mints. I can’t believe Sarah Palin and I both like the same kind of Girl Scout cookies. I didn’t really get what Gov. Palin was saying about losing weight after the baby was born. She’s talking about her baby Trig, and she gave birth to him last spring. She already had her figure back by September, for her Vice Presidential rollout, but I guess she’s lost even more weight.

So, was this Gov. Palin’s official “statement” about the Levi-Bristol split? I would have expected a lot more. Honestly, I was hoping for some gaffe-and-wink-filled press conference, but my hopes have been terribly dashed. Gov. Palin’s lack of any substantive comments on her daughter’s split seems both smart and classy. Way to go, you betcha.

Sarah Palin is shown in the header on 2/20/09 at the Wasilla airport before a charity trip to deliver food. Credit: Marc Lester/Anchorage Daily News/MCT