Observations

Karen, who has clearly been subject to my Observer Woman Magazine rant so many times as to be able to quote it verbatim, kindly sent me this link yesterday. Read the profile to the right – so nice to realise I am not alone in my dislike of this piece of tripe publishing. The Food monthly is OK; Cameron tells me the Sport one is pretty good and he seems to read the Music one, but – leaving aside the irritating implication that we women shouldn’t be bothering our pretty little heads about the news, the review or heaven forbid the business section* – why is the Women one full of inane articles about ex-lovers analysing what went wrong, and shoes? I like a nice shoe as much as the next woman** (assuming she is not Imelda Marcos) but I don’t buy a newspaper to read vapid articles about them. (No, I buy it for a crossword and some recipes, mostly.) And £400 handbags! Does anybody really, seriously, have one? Want one? Need ideas for better things to do with that sort of money? 

If we must have our own special supplement -  and I don’t object to women’s magazines per se, but I do object to getting such a low-quality one with what is supposed to be a sensible and serious newspaper - couldn’t it be filled with something a bit different (and not a poor copy of flippin’ Grazia)? They did have Veronika Robinson down for an interview – she is interesting and has plenty to say (as, I imagine, do many of the other women interviewed for the “female tribes of Britain” piece) – but each woman was reduced to a couple of random questions and answers and a photograph looking glam.

Jo Brand was on Desert Island Discs last week and the fact that I was surprised to hear her say she believes there are women out there who are not interested in spending half an hour putting on their makeup but have better things to do (like, y’know, chat on MSN for hours) says a lot about the society we live in: I thought I was fairly immune to all that. Even the women presented as being super-smart, successful, ambitious, blah blah blah had to be all cleavage and legs on the front of the OWM.

Oh look! I’m ranting incoherently again! (Blame the 4 hours of sleep I got last night, but that’s another story; one that involves sprained ankles, flights to Germany and a child feeling lonely in her bedroom.)

*I admit I do not read the business section. But I reserve the right to read it should I so choose.
**So much so that I admit to being pretty horrified when one of the Badly Dressed Mums*** who hang out at the Methodist Church Hall**** turned up in shoes matching my Nice New Pair.
***All leggings and baggy jumpers – in an it’s comfy-and-it’s-worked-for-20-years way not a wildly trendy way – and woolly socks on the outside.
****Fair-trade coffee and home baking at a fraction of the Costa price and a big area with toys for the kids. But not cool. 

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 20th, 2007 at 3:00 pm and is filed under modern life is rubbish. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.