Our realtors just called; apparently there has been a scheduling mix-up, and they had to cancel this Sunday’s outing. My first thought was “Oh! I can read magazines!”
I love magazines. Somehow they manage to present the perfect combination of information and fluff. If you suspect that I’m not talking about The Economist, you’re right. It’s informative, but wow, is it dense. (Although the photo captions are excellent.)
Over the years, I’ve had an astonishing number of subscriptions. Eventually, though, a magazine will run through its material, and it becomes far too obvious that the editors are trying to put a new spin on old news. After several years, for example, I wasn’t sure that Allure and Self had much more to tell me.
Sometimes the entire tone of a magazine changes. Once upon a time, Glamour used to present a cross-section of fashion, beauty, and women’s issues. Ironic? Sure. But there was a lot going on in that magazine, and I enjoyed it. At some point, though, it became a repository of reader-submitted anecdotes and Top 10 lists. And it turns out that Glamour readers have lives that I don’t really want to read about.
Over the past few years, I’ve moved toward a selection of health, home life, and cooking magazines. I like to read a magazine without interruption, which means that they generally stack up until J goes for a long bike ride.
While Women’s Health doesn’t seem to have shown up this month, and Gourmet is floating somewhere out there in the postal system, I do have Everyday Food, Prevention, and Real Simple to look forward to. Somewhere around here is this week’s copy of Time. And since tomorrow is Saturday, and Saturday means mail delivery, who knows what else may lie ahead?