OK seriously, I can’t believe I keep blogging about magazines—this is the last one, I swear.

Sooo maybe I never made it all the way through Time magazine—you know, things to do, places to go, people to see, whatever, so I moved on to Budget Travel.

No sooner than I open up the magazine do I find something to blog about!

In the first few pages of Budget Travel from November is a two-page ad for various vacations in Italy from “the Globus family of vacations” (four different travel package programs catering to independent, luxury, budget and… I don’t know, one more kind of traveler). For some reason, all of their photographs of “real Italy” are totally ridiculous. I mean, it shouldn’t be possible to completely caricaturize, in so many different ways, a whole place in so few pictures. These photographs feature all of the essentials: the backs of two pensive American travelers, stopped at an otherwise empty sidewalk café in front of two empty cups of espresso (“A Monograms independent vacation gives you all the time you need ot sip espresso and soak up local culture”); a vineyard snaking over rolling Tuscan hills (“Globus travelers enjoy a private wine tasting and lunch at the splendid Verrazzano Castle”—as do Syracuse University study abroad students, incidentally); and photographs of a Venetian bridge, a few gondolas, and the Roman Coleseum. What strikes me as strange about all of these pictures is the total lack (except for the espresso shot) of people; neither tourists nor Italians show up in any of these photographs. Perhaps the purpose of this is to create a sense of intimacy with the sites that Globus is insinuating it is capable of delivering, but it’s almost disconcerting, implying that the impetus of travel lies in the confrontation between the self and the site, not the confrontation of the self and, well, the whole package.

I don’t know how many of you have heard of Bust magazine, but the WU has subscribed to it for a LONG time and I just started reading it. At first I was hesitant, because it seemed ultra (bordering on militant) feminist, and that’s just not my style. But, since I started working as a co-fac and picking up the mail, I’ve been flipping through the issues, and they’re amazing. It’s obviously a feminist magazine, but it isn’t overly political (just the right balance of fluff pieces about how much Paris Hilton deserves to be punched in the face with pieces that critically examine our government/society), and always has interesting interviews and reviews and art pieces and…

because I'm in my grandma's room and she wants to go to sleep.

this story is actually kinda about my grandma, so it works out really well. How? I don't know. But listen to what I have to say...

For the last 2 or 3 years, my grandma has bought me a subscription to Newsweek (which I read half of and skip over anything political because it's the SAME every week. Really, they should just put out one issue a year [I guess they'd have to start calling it Newsyear] and have one article that succinctly says, "It's all been pretty bad."). Anyways, just recently i got a hold of a few Rolling Stone magazines. The day after getting my hands on these babies I told ol' Grama to cancel Newsweek and get me some Rolling Stone. I figure at this point in my life (I'm 21[but my birthday's on Nov. 9th {gifts can be left in Pomona box #244, thanks.}]) I want to stop pretending I care more than I do about politics and most world issues.