Cookies are bad for you

Earlier this week, a good friend and fellow blogger over at Are Things Complicated Yet? gave me a copy of "Cookie" magazine over lunch. I promptly went home and devoured every page of it as my son took his afternoon nap...

For those who have never experienced this fine publication, "Cookie" is basically written for the people that never wanted children, but somehow found themselves with one or two anyway...

It's filled with pages upon pages of beautiful ads for designer baby clothes, lavish nursery furnishings, and posh baby gear that I could never afford and articles dealing with problems I would never have.

For instance, here are some articles from the March/April 2007 issue...

One mom's (angry) rant... er, plea to families to STOP LISTING ALL OF THEIR KIDS' NAMES ON THE OUTGOING MESSAGE ON THEIR ANSWERING MACHINE. Apparently, that annoys some people...

Another mom writes about her dilemma with conflicting parenting styles between their two homes... Nope, she is not referring to divorced co-parenting. She is actually worried about how she should parent while in their summer home in Maine, where the livin' is easy, versus their place in Manhattan, which sounds like a pretty neuritic place based on this article...

Oh no, what is a mom to do?

Last, but not least. Sure to be favorite among its target audience. A completely pointless article devoted the perils of modern-day feminism and how being a SAMH is an upheaval of all that our mothers worked towards...

Here is an actual quote cited in the article:

"Your own career is an investment you make in yourself,"..."one that will pay dividends throughout your life. Some benefits are financial, some are intellectual or creative.... If you devote your life to supporting your husband's career, those dividends belong to him—as does the career itself." ([The writer] reminds her readers often that marriages, promises that they are, can easily be broken.)

followed by...

"If your husband divorces you or drops dead, was it really such a great idea to stay home if you can't afford to buy groceries for your kids?"

Ummm, okay? If you can afford to clothe your daughter in that $340 get up (including a $150 cultured pearl necklace) on page 187, I can guarentee you're not going to worry about paying for groceries....

That very same day I was flipping through this magazine, my "problems" entailed finding my son's shoes ("I spy the left one. Now, where did he hide the other one..."), getting the smeared avocado out of his hair, and teaching him how to get off the sofa feet first, not head first...

How funny that I didn't have the time to worry about how I was setting back feminism to the 1950s or the outgoing message on our machine...

For the record, I don't even remember the last time I even checked our phone messages.

Although I refuse to actually pay for it, "Cookie" doesn't necessarily lack merit. Afterall I wouldn't bother to read my FREE copy if there weren't a few useful tidbits. Every issue has at least one smart solution-anything from how to "prepare your last will and testament" to "planning a budget family beach getaway", but I mostly read it for the entertainment value.

Okay, time to search for where my son hid the diaper cream... Oh well, I'll have to consider that summer house another time.

Ciao!