Entertainment Weekly and US Magazine arrive at my door with the regularity of a gastroenteroligist's bowel movements. I skim through them while on the throne (fitting, no) or in the mornings when I can't stand the Canadian drawl of NY1's Pat Kiernan, and I stand at the counter shoveling Cheerios into my gaping maw. It's not too far a stretch to realize that these magazines (these two in particular) are just catalogs. Their imperatives are to make us buy something (Coldplay rawk tix, plasticine Hulk action figs, that Angelina's boobs are real, or that we would have a much better swagger if we only had Ewan McGregor's spikey haircut) and to dream a better dream. How different, really, is it from a Sharper Image catalog? I don't need (or can't afford) any of that stuff either – a back massaging chair is about as useful to me as J Blow's Juicy Couture sweatsuit. I am one for cursing and yelling at these rags – slandering them like they were Kobe Byrant's reputation – but I still find myself once in a while pining for something, and that of course is what it about. Make me desire things I didn't even want. It's a Zen koan. It's a marketing gargoyle sitting on my coffee table (or the back of the terlit) warding off the ghouls of complacency (or constipation). If only I was a druid I could reverse its spell on me. Speak incantations of simplicity and contentment. Just like Carrie Otis does as she practices her yoga on the veranda overlooking the Hollywood Hells.