While not a regular or avid reader of the magazine, I have picked up the odd copy of 'Cosmopolitan' now and again throughout my life - most often I admit from service stations so that I'll have something to read during the interminable long drive north to visit relatives in Scotland. I haven't purchased it for a couple of years now, but was tempted by the April 2010 issue for it offered a free synthetic-cloth shoulder bag in a natty navy and off-white stripe, that I quite fancied the look of.

£3.40 for a 'glossy' woman's magazine is generally a bit much I think (you can get the cheapest pre-budget bottle of red wine that Tesco sells for that), but in addition to the bag with the April issue, you also got a little sample tube of Olay day cream (that came in a massively over-packaged cardboard box on the front of the magazine), a 20%-off discount offer at Dorothy Perkins (although, as the new owner of a Dorothy Perkins storeccard, I'm currently up to my armpits in 20% discount vouchers for that store, but it's still a nice thought) and, of course the glossy 'woman's monthly of monthlies' magazine itself. As you notice, the magazine itself features fairly far down on my list of reasons for buying it, which can never be a very good sign.

One of the times I consciously remember reading an issue of 'Cosmopolitan' in the past it had a feature advising you on what to wear when meeting your boyfriend's parents for the first time, which I remember - appropriately enough - because this was in 1995 just before I was first introduced to my partner's mother, and the advice back then struck me as bit bleedin' obvious (in the interests of making a good first impression, it was advised that a young woman should not wear any outfits adorned with nightclub-singer-style all-over sequins, or clothing that showed her underwear or left her boobies hanging out). Funnily enough they had the exact same feature in the April 2010 issue with the pretty much exact same advice.....

Ugh. While I'm happy enough with my 'Cosmopolitan' that came with the free bag because I haven't read one in a long time, honestly, the content (mostly pictures of clothes, bags & make-up; also coloumns written by 'single girls about town' etc.; 'celebrity' gossip about and short interviews featuring generically similar young people hardly any of whom I've ever heard of) gets pretty samey pretty quickly, and from what I've read so far there's not much there that you couldn't find in a colour supplement from any of the weekend newspapers.

To be fair however, I don't think I'm exaclty in the magazine's target demographic.