Oh The Humanity

They started coming about a year ago.  Month after month after month, our mailbox would be stuffed full of magazines.  Not catalogs and the straight to trash mailers everyone gets, but real magazines.  Vogue, W, Shape, Women's Health.  None of which had I subscribed to, none of which I wanted.

I subscribe to three magazines, the choice of which probably says plenty regarding my mental age and priorities without me having to offer any explanation: Marie Claire; Martha Stewart Living; and O, The Oprah Magazine.

Marie, Martha, and Oprah are my girls, but I barely even have time for them, let alone a bunch of uninvited guests.

When The Others started coming and kept coming and did not stop coming, I asked Joe if he'd gotten them for me and he said no.  I asked my mom and Joe's mom and they both said no.  I refrained from asking anyone else and I certainly did not dare complain lest my anonymous gift giver be offended.  Vogue, I flipped through occasionally.  Shape and Woman's Health got occasional glances.  W went right to the recycle bin.
In case you are not aware, W is a giant magazine, bigger and wider than any magazine has a right to be.  It is not a humble magazine by any means, it is ostentatious, and unapologetic for how it over-stuffs my mailbox every month.  They would come every month and every month I would think where did they come from, who paid for them, who did this to me, MY GOD MAKE IT STOP.  

Since no one copped to it, since I never got a coy "so you read any good magazines lately?" from any of my loved ones, I started to get paranoid.  What is the universe trying to tell me?  Vogue, W, Shape, Women's Health.  I need to get in shape and dress better? (Okay, probably.)  I need to start taking supplements and buy horrifyingly expensive handbags?  I need to learn how to do pilates and figure out what the hell a socialite actually does? There must be an explanation for why this is happening.

Then I came home to find all 902 pages of the Vogue September issue in my mailbox.  902 pages.  Of which I'm pretty sure only 50 pages display actual content.  And the W September issue.  You know what W does to celebrate September?  They make the magazine wider and taller.  The trees, you guys.  My word, the trees.

I will say though, that it was almost worth it just to see Joe flipping through the Vogue September issue, trying to figure out the point.  "Ad, ad, ad, ad, ad, ad, ad, ad, ad, ad, ad, ad, WHAT THE HELL IS THIS WHERE ARE THE ARTICLES?"  I tried to explain the importance of September issues in the fashion world and how the number of ad sales are actually a good thing, they mean the economy is getting better, but I gave up after he didn't land on the Letter from the Editor until page 276.

I couldn't take it any more.  I finally sent an e-mail to customer service asking for the madness to stop/for my non-existent subscription to be cancelled.  A couple days later, I got a response: your subscription was placed by an agency.  You have to call the agency to make it stop.  I'm sorry, what?  So I called the agency. Apparently, I was the lucky recipient of some promotional effort and I was receiving one year subscriptions for free.  Do you still want to make it stop?  It's only going to last one more month.  Ummmmm......YES!  If for no other reason, so I can feel like I can regain some control over this situation.  You have no idea how many nights of sleep I have lost over this!  I almost started taking supplements.  Cancel, please, cancel now!

Mystery solved.