Do the doll mags celebrate grown people dressings as Barbie and Raggedy Anne? It made me shudder to see married couples proudly dressing as big floppy toys complete with brand-name tags made to scale. What could drive them to commit such degradations? What self-respecting guy would even do that? (I guess that question answers itself.)
I guess it beats putting one’s lips around the barrel of a .357 and pulling the trigger, but not by much. One doesn’t have to live down the ignominy of eating a bullet. Partying as your favorite Beanie Baby, on the other hand…
There are actually several magazines devoted to Beanie Baby collecting. Or at least there were a year and a half ago, when I worked at a toy store and had middle-aged soccer moms constantly asking if we carried them. We didn’t. I usually sent them to the video store / newsstand around the corner, which carried just about every periodical you could think of – and also happened to be full of people wearing black with piercings in strange places. It was always amusing to see the soccer moms’ reaction – “You want me to go into THAT place?”
Felt a little sorry for the newsstand employees, but I didn’t know where else to send them.
Actually yes, at toy fairs and conventions…is it really any different from dressing up like Spock?
I will admit the Beanie baby ones are a little more narrow, and they’re little more than just big catalogs…the doll collecting ones usually have homemade doll contests, collector’s items, etc etc…
Personally, I wish there were more history magazines, about the history of Royalty. THAT I would love.
No, it’s not any different than dressing up like Spock at a convention, but I’m not talking about trade shows or conventions. These freaks are having parties at home and having all the guests wears full-boy Beanie Baby suits they made. Did the husbands grinning stupidly in these photos actually volunteer for this kind of humiliation, or did their sadistic schlockmeister wives blackmail them into accepting the emasculation? I’m all for people doing weird shit behind closed doors, but this is just too, too sick.
Strangest: Powerpuff Girls Powerzine. I saw this in a video store. I have no idea what the hell they’d put in there. I’m guessing merchandise ads, posters, or information about the movie, scheduled for release in like 2002. It’s a very strage magazine idea, though.
Also, yes, there were about 3 or 4 Beanie Baby magazines. There was the Official Beanie Baby Magazine, Beanie World, BeanieManiaSomethingorother, I don’t know. The sad thing is that my little sister actually got those magazines on more than one occasion. “Did you know Batty the Bat is retired? Mine could be worth $2.50 by now!”
Stupidest: Any of those celebrity magazines. People who give a shit about what celebrities look like without their makeup have no lives. It’s like the little children who stand around the playground spreading rumors about the other kids, except that instead of actually talking to people, they sit at home and read the magazines and pretend they have lives. I just don’t get it.
OrcaChow-OH…now THAT IS a little much.
However, that’d be a neat Halloween costume…a Beanie baby…just dress up like some animal, and then make a tag for yourself…
(And stick a big price tag on saying…5.99…)
The lamest? Those stupid “True Confessions” magazines…the stories are all fake, anyways.
The first issue I ever saw I thought was a fake. It’s such a parody of all the men’s magazines, and it’s not even trying to be! I thought it was a tie-in to The Man Show. The cover model had to be a 42DDDD and the article blurbs were hilarious (Ten Ways to Tell Your Woman She’s Too Flat). Unbelievable!
I still think “Rubber Stamper” is the most strange. How much can change in the course of a month is the world of rubber stamps? “We are now selling date stamps with ‘20’ at the beginning because of the new millenium.” “Here is a true story of a man who lost his rubber stamp once.” “Letters to the editor regarding stamps.” LOL.
While this is as silly as any of the collecting hobby magazines, it’s not the silliest, I’m sure.
They could do articles about rubber stamp crafts, new stamp releases (e.g. a new line of Thomas Kinkade stamps or Garfield stamps), collecting tips, announcements of hobby shows and listings of shops and mail-order houses that carry stamps, collector exchange section…there are a lot of things. Rubber stamps aren’t just those rotating date stamp things.
There is a magazine called WOOD, but it isn’t about wood per se, it’s about woodworking. You know, tool reviews, project plans, etc. Perhaps that’s what you saw.
The wierdest actual magazine I’ve ever seen was Wired magazine. About 99% ads, and what content there was read like it was written by a propeller-head on acid. I think they changed their name after a few months. at least it quit showing up in the IT offices.
I saw a magazine devoted to Golden Retreivers a couple weeks ago.