Image via Wikipedia

"I'm Just as Beautiful as you, rake face!"

The launch of Just as Beautiful, the UK's first magazine aimed at 'curvy girls', certainly got the media flapping their bingo wings lately.

Now, if I'm honest, I've got a love-hate relationship with women's magazines. I'm nosy enough to read them from time to time, but I can't be bothered with pages of fashion or the mating habits of so-called celebrities (no, I still can't use the word celeb without having a gag reflex) - non-entities more like. And with every titbit of interesting, I find I'm forced to choke on a generous side of clap-trap. How to get a man, how to keep a man, what to do when your man shags your best mate,  how to rescue your man's libido, and then just when you think you can't possibly be enlightened any more, the trumpcard: you don't need a man, you're just wonderful all on your tod!

Well thank you very much for validating my existence.

But I digress. All I really wanted to do was flag up the latest fly-swatter to hit the news stands: JUST AS BEAUTIFUL. It's a magazine with solely plus-size models. It can't be just me that thinks the title couldn't have been any more patronising if it tried. I mean, how condescending sounding is that?!

Call me cynical, but it looks sneakily like the fashion world's answer to the size 0 backlash, and it sounds something like: "No we won't put fuller (read normal) figured models in regular magazines, but over here on the sidelines you can wallow around in your giant fat pants and big yourselves up as much as you like. Now get off our case!"

Meanwhile, over in The Economist, a magazine that is worthy of the trees that sacrificed themselves for its existence, I read that scientific tests have revealed that a group of mice (which are nocturnal) fed during the day gained 50% more weight than a group fed in darkness, suggesting a possible link between weight gain and mammals' natural metabolic cycles. Scientists are now wondering whether we might all be slimmer if we didn't eat after dark.

What I want to know now is - does the light of the refrigerator door count?