I just subscribed to ReadyMade, the Martha Stewart magazine for boys and everyone who wears Ben Sherman shirts, and I was thinking about how much I like it compared to some other magazines I’ve been reading lately. So here’s an impressionistic list of those magazines.

The New Yorker: 1) Obsessively tangential reviews of experimental theater. 2) Angst-ridden stories about growing up in the projects, set between twin rows of advertisements for distressed canvas travel hats and upmarket liposuction techniques. Take magic marker and write “LIMOUSINE LIBERAL” on your forehead when reading these stories. 3) Ex-editor Tina Brown’s obsession with titties (“Annie Liebowitz photographs Las Vegas showgirls!”) 4) Essential delivery vehicle for Roz Chast cartoons into your home each week.

Reader’s Digest: 1) Stories like “I fucked a bear for the FBI and found God!“* 2) Getting that Duane Hansen smell out of your clothes.

2600: 1) How to hack traffic signs so they don’t say “EXIT 43 EXPECT DELAYS 10AM – 3PM”, but instead say things like “0wN3d by 7334 h4x0r d00d” and “FREE KEVIN.”

Utne Reader: 1) Live in a tree! 2) Hug a tree! 3) Be a Buddhist! 4) Next month: Be a tree-living, tree-hugging Buddhist!

ReadyMade: My faaaaaaaavorite magazine right now. This month: 1) Build a lite-brite table. 2) Pinhole cameras. 3) Make a sofa out of dirt and sod.

* That’s the punchline of a joke my mom told me, about a guy who submits a story to Reader’s Digest entitled “I fucked a bear”, but gets rejected, so he re-submits “I fucked a bear for the FBI”, and get’s a lukewarm interest letter, so he submits once again as “I fucked a bear for the FBI and found God”, and it runs on the cover.