I once flicked through an abandoned copy of GQ magazine in an airport lounge.  Have you ever seen one of these behemoths?

I was bored and it was just there on the table I was sitting at, so obviously I was going to leaf through its pages.

At first I wondered why anyone would buy a brand new magazine and then leave it in the departure lounge.

Then I picked it up.  This was a heavy magazine!  Maybe the owner was worried it might prevent their flight from leaving the ground and left it behind.

I turned over the cover and was greeted with an advert.  Fair enough, plenty of magazines start with an advert.  This was followed by an advert, then another advert before moving on to numerous pages of adverts and adverts.  By ‘numerous’ I mean 22.

That’s right; the ‘Contents’ page was on page 23.

By this time I had this overwhelming urge to grow back some stubble, head back to duty free and buy a suit/watch/aftershave whilst pouting and looking intensely into the distance.  Maybe THAT’S where the owner of the magazine went?

I kept turning pages and eventually I found an article, on page 37.

This was ridiculous.  I was being bombarded with more images of men in various states of undress than I’d like.  I have a limit.  That limit is roughly 0.

I decided to test a theory.  I closed the magazine and then let it open at any random page.

Advert.

I tried again.

Another advert.

I flicked the magazine like a flipbook and stopped it randomly.

It was an article about a man who, whilst walking through the autumn leaves in his coat had decided to….oh no, wait, it was another advert.

What a infuriating, pointless and really, really, ridiculously good looking waste of my time.