You got me and, Arnie, I got you…

Occasionally, I go into a shop and look at their wall of magazines with an open mind - that is, I attempt to detach the feelings of antipathy and cynicism that have barnacled their way onto my brain during more than ten years of working on/for/with them. It is basically me trying to inject a frisson of excitement back into our relationship – walking into a newsagent, pretending we are strangers, just like the first time we met...

Even more occasionally, I might buy one but actually hardly ever because they are for the most part a) expensive and b) no good.

Yesterday I was cruising the magazine aisle – past middle youth, through teen, tween, crafts, puzzles, homes, health, food, music, men's porn-lite, and eventually 'Sports & Leisure'. I know that things are changing in the magazine industry, but I was still shocked by the unorthodox titles they had chosen to position front and centre, as having mass-market, buy-this-and-your-life-will-be-better bloke appeal. None of your brightly coloured, bromance-fostering football rags. Instead…

On reflection, I don't know why I'm surprised. After all, men, this is exactly the kind of look that chicks dig – a map of Britain's B-roads in veiny relief across the body, a skintone I'm calling My Nan's Dining Room Table, and the knowledge that if we (females, women, chicks) attempt to assume any kind of dominant physical position, we will simply slide off, back into submission. 

It's a little known fact that during his bodybuilding career in the late 60s and 70s, Arnold Schwarzeneggar was managed by Sonny Bono. You can see them captured in their glory days here on the cover of Muscle & Fitness, Sonny's moustache turning upwards in rapturous excitement at feeling Arnie's Arms Of Oak. The pair would sing along to I Got You Babe in the car on the way to competitions. Sonny would throw his voice around to render both his own part and Cher's, while Arnold would honk out the 'ba-ba, ba-ba's in a flat, heavily-accented monotone.