• by Larry Dobrow , Featured Columnist, July 26, 2005

Today's mission, should you choose to accept it: Play along with benevolent Uncle Larry as he attempts to locate a scintilla of bona fide editorial content in the August 2005 issue of Lucky. Ready? Seatbelts fastened? Helmets, elbow pads, and protective cups (men only) in place? Let's begin.

We start our fantastic journey on page 36, which houses the "YES!" stickers that readers with short attention spans can attach to the pages they'd later like to revisit. These stickers, which peel back to reveal plugs for Jeep-branded gear, invest the magazine with the air of an elementary-school project best saved for the days when the teacher is hungover. You can put these stickers to quick use on the next page, which offers up a host of "Shops We Love." One is identified as "madly cool," while another is dubbed "charmingly frilly." Choices are confusing!

But wait. Be thrifty in your stickering, as Lucky offers its "denim guide" starting on page 142 (not on 140 or 141 -- those are just pesky, indistinguishable jean ads). At a dashing 5'1", I'm more than a little bit swayed by the promise that tucking in my high-waist jeans will make my legs "look miles long"; as if to emphasize this nubby-to-majestic transformation, the mag flashes into a faux-script font. Well, heck, I'm sold. Myrna, where's my Diners Club card?

Jump with me now to the "Shoes of the Month" extravaganza on page 73. Are those actual paragraphs I see? A blurb? A plane? Nope, it's just a metric truck load of shoes, each succinctly and rapturously appended ("A fresh dose of still-summer color in a sweet, airy sandal," "So skirt-worthy"). Darn it, take it easy on the stickers - we haven't even reached "How to Dress Around...," "All the Best Tops," or "Secret Ingredient" yet.

Since we're on a super-secret mission of our own, let's go deeper-than-Ethan-Hawke undercover with Lucky's own "Beauty Spy." You'll need Valerie Plame's CIA classification - not to mention her grand-jury-ready shimmy - to get to the bottom of the mysteries involving "saltwater sexy" hair and "sheer and shimmer-free" lip gloss. Stylist Estee Stanley, your contact in the Berlin underworld, will attempt to lure you with her "newest addiction," some kind of sodium-pentothal-infused freshening mist that "smells so clean." Do not engage her. I repeat: Do not engage her.

We conclude our ecstatic mission on pages 183 and 184, which feature "the Lucky August listings" (as opposed to the lines upon lines of listings on pretty much every other page). Here, the mag features blurbs that are totally, completely not advertisements, even though savvy shoppers (and I stop to ask: Are there any other kind?) can get a 20 or 25 percent discount if they mention Lucky at the cash register. Profligate AND thrifty at once: Lucky is most surely my kinda gal.

That's our exercise for the day, folks. We might not have found any legitimate, traditional editorial content, but gosh, didn't we have fun searching? Return your seats to the upright position and try like hell not to poach that darling cropped high-neck jacket that's peeking out of the overhead compartment. Fondly, Uncle Larry.