you're so vain

So I caved in and bought Grazia magazine the other day. Spring is coming, and I need to study shoes and sandals, possibly handbags. Mmmm, I thought, Delicious! But picking up the mag I saw there was an insert included, another magazine rather, and thought Oh tops it's Grazia Casa so I can get into gardening mood which is going to take more than a push and shove (of my mower as well).

But then I saw it was Grazia UOMO and groaned. Grazia MAN. Oh well for one euro ninety I could leave it around for my jeans-below-the-bum sons.

Now while I wait for my obstinate computer to download I have been flicking through it. Oh my goodness! What has happened to the Italian man? Have I always been so blind? Fine, I love gay men and their delicate taste, but who are all these girly guys??

Flipping past the young things I have been trying to find a mature Italian male only to find - what? Tanned faces and stylish wrinkles, flat eyes and flawless shoes, rolled up trousers and not a yacht in sight?!

What a festival of vanity! Is it because I have been too long in the mountains with messy-haired men with panda tans? With their gorgeous wrinkles and steely thighs?

And worse - or even more twisted - am I wrong to expect a bloke to not care how he looks while I am allowed to pore over designer shoes?

Please, please! Tell me there is someone out there who thinks WHITE JEANS ON MEN ARE A CRIME!