Working in Observer Towers carries with it scant privileges. We get some discounts at local pubs; we get the odd freebie in the post (see Blog passim) and we get free newspapers. Well, free copies of newspapers produced by us.
Which means we can leaf through the Observer Magazine on a Friday morning while the rest of the nation must pine for it until Sunday. Sometimes on the blog we bring you sneak previews, but not this week. Sorry. Our bad. It is a good mag, we promise.
Jason Burke, chief reporter, has recently come back from South Asia and has written about the people he met who are trying - with some success - to rebuild their lives after the tsunami. Beautiful pictures with that, too.
The other big feature is a surprisingly revealing interview with Johnny Depp, who comes across quite well. But then the big movie stars often do come out quite well from their big interviews, either because they are very charismatic (that's how they became big movie stars) or because interviewers want to keep the door open for future access so don't stick the knife all the way in. Or both. Still, that doesn't necessarily detract from a good piece of writing.
Depp quote corner: (At the Oscars) 'All Vanessa and I could think was: "When and where can we go smoke? Where can we get a drink?" and "When is it over?" And: "Please don't let me win."'
Fact plucked at random from the pages Sunday's Observer magazine: British graduates phone their mothers 20 per cent less often than non-graduates.
We'd love to tell you what's gonna be in the rest of the newspaper on Sunday, but we can't in case prying rival eyes are pointed at the blog ready to nab our deep and scoopy scoops.
