No more mags for Jas

	Jasmine and Mariah

This time of year is always hectic with music stars all back from their holidays raring to go and get back that paper they've just spent on their vacations. Last week was the Mobo launch party at Beach Blanket Babylon in London's East End. (More on that next week.) And what a hectic week this is going to be.

We have Russell Simmons and 50 Cent sitting in front of us to kick start the week and it gets crazier from there. MTV Base presenters will be running around getting ready for their interviews, the camera crew will be tensely charging batteries and setting tapes up, and some of us will just be trying to breathe. Life's too short for stress.

I've had chats with my mate Mariah on numerous occasions in the past about things that stress folks out. One thing that she insists helps alleviate her stress is having no women's magazines around her. I used to turn up at her boat, penthouse apartment or jet plane laden down with mags, insisting I needed something to read, whilst she would shake her head knowingly at me. "That stuff will brainwash you," she used to tell me. But do you know what? I finally get it. Everything she has tried to school me about for years has finally sunk in.

I realised last week that reading wide variety of women's mags will drive you crazy. Men: don't switch off, coz what I'm about to tell you is going to help you understand that women aren't crazy, moody, menopausal freaks. This is the type of cycle many of us are involved in subconsciously: We grab a copy of a celeb mag and gleefully read the crazy and pitiful stories about reality show stars like Jordan and Jodie Marsh, and in comparison, our lives seem blissful.

Then we flick through and take pleasure in the pages where celebrities' flaws are blown up and circled. Their bulging bellies, cellulite, non-waxed body parts, yellow teeth, orange tans and double chins send us to confidence euphoria. We go home and radiate happiness and our families, friends and boyfriends are happy coz we're happy.

Next day, we're drawn to high-end mags like Vogue. We dribble with craving at the sexy - and expensive - must-have handbags and accessories, and suddenly we're reminded of what we can't afford. And although we know that most of the women in the magazines have been airbrushed to within an inch of their lives, we now feel incomparable, insecure and depressed.

At lunch time, we run out and waste money on that must-have handbag, but the high is short-lived. That night, our mood crashes as we moodily snap at our boyfriends about how poor and ugly we are. Our loved ones ask what's wrong and we snap back, "Nothing!"

The next day, more magazine headlines scream that they have the answers on how to become "the perfect woman". We eagerly race through the mag to learn how you can "seduce your man and be the only one he ever remembers" and once we get the answers, we rush out and buy the sexy props we'll need for that night. Later, our surprised - but happy - boyfriend has a great night and all is happy in our world... Until tomorrow night, when we take the "Is you're your boyfriend right for you?" quiz, and discover - according to the results - that you're with the wrong man and that he's holding you back.

You then have a bad evening, questioning all your life decisions and you become a nightmare to be around. The next morning we pick up a "thinking women's mag", and start to feel great about sisterhood, womanhood and the likes, as we read the fascinating stories of high-achieving women around the world.

After the initial feel-good factor, we evaluate our own lives and then feel lower than low in comparison. Another miserable night ensues. But not to worry: you can start the whole cycle again the next week. If an alien was to go to WHSMITH, they would think that men had real interests like gadgets, travel, gardening, music and life. Women would seem like fashion and men-obsessed freaks. So I'm not reading women's mags anymore.

In other news, I'll be attending the African Caribbean Leukaemia Trust (ACLT) ball this weekend. But I do have an absolutely awful dilemma: there are two other functions on the same night. Russell Simmons is having a party and designer Wale Adyemi and DJ Nikki are having a joint warehouse party. Now don't get me wrong: In the past, this number of functions hasn't spoilt anything. I can do three parties in one night. But a ball, a bar party and a warehouse party in a ball gown? Oh dear.

When I told Wale to change dates for his party, he reassured me: "Jas, you have to be in the building. Wear the ball gown and we will customise it in three minutes for my party, as soon as you arrive." I might take him up on that offer. Think how amazing it would be if I could carry around a mini, portable Gok Wan in my pocket.

(The Voice)