Axes & Alleys: Our Last Best Hope for Peace!

Last issue we bid a fond adieu to several writers who have passed out of our lives or passed on with their own. While we know the vast majority of our readers care not a whit about the people who make the magazine, we are quite aware of the importance of our articles, columns and features to them. Many of you have noted certain of these disappearing from our pages. Instead of introducing you to the exciting and, dare we say, new entrants upon these pages, we will show you a little of how the publishing of a magazine works by listing a few rejected candidates for inclusion in these pages.

The Snowman Report
Bob King, agriculture specialist of the Cornell Cooperative Extension of Monroe County, would write a monthly report on snowman infestations across America, control and extermination, as well as hobbyist breeding tips. As this feature would be largely seasonal, we rejected it out of hand.

Butane 12 Step Program
A resource for those addicted to the storage of butane, collection of butane products, and physical abuse against butane. While the concept did have widespread appeal, we were searching for new columns with staying power and this one would necessarily last only one year.

Yo-Yo Instructional Video Transcripts
Transcripts of various instructional yo-yo videos provided in partnership with www.yo-yo.org. Initially we felt this was a great concept and did attempt to insert such a feature in the last issue. Unfortunately it was unwieldy, took up over twelve pages, and featured not a single scantily-clad woman.

We hope you appreciate this peek into the backroom dealings and thought processes of Axes & Alleys. Also, we hope you appreciate the fact that we did not subject you to the above, quality-lowering concepts and their brethren in future issues of the magazine.

Download this month’s Axes & Alleys today and feel free to ogle all of our previous issues in the archive.

As you’ll read in this month’s letters section, Paul David Hewson wrote in to ask us why we always hire celebrities to appear as our cover models. As he so rightly points out, some of the most attractive people happen to not be celebrities. Thanks for the suggestion Paul David Hewson. You are no doubt pleased to know that we’ve taken your advice.

This month we present our latest cover model, Irene Baras. Ms. Baras is a casual acquaintance of the Axes & Alleys editorial board. We’ve gotten to know her over the past four years, usually over beer, ground beef, pasta, flour tortillas and sundry other products common to the grocerial arts. You’ll no doubt agree she’s an attractive dame.

Now we would like everyone to offer a moment of silence in memory of the Scythians, who disappeared from this earth so many years ago. They are sorely missed and will live on in us through each passing generation (due to mitochondrial DNA).