It’s Wednesday, and is it just me, or has work been especially hard as we head towards the calorific holiday season? Just be glad that you won’t be critiqued by millions on your pecan pie-induced weight gain, and when you get too drunk at the office party, you won’t have to read about it on the cover of a magazine the next day. Celebrities aren’t so lucky. But their pain is our gain because their (possibly fictional) dramas are usually more interesting than anything we could make up on our own. And because we love you so much, we’ve read every tabloid that came out today and hand-picked the juiciest stories. Enjoy!

The December issues of women’s magazines are all about one thing: gift guides. Editors work for months on these compilations, their cubicles overflowing with both insanely awesome items and completely lame stuff that they have to sort through. It sounds like more fun than it is. Trust me—I’ve been there. So which of the major women’s magazines have been naughty and which have been nice this year? After the jump, we grade each issue for you.

For those of us who have a gay boyfriend in our lives, we know how to gross them out in five seconds flat. I have a list of words that I know I can say to mine that will make him squirm and run around the room, screaming like a school girl—vagina, p**sy, c**t, clit, moist. My favorite line of questioning with my gay boyfriend is about the one time in college that he had drunken sex with a girl before he was out. Each time I press him for details he says things like, “I don’t really remember,” or “I only put it in there for a second,” or “Ewwwwwwww!” His experience of straight sex is not unlike Adam Lambert’s recent account in Out magazine. When asked about performing oral sex on a woman, he gave this eloquent description of the experience:

“It was a little gross because I don’t think she was as clean as she could’ve been. It wasn’t the act of it that really turned me off. I don’t really remember. I was 18 and I was drunk.”

Ah, men. So many hot ones. So very little time. Thankfully, GQ has seen fit to round up the hottest, coolest, funniest, most talented, and generally awesomest guys of 2009. Want to see who they are? Find out here!

If you happened by a newsstand this morning, you no doubt saw the new issue of Newsweek featuring Sarah Palin on the cover. In the pic, Sarah stands in a beauty queen pose wearing a red sweatshirt and short shorts, her legs shiny and her hair perfectly coifed. My first thought looking at it was: Could she have really posed for this? I mean, she did don the red sweatshirt on her book cover. But, nope. Mystery solved. The image came from the August issue of Runner’s World magazine, where she posed for several images in jogging gear—some with Trigg, some without—and gave such deep quotes as, “It doesn’t matter your background, your demographics, your race, your political affiliation, [running is] such a uniting, healthy, fun, awesome activity. It cracks me up going to some running event and seeing some dude who campaigned so hard against me, or a lady who’s been blogging some mean comments about me. But we’re all there together.”

Sarah, of course, is thoroughly nonplussed with the cover. It doesn’t help that the cover line reads, “How Do You Solve A Problem Like Sarah Palin? She’s Bad News For The GOP—And For Everybody Else, Too.” Wonder what she would have said about that on “Oprah” yesterday.

It’s not that often that The New York Times Magazine slaps a Hollywood starlet on its cover. The last time was in February, when Kate Winslet fronted the Oscars issue and was one of eight nominees featured in the cover story. So I was pretty surprised to see Megan Fox‘s blue eyes staring out at me from this week’s cover—even though she has no film out and is not particularly relevant at the moment—along with a five-page story about her called “The Self-Manufacture of Megan Fox.” I scoffed, but the article is actually pretty interesting, especially for someone who has written countless posts over the past year riffing off of some of the insane things Fox says in interviews. To anyone listening to her words, it was pretty clear that she was going provocative to get a reaction. But, at least according to this article, Fox’s plan to make herself infamous was much, much more deliberate—she’s presented not only as smart, but as an image-maker on par with Karl Rove. “Hollywood is filled with women who have tried to cope. I like to study them. I like to see how they’ve succeeded. And how they’ve failed,” says Fox. “I’ve learned that being a celebrity is like being a sacrificial lamb. I created this character as an offering at the sacrifice.”

Did 47-year-old Demi Moore make some kind of pact with the Devil, and that’s why she looks so hot on the cover of the December issue of W? Maybe. I think it’s the yoga. Our fashion editor Erin thinks Photoshop hath tweaked her. Perhaps it’s both. Regardless, Mrs. Ashton Kutcher says getting work in Hollywood at her age isn’t easy, no matter how famous she is. “The frustrating part is that the type of roles I’d be interested in are not really coming to me,” reveals Moore. “I hate to say it’s a function of my age—but yes, I think in some ways it is. The majority of [female] roles are geared between 25 and 35.” More pics after the jump!

Happy Hump Day! You’ve been working really hard all morning so it’s probably time for a break ... from reality. Tabloids are an important tool for participating in some healthy childhood make-believe. This week Angelina Jolie donned the covers of four tabloids, so let’s prepare for the inevitable showdown—who will win Brad’s heart? Only one way to find out! We’ve conveniently extracted those stories and more that you would have cared about if you were shameless enough to read tabloids yourself.

In the past few months, we’ve seen more magazines disappear then we’d like to remember. But among the remains of glossy pages, a few bright hopes remain. Lonny, which is basically an online version of Domino, has launched. And now we have a brand-new site to troll for magazine content. Maggwire is kind of like the magazine version of Surf The Channel, linking to online hosting sites instead of serving up original content, in order to stray from publisher issues and legal trials. The site garners content from magazines, displaying summaries, ratings, and comments, but links to the actual articles on the publishers’ websites. You can use it as your RSS of magazines, sort of like a virtual coffee table, but without all the clutter. [Lifehacker]

For only the second time ever, Oprah is sharing the cover of O Magazine. Ellen DeGeneres shot four covers with Oprah, but this one where Oprah is plugging in her lights is the best. Oh, and the last time Oprah shared her cover, it was with Michelle Obama. Nice company, E!

The December issue of Vanity Fair contains a pretty shocking article called “A Crime Of Shadows.” The piece is about a convicted sex offender named “J” who was coaxed by Pennsylvania detective Michele Deery into meeting for sex in a parking lot. While this is not a crime, Deery had posed in a chat room as “Heather,” a mother with two kids and she made it very clear to J that she wanted her young children—who she said were ages 8 and 11—to be involved. Deery and J had quite a lot of nasty back-and-forth before their meeting, where a bunch of cops, not a mother and her two kids, showed up and slapped J with a slew of charges, landing him time in prison. But what about his side of the story? That’s what this piece focuses on.

Oh my God, look! Models—not celebrities—on the cover of a fashion magazine! And they’re black! November’s Teen Vogue published a fantastic cover story about models Chanel Iman and Jourdan Dunn, who spoke candidly about the racism in the modeling industry and the competition that results when black models feel there can only be “one black girl.” (Chanel is actually black and Korean—damn, she should have been in our biracial hotties slideshow!) The pair dished to Teen Vogue about the fashion industry’s flat-out racism:

Iman: “You’re being told, ‘So and so is only booking one black girl. It’s either you or Jourdan,’ So we’ll be sitting in the lobby looking at each other like, ‘Okay, I want this job, and she wants it too. Which one of us is going to get it?’”

Dunn: “I remember last season, I was about to go into a casting, and my agent phoned and said, ‘Turn back. They decided they don’t want any black models.’ I was like, ‘They’re actually telling you that’s the reason? Are you serious?!’”

It’s hump day again, and while you might not be taking advantage of your opportunity to “hump” today,  it’s safe to assume that the stars are busy enough for the rest of the population—at least if you think everything you read is true! Once again, we’ve hand-plucked the juiciest tabloid stories for your media consumption, so take it with several grains of salt, and eat it up!

What’s the latest must-have for the forward-thinking fashionista? H1N1, if the latest provocative layout from photographer Steven Klein for Vogue Italia is to be believed. Previously, Klein has used everything from the Iraq war to the NSA to tell his fashion stories, and this new spread from the November issue is no exception. In it, flame-haired model Rianne ten Haken seems to be grappling with the consequences of living in a contagion-filled world. Surrounded by men in white masks, she ends up collapsed on the floor with no one to help her. Good thing she looks damn good with the swine flu. Check out more images after the jump.

• Robert Pattinson denies rumors that he and Kristen Stewart are dating in the December issue of Vanity Fair. Also in the story, he says he thinks he resembles a cartoon character and that one of his legs is longer than the other. [Vanity Fair]—This could be the first time the Tiger Beat crowd will rush to purchase a copy of Vanity Fair.
• Lindsay Lohan and Gerard Butler reportedly got cozy in Morocco on Sunday night, locking lips on the dance floor and then leaving together. [NY Daily News]—If this is true, Gerard is totally taking advantage of Lindsay, who still seems to be getting over Sam Ronson.
• Some people are saying Kate Hudson, who is dating Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez, is a good luck charm for the team. Also, a source told Us Weekly that A-Rod is “less of a jerk” and “more free-spirited” now that he’s with her. [Us Weekly]—If he’s become less of a jerk, she’s a real miracle worker.

In the upcoming issue of Seventeen there’s a story about a young woman who discovered that her boyfriend was actually a female. While I think it’s cool that a traditional teen magazine like Seventeen is covering the existence of transgender teenagers, which wouldn’t have happened when I was reading the mag back in the day. But the story’s angle doesn’t do much to discourage negative attitudes towards teenagers who are struggling with their gender identity, and that’s a shame.

Oh sweet Wednesdays, alleviating the happy hangovers of last weekend and preparing us for the crazy times that will be this weekend’s Halloween candy-corn binge. Just like the neighborhood kids, your favorite celebrities are also playing make-believe—although not voluntarily—in the pages of this week’s tabloids. Once again, we’ve compiled the super true-ish stories from this week’s ‘bloids for your unembarrassed perusal. Enjoy, cause this week’s are pretty major.

Michelle Obama is doing her part to save the struggling magazine industry by appearing on the cover of Glamour for its December Women of the Year issue. Editor in chief Cindi Leive writes on Glamour‘s website that the magazine is honoring the first lady’s “commitment to mentoring young women.” On the inside pages, Michelle is pictured with seven interns from the East Wing, and she gives women advice for reaching our goals:

“I was blessed throughout my entire career. I had people rooting for me. It started with my parents, but it extended to almost every teacher that I had. When I was a young lawyer, there were other women and men in the firm who took me under their wing. Look for those mentors, because sometimes mentors don’t find you—sometimes you seek them out. Oftentimes, they’re flattered and glad to lend a hand.”