Editor-At-Large: Handbags are more addictive than drink, drugs or dreary sex

Talk me through the mindset that makes a normal, intelligent woman get up at 2am, pick up a blanket and a sleeping bag and head down to Sainsbury's in Camden Town to join a queue camping out to buy a shopping bag? The hysteria generated by the sale of a £5 unbleached cotton shopping bag (embroidered with the logo I'm Not a Plastic Bag) designed by Anya Hindmarch verged on the obscene. It was, of course, the natural conclusion to bag fever, the illness that has gripped us for the last couple of years. I'm trying to pinpoint the moment when the handbag stopped being something you stuck a packet of tissues, your purse and makeup in, and started to be an object so desirable that you would do almost anything to own one by the right designer.

In our current obsession with weight and the size zero debate, we have overlooked the fact that most of the ads in glossy magazines feature stick-thin women pushing, not their breasts towards us, but a handbag. A bag that is festooned with entirely redundant padlocks, zippers, identification tags, fringes, bits of embroidery, studs, stitching and enough pockets to file the contents of a public library; a bag cut from the skin of an exotic animal or reptile; a bag so enormous that fashionably stick-like arms can barely lift the thing; a bag so expensive you can forget about moving to a new flat, but must take out a mortgage in order to purchase the next must-have model - which inevitably has a longer waiting list than any fashionable cosmetic surgeon; a bag that screams look at me - I am full of personality.

Bags are more addictive than any drink or drugs. They are far more desirable than dreary sex. After all, you can take your designer bag everywhere, it is worshipped and admired by all your female friends, it stays close by your side, and never answers back. It denotes your position in the fashion hierarchy, and signals that you are on-message. Now, celebrities are ranked, not by the success of their latest television series or album, but by their handbags. God forbid that they step outside the front door without pre-selecting the bag designed to engender as much jealousy from the sisterhood as possible.

Sienna Miller and Keira Knightley - do those woman actually pay for the hundreds of bags they are photographed with, or are their careers reduced to a moving billboard for designer handbags? Once you bought via QVC - now you just log on to the internet and order what these two have been carrying. And while we all want to save the planet, aren't we just a little confused if we don't think that there's something remotely repulsive about shelling out more than £1,000 for a bloody handbag? Isn't it consumerism gone totally bonkers? Of course, Sainsbury's was bound to get it all so tragically wrong. First, it announced that trendy Anya Hindmarch was designing a limited edition of 20,000 re-usable shoppers in order to promote recycling and cut the number of plastic bags used by its customers.

Very laudable, I think you'll agree. Then, Miss Hindmarch was allowed to flog 1,000 of these bags through her shop, and they ended up on eBay for hundreds of pounds. After some were given away at the Vanity Fair Oscar party in Hollywood, Keira and Sienna were spotted "using" them (obviously no one really uses them, they just rest on your arm). Thus, Miss Hindmarch had brilliantly orchestrated the latest version of bag fever. By the time the remaining bags went on sale, people were queuing all night, and their value on eBay had soared to £400. Sainsbury's sold them in plastic bags, which defeated the exercise. More worrying, the "ethical" bag turns out to be made in China, where labour is cheap (20p to 30p an hour) and has travelled thousand of miles to go on sale in the UK - not very carbon-conscious. Meanwhile, Asda has asked its customers at two Yorkshire stores to chuck unwanted packaging in bins in order to force manufacturers to reduce waste. But don't expect to find a single handbag in a skip - because when it comes to fashion and bags our attempts to be "ethical" are not just muddled, they are plain potty.

Who styled Spector? He's like a porn movie pimp

There's no better show on television at the moment than the Phil Spector trial, live on Sky every day. First, marvel at the music legend's amazing page-boy blonde wig, which makes him resemble none other than Ann Widdecombe's sister. There's a slight hint of lipstick on those lips, too. Who on earth styled this nutty old fellow who wears purple shirts with large flapping Eighties-style collars, and pale grey suits suited to a walk-on part as a pimp in a remake of Boogie Nights? I keep expecting Mark Wahlberg to take the stand and start describing the porn movie industry! Spector's young wife sits with her arms around his shoulders as prosecutor Alan Jackson takes us through a long explanation of the four times in the past when Mr Spector has allegedly taken women home and pulled a gun on them. If convicted of killing Lana Clarkson, a girl he met at the House of Blues in Los Angeles, Spector's record producing days will be over, as he faces up to 15 years in prison. I was gripped for a couple of hours as we heard a detailed description of all the drinks Mr Spector allegedly downed on the night in question. His favourite cocktail seemed to be something called a Navy Grog - containing a triple shot of rum, but then he moved on to several Dacquiris. Spector's defence team claim that women seek out his company as he is a "true romantic". Tell me more...

A cover-up: Hold the front page for Ross and Rebekah

Tabloid editors fill their pages with gossip and cheeky pictures of famous people. And they become famous in their own right - when Piers Morgan was sacked from the 'Mirror', he soon stopped sneering at celebrities and ended up a judge on an American talent show. Rebekah Wade, editor of 'The Sun' was married to TV star Ross Kemp. I say was, because this couple have managed to mysteriously split up and file for divorce without any of their buddies in the press mentioning it! Now, Rebekah is reported as "stepping out" with someone to do with horse racing. But Mr Kemp has been airbrushed out of the picture. Funny, that. Could it be to do with the fact that one of Ms Wade's friends is top PR man Matthew Freud? If Rebekah was a pop star, or gay, of course it would have been all over her own front page.

Take stock: Marco, it's poor taste to chase fame with a cube

Marco Pierre White is a very confused man these days. He'll say anything to get our attention, and his long-running feud with Gordon Ramsay has become the stuff of legend. While Gordon presides over an expanding empire, launching gastropubs, opening eateries all over the world, appearing on television and writing hugely successful books, Mr White's empire has shrunk to a group of restaurants in London. Now, in an interview in a catering magazine, he claims that Knorr stock cubes are 'the best fucking ingredient in the world." I know that controversy is his lifeblood, but promoting cubes packed full of salt and artificial flavour enhancers just seems like shooting yourself in the foot.

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